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pyrohornIII

Burnt Ends
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Posts posted by pyrohornIII

  1. 1 hour ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

    Teddy was an actual boxer and once gave a speech immediately after being shot in the chest with a .38, so I wouldn't discount him.

    Yeah, Teddy was a boxer in college and wrestled or boxed nearly daily while in office.    Plus by immediately, he was shot while giving the speech and then continued on to finish it over a half hour later.  Then he let them take him to the hospital. 

  2. I went to a Beto grassroots organizational meeting in Huntsville this afternoon.  They were expecting 10 and had 50 show up.  It will be interesting to watch the groundswell over the summer play out.

    Most hadn't heard or Beto until the last month or so, but all hated Cruz with a passion.

  3. Anybody see anything else on this?   It's a Post article linked through MSN. 

    https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/us/‘this-is-not-of-god’-when-anti-trump-evangelicals-confront-their-brethren/ar-AAxGbyq?ocid=spartanntp

    ‘This Is Not of God’: When Anti-Trump Evangelicals Confront Their Brethren

    Spoiler

    LYNCHBURG, Va. — The night before Shane Claiborne came to town to preach at a Christian revival, he received a letter from the chief of police at Liberty University warning that if he set foot on the property, he would be arrested for trespassing and face up to 12 months in jail and a $2,500 fine.

    At first glance, Mr. Claiborne hardly appeared a threat to Liberty University, a dominant force in Lynchburg, Va., and a powerful engine in evangelical Christianity. Wearing baggy clothes that he sews himself, Mr. Claiborne preaches the gospel, lives among the poor and befriends prisoners on death row, modeling his ministry on the life of Jesus.

    But to the leaders of Liberty, he was a menace to their campus. He and his national network of liberal evangelicals, called the Red Letter Christians, were holding a revival meeting to protest in Liberty’s backyard. Their target: Jerry Falwell Jr., Liberty’s president and a man who has played a pivotal role in forging the alliance between white evangelicals and Donald J. Trump, who won 81 percent of their vote.

    Mr. Claiborne and his group are the other evangelicals. The Red Letter Christians, a reference to the words of Jesus printed in some Bibles in red type, are not the evangelicals invited for interviews on Fox News or MSNBC. They don’t align neatly with either political party. But they have fierce moral and theological objections to those evangelicals who have latched onto Mr. Trump and the Republican Party.

    “Let’s go where the Christians are, go where toxic Christianity lives,” Mr. Claiborne said last year, when proposing the idea for a revival in Lynchburg at an annual retreat for the Red Letter Christians.

    The revival last month was the most energetic of several recent attempts by Christians in various camps to confront what they see as Mr. Trump’s “court evangelicals” selling out the faith. The critics have written columns, and a book called “Still Evangelical?” They convened a closed-door summit last month at Wheaton College. A number of bereaved, eminent elders plan a procession to the White House soon to hand over their manifesto, “Reclaiming Jesus: A Confession of Faith in a Time of Crisis.”

    Mr. Claiborne and his group were far more audacious, but they also faced disappointment, resistance and fear. They were taking on Lynchburg, a company town where Liberty University is the biggest employer. Their “Red Letter Revival” revealed the state of the evangelical church in 2018: The loudest voices and institutional power and money are with Mr. Trump; the dissenters are fired-up, underfunded and scattered; and the vast majority of pastors are silent for fear of dividing their congregations or risking their jobs.

    “There is another gospel in our country right now, and it is the gospel of Trump,” Mr. Claiborne preached at the revival in his Tennessee drawl. “It doesn’t look much like the gospel of Jesus.”

    Lynchburg sits at the heart of pro-Trump evangelical Christianity. Liberty University’s commencement speaker last year was Mr. Trump, a personal friend of Mr. Falwell’s. Fox News hosts are frequent speakers at chapel services.

    Mr. Trump has retained the loyalty of conservative white evangelicals because he is delivering on their political priorities: appointing conservative judges, moving the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem and allowing religious entities to opt out of serving gay people or providing birth control in insurance plans. This record has enabled them to look past Mr. Trump’s personal scandals, including allegations of extramarital affairs.

    But Red Letter Christians and other evangelicals have increasingly become frustrated that their church appears to be endorsing Mr. Trump’s program of deporting immigrants, fanning racial tension and passing a tax deal benefiting the rich.

    “This is not of God,” thundered Barbara Williams-Skinner, an influential black evangelical elder in Washington, D.C., as the audience stood and clapped at the revival. “This is not worthy of our savior. This is not what he died for.”

    Beginning in January, Don Golden, the executive director of the Red Letter Christians, visited Lynchburg seven times in three months to try to recruit like-minded leaders and Liberty students.

    Mr. Golden had done refugee and missionary work in 70 countries. At age 51, with three daughters in college, he had left behind a fat salary in large ministries he called “Evangelical Inc.” and was on contract for the Red Letter Christians, without health insurance. Each morning he prayed to God to help him make it through the day without a mishap.

    In Lynchburg, Mr. Golden began following the approach of the mass revivals honed for decades by the Rev. Billy Graham, in which organizers from out of town recruited local ministers to help turn out crowds and engage new believers. But Mr. Golden quickly learned how challenging his task would be.

    When the president of Lynchburg College, Kenneth R. Garren, learned that some of his chaplains and faculty had hosted a Red Letter meeting on campus, he told them the college could not sponsor the event or host meetings.

    “We didn’t want to take sides. We have a fine relationship with Liberty,” said Michael Jones, a spokesman for Lynchburg College, also a Christian school.

    Three days before the revival, Mr. Golden met for breakfast with a leader of a local evangelical church in the dim, empty back room of a downtown cafe, so as not to be seen together. The church leader, who spoke on the condition that neither he nor his church be identified, said he believed in the Red Letter campaign because he was concerned about white evangelicals’ bond with Mr. Trump.

    But the leader said that his church could not participate in the revival. He and three other elders at the church had jobs at Liberty University.

    Still, Mr. Golden and the Red Letter Christians found small signs of support. The local organizing committee for the revival included three Liberty students, a Native American minister, and a few black pastors and church leaders. They held different views on homosexuality, but decided to work together in the interest of Christian unity.

    “We need to break out of our silos,” said Anne Boynton, an elder at First Christian Church, who was a local co-chairwoman for the revival. “This is an aspirational moment, an opportunity to experience what the kingdom of God looks like.”

    Mr. Golden also went to a white stucco church, Rivermont Baptist, to visit the Rev. Byron J. Elliott, who had been deliberating for weeks whether to accept an invitation to preach at the revival.

    Mr. Elliott’s father, also a minister, had grown up in the church and braved the sit-ins at a “whites only” lunch counter on Main Street. The family later moved to New York and Mr. Elliott said he returned to Lynchburg two years ago to serve his father’s struggling church. But he felt like an outsider.

    “Everyone’s afraid,” he said, pausing. “That’s strong language. Everyone’s very mindful of how they speak and how they deliver the truth. It’s hard to tell the truth in a context like Lynchburg.”

    Few black churches in low-income Lynchburg can support full-time pastors, Mr. Elliott told Mr. Golden, so many find jobs on the Liberty campus.

    Mr. Elliott, though, had made his decision. He would preach at the Red Letter Revival. “I’ve learned recently that there’s a difference between having something to say and having a voice,” he said.

    But there was still the question of how Mr. Falwell himself would react to the event. Ten days before the revival, Mr. Claiborne wrote a letter to Mr. Falwell inviting him to join. Mr. Claiborne was not entirely a stranger — he had preached at Liberty after writing his book, “Jesus for President.” And Mr. Claiborne asked if he could bring some of the participants onto the Liberty campus for a prayer vigil. He asked Mr. Falwell to join them.

    “I already pray for you, but I would love to pray with you,” Mr. Claiborne wrote, signing off, “Your brother in Christ.”

    Mr. Falwell never responded, though in addition to banning the Red Letter Christians from campus, he forbade the Liberty University student newspaper from covering the revival. When Erin Covey, the student assigned to the story, asked Mr. Falwell to comment on the revival, she received a text from him that said: “Let’s not run any articles about the event. That’s all these folks are here for — publicity. Best to ignore them.”

    Mr. Falwell’s brother, the Rev. Jonathan Falwell, agreed to meet with Mr. Golden, though, at Thomas Road Baptist Church on the Liberty campus.

    “We really didn’t ask permission to come to Lynchburg,” Mr. Golden said in the meeting. “But we weren’t asked permission for evangelical leaders to say that Donald Trump is the president for evangelicals.”

    In an interview later by phone, the Rev. Jonathan Falwell said he disagreed with Mr. Golden’s premise that evangelicalism has been compromised by backing Mr. Trump. “I think the condition of the church today is strong,” he said.

    And he said Liberty was justified in barring the Red Letter Christians because Mr. Claiborne had threatened to commit civil disobedience.

    “An organization has a duty to the parents to protect their kids,” he said.

    When the day of the revival came, the mood and the music inside the cavernous auditorium was upbeat, but began to deflate as the 2,000 seats failed to fill. About 350 people from 28 states attended over two nights. Many said they felt alone in their home churches and had come to find their tribe. Another 3,500 watched a livestream. Roughly two dozen students from Liberty University came.

    Mr. Claiborne still wanted to lead a group onto the Liberty campus and hold a prayer vigil — or at least leave a gift for Mr. Falwell, who had just opened a new $3.2 million gun range on campus. Mr. Claiborne had ready a hand plow that he made from a melted-down handgun, a literal following of the Bible’s instruction to “beat swords into plowshares.”

    They decided instead that the Liberty police would not dare arrest an 83-year-old. So that afternoon, the Rev. Tony Campolo, co-founder of the Red Letter Christians, entered the front door of Thomas Road Baptist Church, and left a red box with the bewildered receptionist.

    Inside the box, tied with a ribbon, was a stack of prayers, written on index cards, from the participants of the revival.

    “Dear Liberty, I am praying for your campus,” said one. “The Jesus in the Bible speaks of love and acceptance. I hope you learn to speak of this too.”

     

  4. Your political or religious/philosophical leanings should have no sway over your job security any more than the color of your skin, your age, your sexual orientation, nor gender.   As long as none of that interferes in performing the job within its definition.

    But too often bosses act out of personal reasons to fire people and not job performance.  

    And with Texas being a right to fire state,  I am not sure she will gain much.   My ex wife went through something similar on a local level a decade ago.   The cost of pursuing the case was estimated to be about 4 times what she would collect in damages.    And there was a lot of slander and libel flying around. 

    Supposedly one of the few perks of being a government employee is the retirement package.  I would think after 14 years she would take that into account when it came to possibly leaving for a different position elsewhere.   

    So Brian is right from a righteous standpoint, but Kev is right from the way the deck is stacked. 

  5. Has anyone found a central website or twitter feed that is a good, balanced, accurate and timely source for information?   I find Surly is great at providing arguments from both sides, but it is so time consuming.  Plus frankly, Surly just isn't for everyone, personality wise. 

     

    I'd like to find a place to send friends who are just now waking up to rotten smell emanating off of Trump's administration.  Some place that has timelines and stories that give more detail about points along that timeline.   Also some constant running narrative on what Trump has done and the fallout of his actions or inactions. 

     

    I have gleaned a lot from the WAPO, NYT, Vogue and The New Yorker, but they are all behind paywalls after the first few articles.    

     

    Any suggestions would be appreciated. 

  6. Beto reminds me of a statesman, not a politician.  I see Mr Smith goes to Washington vividly.  But I also see some Teddy Roosevelt in him with his reaching out to the public, fighting for the little guy.  

    One of the things that I hope they consistently hit is where the funds are coming from to finance both campaigns.  Beto is not taking any PAC or special interest money, whereby Cruz is funded nearly completely by sources such as that.  

    We have reached a point in our governance again much like the turn of the 20th Century, where both parties were doing nothing, and doing it slowly.   Big money was running things and it was Roosevelt who had the capacity through charisma and tenacity to stand up and make some needed changes.   He wasn't perfect, he didn't do everything right, but what he did he did out of conviction of helping this country as a whole, not just select groups of it.  Personally, I think we find ourselves right back in that sort of mess. 

    Whether Beto wins or not, what he is doing is reminding us that we as American citizens have the right to higher standards, and there are those still brave enough to stand up for them.   I've never contributed to a political campaign until now and I get a feeling that many more like me are "'getting woke" and seeing races like his as a way out of the apathy we have been lulled into.  Hopefully it is not too late.

     

     

    • Like 2
  7. I thought this article was well done as a summary of what's going on.  The trump saga is like a huge amusement park with big stories spread out theme style.  But there is are certainly common threads that run through the park.  I wish I had the creativity of putting it on a map like the old Six Flag maps.  

    This is a sampler of the writing.  The site deserves the clicks, imo. 

    Donald Trump Really Shouldn't Have Run for President

    Quote

    After such a wild and wooly week in Washington, it behooves me to ask an all-important yet oft-ignored question: Why would a man run for president when the skeletons in his closet are so numerous they have their own union? It is hardly a secret that Donald J. Trump is the premier grifter of the late 20th and early 21st century, the moral inheritor of Charles Ponzi, Marc Drier and Bernie Madoff. In the words of columnist Paul Madoff:

    He may well be the single most corrupt major business figure in the United States of America. He ran scams like Trump University to con struggling people out of their money. He lent his name to pyramid schemes. He bankrupted casinos and still somehow made millions while others were left holding the bag. He refused to pay vendors. He exploited foreign workers. He used illegal labor. He discriminated against African-American renters. He violated antitrust laws. He did business with the mob and with Eastern European kleptocrats. His properties became the go-to vehicle for Russian oligarchs and mobsters to launder their money.

    http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/44527-donald-trump-really-shouldn-t-have-run-for-president

  8. Slang for a way of ordering hashbrowns at The Waffle House diners. Scattered smothered and covered means that the hashbrowns are scattered on the grill, smothered with diced onions, and covered with melted cheese.
    After a long night of drinking, you have to head down to The Waffle House at 3am and get em scattered smothered and covered.
     
     
  9. 21 hours ago, burntorangebongos said:

    The really sad part is that I believe it. Here is the list as of March 2017.

    https://qz.com/929553/here-are-all-the-trump-trademarks-the-us-president-owns-in-china-and-some-that-he-doesnt/

     

    I think Trump is building a nest in G-eye-nah.   That way when the shit hits the fan here, he has a place to go.   What's mind bottling is that he is putting so much into his brand, his name.   That in his mind, the whole world loves him and always will.  No matter what. 

  10. 6 hours ago, burntorangebongos said:

    So since Trump couldn't deliver on the lifting of sanctions,  neither the Russian oil company nor Qatar came out a head on this, right? But Trump saying fuck the Iranian agreement means that Russian Oil should make bank now since there is less competition, right? Maybe that is why nobody could persuade Trump to change his mind, (not even his best bro Macron)no matter what they proposed. Today Bolten said this:

    John R. Bolton, the national security adviser, said on Sunday that European officials should have known that President Trump would withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, despite months of negotiations to salvage the accord that they believed had brought them close to satisfying the president’s demands.

    “Despite the complete consistency of President Trump in his opposition to the deal — opposed to it as candidate Trump, opposed to it as President-elect Trump, opposed to it as President Trump — many people, including apparently former Secretary of State John Kerry, thought that we never would get out of it,” Mr. Bolton said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

    He also said that "it's possible" there will be secondary sanctions imposed on European companies as a result of the US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal. Bolton didn't rule out sanctions for European companies doing business with Iran.

    This was part of Putin's plan all along. Everything Trump said on the campaign trail and the stuff he has kept his promise about has been to benefit Russia. So the tariffs and the trade war with China does too. Trump really is a Manchurian candidate. Fucking traitor.

    What recourse do the European countries have? They are going to be strong armed into following us so Russia gets what they want.

    A more isolated and paranoid Iran means “the Russians gain geostrategically,” said Reza Marashi, the research director at the National Iranian American Council and a former State Department official.

    The United States, he added, is helping reinforce a perception that the Russians want to strengthen: that today Washington may hold sway in the southern half of the Middle East, but the north ― including key areas in Syria, Iraq, Iran and Turkey ― is under Moscow’s influence.

    And that plays precisely into what Putin deeply desires ― to make Russia, 27 years after the fall of the Soviet Union, once again look like an equal to the U.S.

     

    Hey Bolton, about the only thing Trump has been consistent at is lying.

    That's a good find, Bongos. 

  11. On 5/5/2018 at 2:30 PM, Dr. Teeth said:
    He also said this at the same roundtable. 
     
    Spoiler

    President Trump lambasted U.S. immigration policies Saturday, stating that the U.S. may have to "close up" its borders. 

    Speaking at a business roundtable in Cleveland, Trump acknowledged that officials are working to repair certain areas of the nation's border controls, but said the U.S. needs "much more money."   

    "We may have to close up our country to get this straight," he said, but did not offer more details on the logistics.

    "You can't allow people to pour into our country like they're doing," Trump went on. "If we don't have borders, you don't have a country," he said, chiding Democrats for "open border" policies.

    Trump's long-standing promises for a new wall stretching across the U.S.-Mexico border suffered a blow earlier this year when Congress allocated only $1.6 billion toward border security measures in a trillion-dollar spending bill — billions less than the White House demanded. 

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection noted a recent surge in border crossings from Mexico during March after seeing a historic low in 2017.

    Last month, the Pentagon authorized the deployment of 4,000 National Guard troops to be sent to the border in Texas, California, New Mexico and Arizona as part of Trump's plan to strengthen immigration enforcement along the southern border. 

     

    http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/386375-trump-on-border-control-we-may-need-to-close-up-our-country

  12. To me, it sounded a bit like Fox is thinking about turning on him.  This was put out there to test their viewership's responses. 

    It was like praising all the "great things, great programs" while calling out the president over his lying like he has a bad case of halitosis.   They can put up with the bad breath and keep supporting him because of his agenda.  But it would be easier if your breath didn't stink. 

  13. I just don't understand why the B12 cant be the leaders in all power 5 conferences to get the best, unbiased refs and umps they can.  That and unfair operations/recruiting are going to kill the industry.  People are just going to continues to tune out.   Better refs for on the field and better supervision of operations would go a long way in all sports.  They seem to be able to do this in the pros.   Pay these guys enough to make them want to do the job and do it right.

  14. If nothing else it points out how he spends his time.   That was 11 AM and he is reading through tweets and responding to stuff like that.  He must spend a lot of time on the shitter.

  15. 41 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

    They are YouTubers.   They have the market cornered on African-American women on YouTube who support Trump. The only thing they care about is views, because views equal money.  

    BIngo.

  16. Yeah, try sending some money to someone who doesn't have a bank account.   It's murder.   Green dot sucks, but its the cheapest.  But you have to go in every time to get a new card.  Western Union is convenient, but its right at 13% or higher surcharge.   Paypal will put "suspicious" on any transaction they choose then then hold it for weeks...that's after charging you 7 bucks for the transfer.  It truly is a rigged game against the poors. 

    And more companies are going with direct deposit.  With no account, it's a hassle to get a paper check.  

    On the other hand, there is a lot of stuff going on with cash right now.  Because people who don't have bank accounts don't have cards to use at gas pumps, etc.  So in the past few years more people paying with cash.  Cash is often unreported, thus the government is losing out on the income tax end? 

     

     

     

    • Like 2
  17. Because we have been turned into a nation of competitors by marketing people and the main scoreboards are looks, power, possessions and wealth.   No moral scruples need apply to getting the upper hand in any or all of these areas.   That breeds a whole lot of insecurity.  With that insecurity comes the tribe mentality and the natural instinct to diminish others in order to uplift yourself, instead of genuinely improving yourself.  

    We are judged too much on what we have and what we do to others...not what we do FOR others.

    • Like 1
  18. 13 hours ago, 4th&Five said:

     

    Quote
    Jackson was named to succeed David Shulkin at the Department of Veterans Affairs after Shulkin was ousted last month. Shulkin faced ethical issues and tensions with political appointees within the agency and the White House. A White House official told CNN that Trump was pleased with Jackson's performance in an extended grilling by reporters in January over the President's health and cognitive fitness.
    But Jackson's selection was met with questions on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers in both parties have called into question whether Jackson has the right experience to run the federal government's second-largest bureaucracy and that little has been known, until recently, about his policy views.
    "I'm not sure anyone can run the VA," Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn told reporters Monday. "It's so big, it's one of the biggest bureaucracies in the federal government."

    This hasn't stopped them from approving most of the other appointments Trump has put before them.  How many have they rejected? 

     

    I'd say whatever they are hiding about his past is pretty bad.  

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