I’m for legalization of pot. We’ve wasted a lot trying to fight it and its not going away. Something like 75% (old statistic, uncited) of people in local jails are in there on felony maryjane counts. Kindof rediculous, especially when they want to raise my taxes to pay for more jails, and I could really care less if my neighbor smokes a doobie once in a while.

Other drugs probably should remain illegal, but I only really know details on a few of them, like meth, pcp, crack, H, etc.

Acid probably isn’t that big of a deal either, but I’d probably like to try it before voting.

Well, I officially know who to vote for now.

At first, Madonna had convinced me that Wesley “Look ma – I almost started World War 3 all by myself” Clark was a good-hearted man that should lead the free world. Little did I realize that Madonna’s superior knowledge of world politics and those who should sit in seats of power would be trumped.

That’s right, boys and girls… Madonna “I’m really into the Buddhist Kabbalah but I still wear Jesus on a necklace” Chicone has been trumped… by Moby. That’s right. And Moby has pointed me to the light that is Al Sharpton.

So take it from the skinny vegan evangelist who hasn’t made a good record in four years and actively avoids Eminem because he’s afraid he’ll get his protein-deprived body dragged around the block: Al Sharpton be the man.

From Al Mohler’s column today. I cannot say amen loudly enough to this column. IT IS the world I work in. All of it. Please read it all.:

“As Shaw describes, “our stricken children spend much of their time pursuing entertainment rather than accomplishment: TV, video games, mall roaming, computer hacking, substance abuse, [and] promiscuous sex.” Furthermore, “Prematurely on their own, they put their asocial, disaffected peers before their parents far too soon. Taking a page out of our own playbooks, they derive their self-worth from possessions, demanding special sneakers or the latest high-tech toy. It is as though they live on a bed of quicksand that will swallow them if they are not cool or fashionably correct.”

Apparently, my website, www.internetmonk.com, is getting up there in the ratings… Sorry, MIchael. But the SPAM says I am officially the owner. So there. Thpt.

Hi there! Sorry for an e-mail out of the blue, but I just
did a search for the term ever quest monk on Google and
found internetmonk.com ranked 27. Since I publish a related
website about Entertainment – Games (it’s strictly
informational, so I’m definitely NOT a competitor of yours),
I’d like to link to your site.

Christine A. Peterson
RAC IM: 457278.

Amanda: Great book suggestions. A Farewell to Arms is my all-time favorite. It’s so wonderful!!! Now you’ve got me wanting to go read it!

Jesus-and-baptism. Jesus-and-communion. Jesus-and-the Westminster confession. Hmmm… Jesus-and-angels. Jesus-and-Moses. Hmmm…

Check this out, especially those of you denominating yourselves as “Reformed.” I’m always interested in seeing how baptism plays out over there, since it’s like the #1 issue to fight about.

The Lack of Chick Translations: I must apologize to the blog. Here at Translation Industries, Inc. (“Building a Better Fundamentalist Nutjob”), we’ve become rather overloaded with actual work. Rest assured – future translations are planned and will commence after a short delay.

Quick Question to our Blog Tech Guru: How can we get “Chicky Narratives” added to the list o’ categories again?

1. Ditto.
2. Ad hominem with KH leaves me all psyched out and no place to go.
3. RCC taught me all prots were condemned. I’m better now.
4. Who are the Bereans?
5. Read the Screwtape Letters and saw his Video Bio. I dislike CSL, but I would read his stuff if threatened with bodily harm.
6. Acute Statement.
7. In other words, this is how nuclear and rocket scientist get such a bad rap.

Drugs I believe drug Ads are advancing our culture in the knowledge of evil. There are a lot of conspiracy theories out there regarding the CIA and the infiltration of banana republic regimes. If the US were serious about drugs, we would take them on, the way we did Saddam. Propaganda and spin.

I am sooo behind. I have some thoughts on the children in church thing, but those will have to be posted later when I have more than five minutes left before class.

Quickly, though, Noel, I have another few suggestions to add to your list. If I duplicate any, I apologise.

The War for the Oaks

Magic Kingdom for Sale – SOLD!

Jane Eyre

A Farewell to Arms

Catcher In The Rye

Dragonriders of Pern – note, this is an entire series. Start with Dragonsdawn

That’s all off the top of my head. If I think of anymore, I’ll let you know. :)

Yes, Tom, doing nothing is a better alternative. Just like doctors swear to “first, do no harm.” Even if the drug war were simply an ineffective approach that didn’t make things worse, the fact that it consumes resources that would be better spent elsewhere makes it immoral.

For the record, I’m not a disinterested by-stander in the realm of substance abuse. I have been around faith-based treatment programs for alcoholism and drug use since I was 6 months old. My father devoted his entire life to working with addicts. My first paying job was at a rescue mission. During my college studies, I spent several days each week working with drug users. I’ve witnessed my alcoholic “uncles” from the mission during relapse, when they show up at our house in the middle of the night and piss all over the porch. I’ve cared for babies while their moms fought (and in most cases, lost) their fight to stay clean. I’ve fished kids out of back alleys and crack houses where they had collapsed, rode in the ambulance with them, held their hands when they woke up and told me not to bother telling their parents, who were too strung out themselves to notice. I’ve held crying 15-year-old girls as decide to give up their crack-addicted babies because they knew couldn’t care for themselves, let alone their kid. I’ve been in the prisons that are full of fathers, sons, brothers and husbands doing time because they were in a car with someone who was carrying when they got profiled.

I’ve fought (and am still fighting) subtance abuse myself. I’ve struggled with compulsive use of alcohol and drugs. I’ve had legal troubles. I’ve destroyed relationships. I’ve damaged property and people. I’ve been to (and still go to) 12-step programs.

A lot of people say things that sound right when it comes to drugs, but they’ve never been there. I’ve been on the battlefield, and I’m telling you that we are not winning this war. All we’re doing is letting those who aren’t in the trenches feel better about themselves.

I’m not a bleeding heart on this stuff, by any stretch. I understand and value the rule of law. I vote Republican, generally, and I support conservative values for the most part. I believe firmly that drug abuse is a serious problem, and I agree that it’s a form of immorality. I know that no addict can blame anyone by himself for his addiciton. But the “War on Drugs” has proven time and time again to be as effective a measure as medical “bleeding” was two centuries ago, and it’s time to face the facts. We’re making it worse. We need to stop.

On The War On Drugs: Man, I love this topic! But I’ll sit back for a while longer and see how it plays, first. One of these days I’ll work up the energy to compile a long list of arguments for each position, and demonstrate how, generally speaking, people holding each position never actually answer the objections of the other, they just use some of the same words to answer a slightly different problem. And it works both ways, too! What fun.

Pepsi Drinkers: Thanks to generosity of a certain BHT fellow by whose initials I am unworthy to indicate sarcasm, I am reminded that some parts of this country have already begun to receive Pepsi bottles labeled with the Apple iTunes Music Store promotion. One in three bottles has a code under the cap good for a free song of your choice from the iTunes Music Store, redeemable beginning February 1. If you watch the SuperBowl, you’ll see commercials, don’t worry.

So, if you’re not an iTunes user, now is a perfect time to start (Mac or Windows only, Linux users will have to use another computer long enough to burn the track to CD).

If you’re not going to do that, then I’m a perfect candidate for receiving emails (pwinn-at-winn-dot-com) or IMs (AIM:PWinn089, ICQ:2561556, MSN:pwinn089-at-hotmail-dot-com, Yahoo!:pwinnski, Jabber:pwinn@jabber.org) with the ten-letter codes you aren’t going to use. Why me? Um, because I asked nicely!

Look for free music under the cap of a 20oz or 1-liter Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, or Sierra Mist near you.

Sorry if this posts twice…I’m having computer trouble.

Not that your comment was directed at me, necessarily, but I don’t live in the suburbs. I teach in Muhlenberg County, which is nicknamed Methenburg, and I spent four years teaching in an area that was plagued by drug abuse, even if it wasn’t as obvious as some of the things you mentioned. And not to play “I’ve seen more plight than you have,” but I grew up around the abuse of almost every drug you could imagine. My first step-father was a heroin junkie, my friends smoked pot and other funny-smelling stuff at the busstop every morning, and drugs were dealt in the alley behind my school (Johnson Elementary, 6th street, Lexington). I don’t have time to go into the rest of the melodramatic story of my sister’s struggles and years in rehab, my brother’s drug escapades, all the times I was offered drugs by crack-heads, etc etc. But even if all that weren’t the case, I’m not sure the “You don’t llive around it so you can’t comment on it” argument works. Isn’t that like the old chestnut about how men can’t comment on abortion since they can’t get pregnant?

Having lived in 2 different neighborhoods where drugs were a pretty big problem, I’m really not in favor of deregulating crack, meth, heroin, or prescription drugs. Drug abuse destroys families and neighborhoods, and it’s just not worth it. It’s really easy to talk about it in your nice suburbs where the only drug users are your kids, and they mostly keep it to out behind the church after youth group where you don’t notice it.

Frankly, I think the solution is shooting drug dealers. Would you sell crack if getting caught means getting shot? Probably not!

Hey, that rhymed!

I am dead set against drugs, but I don’t think that means I have to be in favor of any and all techniques to get rid of them. Some techniques just do not work. Would I be in favor of paying millions of dollars to pass out salami to drug users as an alternative to crack? No. Why not? Because it wouldn’t work, and it would be a waste of money. Similarly, when the “war on drugs” has failed miserably, I choose not to be in favor of it either. Honestly, I don’t know that I have the correct solution to the problem (I’m no expert in the field), but to me that does not mean that I have to support the government’s ill-advised and failed one.

Really, I think the answer lies in helping people want to stop doing the drugs, as opposed to punishing them when they do. Of course I am not saying that no one should ever be punished for a drug-related offense. But throwing people in jail for every drug offense does nothing to get them to stop except while they are physically in the jail (assuming—ha ha—that there are no drugs to be had in the jails)—it does nothing to address addiction, emotional problems leading to drugs, social attitudes toward drugs, etc. I know drugs are harmful (my brother just got out of his 3rd tour of prison, one of which was on a drug-related charge. He deserves to be there, but not because he smokes pot). But since when is everything that is harmful to individuals illegal? Of course, that is a completely different argument.

I don’t know. It is a complex issue; and as I say, I don’t claim to have all the answers. But I am sure that what’s happening now is not working.

I’m really not going to get into it too much except to say…well, what I’ve already said. I have to go to work here in a little bit. And I’m not sure how much reason rules the day when things that I have posted, believing that I made a good logical argument, get misconstrued as personal attacks.

Be warned: While emotion favors the war on drugs, reason doesn’t support it. Here at the BHT, reason tends to rule the day. Just something to keep in mind as you wade in toe-to-toe with Jim. Good luck!

Jim,
What’s the alternative? Doing nothing? Just sitting back and allowing the nation to become one big Amsterdam with a hash house on every corner? (I’m overexaggerating here, but you get the point)

Maybe the way the battle has been fought has not been very effective, but I don’t think every little anti-drug measure should be ridiculed. As a Christian, living in the meth lab capital of the world, it seems, I really think illegal drugs are something I should be against. If what we have isn’t working, maybe we need to try a new tactic. Not being an expert, I’ll leave it up to whoever the “drug czar” is, but I don’t think twiddling our thumbs and building more rehab facilities is the answer.

Great list! I’m with you on #2, #3 (obviously), #6 (though I enjoy making my theology more obtuse).

Michael: I’ve actually thought it true for a long time that all Christians have trouble passing on their religious beliefs. Of course, I’ve always run in P/C circles, too. If it is in fact easier out here, then I’ll be happy, but I’m not relaxing, either. I’m speaking on more or less this very topic in four months, so I look forward to your article.

I can tell you this: before I joined up with the Anglicans, I would have said that non-P/Cers have a greater retention rate because of the lack of “real” content. The image from the outside to me was a bunch of people going through empty motions and participating in a social group.

Also, great article on the RCC, and great summation post, too. You’re relative-linking now, you whiz! Clearly I could phrase my own discontent with the practices of P/C churches as just that – a quest to find real authority, or at least a lack of pretenders thereto.

Tom, sorry to get in your face first thing in the morning, but really, now…

The “War on Drugs” is a joke, and the incredible artless waste of money (it’s MY money and yours that pays for this stuff) that constitute “drug awareness campaign ads” is sinful. We’ve been “fighting” against drugs for decades, and by all accounts more people are using drugs than ever, and they are starting at an earlier age. Why is it that people with the common sense to oppose morally “neutral” child sex education in public schools can’t seem to apply the same logic to drugs? We increase sex education, and kids have sex. We increase drug education, and kids take drugs. It seems pretty simple. I’m not arguing that the tactics we’ve deployed against drug use are behind all drug use, but they clearly aren’t working, and we should be willing to give them up.

Michael: What you’re writing about reminded me of the third verse of “Mm mm mm mm” by the Crash Test Dummies:

‘Cause then there was this boy whose
Parents made him come directly home right after school
And when they went to their church
They shook and lurched all over the church floor
He couldn’t quite explain it
They’d always just gone there

I wonder who this child has been listening to?

I don’t know if I can get this new IM thing written or not. Basically, we are talking here about religious (fanatic) parents- good people really- who are just doing things that will send their kids out of the faith like a rocket.

For example, would you take a small child- let’s say 6-8- to a Pentecostal prayer meeting where there would be lots of dancing in the Spirit, loud talking to God, rebuking of the devil and demons, speaking in tongues, sightings of angels, etc? Would you tell a child of the same age to spend their time praying? Would you have your kids memorize scripture, or write scripture as a punishment? Would you explain to a child that their bad thoughts and actions are because of the devil and demons trying to get them to do bad things? Would you pray “hedges of protection” around your kids, as if you were magically stopping bad things from happening?

If someone says, “If you raise your little children as Christians, they will turn out to be good Christian teenagers,” what might be your response?

We can add James Brown to the grungy mugshot gallery, along with Nick Nolte, Glen Campbell (our beloved brother in Christ), and Michael Jackson.

I Feel Good. NOT !!!

Things I learned here and elsewhere..

When I asked Michael for a beer, my goal to read more than post because I wanted to learn some things about other people’s views on Christianity. Except for a few subjects I have stayed quite close to my goal.
apply jn where needed..

1. People that have other ideas than me might not be wrong.. If you knew me, you know that’s a major development!
2. Michael is the first person who ever explained his views on an Old Earth that I respected.
3. I have respect for other protestant denominations other than Baptist. I was taught that Methodists/Preysbeterians/Lutherans were all in varying degrees -always wrong, liberal, incorrect or Catholic wannabes (Lutheran).
4. No one ever mentions the Bereans? Sup with them?
5. CS Lewis is not always boring, but the first two things of his I read were.
6. The more people read others, the more obtuse their theology gets.
7. The quest for knowledge can often mask a shortage of wisdom and common sense, and knowledge without the other two is a very bad thing.

ANTI-DRUG ADS ARE NOT FOOLISH.

My daughter’s right. Mohler missed the biggest reason bi-sexual chic is in. Attention from BOYS who think it’s way cool. But hey, a seminary President can’t know everything.

I’m preaching tomorrow. I wrote my sermon notes and now I can’t remember what disk they’re on. How much more fun life was back when I was organized? Whenever that was. BTW- people who think we normally ought to be focused, emotionally stable, happy, etc, must be breathing strange gases.

I’ve gotten one letter from a preterist asking that I read a book about Revelation. If R.C. couldn’t get me there, no one else will. I’m getting notes from happy Catholics, and only Jenny has tried to get me to come over. My last post on the authority page over at the Forum says it pretty much the best I can.

I’m getting tired of kids whining about the cold weather. (Which, as the Yankees know, isn’t really cold.) Don’t students understand the concept of the four seasons? It’s still January, people. Gather up your diapers and brave it out.

Aaron Boone leaves the Reds for 5 million, goes to the Yankees, beats the Bosox with a dinger, then blows out his knee this week. Sorry Aaron. Now excuse me. HAHAHAHAHA.

Dennis Miller finally hit his stride tonight. Good show. Nobody asks interview questions like Dennis. He told Rudy Guliani that he had bxxxs the size of Macy’s floats. Won’t hear that on CNN. The grief over losing Dean as a target is palpable over there. Comedians stuck with Kerry and Edwards. Dull, dull, dull.

BTW- Kerry says he’s never heard of Botox. What’s the french word for that?

My uncle, the Rev. W.O. Spencer, is the man who showed me everything I ever knew about God that mattered before I was a Calvinist. He’s elderly and fell badly this week and is out of his head hallucinating in the hospital. Because of the “Patient’s bill of rights”, they can’t do anything to restrain him, and it’s a bad scene. Please pray for him. He is a wonderful man whose last years have not been pleasant. Pray for his wife, Dorothy. He is a special person to thousands of his flock, and it’s tough to see him going through this. He is the last of the 8 children in my dad’s family. I knew them all except one who died in his 20’s, but they were all Christians. Mountain people with great old fashioned names and faith. Hard to let them go, but a grace if they go peacefully. I don’t like to pray for comfort, but a good death is a good prayer.

Here’s a paragraph I wrote about him in “A Career in Foolishness.”

My only model for being a preacher came from my uncle, W. O. Spencer, who pastored for more than fifty years in Western Kentucky, mostly at the Hall Street Baptist Church in Owensboro where I grew up. A man with very little formal education, he carried a sense of God about him that made him different from other men. When he came to the pulpit every Lord’s Day, there was something about him that declared he had been with God. He was mysterious, different, anointed with the Holy Spirit. He was the very opposite of the stand-up comedians occupying today’s pulpits. I now realize that in him I was seeing the best of what preaching is supposed to be: a man who is compelled to pay the price to be with God, so that he may stand before other men and speak for God.

Personally, I do not know of any “Charismatics” that stick with it for long, except the few on the top of the food chain..
Once the blabit/grabit Jabez magic wears off, there is little left.

Sorry if this got double posted, My ‘puter went nuts a few minutes ago.

Someone here mentioned some seafaring books,, I forgot who, but it reminded me of one of my favorite books of all time called “The Bounty Trilogy”
I used to make a wooden model ships as a hobby and have always been interested in the sea/ocean/,, heck water in general. maybe it’s where I live?
So if Noel or anyone ever wants to read a great adventure that is true, I would highly recommend this book..

Anyway, I’ve read this book at least 5 times and it never ceases to amaze me. the second book is made up from Lieutenant Bligh’s own notes.

My dream has always been to go to Pitcairn’s Island, where the mutineers ended up.

I don’t know if anyone noticed, but our own credobaptist deer hunter, Bill Mackinnon, was one of the “quotables” in the most recent issue of Modern Reformation. They quoted one of the articles posted on the iMonk’s site.

That’s pretty cool…

OK. Denise and I were just talking, and a thought occured to me. I am comparing this with 30 years of working with teenagers, and I think it’s true. I would like your feedback.

“Pentecostals, Charismatics and other intensely pious groups, tend to be unable to pass their religious faith on to their children intact. Those children may be Christians, but their chances of being P/C are significantly lower than those of Catholic or Baptist or other mainstream backgrounds.”

Actually, what I said was, “When you are a member of a cult- and I say that with all due respect- your kids probably won’t want to join it.” But that’s rather crude.

This is an IM piece in the works, so get in on the deal now!

“Dean looks across the room and sees his old homosexual lover from college. Suddenly, a strange memory rises up from deep within him…”

I’ll admit that I’m curious about why CBS is refusing the ad, since they’re accepting other political ads. Including the misguided and foolish anti-drug ads. Penance for considering The Reagans, perhaps? (JN)

As far as them being a private company, I beg to differ. They are entrusted with a monopoly by the federal government, and with that coercive force comes responsibility. Now if you want to talk about how the airwaves ought not to be regulated, then that’s cool, but some sort of quasi-deregulation that keeps the frequency monopoly the way it is while relaxing ownership rules doesn’t count.

My entry is a headline: DEAN SWALLOWS FROG!