Friday, May 2, 2008

Killing poor people

Corn flakes going from $3/box to $4/box is a problem when you are an average American which makes about $40,000 yr. But you are not going to starve. You will simply have to adjust your life and cut corners somewhere else (cancell cable TV or cell phone service?) to pay for your rising food costs. However, if you live in Bangladesh or Africa and you make $1000/yr, having a bag of corn or rice triple in price in the past year means that now you and your kids are going to starve to death. There is no possible way that these "poorest of the poor" are going to be able to triple their income to pay for the food they need. On the front page of the Wall Street Journal, congress is going to start looking in to price gouging practices as large commodity companies like Cargill and ADM as they have made $billions in profits handling a majority of the world's corn and rice. So while US stockholders and CEO's reap $billions it's, in part anyway, at the expense of millions of people now being shoved into starvation.

I strongly believe that Cargill SHOULD be able to make a handsome profit doing what they do best...but I point this out to show what a global society we have become. When we burn corn in ethanol plants and the price quadruples to $6 /bushel because we increased the demand, it affects the "least of these" on all corners of the globe. I know Jesus talked a lot about the "least of these" and I believe that the rich are not only dominating the poor in these Last Days, I believe that we are crushing them to death. Certainly this is just more evidence that Jesus return is imminent as the world cries out for justice and the gap between "haves" and "have nots", grows to it's highest level in the history of the world.

Listen to the words of James 5:5 as he warns "the rich"--You have spent your years on earth in luxury, satisfying your every desire. You have fattened yourselves for the day of slaughter. You have condemned and killed innocent people, who do not resist you.

Running our cars

We all know that one of the things that makes America so great is the freedom we have to jump in our car and drive ANYWHERE in the entire country. We have a love affair with our cars and the huge part they play in our lives. As a commuter I know there are many days where we put 100+ miles on our car just getting to work. In 1998, oil was $18/barrel and gas was $1 gallon. This made is economically practical to buy a house in Buffalo and save $50,000 vs. the same house in Plymouth. You saved $500/mo on your mortgage and put a fraction of that into gas getting you commuted. But that will not be the case any longer, at least in the short term. Read what some of the leading experts have to say on our dependence on gasoline and some of the things we could do. Remember, OPEC is collecting money from us and using at least a portion to buy guns and bombs for Islamic Extremist groups that are then turning around and using them to kill us, or attempt to kill us.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.aspx?GUID=7DFE9F38-493C-4887-9E33-4D267570E830

Spending

It seems the reason that most democracies ulitmately fail is that it's voters will never vote for something that will cause them personal pain and/or sacrifice. We would rather borrow the money to keep us comfortable and let our kids and grandkids worry about it another day. It is blatant evidence of how selfishness is wrapped up in humans right to the very core. And it is one of the reasons that the US will get knocked off the top from it's perch as "king of the hill". Read this article by Congressman Tom Coburn;
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?print=yes&id=26242

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Glenn Beck

Glenn Beck, for those not familiar, is a talk show host on CNN. He is very conservative and has been sounding the trumpet for sometime about national debt, mortgage bailouts, China buying all the US bonds, etc... Last week he had Joel Rosenberg, author of EPICENTER and DEAD HEAT, on his show every night and they were talking about The End of Days. Now, that's pretty darn amazing that this conversation was happening on CNN and could have been watched by millions of people countrywide...probably many of which have NO COMPREHENSION of biblical prophecy. We can pray that the shows helped to open some eyes of some lost souls and that the Holy Spirit will use events like this for the Great Harvest which is at hand. I am going to post just a snippet of one of the interviews here;

BECK: That are coming our way. And it`s the -- is it the first time really -- people have been talking about this for 2,000 years. The first time, really, that we can say -- a lot of the big ones are now in play? ROSENBERG: Absolutely. You know, we say on Passover, why is this night different from all other nights? And people ask me, "Joel, why is this period of history different from all other periods of history?" I mean, Jesus said, "In the last days there will be wars, rumors of wars, earthquakes, famine." We`ve had that for all of the last 2,000 years. So why is this period different? And the answer is Israel. The only document on the face of the planet that said Israel would be reborn as a country in the last days and Jews would re-gather into the holy land after centuries of exile, was the Bible. And this Bible prophecy, most people in the world didn`t believe it. Actually, many Christians didn`t even believe it. It`s a whole replacement theology that got developed. God was done with the Jews. But May 14, 1948, almost exactly 60 years ago, Israel was reborn. And now we`ve got a situation that makes this period of history different, because Israel is what Bible scholars call the super sign. The fact that it has been reborn sets into motion all of the other prophecies.

Here is another good one;

BECK: When you first started writing it, then, was it more of a "what if" -- was it fiction? And now it`s more of -- don`t want to put words in your mouth -- more of a watchman on the wall kind of a Ezekiel 34 kind of thing? ROSENBERG: It has accelerated into the second point, for sure. What happened was this prophecy of Ezekiel 38 and 39, where Russia will form an alliance with Iran and Libya and these other countries in the last days. I`d always been fascinated with that. But I was on a plane from Washington, D.C., to New York City in the fall of 2000 with Natan Sharansky, the former deputy prime minister of Israel. And while we were chatting, I said to him -- we got chatting, and he said -- he started telling me the story of how, when Benjamin Netanyahu was the prime minister and Sharansky was a cabinet minister, Netanyahu sent him to Russia to meet with then KGB chief Vladimir Putin to talk about the threat of Russia selling nuclear technology and weapons to countries like Iran and Iraq. And that Netanyahu as prime minister was worried about a Russian-Iranian alliance, in particular. Well, here is my political track. I`m just helping Sharansky get his message out. But now suddenly my prophetic side kind of clicked in. And I don`t mean I`m a prophet. I mean that -- my interest in prophecy. And I thought, "Wait a minute. Did he just say that the prime minister of Israel is getting worried about a Russian-Iranian military alliance? Because that has never happened in 2,500 years." And when that... BECK: That`s Gog and Magog. ROSENBERG: That`s Gog and Magog. That`s Ezekiel 38 and 39, which I thought for many years, I believe it`s going to be true. But that must be 1,000 years off. I mean, it`s not close to happening back in the 1990s when the Soviet Union was collapsing. And that moment on that plane on the way to New York City, I began to think, "Wait a minute."

Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Iran and Russia

We are all paying attention to the union of Russia and Iran (Persia) because of their place in the battle prophesied in Ezekiel 38 and 39. For the first time in human history, this alliance seems to be strengthening. Why? Russia has guns, missiles, planes and ships. Iran has oil. Plus they would both like to have a larger share of world power. I see Russia becoming very dangerous in the near future as their society crumbles. They don't have a lot of positive assets to play with so we can count on them playing with their negative assets in their last years. So this headline and article is pretty amazing; http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=080428180001.067st43s&show_article=1

Expensive Oil

I know that America has an incredible history of solving problems using technology and innovation. I have an idea that 20 yrs from now (if the Lord hasn't come) we will all be driving some sort of car that runs on hydrogen that we get from our garden hose. But the question I have been pondering is this; will we be able to limp along and stay strong as an economy if gasoline goes to $7-8 per gallon in the not distant future. Because $200/barrel equates to pretty expensive gasoline. See the headline from OPEC below;


Opec says oil could hit $200
By Carola Hoyos in London
Published: April 28 2008 13:56 Last updated: April 28 2008 20:03
Opec’s president on Monday warned oil prices could hit $200 a barrel and there would be little the cartel could do to help.
The comments made by Chakib Khelil, Algeria’s energy minister, came as oil prices hit a historic peak close to $120 a barrel, putting further pressure on global economies.

Monday, April 28, 2008

Slave to the Lender

The attached article builds on what we talked about yesterday in Adult-ed. Turns out this old guy has seen a lot in his 89 years and doesn't like what he sees now. He says that one of the big culprits of how much risk our society is currently in is the overborrowing of institutions and consumers. Read on; http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120916592206646195.html?mod=mostpop

Jimmy Carter

So what is wrong with President Jimmy going to the middle east for a little chit-chat? Forget the fact the many congressmen from both sides of the isle wrote him a letter and asked him not to go. Read the Wall Street Journal article to find out the depths of how wrong Mr Carter truly is. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120908506974843623-search.html?KEYWORDS=jimmy+carter&COLLECTION=wsjie/6month

Muslim Intolerance

It's interesting to me that muslims DEMAND that we accept their ways, their customs and religion...in a word, they want us to be tolerant of them. But the stories are coming in from all over the world of the INTOLERANCE they show towards any that want to walk away from Islam, especially if it is to convert to Christianity. http://www.christianpost.com/article/20080422/32063.htm

Please notice the last paragraphs of the above article as it has a glimmer of good news; the secular media is picking up on the "outrage and injustice" of muslims threatening Christian converts.