6 But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.
There’s been some talk about something happening in October that will shape the imminent election. For any interested on what these events might be, this is an interesting article. That article is probably pretty strongly conspiratorial to a lot of my readers, but my point isn’t to point out any conspiracies or to lend credence to particular theories.
My objective today is to say “stand firm” and go into this election with much prayer and faith. Regardless of what happens, how accurately it was predicted, or how complicit any parties may be… the point remains that if it does affect the election then it doesn’t matter who was behind it, if anyone. So I beg of you, all of you, have faith and do not waver! I’m not going to presume to tell you who to vote for. However, don’t be tossed about, prayerfully make a decision and then stick too it, whatever happens.
I’m not saying a nuke will detonate, or that I believe we’ll endure some kind of attack. I don’t know even that anything will happen. We might not even realize as subtle winds toss us, so let us be watchful and prayerful, and seek the Lord’s guidance.
As a side note, when you’re studying out your decision, keep in mind that there are more choices than two.
I’m no economist, but I know some basics and I have been thinking a lot about things since the whole credit crisis and the bailout. Now I’m going to make some predictions. Take them with a grain of salt.
Stocks have been crashing, markets have been freezing, mortgages and loans of all kinds defaulting, all in a interdependent way. Additionally, silver and gold have seen a dramatic drop in price against the dollar, and have really stayed remarkably low for a while now, going on week two. This is the brunt of all my thinking, why in the world, in times of economic trouble, are the traditional securities, gold and silver, so darn low?? Real estate prices are low. Gas prices are low. Stock prices are low. Just about anywhere you look you find more low prices.
The only conclusion I could come to is that indeed it is not the stocks that are crashing or the values of gold and silver going down. What we are really seeing is the value of the DOLLAR going up! Absolutely remarkable IMO. Of course there’s an explanation, it goes back to the interdependencies of the last paragraph. There is a credit crunch, or credit freeze, or credit crisis. Whatever you call it, short answer: people are hoarding money. Nobody wants to let it go, nobody wants to lend it out not knowing if it’ll ever come back. This produces a scarcity of the dollar, and what is scarce and in demand becomes more valuable.
The take home point is that you can look at things from a different point of view. In Newtonian physics you might take a particularly hairy problem, transform it into another frame of reference, and come out with a much easier problem. I’ve followed this financial crisis with intensity, and I’ve spent a lot of brain power trying to wrap my head around it. I understood that housing prices were down because of defaulted mortgages, I understood that businesses were having a hard time getting loans because these credit default swaps permeated the market. What I couldn’t wrap my head around is how it’s so darn far reaching, even to gold and silver, and, well, everything.
This is where I found it useful to change my frame of reference. Instead of asking why everything else is so cheap, instead I ask “why is the dollar so uncharacteristically high valued?”
What we have is an artificially scarce dollar. The dollars are there but nobody is trading them. Normally, this would result in the same thing we are seeing, dollar value goes up, price of everything else goes down, and eventually things play out, people learn who to trust, money flows again, and everything goes back to normal. Arguably, if the crisis is big enough, things might not get to normal, or at least not converge to normal in any orderly fashion. If and when things get back to relatively normal, those who acted when the dollar was artificially valued high will have made a killing.
However, we have an additional variable, a big one, to the tune of near $1 trillion dollars pumped into the system in a very short time period. Dollars are guarded jealously, the government pumps tons of dollars out, those also are hoarded and the value of the dollar remains at this high point. Now, when people finally decide to trade their dollars again, and this they will do, we won’t ONLY go back to the original value of the dollar, but instead the dollars value will go back down PAST its original value. Prices will sky-rocket. Gas will return to $4/gallon AND THEN SOME. Same story with everything else with fluctuating prices. Gold and silver will go back to their pre-crisis points AND THEN SOME, perhaps even stocks will come out way better than they were pre-crisis.
Perhaps if things get really bad, what people might perceive is a horrifying devaluation of dollars, getting the message to get rid of their dollars. This would serve to exacerbate the falling price of the dollar. You go from hoarding to hot potato. We just might yet see hyperinflation in our boastful US of A. Just maybe the Lamanites CAN get into Zarahemla.
My brother points out that $1 trillion is not a very large percentage of the total money supply. However, it is enough to push the dollar below it’s previous trend line, and coupled with peoples interpretations and resulting actions, it could be enough to be devastating.
How long till this all goes down? That I’m not so sure of, nor how fast it will happen. I’ve heard others quoting as long as a 5 year ‘recovery’ period. All in all, the slower the recovery the better off we’ll be. If the recovery happens too fast, watch out for hyperinflation.
The bailout could in fact perform favourably, it might actually serve to broaden the recovery curve I mentioned. Then again it might not, I don’t pretend my analysis is that detailed. As an aside, I’m not opposed to the idea of using money to solve this problem, what I am opposed to is using taxpayer money. And what I think is particularly dangerous is using money in a way that increases the money supply. This easy credit, $1 trillion of “new” debt against the American people, is a huge gamble to make.
Word to the wise, take advantage of the high dollar value right now. Some speculate (in different terms) that the dollar will be at it’s highest mid-winter. But if you want to be safe, buy now. If you have stocks DO NOT SELL THEM.
You might ask, “but if we all go buy right now, won’t that bring on the ‘too fast’ adjustment you were talking about?” That’s a good question, the answer is the more that buy now the better, because I guarantee you that “everybody” is not going to be doing that. The vast majority of people will buy when things get ugly. So the more that buy now, the more that serves to spread the distribution. So not only is it the best thing for you to do, it also serves to help the economy overall.
I don’t claim to be prophetic by any means, but I reserve the right to say “I told you so.” I also reserve the right to be wrong. :)
The blogosphere is rife with discussion on gay marriage and the LDS Church’s involvement in California. I would like to do my part in the battle for family. I pray this post will have positive effect in that battle, however modest it might be.
First of all, I’ve already said how I feel about group rights. Gays don’t have rights. Human beings have rights. Gays happen to be human beings. Good, we’re on the same page.
That said, this isn’t really about gay rights as much as it is about gay marriage, but it brings me to my first point.
Marriage is not a right.
For all the talk about gay rights you can mostly chalk it up to human rights that need to transcend prejudice. In other words, instead of clamoring for “gay rights” they should instead be insisting that they be afforded the already existing human rights. Gay marriage, on the other hand, is a prime example of a group inventing new rights so they can feel the same as everyone else regardless of their decisions. It’s like a people with dreadlocks inventing a right to lay their heads on your table simply because you don’t mind another person without dreadlocks doing it.
Marriage is fundamental to society.
This is entirely incident to marriage not being a right, but is yet a powerful argument against the thought that marriage should be a right. Marriage is the very institution by which children have parents, both mother and father. It is the core of the fundamental unit of society—family.
Marriage involves more than the couple.
Intimate relations are not just about consenting adults having a good time. There is ever present the possibility of new life. This new life has rights just the same. It has needs, physical, emotional, spiritual.
Husband and wife have a solemn responsibility to love and care for each other and for their children. “Children are an heritage of the Lord” (Psalms 127:3). Parents have a sacred duty to rear their children in love and righteousness, to provide for their physical and spiritual needs, to teach them to love and serve one another, to observe the commandments of God [etc.]
Children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony, and to be reared by a father and a mother who honor marital vows with complete fidelity.
It is because of this sticky situation that marriage is instituted. The very purpose of marriage is to give children stable homes, to assure where possible that when children are created they have a mother and a father. Once you realize this, you realize that gay marriage isn’t the only thing you ought to be worried about. Fornication, adultery and divorce come to mind. Alas, this post is about gay marriage. Indeed, homosexual relations cannot result in offspring, so the very reasons for instituting marriage don’t even apply to the deviants. Yet they insist they have a right to marry. Again I propose it’s merely about them feeling the same as everyone else, regardless of their personal choices. It’s validation, nothing more.
Government should be involved in marriage.
Many of my libertarian friends throw around the idea that government should step out of marriage completely, leaving it a private and religious matter concerning only those involved. This is one of few places where I diverge from the libertarian camp (though not necessarily libertarian ideals). As stated previously, marriage inherently involves more than the parties involved. It involves family and new life; it involves society as a whole. It is in the interests of everyone involved (and everyone is involved, who among us was not born of a mother and a father?) and we should take every opportunity to encourage marriage over promiscuity and counseling over divorce. We should take every opportunity to afford children the privilege of being born into the marriage relation, and where that’s not possible to be adopted into such (no, I’m not saying single parents should give up their children, though they shouldn’t be discouraged to do so). The government is the vehicle by which the people are governed. Whereas the people deem it in society’s interest to afford children the opportunity to develop under the guidance of bonded mother and father, encouraged to stay together, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, thus is born the state sanctioned institution of marriage.
Connor, kudos to you for standing up for liberty. I find it sad that there are those who would so vehemently oppose liberty in any form. As for anti-discrimination laws and affirmative action laws, they are indeed different, and yet the same.
“Redistribution of wealth” is a hot topic these days, perhaps we should coin the term “redistribution of liberty.” It’s an erroneous and an insidious ideal that a group should be made equal, for you can’t make anything equal but the individual. Where a shop owner may refuse credit to a man based entirely on individual merits, how is he to prove his state of mind to the law if that individual happens to be in group $minority protected by the ill-conceived law?
I will reiterate for for clarity’s sake… “Rights can ONLY be protected on an INDIVIDUAL basis.” Note that rights cannot be “granted” except by God, or derived as necessary from those God given rights. To find such words as “minority” or especially enumerated groups in legislation is to find legal and even mandated discrimination. From merriam-webster.com:
3 a: the act, practice, or an instance of discriminating categorically rather than individually
This discrimination may be spelled out such that it is discrimination in favor of a group, but as all things must be balanced, this discrimination is necessarily in hindrance of another group, specifically anyone not belonging to the favored group. I doubt anyone would be all gung-ho for anti-discrimination legislation in favor of caucasian white males. Such legislation would be immediately labeled as bigotry, so why the double standard?
In fact, to be truly anti-discrimanatory, you must allow everyone the discretion to make decisions on an individual basis on any characteristic he deems relevant. And thus it follows that to be anti group discrimination, you must be pro individual discrimination. Unfortunately, such things as skin color and other traits shared by groups are also perfectly valid as individual traits. Such is life, and we must live with the bad judgments of individuals if we are to value liberty over entitlement.
I just finished reading an article on how we have strayed in a very fundamental way. It’s called Federalism: The Great Lost Concept. Here’s an excerpt.
A return to federalism, which is what Dr. Paul offers, is a return to the great experiment our Founders started. As a supporter recently said, we can choose between Candidate A and Candidate B’s plans for our lives, or we can choose Ron Paul’s plan to give us back our lives.
And for those of you who think Ron Paul would recklessly take us to anarchy, another excerpt.
It is possible to streamline operations and return to the states the powers they once held. Dr. Paul is not in favor of immediately abolishing programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security because, while these programs are unconstitutional and ultimately harmful, too many Americans have been made dependent on them for those programs to be immediately ended.
This is in response to Jordy’s post. Though it quickly degrades into rant, it comes full circle to my main point.
If you follow my blog, you know I’m fairly anti Romney. Yet that’s not to say I’m anti Mormon, as I am one. Which begs the question, “Is Romney’s failure truly a reflection of religious bigotry?” Of course I’m one person, and this is all anecdotal. I would like to say that had Romney been truly conservative instead of merely “more” conservative than McCain, that he might have done better, stayed in the race, maybe won. Alas, I can see this is not the case. If Romney had been truly conservative, he’d likely be in the same boat as the true conservative. Perhaps not, for if he was in that boat he would have jumped ship long ago. Maybe that’s unfair, calling him a quitter, but I digress.
So here Romney runs as the “conservative” choice, as well as the shrewd businessman that can turn around the heaviest, most sluggish, most doomed of vessels. I almost wonder if he dropped out (or suspended) because he was sacrificing more and more of his true conservative values for the sake of media acceptance, the campaign, and the party. C’mon, we all know his loyalties lie with the party above all else. The theory goes he could not do it anymore, he couldn’t keep sacrificing his principles to keep the campaign going, but he endorsed McCain, the antithesis of conservatism… so much for that theory.
You may think with all this ranting I’m bashing Romney and may yet give him a whopping slap in the face. Well, you may be right. That depends on how you interpret it. Above I was merely conjecturing, posing possible reasons behind his suspension as well as reasons behind the reason for his suspension, another reason, you might say the reason… his lack of support. Funny definition of lack of support though, I think he really had a shot still, he was the runner up! Though I digress yet again.
There is a point to all this. Regardless of why Romney was losing, regardless of what tactics were used against him, regardless of what he really does believe in, the fact remains that he dropped out. This is the slap in the face, so brace yourselves. I truly sympathize with all you Romney fans out there. Whatever the reason you supported him, you were counting on him. You were counting on him to keep McCain out. You were counting on him to save our dollars. You were counting on him to bring God’s blessing upon our great nation. You were counting on him to bring his conservative values to the white house. Whatever it was you were counting on it, and he has let you down. And for what? For “the party.” And now he jumps behind McCain “for the party.” I’m truly sorry. If my main man did that to me, if my candidate of choice (you know who he is) so much as hinted at dropping the race, I would be dismayed beyond consolation. My heart goes out.
Now ain’t that depressing? I think everyone has probably heard by now that Romney has officially endorsed McCain (aka McPain, McInsane, McShame). I would say I cannot believe it, but in fact I do. Merely because the more I found out about Romney the more I realized he is just the mormon version of McCain. I don’t want to believe it, but I do. Romney has lost any ounce of my respect he heretofore had, where before I somewhat generously if hesitantly gave him the benefit of the doubt. Now it’s come to this and I have to believe that sane people will not follow Romney’s endorsement. If this all isn’t depressing enough, here’s another video. This one at least has some hope to go with it.
Your choices are now McCain, Huckabee, Ron Paul or whoever wins the Dem. nomination. I used to lean towards Obama as a second choice, not that I’d ever resort to a second choice, but with fozzmoo’s recent article I fear he’s not much of a second choice at all. Obama is to Clinton as Romney is to McCain.
To be honest I’m not entirely well educated on Huckabee, but I hear he blew the lid off with high spending in Arkansas, and his admitted ignorance on things war doesn’t help much either. I hate to say I told you so, but it looks like Ron Paul is our man, so please go out and make a difference.
“I believe in limited government. I believe the purpose of government is
to protect liberty and not to run our lives, or run the economy, or to
police the world.”—Ron Paul
The above quote was from a radio interview. I don’t think anybody could
say it any better. That quote is the very embodiment of why I support
Ron Paul to the very end.
Want to find out more of what he’s about? Here’s a blog that has video
of his speech at CPAC.
If you find yourself dismayed and at a loss with Romney’s suspended
campaign, please please take a close look at Ron Paul. If you have any
doubts about him or any compelling reason not to support him I would
certainly appreciate the chance to look into them, for my own
enlightenment as well as yours. One friend of mine brought up a concern
that, given any merit, would deeply concern myself as well. I spent
many hours that evening looking into it, at the expense of
homework, and came up convinced that the allegations were nothing but
misrepresentation and slander.
If you wonder what could be done at this point with most primaries
already passed, just drop me a line. There is work to be done.
Here’s Mitt Romney answering a question about medical marijuana, if you can call it answering.
I’m not going to get much into the rights or wrongs of marijuana, medical or not, the war on drugs, or all that jazz. Instead I’m going to address Romney’s dodging of the question. One might say he in fact answered the question very directly, “I’m against the legalization of marijuana.” That’s a fine answer, Romney, but you were asked a very specific question. “Will you arrest me and my doctor if we use marijuana to treat my ailments?” He just wanted an honest answer.
Some have sympathized with Romney, saying it’s a loaded question. If he answers yes, then he’s not sympathetic to the less fortunate. If he says no, then he’s a hypocrite.
I say well then Romney, own up to your policy. If your policy is marijuana is bad in all shapes and forms, and you believe the feds should arrest abusers, then own up to it. Tell the man he’ll be arrested.
Ron Paul gives a very straightforward answer to this question. He says the federal government has no business interfering with such matters. Paul says the states have the say here. He says he (or the federal government) will not arrest you.
The tragedy is that Romney dodges around the question so he can fool as many people into voting for him as he can. If someone is going to vote against him because they don’t think the feds should arrest users in sympathetic states, then that’s their prerogative, and shame on Mitt for not coming clean to them.
