The Big Muller Let-down

Muller didn’t volunteer a darned thing as far as new information we didn’t already know.  He would not be “tricked” into reading from the report and having clips people could use on the news.  Getting any answer from him was like pulling teeth because he kept saying “I’m not here to talk about that” or “that’s outside my domain”.   He would not even admit that the reason why charges weren’t filed against Trump is because a court in 1974 said you couldn’t indict a sitting president.  The best we got from him was that a president could be indicted after he left office.  Trump got on the air seven minutes before two and crowed like a rooster about what a great day this was for the Republican party and America.  The chances of impeachment now are less than zero.  Basically Trump wanted the democrats to fold their hands and abandon any thoughts about winning the election next year.   Muller spoke before two committees for seven hours from about twenty to six to twenty to one.  All the commentators could say is how tired Muller was and how he’s seventy-five years old and he’s retired and all.  Even Trump said that Muller’s performance was a bad one.   I made a lot of mental notes as the interview was in progress but unfortunately I didn’t write anything down.  There was a lot of minutia that could be explored.  The silver lining of the thing was that the Republicans were also frustrated in their attempts to put words in Muller’s mouth.  They argued that a prosecutor’s job is to lodge charges and if you don’t issue indictments then you have no business doing a report on things that were NOT charged.  This is a difficult argument to best.  But all in all I think the democrats’ decision to even have Muller on did their side more harm than good.  As if by conspiracy the sessions were very tedious to listen to.  I would only say that the news people did manage to salvage a few interesting clips.   Muller may have sacrificed and served his country in time of need but he sure as hell didn't serve the Democratic Party when they really needed him.  

Let’s talk about the reports of the resurrection of Jesus in the Bible.  Let’s bring forth examples old and new.   Here’s an old one.  Three women were on their way to the tomb and asked themselves on the way there, “But who will roll away the stone”?  This is a good question and any other group of women would say, “We need to go back and bring a man with us and get a crowbar and the wedging tools we’ll need”.   Keep in mind it was really early in the morning and the likelyhood of seeing someone at the grave site was very unlikely.  Why were they even on their way to the tomb this Sunday morning.  Supposedly to bring spices to put on the body.  But in fact it says in John that this preparation for burial had already taken plate late Friday afternoon.  It would have been taboo in that culture to disturb a dead body.  The entire trip makes no sense.   We then have seemingly endless reports about “seeing the gardener” at the tomb.  Or- - - then it’s the gardener and all of a sudden it’s Jesus.  Or they are told “Jesus is not here” and a minute later he shows up.  Or they are told "Jesus is not here.  Go to Galilee and you will see him there” when another gospel says that whatever you do “Stay in the city of Jerusalem.  In the book of John it ends with the disciples eating fish that they had just caught on the lake of Galilee.  There is no thought about Pentacost or the outpouring of the Holy Spirit back in Jerusalem.   Here are a couple of brand new examples for you to ponder.  It was said in getting a replacement for Judas, who betrayed Jesus, that he must be a member of the original group of  120 men and that “He must have been with our group all along”.  The trouble with this one is that ALL of the disciples betrayed him on Maundy Thursday.  There is no one who would stand with him.  So by that line of reasoning there would be no candidate qualified to take Judas’ place.  Finally I’d like you to chew on this one.  When Peter got up and made a speech on Pentacost, he talked about the resurrection and Jesus sitting on the right hand of the Father and all.  But at no time did he make reference to Jesus ascending to heaven in a cloud at the Mount of Olives.  The question is that if hundreds or perhaps thousands of people saw this event, why was it even necessary for God  to generate a whirling wind and tongues to get peoples’ attention at Pentacost?  It would seem as though the whole “Gospel” thing would have been kicked off ten days previously when there would be hundreds or more of mini-gospels running around talking about the man who ascended into the clouds.  Or when St Peter was going on and on about how "Sinful men killed the prince of life" how much better if Jesus had held out just ten days longer Peter could have introduced a live Jesus right there to the crowd.  But then we have a reference in John about Jesus saying to his chosen “And now I am no more in the world”.  What did Jesus mean by that?  Was his resurrection just a spiritual thing as many maintain?  It would seem as best the resurrection was a highly secret thing not seen by just anybody.  It seems that nobody but the elect ever witnessed this at all.  This would conform to Isaiah 53 when it says that Jesus was reckoned as dead by his own generation.  If he was reckoned as dead, then how could ANYBODY witness his appearance? 

Justice John Paul Sevens Dies

Former Justice John Paul Stevens died yesterday at age 99.  He had been appointed to the bench by President Ford in 1975 as a moderate.  He evolved into a strident liberal.  He left the court in 2010 and so had nine good years of retirement.  He wanted to abolish the second amendment as a relic from the eighteenth century.  I didn’t know that about him but it takes guts.

Los Angeles has a major rat infestation problem and California is the worst state for rats behind Illinois.  The legislature voted to ban the most effective rodenticide against the rats on environmental grounds.  You heard the expression about “giving a rat’s ass”.  Well they have “swamp rats” that are as large as fifteen pounds and they have frickisee of rat that involves eating the hind quarters only and fixing it up with a little hot sauce and red wine and other ingrediants in Louisiana.  For some reason they don’t want to use bug spray on these ten plus pound rats so they have trained dogs just to point to the rats when they see them.  Apparently the dogs are afraid of them and will not attack.  The trouble of course is that everyone is afraid of the homeless lobby because we can trace all the rats to the homeless who leave trash and food all around.   I don’t know.  Don’t they have general hygene regulations an y more? 

Two thirds of the people who get alzheimers are women and it’s not just because women live longer than men.  It’s a sex related genetic component involving the production of plaque in the brain.  Naturally scientists want to cling to every bit of research they can muster.

Today a vote was taken in the house to begin impeachment procedings against Trump.  Most likely it failed.  I don’t know that yet.  A previous vote of a similar nature only got sixty votes.  They want to hear Muller’s testimony first.  Muller was supposed to testify before congress today but it was postponed till next Wednesday the 24^th to give congressmen a better chance at formulating questions.  Of course if past behavior predicts future results, in 2015 nobody gave Trump a chance of being elected President.  They said he wouldn’t even take the job if elected.  Now Trump is clinging tenatiously to power.  Of course we had the Russian mess and the Julian Assange mess.  You know all of the factors and the president is banking on all those factors repeating themselves again this time.  Of course the economy just passed the tenth year of recovery.  That’s ten years as opposed to just nine years for the famous boom of the ‘sixties.  If the economy is still good a year from now there’s no telling what will happen despite now trailing by ten points in the polls.  Trump has beaten the polls before.  Meanwhile all of us will grow old in vain anticipation of some big “turning of the political tide”, which never occurs. 

At about two I went down to see Dr Saran.  I missed refreshments, apparently.  There was a short line and Silva was behind me.  She gave Kevin a cookie.  When I got in my temperature was 97.7 and my blood pressure was 124 over 70.  This is despite just having had a cigarette and being on the nicotine patch.  I told the doctor I was smoking a lot less.  He asked me if I ever had the colonoscopy and I said I hadn’t and I didn’t want one.  He said “Well if you feel uncomfortable about having one you don’t have to have it.  I said that was fine with me.  I owe God one for removing that albitros over my head all these months.  Just in case any of you are wondering Christianity is not racist.  Jesus was Jewish and not Nordic European or whatever.  Christianity and Nazi Norse myths are not compatible.  We sing in church “In Christ there is no east or west in him no south or north, but one great fellowship of love throughout the whole wide earth.  The apostle Paul writes “We are of one blood” and I believe he means- - race.  There is no “black” blood and “white” blood or anything like that.  Blood is one color, red.  

ICE was supposed to have conductive raids yesterday of illegal aliens yesterday but it didn’t happen and everybody in the media was surprised it didn’t.  There was talk that they might do it today because people let their guard down and were going back to work and taking their kids to school and getting out of the house.  I’d like to think Trump’s gone yellow on the issue but I’m not sure.

Sometimes I wish I could write a major treaties on the benefits of Christianity in my life.  You know, “What God has done for me”.  I guess he’s kept bad things from happening to me that otherwise would have.  This is what Pastor Don said to me back in the late ‘eighties.  At the time I wasn’t ready to receive it but now I see things differently.  He has kept me from horrible diseases such as cancer, and he’s given me the blessings of living in the United States.  That’s always something to be grateful for.  I guess you could say that God has been “patient” with me and putting up with my many faults. 

Saturday July the 13^th was Stonehenge day in New York City.  It’s the day the sun shines right down the street, the deep valleys, at sunset.  The shadows are just starting to shift around here so you get a little shade after dinner before the tree shadow arrives.  To celebrate the 42^nd anniversary of New York’s power failure in 1977 they had another power failure Saturday night right when they were doing all of their concerts like at Madison Square Garden and Broadway.  A transformer caught fire.

Around here it was the ABC network news and Eye Witness.  I had a speck of GH on.  We had a turkey sandwich for dinner with mint chocolate chip ice cream for dessert.  I lent Mario another cigarette before dinner when nobody was around.   Tux no longer has his flea collar.  

Let’s hear it for Attorney General Barr.  He screwed up royal again.  Do you remember the case of Eric Garner?  He was arrested for selling bootleg cigarettes on the street in New York.  But the cop put a knee to his chest or something or maybe his neck.  At any rate Eric Garner said “I can’t breathe” - - - eleven times he said “I can’t breathe" and he finally died.  That was five years ago and tomorrow the statute of limitations expires and the justice department was “divided” and Barr made the final decision.  This is obviously another reason for Black people never to consider voting for Trump. 

Tropical Storm Barry Bears Down on New Orleans

Today is the tenth anniversary of when President Obama and Hillary helped out in the coup in Honduras that overthrew a democratically elected president who cared about the people and had many social programs- - and he was replaced with just another despotic dictator who oppresses the people.  The guy in July of 2009 was overthrown with US help because he was a "Social democrat" or whatever Bernie Sanders claims to be.  This would not do, especially because this pre 2009 leader was said to be getting just a little friendly with Hugo Shavaz.  We wanted someone who was business friendly and also drug cartel friendly. 

Trump's secretary of labor, the one involved in all of the Jeffrey Epstein stuff,  has apparently resigned.  If this is true it is a good thing and a small step taken by Trump to purge his administration of corruption.  I heard another official was arrested with child pornography on his phone.  Trump would not be at 44% in the polls in my oppinion if impeachment procedings got started. 

New Orleans is in trouble again.  Flooding has already ravaged the city and surrounding areas with ten inches of rain an hour at some points.  Heavy rainfall is scheduled for the next 45 hours as tropical storm Barry burrows down on them.  Parts of New Orleans are below sea level and the Mississippi river is at record height.  Flooding is up past the tires of cars if any can still run and much of the city looks like the canals of Venice.  Stay tuned. 

President Trump has backed off of his threat to use executive action to put the Census question about citizenship on the forms next year.  Instead the president going to consult the commerce department about another way of getting the citizenship figures Trump wants. 

The Dow Jones industrials closed at a new high today of over 27,000.  The markets are up sixteen percent for the year.  New job figures look good.  Gold is inching its way up over fourteen hundred.  It might be a good time to buy.  There doesn’t seem to be the slightest of any indication of an economic slow-down.  On the contrary it seems to be full speed ahead.

They had a mass wedding in Central Park representing the fifty-two states.  This is the politically correct version where the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico were represented.  If you were to do a version of the 52 stars on the flag we would have it would be rows of 7, 8, 7, 8, 7, 8, 7 adding up to 52 or dividing fifteen in half.  I’m pretty sure that’s how they would do it.  

RELIGION IN THE SPOTLIGHT

I happened to have the thought that “What if the Holy Spirit” and God weren’t the same person.  If I wanted to be really snooty I would liken the holy spirit to Eve Donavin or Christine Di Mira.  You know, someone without any friends but they have high hopes of ruling the world or at least their little domain.  They want to be a key player.  You may ask me “How can they have power if they don’t have any friends?   That’s a mystery.  The holy spirit has friends of course, those who sharee his same fantasy.  But people like Christine Di Mira and Eve Donavin don’t need friends; they have circumstances on their side.  At least until now they do.  It’s a pretty good trick if you can pull it off. What if the sovereign god of the universe is tiring of over two thousand years of this spiritual Zionism stuff where the lamb of God is slain from the foundation of the world and was born to be “King of Israel” as the song says, otherwise known as the Lion King?  What if God decided to pull the plug on all of this guilt hand wringing stuff about “You sinful men killed the prince of Life” or whatever, preferring to preach a dead Christ rather than a living one.  I think it’s all growing old.  I think all of this Disney Lion King stuff is growing old too after 25 years.  And I think Star Wars has been driven into the ground with something they used to call “over-exposure”.  People have had enough of it and want to take a break from it.  How many times can you hear “A-cumma-Mettqada” or whatever and not have it coming out their ears?  I know I talk blasphemy; it’s blasphemy against Disney Corp. 

.  I still have a lot of other religious stuff to type but not today.  It would be interesting to see who speaks more truth.  Is it “God” or that which I believe to be God, or is it Satan, ever whispering in my ear, filling my head with stuff that robs me of my “faith”.  It also occurred to me that one could modify Origen’s statement to say “Not all justice is justice that is recognized by God”.  I have my sense of justice.  The Bible plainly teaches us “Our ways are not God’s ways.  This has certain implications.  If I’m really “totally morally depraved” as Calvinism teaches that I am, then how am I in any moral position to make a decision about something so weighty as my eternal destiny.  If someone was falling down drunk and Satan got them to sign a contract surrendering their soul for eternity, mightn’t someone say that that wasn’t fair because one signer was mentally incompetent?  I don’t know; ask Neil Savedra.  He says that by sheer force of the human will to have “Faith” then all obsticles are surmountable. 

I have just one more point to raise about the ministry of Jesus.  When John the Baptist was in prison he sent a message to Jesus' disciples of "Are you the annointed messiah or are we to expect another?"  Jesus responded, "Tell John that the blind see and the lame walk and the prison doors are opened and the captives are set free".  This last part is an allusion to Isaiah 61.  But in that case the "prison doors" referred to political prisoners of the government, I'm pretty sure.  Jesus spoke of it as being deliverance from demons and the dominion of Satan.   One might say he watered down the basic messianic message, which was primarily political.  However today you have people, probably Neil Savedra, saying they are suspicious of "Deliverance ministries".   I'm thinking, "Why would you want people not to be delivered from demons?"  The answer is there is a basic distrust of anything Supernatural among the religious community, particularly with Neil Savedra.  There are only two exceptions to this rule.  One is if they are in complete control of it like some kind of a staged theatrical production like Jim Jones "pulling cancer" out of patients.  The other is if it is some historical act where the primary goal was not deliverance or healing but to prove some etherial theological point.  The very arrival of the Holy Spirit was not primarily to "give people gifts" but to explain how the Church got here so quickly and didn't take the hundred years to get established that we all know it took.  (Selah)

All of the News that Fits

H Ross Perot died today of leukemia at age 89.  He was born in 1930 and I guess he started his own electronics company at age 32 and soon became a millionaire.  But then he sold out or something in 1984.  He ran for president in 1992 and got 19% of the popular vote.  George W Bush regards him as a great patriot.  He did a lot of charity work.   I voted for Ross Perot in 1992 and he is one of the few totally honest politicians.  We need more of them today. 

An eighteen month old girl named Clowie from Indiana fell through an open window in a child’s play area on a ship and fell eleven floors or 150 feet to her death.  Her grandfather held her up to the unknowingly open window and somehow she slipped through her grandfather’s hands.  They want to see the surveillance record.  It’s a strange case.

Trump praises Jeffrey Epstein because they are good friends.  This is the guy who ran that sex ring involving young girls as young as fourteen.  Clinton was also buddy-buddy with Epstein.  The secretary of labor was the prosecutor in the case that helped cover up his earlier crimes by giving absolution to fellow conspirators.  But now we hear this prosecution deal was ruled illegal by the Supreme Court because it didn’t take into account the victims bill of rights.  They were ordered to prosecute but then didn’t.   If Trump likes firing people now he should fire his secretary of labor and we’ll all feel better.  Of course people like Judy say “Well the package Trump comes in may be flawed but his heart’s in the right place”.    I do not understand this love affair between fundamentalist Christianity and President Trump.  By the way it isn’t up to me to “forgive” Trump’s sins against others.   It’s funny how Christians hate the idea of a lay person assuming the mantle of God except for one area.  They want me or anybody to assume the authority of God, who is the only one according to the Bible, that can forgive sins.  But there is some magnetic attraction between fundamentalist Christianity and President Trump.  

Police in England used to be like they are in America.  They could lie to suspects while questioning them and brow beat them and threaten them and get them to sign false confessions.  But they can’t do that anymore.  Knowing the police propensity to lie like on ‘Major Crimes’ I wouldn’t make any kind of a deal with the police even if I was guilty.  I would say “We have a legal system in this country and I’m choosing to let them do their jobs”.   I have yet to hear a suspect say “I respectfully decline to answer that question because I honestly believe my answer might tend to incriminate me”.   You also can’t deprive them of meals or getting rest.

Now they are in the process of perfecting drugs that literally switch off dangerous genes such as dreaded genetic inherited diseases, even Huntington’s disease.  They are trying out these drugs right now in patients with some success, and within five years or so they may be able to eliminate other diseases.  Who knows, maybe Downs sidrone or Tay Sachs.  We’ll see.  Of course some may say we are “playing God” and it’s always been up to the sovereignty of God whether a person was afflicted with some debilitating disease such as Huntington’s.

God can strike you down whenever he chooses.  On July 4^th there was this guy out in the desert working on his car and he had it up on a jack changing a tire.  Then the 6.4 earthquake strike and the guy was killed, crushed to death- - just like that.  They didn’t find the body till five days later and it’s the first death resulting from the two earthquakes we’ve had.

According to Christian litriture,  when you’re Born Again, like President Trump is alleged to have been a few years ago, God comes in and controls your life and “Self” is de-throwned to assume a subordinate role.  God is now the driving force that makes the decisions in your life.  According to Calvary Chapel, this is a wonderful thing.  It would mean if true, that “God” has been controlling the destiny of our country these past three years.  Of course if I ask why “God” isn’t leading my life I’m told glibly, “Well, miracles don’t occur today”.   That’s not what it says in the Bible.   I had other observations about Christianity but I’ll save them. 

7.1 "Aftershock" Strikes Southern California

This is Sunday July 7, 2019 and it’s Ringo’s 79^th birthday and also the first days of the running of the bulls in Pampalona, Spain.  It’s after one thirty and I’ve been fighting drowsiness all day.  It’s just something to talk to the doctor about.  It’s time we covered the Trump news.  I now believe that the odds are at least fifty-fifty that President Trump will be elected again given the media coverage and the trends we have seen before.  The economy has never been stronger with the addition of another 250,000 jobs last month and unemployment at 3.7%, which ties a fifty year record.  The economy most often is the leading factor on whether a president will be re-elected or not.  President Trump has risen to 44% in the polls, which is an all time high for him and in his mind it’s worth celebrating.  It doesn’t matter whether 53% of the people disapprove of his performance in office given the trend that nobody liked him in his own party four years ago but he still got nominated and elected.  The right wing cabal still rules even though they are a decided minority.  Of course the US Senate is Gerrymandered ALL of the time, not just in certain states.  This means it takes a very small percent of the US population to vote these republicans in in order to hang on to power.  You will have the courts making favorable rulings for Trump and of course you have kicking off voters off the rolls and also closing democratic polling places.  You have “caging” where they call you up and if they think you’ve moved they assume you’re illegal and they kick you off.   It’s funny how Chris Matthews didn’t even talk about Trump’s performance last Thursday with that parade and speech or whatever it was.  I missed everything because I was either out watching fireworks like normal people or else it was endless earthquake coverage.  All I know is Trump said something about the British taking over the airports in America in 1775.  He blamed this blooper on his tele-prompter.  Trump has a God-given talent of blaming anything on anything.  And people buy into his line of bullshit.  Now Trump is once again saying that Joe Biden is a lost cause even though he is still leading in the polls, both against the President and his democratic contenders.  Trump is like a wild animal.  He sees just a glimpse of weakness and he goes in for blood. 

As you know Southern California has had two major earthquakes in two days.  The first was 6.4 on the rictor scale and the other, the larger one, is 7.1 magnitude.  The first occurred at 10:33 o the Fourth of July and the 7.1 was Friday evening at 8:19.  I didn't even feel the shaking of the first quake because I was outside smoking, but I sure felt the shaking of the second one, which lasted over a minute.  Both struck the town of Ridgecrest and caused moderate damage for its size.  It's kind of a bummer just digging out from one and another bigger one strikes.  Both quakes have received heavy air play on the network news outlets and even on the BBC news.  It's rare that a 6.4 earthquake will be a foreshock to an even larger quake.  They said it was a nine percent chance of happening but it's something that's almost never happened before.  Both quakes were the largest California has experianced in the past twenty years.  If you've been following these quakes you know all about them anyhow, but perhaps a few readers of this haven't been following that closely.