What Budget Crisis?

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They just replaced all the faucets in the building that serve our purified water system. We noticed last fall that there was corrosive rust in one of the icemakers, which indicated that the purified water was corroding the faucets. Apparently, when they installed the system, all of the lines are plastic except for the faucets, which are metallic.

One of the maintenance guys showed me the invoice. Each faucet cost $459.18 and they replaced 36 of them at a total cost of over $16,000. Budget crisis? What budget crisis? That's a significant chunk of my annual salary.

I don't see how this will be a good move. I am fairsure it's cheaper to replace all the faucets with brand new but uncorroded metal ones every few years (I've been in this office almost four years). Also, the maintenance guys are not sure these will last as long as the metal ones because when you cinch down the plastic threads to make it tight, they basically get destroyed. We'll see if this was money well spent.

This is evidence of my argument that we can cut things from the budget without cutting people. It's also evidence that a $300 hammer might be a perfectly acceptable price in the eyes of some folks. Maintenance doesn't think so and neither do I.

What You Really Know

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If I had it over to do again, I would make one change to my educational pursuits. I attended a small state university void of the normal accolades and splendid faculty but with appropriately cheaper tuition than more prestigious institutions. I liked my program, my major, most of my teachers, and my life. I like what I know. What I know isn't however reflected in my grades. I know things that my transcript doesn't say I do. What would I change? I'd care less about my transcript.

The practical matter of graduate school is that most people will receive a B. I mentioned in a previous post an undergraduate organic chemistry course where our instructor, who had once taught chemistry at Harvard, gave one person an A, one person an F, and most people a C. In graduate school, a C is basically a failing grade, and so there were professors who would give one person an A, one person a C, and the rest a score of B. If I had been smarter, I would have worked just hard enough on the course to be better than the worst student. My B would have been enough and would have freed me to learn things I actually wanted to know.

I learned a lot of things in my life that don't appear unless you engage me in conversation. While I was on my mission, I learned to speak German as fluently as a foreigner can and picked up some Italian when I got ahold of "Italian For Missionaries" when I transferred to Innsbruck. Look at my transcripts, and you'll see one year of french and two years of german, but in high school. I have read Locke, Montesquie, von Mises, Hobbes, and all the works of Shakespeare since college. You would only know that to speak to me or look through those books in my personal library because I have never taken a course on literature, politics, or economics since college. Even in my own field, I still read things. I read Widtsoe's "Dry Farming" which is the theorem on which irrigation is predicated. I know about the fungus that makes ants commit suicide and the baumanii infestation coming over from wounded soldiers. I listened to NPR talk about "volunteer weeds" invading the normal population after we genetically modify them. I also know that your banana is radioactive and that the FDA is perfectly ok with that. I know about the difference between elemental and colloidal mercury, which is why I'm not afraid of old vaccines. I also don't like vaccines much, because I know that in order to elicit an immune response against most viruses, you have to actually inject a live virus or couple its antigens to something else, which is why some folks catch the flu from their shot.

What you really know is not reflected in your grades. I have been teaching long enough to know that grades only really represent how much information our students were able to barf back up for the exam. Students complain because we don't test their knowledge when we actually do. I'm not interested in what facts you know; I want to know if you can use them. One of my favorite teachers as an undergraduate for our final presented us with a question like this:

If I mutate the amino acids at 171 from TYR to ALA and 242 from ARG to PRO, how will that affect the structure and function of this tyrosine protein kinase in the tissues where it's active?

That was our entire exam. Seriously. Nobody picked "C".

I did very well because of what I actually know. I continue to do well because of what I know. When it became possible that I might get cut, several senior scientists at the college volunteered to go to bat for me because they knew they could count on me. When I helped one of my father's subordinates move and a few of his senior supervisors decided to test me about a subject for which I was actually passionate, I gave them a broadside. I will be able to go somewhere and do something else because of things I actually know, even though they are not on my transcript or clearly evident from my curriculum vitae (resume).

What you know is what matters. It's all you really take with you in the end of every phase of life. The transcripts and diplomas matter to some, but I am esteemed, respected, and valued by people much more successful than I in spite of my lack of prestigious credentials. They are more interested in what I am and why. I am someone you can really know.

Confidence and Arrogance

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I have found in the last year a great deal of confusion between these two terms. I meet girls who tell me I need more confidence who now think I'm arrogant. One of my most faithful readers sent me this message last week that kind of explains it. She said, "we've all been taught that if we do that {think we're wonderful], we're arrogant". It's a fine line to walk, and it's a fine line to talk.

The difference between arrogance and confidence seems to be a function of your point of view. As long as you validate the worth of others and agree with them, they call it confidence. As soon as your self worth rises enough to question them and their motives or if you don't meet their expectations, they perceive it as arrogance.

I keep a blog and post on Facebook for a simple reason. I do it, although I share some of the same concerns as you about what people may learn about me, because I feel I ought to. About a year ago, I considered deleting my Facebook account but kept it because of the people I might be able to influence if I kept it. Arrogance and confidence depend on your motivation. I don't do it to be famous. I do it because I hope it will help others. Moreover, I don't even care if I get credit. The ideas I express are not new- they are just new ways of expressing things we already know.

Assaults on you from people who used to love and respect you probably arise from jealousy. Instead of admitting that they are wrong or chose incorrectly, they will attack those who chose wisely. People who are unhappy with their own lives often mistake security and confidence for pride and arrogance. When we label people as "arrogant" or "selfish" or even "good" or "loyal", we actually do them a disservice. People are none of those things and all of them at the same time. What they do might be arrogant, selfish, good or even loyal, but we are the sum of our deeds, not a single act in and of itself, and if you label someone based on an event or your perception of an event, you do them and yourself a disservice. Much of how we spin what we say depends upon our point of view, and most people want to be validated.

External validation isn't really valid. If a man receives little praise for his work, does it make him a lesser man? If more, a better one? Greatness is not a function of accolades and rewards but rather a reflection of how true he lives to his virtues, principles and promises. It's ok to think you're wonderful if and only if other people tell us it is true but not if we inherently believe it of ourselves.

My confidence comes from being true to myself and my principles. At the end of the day, I am the only person who spends 24/7 with myself, and I have to live with myself every minute of every hour of every day. I do what I do, say what I say, believe what I believe, and am what I am because that is the only way for me to find peace in this life. Sometimes it sucks to be lonely, but I'd rather be lonely and at peace than be surrounded by people who play parts to appease others.

In an interview with a member of my Faith a few weeks back, we brought up the subject of honesty. I told him that sometimes I am honest to a fault, even when it might not go so well for me. My friends know that if they really want to know the truth, they can come to me and that if they don't I'll just spin around in a circle on my chair.

Just keep spinning, just keep spinning, just keep spinning, spinning, spinning…

Perspective and Premise

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I sat this week in a class and listened with some resistance to what I was taught. The teacher, well-meaning though he may have been, presented as forgone conclusions that A will lead to B. Although I agree that it can, I do not like his premise, and he didn’t like it when I questioned his conclusions.

As a consequence however, of this resistance, I had a conversation with another class member. We discussed how perspective makes a great difference. Things are not always as they seem. For instance, it is less stressful for a worm to dig through the dirt than for it to go fishing. Likewise, it is not always better to see the glass as half full. Any waitress who regards your glass as always half full runs the risk of lower tips for lack of attentiveness to the beverage at hand. Another professor has a friend who was interviewed for a job in Tower 1 on 11 September 2001 but was not selected. If he had been, he would have been on the 70th floor filling out paperwork to start working when the plane collided with the tower. It was better he wasn't hired for that job!

Just because we can do a thing does not follow that we must. Just because something is true somewhere doesn’t mean it’s true everywhere. We like things to be easy, cut and dry, and quick, and so we like to wrap things up in pretty little packages because they look nice and stack more easily. Frequently, when something doesn’t conform to that hope, we dismiss it as irrelevant or unimportant because it’s inconvenient to the narrative to which we so desperately hope to cling. We take things we hope for laws while simultaneously hoping not to be taken in violation of the laws. We drive along the highway of life thinking the road belongs to us when sometimes even the car belongs to someone else.

When my local friend and I go hiking, he is frequently glad to have me along because I pay attention to the trail. He says many people get lost because they don’t look behind them to recognize the way out. Even this last weekend, he noticed a rock that has always been there but that the previous two occasions he completely missed because we went at it from a different direction. There are so many things we miss because we are accustomed and comfortable to seeing things in only one particular way.

I know that things are different from how they seem at first glance. When I was younger, my mother bought several series of books on virtues, values, and principles to entertain and educate us. In one volume of the Bernstein Bears, Mother Bear teaches Sister Bear about appearances. While she cuts up apples, Sister notices a misshapen apple that’s knobby and lopsided, and she assumes it’s a bad apple. However, when Mother cuts it open, the flesh of the fruit is perfect and wholesome. Mother finds another apple that looks perfect on the outside and cuts into it, only to reveal a rotting flesh where worms have made a home.

While stereotypes and assumptions are based on truth, it does not make them law. I have seen a lot of scientists extrapolate for the entire population information gleaned from only one or five individual representatives thereof. There are attitudes we adopt that hurt us and our human experience. I once had a coworker who confessed to me that she was glad she was forced to get to know me because she never would have chosen to get to know me. If not for circumstances, I would never have met any of them either, because I would have gladly gone into my chosen vocation more quickly than I did. I am often quick to do certain things, which are based on experiences, whereby I hold strangers accountable for the transgressions of others. I feel bad about this and endeavor to change my expectations.

That being said, what you are is more than what you say or even do. Just because you do something that is virtuous does not make you virtuous too. Jesus warned us about those who grudgingly give gifts or those hypocrites who do things for the wrong reasons. What you are depends largely on your motivation and energy. There are things I would like to do differently, but since I like where I have arrived, it would only serve to upset where I am and put me at risk of losing things I prefer to keep as they are. All too frequently, we are interested in to do lists, which are about accomplishments rather than on to be lists, which focus on transformation of our personae. When your actions back up your words, we can have a conversation. Until then, I reject the premise and look for truth.

Post Rapture Thoughts

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I actually feel bad for the people who hoped the rapture would come on Saturday, but I feel worse for the people who mock them. I wasn't particularly expecting it to come, because I know where Jesus says no man knoweth the day nor the hour, and so it just didn't resound well with me. However, there are people who are absolutely jubilant that it didn't happen.

Give them credit for their zeal and preparedness. Some of them spent a great deal of money preparing and a great deal of time warning others and setting their lives in order. If it had come, what would you do? When the moment arrives, will you be ready? What if it's tomorrow?

When you think of preparedness for a future event, most of the people on the planet hope it won't happen in their day. They hope and pray that wars and famines and plagues and poverty will be put off just a little while longer until they're gone. That's kind of a backwards attitude, to wish it upon your children rather than suck it up yourself. Most people I know are not preparing as much as they are hoping that the end time will come after the end of their time. They are not preparing for it so much as hoping to be able to avoid it.

Jesus himself gave us the parable of the ten virgins. They represent those who believe in Christ, his mission, his message, his atonement, and his return. Half were wise and half were FOOLISH. Now, we can imagine that some of these might be perceived as foolish for selling everything they had and being duped into following, but I ask you this question. What are you doing right now to make sure there is oil in your lamp? Which kind of attendee to the Marriage Feast will you be- one who is late or one who comes to honor the Bridegroom? At least these people were thinking about and planning for something Christians all have in common.

Look into your own heart at how you reacted. Real Christians would not point and jeer at their fellows who falsely predicted the date. Real Christians hope for and look forward to the return of Christ steadfastly and with a perfect brightness of hope. When that day comes, I welcome it, and if it had been Saturday, that would have been perfectly fine with me. Prepare now, for those who are prepared will stand confidently in His presence when He returns.

Affairs of Agency

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I had an argument with Elder Findlay on my mission. He called me up one night to get our weekly missionary goals and took occassion to the fact that I planned to baptize zero people that week. It gave me an opportunity to concretely express what had been up to that point only a vague misgiving with a premise, and as a consequence we were both taught.

When he finally let me speak, I explained my position succinctly yet thoroughly. I had nobody who was making progress. I had not taught anyone far enough to be ready. Nobody I was teaching had agreed to be baptized. Most importantly, how can I set a goal for something that involves the agency of another person?

Elder Findlay pressed. I hung up the phone and refused to speak to him when he called back. Finally, I told Elder Lucas to tell him my goal was to baptize 1 million people before the next Sunday. Ironically, I think he actually took me seriously and wrote that down, because the mission president brought it up later.

As I later explained to him and to the others, I can only set goals over things I actually control. While I can look for people to teach, invite them to make and keep commitments, and follow up, only they can actually follow through. Too often we set goals that involve affairs of agency over which, while we may have influence, we ultimately have zero control, especially if we are righteous. Evil men may compel action, by the truncheon, bludgeon, or bayonet, but righteous men work by persuasion and longsuffering.

Ultimately, it is up to each person to decide what he will do and become. I can give him all the tools, knowledge, and encouragement in the known universe, and the choice is still up to him to act, react, or renig. Even at 20 years of age, I knew that most people would renig on that type of commitment, and I was not going to be held accountable for things I could not or should not control. I'll ask, and I'll ask the best way I know how, but ultimately they are accountable for their own choices.

When you set goals, keep in mind things you can actually accomplish. It is as equally stupid for me to set as a goal to be married by 31 December as it would be for the Washington Senators to win the National League pennant. I could find someone I desired to marry perhaps and ask her by that date, but ultimately she would have to say yes both to the proposal as well as to the officiator for me to reach that goal, and as such it's out of my control. As for the Senators, in 1901 they moved to Minnesota and were renamed the Minnesota Twins, and as such they cannot win a pennant because the team no longer exists.

Many people insist on imposing their will on others. In his speech Thursday, President Obama basically bossed Israel around, even though Israeli gains have been gained by conquest against aggressor actions by its neighbors. I'm glad nobody ever did that to our nation, or else I might be living in an extension of Russia or Spain for all I know. Telling small children they cannot have a treat or must come along is one thing. Telling an adult what they must do, particularly if they are not part of your stewardship or 'flock' is quite another.

Agency is one of the most precious things we have. James Talmadge in his book "Jesus the Christ" calls it one of our primary and unalienable rights. It is how everything hinges for us in this choose-your-own-adventure of life, but unlike the books of that type from our youth, because of Jesus Christ, we can change our minds, go back, and try another path if we discover we're on a path that eventually leads to dragons, dungeons or destruction. Even that is our choice. He stands at the door and knocks. He will never kick it open.

I love this painting by William Holman Hunt, 1827-1910, called Light of the World. Notice that there is no doorknob on Christ's side of the door, which means that the only way he can get in is if you let him in.

You must choose wisely. However you choose, the choice is up to you.

Manipulative Ads With Children

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Wednesday night at my parents house, I caught an advertisement with which I took exception. It featured a series of small children, who were clearly prompted in what to say, complaining about the proposed budget cuts. "How could you cut teachers so that companies can continue to keep their money?" one of them asked. That is a crying shame and a manipulation of children.

One of the strangest things about this is the premise. Cut the companies to educate us, so that when we graduate there won't be any companies to hire us because they won't have any money. I'm also fairsure the children or their parents were compensated, which means in essence they sold their children and sold out their children to make a little money right now.

Interestingly enough, the Clark County School Board, which manages education where I live, voted unanimously this week to cut 1000 teacher positions. When you look at the numbers, the net effect is to increase class size by three students. Strangely to me, there were 1800 positions cut, 1000 of which were teacher positions. How many administrators were cut?

Many of the administrators don't belong. When I was in High School, ironically enough in this same school district, they showed me just how useless and backwards the process was for administrators. After my US History teacher showed us the movie "Glory", which is Rated-R, to a class full of 15-16 year old kids without notifying our parents or asking them if they were ok with it, I complained. He was promoted to dean. Now, that's maybe not what happened, but that's what I saw as a teenager. Conversely, my AP Calculus and AP Composition teachers, who were absolutely stellar individuals, were both denied their applications into administration. There is also a dean over at Rancho HS in charge of discipline who looks like a tatooed thug. Him I have seen with my own eyes, and how can a man who cannot discipline himself be an example of discipline for the miscreants in his school?

For many of the young people, this is a null sum game. They see there is a finite amount of money in the world, but they bicker and whine if we apply the bell curve to them. Surely a 92% cannot be a D in a class of brainiacs! It is if there is a limited supply of A grades to assign! That was the case in my Organic Chemistry Lab- the professor gave only one of the 18 of us an A, but by the time we got halfway through the year, I was willing to accept anything as long as I didn't have to retake it.

For these people the world is flat. They require companies to 'take one for the team' but are not willing to do so. These fat men in tall hats are those General Buford mused at Gettysburg would talk about how valiant Meade's failed charge would be if Meade didn't take the high ground. It's ok to redistribute as long as it's not their loss. Don't believe me? Watch this video:

They worked hard for their grades. People work hard for their money. Maybe you don't think it's hard work, but you don't really know that do you. Watch Dirty Jobs or Undercover Boss and you'll see how hard some of these people really do work. They earned their money because someone decided it was worth that much to hire them.

Contrary to the children's pleas I mentioned earlier, scholarship and school learning will not collapse if we cut money. The solution is always money for these folks. Learning hasn't really been occuring in schools for years. I am what I am in spite of the Clark County School District, and not because of it. I had engaged and empowered teachers, involved parents, and internal discipline. You simply can't force people to learn who do not value it, no matter how much money you throw at them or how many No Child Left Behind laws you pass. You are holding people accountable for affairs of agency in other people. That never works.

Comparison Makes Us Proud

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Thanks to an ongoing discussion with a friend at church, I have been chewing on the phrase "I'm proud of you" for a while now. As a matter of semantics, there are those who argue that there is a good way to be proud. I am not sure I agree.

On the way to work this morning, a woman cut me off while she sped in a 25mph zone just before we caught up to traffic at a red light. Naturally, I noticed and paid attention to her bumper sticker, which proclaimed her pride at some scholastic accomplishment of her middle school age child. This kind of pride is the reason why pride is bad. It was not enough that her child succeeded. She needed everyone to know that her child was better than others.

CS Lewis wrote that pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. It was only when this woman compared her child to those of all other parents that its achievements mattered. My parents were pleased with our accomplishments, but they were never so proud as to plaster their cars with asinine bumper stickers that are no longer valid in a few years when we moved to the next higher school level.

When I was a student, I was frequently embarassed by my grades. It wasn't that I earned poor marks, because I went all through school with a very lofty GPA. What embarassed me was when professors and teachers drew attention to me. It set up enmity between me and my fellows, not that I was mad at them but that they loathed me. I truly desired to do well, I just preferred to keep it to myself.

I am not one of the type of people who likes to talk about what he has accomplished. Frequently, I do things and keep them secret as long as possible because I do not want the attention. I compare my present self with my self of yesterday and determine if I am making progress compared to who I was and not compared to other people. I don't have a brag book or a "yay, me" wall, and although I have a folder full of recommendation letters received over the last decade or so, it's secure in a box on the floor of the library in the loft where I can find it if I need it but where nobody else is likely to look.

People think they are better than other people because on comparison they appear to be so. Truth is however that we don't know anything about them. Many people are not doing as well as they lead us to believe and many people are better of than we might think at passing glance. Most of the best moralists and entrepreneurs look more like the meek of the earth than the most successful of men. After the final accounting it really doesn't matter if you are better than someone else, because we're all reduced to the lowest common denominator at death. What really matters is that you are a better person today than you were yesterday. That's the only comparison that really matters.

If you use the stickers, post your accomplishments, or talk incessantly about the great things you or your family have done, that's great. Talk about it with the people you admire and of whom you are 'proud' because of what they do and not for how it makes you look. Maybe that will incentivize them to continue to achieve, and that's the only context of which I am aware in which they are appropriate topics of conversation. Do your loved ones know you admire them in any other way than that you hang bumper stickers and plaques on your cars or walls? Tell them, but not as a means to lift you as much as a means to uplift them.

Let God himself be the example of conversation:

And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. --Matthew 3:17

His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord. --Matthew 25:21

Pioneer People

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I find it slightly odd that so many people of my Faith can track, with pride, their family lines back to pioneer stock. Many of our ancestors, including some of my own, traversed the North American continent without much preparation, guidance, or knowledge of what awaited them. Until Brigham Young left Nauvoo, IL, in 1846, not many people had seen much of the Midwest or the West of what is now the United States, and most of those who had were solitary survivalists who advised any who considered the attempt to stay out of the West. In fact, legend has it that Jim Bridger offered Brigham Young $1000 in gold for the first bushel of wheat from the Salt Lake Valley.

Over the past several years, I have been privileged to visit several of the more fundamentally important sites along what would eventually be the overland route. I have been to Donner Pass, seen where the Hastings Cutoff meets the Pony Express Route, walked between the ruts of the Oregon Trail in central Idaho, and stood aside the Sweetwater outside Devil’s Gate. As I visit the sites, I consider the tenacity of the intrepid souls who walked thousands of miles without benefit of rest stops, restaurants, resupply, credit cards, cellular phones, cushioned seating, or even appropriate footwear, food, and firearms. They crossed thousands of miles of wilderness full of Indians, predatory animals, turbid weather, and rough terrain to eke out an existence in the barren alkali flats of the Great Basin where millions of people live and thrive today.

While we honor their memories, frequently we do not remember them. Many of the women I meet proudly talk of their pioneer progenitors while they themselves cannot sew, cook, clean, or accomplish any of the things those women did, let alone walk barefoot carrying a sick child in the August heat or October rain. Many of them would perish quickly on the prairie or plain, even the ones who have hauled an empty handcart a few hundred yards within view of the highways that now traverse the Wyoming landscape. They are frequently proud of their ancestors, not for the ancestors, but because they believe it imbues them with some inherent strengths and abilities they do not visually exhibit or offer. Some of them talk about how much they want to marry a cowboy, as long as he’s rich. Some of them talk about how they want a man who can build things and then date guys who have never built a blessed thing in their life besides an appetite.

Where are the pioneer people? Among their most noble of attributes, the pioneer people, from the time of Moses until modern day, were the kind of people who moved on the Word of God. Even though the Israelites entered the Sinai in possession of more possessions than my pioneer progenitors, my ancestors had strengths worthy of veneration, in particular their faith. Like it or not, most people prefer safety and security to the animating contest of freedom. It’s why at least in part so many people who care about me worry about me, because I won’t sell my soul for admission to any society. People who care about you, and people who think they care about you, will try to dissuade you 'for your good', but I just can't live at peace with things that are not right. God knows this, and maybe He intends to use it, because I'm certainly not someone who values a little temporary security over what is right

Pioneer people venture forth. It’s that spirit that led us into the west, into space, into the last frontier as well as what Roddenberry called the “Final Frontier”. Pioneer people go where others refuse to venture. They face the dangers, and some of them conquer them. Yet, where are the people who would get behind someone who steadfastly does what is right regardless of consequence, and where are those who would get up if God so commanded and move?

Maybe you know someone who claims they would. Maybe sometimes you are yourself one who does. How frequently you move on the word of God or in the direction of Truth determines, at least in part, the strength of your pioneer spirit.

Come, come, ye Saints, no toil nor labor fear, but with joy wend your way. Though hard to you, this journey may appear, grace shall be as your day. And should we die before our journey’s through, happy day, all is well. We then are free, from toil and sorrow too. With the Just we shall dwell (Text by William Clayton in Hymns by the Corporation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1985, Number 30, written in 1846).

I am grateful for pioneer progenitors. When I walk along the trail, I hear their voices. When I see their graves, I read their names. When I think on their lives, I remember the lessons of faith, discipline, and tenacity that they taught me. It is why a friend of mine told me in December 2009 that “your discipline is your strength”. It was also theirs.

Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and the fullness of my intent is that I may persuade my brethren to come to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and be saved. That is my legacy of faith, and those prophets are my pioneer people.

He Was From Samaria...

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While out for lunch today, I made a stop by the post office to fetch a package from Hong Kong that they refuse to deliver without a signature. As I pulled up to the station, I saw a single other car in the parking lot with its hood up while a man checked underneath it. After exiting my car, I asked him if he was ok. He told me to go ahead with my business and then asked for a jump when I was done. I asked him if he had cables, and he got situated while I went after my mail.

We tried to start his car, but it wasn't his battery. It sounds like it's a starter issue. He thanked me for my help and told me he'd call his cousin or something to come pick him up. The entire time, his wife stayed in the car and didn't make eye contact. By then, other people had pulled into the parking lot, but none of them came anywhere close to the man or me as I worked myself back into a position to exit the parking lot since I had pulled up perpendicular to him.

I think the man was surprised I had offered to help him at all. I think the other people who arrived were surprised he was even talking to me. The man's primary language was Spanish, and my primary ancestry is GB&I, and we aren't usually known for being the closest of friends. On top of that, when I exited my vehicle, I was dressed in my Harley Leather Jacket. Pretty much everywhere I go, that's enough for people to give me a wide berth.

A certain man, traveling the road from Jerusalem fell among thieves. They were evil men who robbed and beat him and left hm for dead. Two walked past, but the third helped the stranger. What was one of the most important details in the story is that the man who helped was from Samaria, in other words, the least likely person statistically and culturally to offer help.

For the better part of two years now, I have been involved with members of a Harley Christian Motorcycle Ministry. Among their number I have surprisingly discovered some of the most helpful, thoughtful, and Christian of people I have ever encountered. They don't look like it perhaps, but those we might think least likely to assist other people are frequently the first to actually do so.

The Good Neighbor was from Samaria. He was of different beliefs, values and norms, but he was able and he was available.

About a year ago, I spoke with a man I respect about a project he started to help other people. I decided to never be too busy to stop and check if people need help. Frequently, there is nothing I can do or nothing they need by the time I arrive, but I think people at least appreciate the thought, even if I am from what would be Samaria to them.

"God does notice us, and He watches over us. But it is usually through another person that he meets our needs." --Spencer W. Kimball

God is Possible

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According to Stephen Hawking, God is a fairy tale. This illustrious and renowned scientist who once wrote in his 'brief history of time' (a book I have never even been slightly motivated to read) that God might be the answer now declares God to be a complete fairy tale. As Mr. Hawking gets older, he sounds less scientific and more pedagogic.

In almost any other time, Mr. Hawking would have amounted to very little. In another time, none of us would know what he thought because nobody would have gone to any trouble to keep alive a man who cannot move under his own power. I find it odd that a man whose own life is made possible by a world in which it was once thought impossible for man to fly, circumnavigate the globe, walk on the moon, and survive if they could not move under their own power is so quick to label something as impossible. That's certainly not scientific, nor is it wise, especially given what he purportedly knows about the world in which he lives.

Everything is impossible until it's been accomplished. Then we take it for granted. During my own lifetime, we have accomplished things that were once taken for granted as impossible to man. In fact, man's very existence, let alone Mr. Hawking's contribution to the story of man, is quite mathematically improbable. Yet, he exists, and so do we, or we don't, in which case it doesn't matter what any of us say or think.

God is possible. Other smart men have pondered that, when you strip away the probabable, whatever else remains, however improbable, just might be the truth. Men have made progress by challenging the premise. Sometimes they met their untimely end. Sometimes they didn't which is the only reason why Mr. Hawking has not yet met his. You cannot prove or disprove God. Science and faith use two different modes to arrive at and explain the things of their world.

I find it to be one of the highest crimes any man can commit to attempt to destroy the faith of another person. Mr. Hawking runs that risk with this statement, but I don't think he really cares. He is more interested in being right than in what is right. No matter what you believe, the truth remains. It is not affected by opinions, perturbations, trends, experiments, or the puny efforts of man. The ways in which we seem to conquer are because we have learned the laws by which nature behaves and availed ourselves of them. Who knows what we'll know tomorrow for sure? Who knows how far we'll go? How might our world be different if Columbus had listened to a man like Hawking? Seriously, this is just very sad. Jesus wept.

Friday Fail Funny

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I just had to share this, because it was hilarious.

The student scored an 'F' because all of the questions were True/False, and he didn't even bother to read the test or notice that, thinking to get 25% of the questions correct by random choice. This next one comes from my own mind and Facebook status today:

Have a GREAT Weekend!

If Angels Governed Men...

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One of the biggest problems I see in politics today is that the men who occupy positions of authority are their own favorite constituent, beneficent and beneficiary. They are willing to trade everything that is good about this society for a little temporary and personally elevating electoral success. They travel around the country working their own legacy, telling half truths and whole lies, demagoguing, to get better conditions for themselves at your expense and on your back.

America hungers for men of principle. When he made his tour of America in the 19th Century, Alexis de Tocqueville said that "America is great because she is good, and if she ever ceases to be good she will cease to be great." There are good men among us. They don't run for reasons already discussed. I'm not saying that they are perfect, but the better the man the lower the propensity that he will be subverted by power. Men, jealous of others for what they lack, are prone to abuse their power to equilibrate their state with their neighbors or to take what they lack by force. That's really what "redistribution of wealth" is about, throwing cash around as if it were theirs to toss.

Shortly after the Columbine Massacre, Darrell Scott wrote the following poem:

Your laws ignore our deepest needs,
Your words are empty air,
You've stripped away our heritage,
You've outlawed simple prayer,
Now gunshots fill our classrooms,
and precious children die,
You seek for answers everywhere,
And ask the question,"Why?"
You regulate restrictive laws,
through legislative creed,
and yet you fail to understand,
that God is what we need!

America is great because she is good. Her strength is not in her glistening towers or stately skylines, in its majestic landscapes or sophisticated weaponry. America's strength is not in the barbecues and ribbons that adorn our holidays but in the ascending chorus of patriotic songs that pay homage to God and Country and the smiles on the faces of children and families together at play. America isn't in the boats or the cabins to which we retreat from the rigors or work but in the conversation and joy that attends a quiet Sunday afternoon spent sipping lemonade with neighbors or dear family members. As Detoqueville wrote, America's strength was in her churches, in the morality or at least the attempts to be moral and religious of her people. James Madison tells us that the Constitution was written to govern a moral and religious people and is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

God is what we need. America has enjoyed the protections of the Almighty since its first days of infancy. Washington called the preservation of his army "little short of a standing miracle". The promise has been written to us that as long as we keep the Commandments of God (not even the higher law- just keeping the basic commandments might be enough!), we will prosper, be kept from all other nations, and be safe forever. It is something on which we must unite.

Just as a bundle of sticks are more difficult to break than a single one, unified purpose and principles made America strong. While we may focus on singular events, ideas, or men, in general there has been a homogeneity of basic values and value in this nation since the time of its founding. Without a Quaker sensibility and a Puritan ideology, America would have been a very different place. It would have been Europe. Said Benjamin Franklin after the signing of the Declaration of Independence: "We must hang together, gentlemen...else, we shall most assuredly hang separately."

There are no angels to govern mortals, and there will never be. There are no paragons on the ballot, and there never will be. If you are better than the candidates as presently constituted, get on the ballot. If not, elect the best person of principle you can get. The people crave a leader of principle, as much an angel among men as any man is capable in this day. You can be an angel to other people if you will be true to yourself and your values. If you would be truly free, govern yourselves and elect those who do likewise.

Distill it Down

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I scored an "F" in college only one time I can recall. My teacher expressly asked for a 3-5 page paper, and I got so into it, that I turned in one that was more than seven pages long. Naturally, my professor didn't want to read all that extra work, and since I had not followed instructions rightfully issued me an 'F'.

People talk an awful lot. They go on and on making much ado about nothing. I had another professor who, although this never impacted me, took off points for nonsense, commonly referred to as "BS". What do you really want us to know? What is the bottom line? What do you want us to take home from this and actually use?

After the things I have read and studied, I could probably go on all day until your eyes glaze over. Many of the things I can discuss have a specific jargon. Some of the other professors and I have discussed how difficult it is sometimes to distill things down for the students to what they actually need at the level they currently occupy. We know a lot of unnecessary details, and sometimes it's hard to know where exactly to draw the line in detail, where they know enough.

Naturally, people complain. They want to know things they can use. Students want to know what they can regurgitate for the test. People are taught too often to answer questions rather than to solve problems, and it manifests at every level of civilized society. When I meet with students individually to answer questions, I point out that there are easy ways to focus your efforts, your study, and your time, but it doesn't seem like anyone has taught them this. There are usually a few (frequently, it's exactly three) salient points from which all the other details flow, and if you can pin those down and point them out, people will remember.

People apply only what they remember. They remember most frequently the bottom line. Keep it short, keep it simple, and keep it relevant. If it's about you, they won't care, and if it won't help them, they won't use it. Frequently, it can help them.  If only we always had an incorporeal voice from an old mentor to whisper in our ear to remember what we know.  Until then, distill it down.  They can handle it.

Secure the Border

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Security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expence and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others. --Thomas Paine

I caught word yesterday just before I left work that CBP has unearthed several tunnels across the border near Nogales THROUGH SOLID ROCK through which Mexicans are smuggling drugs. As the Supreme Court strikes down Arizonas laws and Obama gears up to cater to the illegal alien vote with a new amnesty push, that this story even came out says a lot (of course it also came out over in the UK, so the link should be good for a long while).

One of my highest priorities would be to secure the sovereignty and security of this nation. I would give DHS the power to enforce the laws and protect our borders. I would get the fences built and send the manpower and equipment necessary to prevent this kind of thing from happening, since the North Koreans have previously used this tunnel technique as a precursor for invasion (ground penetrating radar, anyone?). Now terrorists can enter the country more easily than ever- just pose as drug mules and go through these tunnels.

Yes, I said tunnels. There are probably more because they've found several already. Mexico will not police its border and ask its people to obey their laws. Obama will not allow states to do so. Since when did states lose their sovereignty? The Ax boasts itself against him who heweth therewith. We are not safe, and therefore this government is derelict in its duty. I cannot rely on this government to secure our security or sovereignty. Find statesmen who will.

It's Enough

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From time to time, I will pause before answering when people ask me how I am. If you're ignorant of some of the issues going on in my life, suffice it to say that I have problems same as you, similar in substance though they may differ at sidewalk level. When I am asked on the spur of the moment to take stock of the situation, the things that most quickly jump to the forefront of my mind are the things that weigh on my mind. I suspect that is true for most of you as well, that the problems and concerns are the first things of which you think. Naturally, I am tempted to focus on them.

Last night, while I was trying to figure out what to do, I turned on an episode from a show I liked while I cleaned the kitchen floor, the fridge, and the sink. At the end of the episode, when I was paying attention, the lead character told one of the others that he was acting nice because he had a good day. The other character said, "You've been chased by the law, shot at, harbored known fugitives, and you call that a good day?"

The lead said, "I still have my ship."

"That's not much."

"It's enough."

A few months back, I ordered an old Spanish Thaler off the internet. You might know them as "pieces of eight", because the eight pieces are eight fragments of a Spanish Thaler, or "Dollar" from which our currency in America originally sprang. I cut it into eight pieces and mounted it in a display on the wall. The eight pieces represent the eight categories of total wellness, of which I have had seven for a very long time. Several times in the last week or so, when I've felt especially down, I have looked at it and realized that to have 7 of 8 is really a great deal.

Today, there are people who are far worse off than we. I am grateful I do not live in the Mississippi delta, where flooding threatens total destruction. I am grateful I do not live near Fukoshima, where the earthquake shifted the land enough that the cities now flood with the rising tides. I didn't die in a mine accident in Idaho, and I wasn't visited by Seal Team 6 last night. Life is pretty good.

I'm not really sure anyone has all eight pieces. What I do know is that the people who have only the one I lack would desperately like a few more, and that to get that one, in some cases I might have to sacrifice some of the others. I may not have what I like, but I like what I have and that I have something to like. And that's enough.

I leave you with a song from Irving Berlin's "Holiday Inn"

http://youtu.be/Gn-X0EucLT0

Song starts at 2:05 in this clip and runs through 3:11

It's easier to focus on the things at the front of our minds. Instead of focusing on what I lack, I work to keep my focus on what really is. Besides, I know that many people appear to have it all, but they're like ducks on the pond- calm and collected on the surface, but paddling like mad beneath it. Truth is, no matter what's going on at this particular moment, we have this moment, and that there have been and may yet be many more, a significant number of which will be sweet, and that will be enough.

South and Secession

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I think the firebrands of the South, much as I agree with their arguments and love their energy, jumped the gun when they decided to secede. They claim kinship with the events that precipitated the events of the Revolution without acknowledging that the Founding Fathers agreed to armed conflict and rebellion only after all other efforts had been exhausted. I do not know much about the arguments of Southern politicians, except for how it is attributed to James Kemper that Virginia should be ruled by Virginians, not by some president in Washington. The events that led up to 1776 were a long road of more than a century in the making from the Townshend, Stamp, and Intolerable Acts to impressments, quartering of soldiers, and military governors in the colonies. None of those things were imposed upon the South, and the South did not go to the same lengths to redress its grievances as did the Founders.

Generations passed before secession began. As the Founding Fathers died out, Adams and Jefferson in 1826 on the same day, and Charles Carroll, who was the last of the signers of the Declaration of Independence to die in 1832, a new breed of politician rose to authority to which the events of 1776 were alien. They, like so many in our day, ignored the Declaration, which lays out the rationale for separation from Great Britain, and opted out of the Union under the Constitution. This causes two problems. First of all, if contracts can be terminated at will because one side is unhappy, what meaning does the contract have, and how is the Constitution better than the Articles of Confederation? Secondly, the South was not subject to the same list of “abuses and usurpations” for so long a time without redress at all as those to which the colonies before them had been subject. They weren’t forced to give up slavery and were allowed to insist that admission of states had to keep the balance, neither of which is in the Constitution. Yes, there may have been some politicking by northern politicians, and if Stephen Douglass was representative of the average northerner, then I can understand their misgivings. That does not excuse the speed of their sedition.

That being said, I think the South’s premise was correct and noble. The Constitution clearly lays out the argument that the States gave birth to the Federal Government. Creatures do not boast themselves over the Creator without causing backlash, and yet 150 years ago, they were aware that the same proclivity to impose the will of some on others without their consent loomed on the horizon. The States were supreme, and yet the federal government was interfering in their affairs. If a state wants to allow slavery within its boundaries, that is up to the state, until and unless the Constitution expressly forbids it. I am not sure that they were justified to force territories to become slave or free or establish a Mason-Dixon line or bribe Nevada with incentives to come in as a free state. It is also clearly not in the power of the Federal Government after admission of a state to forbid the state to subsequently change its mind. Otherwise, same sex marriage would never have been permitted, especially in Massachusetts, which was once a Puritan haven. Yet, apparently the intellectuals and elitists were at work then as they are now, for if it’s conservative, Constitutional, and moral, it’s subject to change, but once Liberals have their way, it’s immutable and unmercurial forever and ever amen.

Had I been alive back then, I would have argued as vehemently for State sovereignty as I do today. I happen to believe that many things are immoral, unethical, and down right stupid. However, I also understand that the Constitution was expressly written to forbid a few from imposing their will on everyone everywhere within the Union. If I am not allowed to do something by the Constitution, it doesn’t matter if I think it ought to be a federal law. I haven’t the right to meddle in their minds, their lives, their homes, and their decisions. Yet, here they have swooped back again to the belief that they can FORCE men to be better against their will and their morals. I am glad slavery ended so many generations ago, and I am upset it took so long to end such a salacious practice, but the manner in which it was ended was not true to Constitutional principles as I understand them. Of course, neither was secession. If you think it ought to apply to everyone, you amend the Constitution and have the people expressly authorize you to exercise that authority.

It’s just easier for liberals to use the courts, the bureaucracy, and executive fiat or for reactionaries to rebel. Sedition and rebellion are unbecoming of people who have not gone at least as far as the Founding Fathers to seek another solution. If you are going to hearken back to their memory, emulate them in semblance as well as substance. God will not support such sedition or reactionary rebellion. Virginia should indeed be ruled by Virginians as Nevada should be ruled by Nevadans, and it’s time we remind the Federal politicians once more that they work for us and not we for them.

Real Concerns; Real Solutions

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Most of the questions people will ask in a campaign revolve around their immediate relief. I have noticed as they continually stir up stress among us about paycuts, layoffs and the like how so many of my coworkers are worried because their outcomes match their incomes now and how as their wages drop prices will rise. They have real concerns. They worry about their jobs, their homes, their budgets, their futures, and they are looking for someone who offers them a solution. The trouble is that all of the politicians are trying to invent a magic pill that takes effect well enough or long enough to get them elected rather than a long term plan to alleviate and minimize the impact or frequency of similar perturbations in the future. That allows them to kick the ball just far enough ahead of them that they are secure because you continue to need them.

People want answers. They also really want the truth. Sure, some of them can’t really handle it, or at least they don’t want to face it, but if you know the long term plan and outlook, you can make better decisions. So, I will give you the truth, even if it doesn’t work out so well for me, because I’m not telling you the truth because it helps me as much as I’m giving you the truth so that what you do actually responds to what the problems really are.

I do not think there are any short-term solutions to the current crisis. When you finally manifest signs of a cold, you have actually been sick for quite some time. Just as the virus invades you far before you show symptoms, the causes that created the economic, political, and moral problems we see today started years ago, perhaps before I was born. Any politician who tells you that the worst is over or who offers an easy fix is as disingenuous as any snake oil salesman of yore. Those who endure a hurricane know that the eye of the storm is only deceptively calm, and that the gale will return in full force after a brief respite and bring more ruin. Things may get worse before they can get better, assuming that we finally have the guts to do what should have been done in the first place. If you are a week away from foreclosure or a layoff or bankruptcy, there is nothing the government can do that it should do to stop that. What I propose is not to place a band aid on a serious flesh wound and tell you that you’re going to be ok. I am not going to stand around you while you slowly die and lie to you. Removal of this cancer requires a serious kind of surgery, and the healing must start with a cut.

The choice is yours. Are you willing to trade short term security for long term prosperity or is what you need today so dear that you will gamble with the future? Are you willing to trade a little of what you have so that your children can live a better life, or is your interest better than theirs? This really will hurt me too, but I urge you to have eyes to see, to imagine, and to perceive the possibilities. America is the greatest country ever on the face of the earth, and we can have so much more prosperity and happiness and peace than we have now if we do what we ought. Let Obama, Reid, and the like sell placebos if they like while we do what has been demonstrated to work for one and all in every generation of time. Let us now apply liberty.

Dimensional Perspective

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I really like this particular cartoon from the webcomic xkcd, to which I am linked by a cousin from time to time. It shows what could be extrapolated to us about higher intelligences than we, and shows the folly of concluding that just because we can't find it that it must not exist.

The limit of science is in the mind of those who design its experiments. People must first be able to conceive of a way to investigate a question and secondly devise a means with which to detect what they wish to measure. Frequently, as the ants, we use what we know, our 'common types of pheromones', and finding nothing conclude that it must not exist. As I told my students a few Fridays ago, frequently the outliers are the most interesting subjects for future study.

We don't investigate thoroughly enough. Partly, this is practical. It's exhaustive to use every technique and standard of which we know. It's also extremely expensive to run some of the machines available to us. Furthermore, graduate students want to graduate, and so they are disinclined to stay in school earning $20,000/year to boost the resume of their professors for year after year after year. Yet, we often ignore the things that are most important or that might be most important to a specific individual.

For years and years, I heard talk about how most of our genome was 'junk' DNA. As I studied and investigated in graduate school myself, I learned that most of it is necessary for the scaffold of use. God went to a great deal of trouble to built this intricate scaffold to make sure that things were activated when appropriate to the appropriate levels and in the appropriate context/tissue/event. What we once ignored is now a central focus of investigatory research. What might be more immediately visible is how when scientists pointed the Hubble at the darkest part of the night sky, they found tons and tons of galaxies in a part of space that previously went completely ignored.

If there is a God, or anything else between him and us intellectually and maturationally speaking, and I know this to be true, it could easily obscure its existence from us if it chose. What is perhaps more interesting is that God sometimes does communicate his presence to us, and how, because it is often to people or in ways that make very little sense to us. That our science hasn't found him is our fault. God isn't dead, we're just looking for him in ways that are not common to us both.

I believe in God as I believe in the noon-day sun, not that I can see it, but that by it I can see everything. --CS Lewis

Daniel, Don Quixote, and Doug

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We hear a lot about people with guts lately. Sometimes it's about theorizing, sometimes it's about true grit under fire, and sometimes it's about standing your ground. Among my heroes include a series of literary figures who did what they thought was right to make the world a better place despite fierce opposition from the organization. In fact, it seems that most heirarchies venerate the status quo over the way things out to be, and if you disagree, well, sometimes they throw you to the lions.

That's exactly what happened to Daniel. Despite being the king's most trusted confidant, and despite what I can only assume Darius knew about his religious worship, continued to worship according to the dictates of his own conscience. According to the Biblical account of the same name, Daniel's punishment worried Darius, who was pleasantly relieved to discover his friend safe. He stood on and for principle, even though he wasn't going to be rewarded by man for his stand.

Similarly, the Cervantes character Don Quixote awoke one morning and went out questing. When Dulcinera questions the sanity of his quest, pointing out specifically that he cannot win, Don Quixote points out that it's not about winning- it's about doing what ought to be done. Of course, when you go out to tilt at windmills, you need to be ready to be unhorsed periodically, but in the end, he won the hearts of the woman he rescued and his faithful Sancho Panza.

Courage in principles means standing for something. It might mean standing for something even though it will hurt you or standing for something even though man isn't going to like it. I am frequently a thorn in the side of people who favor those who brown nose them and validate their worth and ideals. Years ago, I decided to follow the opinion of Captain Picard and be damned for what I really was. If it's a Catch-22, then at least I was true to myself. More often than not, I have nothing to gain from standing by my principles except that I believe they are correct. Whose principles am I supposed to live? Whose ideas am I supposed to express? They are valuable to me, and I will not sell them for money, or fame, or vocational opportunities. That's the major reason why everyone on the planet who truly dislikes me does so, because I stood in their way and had nothing to gain.

People frequently ask why anyone would get involved in a fight for something that brings no rewards, especially if they don't think the fight can be won. I think any fight can be won. Sometimes you need a Princeton or a Trenton to make headway, but I don't subscribe to surrender until there is no other option. At the end of the day, I have to live with myself, and I feel that abandoning your principles is akin to abandoning yourself, that if I do not support my own principles, even if I'm not directly involved or benefitted, I in essence betray myself. It's ok to be your own best friend and fan.

The world will be better for the battered and bruised man who strives with his last ounce of courage to reach the unreachable star. Even if you aim for the stars and land on the moon, they say, you have still gone higher than most denizens of the earth ever dreamed. Also, as GK Chesterton was wont to lament, what's wrong with the world is that we do not ask what is right. We are more concerned with what is than with what ought to be. That's not my modus opperandi, and that's why Daniel, Don Quixote, Thomas More, and scores of other people have earned a place in my heart. Whether they won, they fought the good fight, finished their course, and kept their faith. Be true. That's the rarest and most valuable commodity of which I am aware in the universe.

Always Makes Me Smile

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Tenure Trap

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I've never been a big fan of tenure. I understand the premise behind it, to help encourage teachers to stay and provide them with job security. I am not sure it's anything more than a two-edged sword, not because of the intent, but because of how the people who seek it apply it in their own lives.

Tenure can punish students. Imagine a world where all the teachers have tenure. Imagine that all of those teachers are not very good at their jobs. Imagine what that will do for the students, their egoes, their tuition, and their futures.

Tenure can punish teachers. Once you have tenure, it can be very tempting to stay somewhere even if it's bad for you. After all, tenure can be difficult to obtain, and if you lose it by moving to another institution, that might prevent you from doing something better for yourself.

People like to think tenure is a magic pill to cure the ills of our educational malaise. Yes, it is true that teachers move around under other conditions, and so you may always have your teachers in a learning curve. Considering that the students are also always learning, why do we assume that keeping teachers in a learning mode is bad? It has promising possibilities to those who are inclined to avail themselves of the opportunity and necessity of continuing education.

Tenure, like most things created by man, can be good and useful. It depends on the people involved in its use- those who grant it, those who gain it, and those who are influenced by it (students primarily). Yeah, I like that conclusion, that it depends, which is true of so many things up for discussion. In any case, I hope that when I'm far closer to retirement that I retain the excitement, engagement, and proclivity to investment in the success and lives of my students as I have today. I know it's possible, because some of my coworkers managed it, and they are those I most admire. Time will tell.

Quotes, Attribution, and the Internet

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Over the past few days, I saw many people post a fake quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. It was proven false today when compared to what he actually said. One of my favorite responses to that news story is this comment:

"The problem with quotes found on the internet is you have no way of confirming their authenticity." - Abraham Lincoln

Naturally, Lincoln could not have said this because there was no internet, and yet because of the appeal to authority in the name, people will frequently pass around lies. People will believe a lie because they want it to be true or because they think it might actually be true. In that case, it's better to just take credit for it yourself.

Ask my students and my friends and you will discover that I am a frequent critic of the internet as a source of information. Particularly sites like Wikipedia, which is famous in that almost anyone can edit its articles with the ruderal quisquilia that catches the eye and ensnares the mind, attract my disgust. No less deserving of disdain is Google, which often lists results not for relevancy but as part of its corporate strategy, i.e., you may pay to move your search result nearer the top.

Over the past year or so, I have been able to show that many quotes attributed to famous people are things they never said. Many people quote them as conveniences to give their claims credence. In truth, the person may have said something that validates you, but it's easier to just slap some famous person behind your own thoughts and create a celebrity endorsement than to read the Wit and Wisdom of Lincoln or the complete works of Thomas Jefferson and find out what they actually said.

Even more interesting sometimes are things they said that go unquoted. In his article in the May 2010 issue of Imprimis, Charles Kesler points out that liberals latch onto both Chief Justice Roger Taney as well as Abraham Lincoln when it suits them, forgetting that they had distinctly different opinions in the Dred Scott Decision. Fortunately for me, and in a way that is somewhat of a mystery as to how, I have a copy of Lincoln's reaction to Dred Scott, printed in 1902, and so I know better. Obama likes to compare himself to Lincoln, but in terms of his social policy, they couldn't be more different in the context of that legal opinion.

I take credit for what I say and do. Sometimes that gets me in trouble. However, it frees me from circumstances where people cannot document what they did or claim the record will show things they hope are true but didn't actually happen. Just because it's said doesn't make it true. Just think of the conflicting reports in the last few days as to what happened in the bin Laden capture. There was a firefight, a human shield, and a weapon, and now there was the opposite. The trouble is that the liars went to a great deal making up details about things that didn't happen and are very light on the salient points when it comes to detail.

Maybe it would behoove us to follow Obama's example and sleep on it when we hear something that elicits an emotional response. Then again, maybe he didn't say he was going to sleep on it either. Who knows? I'm not sure we'll ever know the truth, but I will keep looking, and I encourage you to do the same.