The Man Who Listened To Angels

The Gospel According to St. Luke:
18 Now the generation of Christ was in this wise. When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child, of the Holy Ghost. 19 Whereupon Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing publicly to expose her, was minded to put her away privately. 20 But while he thought on these things, behold the angel of the Lord appeared to him in his sleep, saying: Joseph, son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived in her, is of the Holy Ghost. 21 And she shall bring forth a son: and thou shalt call his name JESUS. For he shall save his people from their sins. 22 Now all this was done that it might be fulfilled which the Lord spoke by the prophet, saying: 23 Behold a virgin shall be with child, and bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us. 24 And Joseph rising up from sleep, did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him, and took unto him his wife. 25 And he knew her not till she brought forth her firstborn son: and he called his name JESUS.

The Gospel according to St. Matthew:
13 And after they [the Magi] were departed, behold an angel of the Lord appeared in sleep to Joseph, saying: Arise, and take the child and his mother, and fly into Egypt: and be there until I shall tell thee. For it will come to pass that Herod will seek the child to destroy him.

14 Who arose, and took the child and his mother by night, and retired into Egypt: and he was there until the death of Herod: 15 That it might be fulfilled which the Lord spoke by the prophet, saying: Out of Egypt have I called my son.

19 But when Herod was dead, behold an angel of the Lord appeared in sleep to Joseph in Egypt, 20 Saying: Arise, and take the child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel. For they are dead that sought the life of the child. 21 Who arose, and took the child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel. 22 But hearing that Archelaus reigned in Judea in the room of Herod his father, he was afraid to go thither: and being warned in sleep retired into the quarters of Galilee. 23 And coming he dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was said by prophets: That he shall be called a Nazarene. (Douay)

We all know that St Joseph was a good man. He was willing to take Mary as his wife even knowing she was pregnant by someone else. Gabriel, the archangel messenger who announced the Incarnation of God in Mary’s womb, reassured Joseph when he had his natural doubts. 

But, Joseph’s kindness, too, is evident in these brief Bible passages. Even though he considered divorcing her, it was easy for the angel to convince Joseph of her innocence and purity. Trusting in that angelic message, he kindly agreed to receive her.  Afterwards, he steadfastly cared for Mary as her pregnancy grew. When Augustus decreed a tax and declared that each person must register in the town of their birth, Joseph reluctantly took Mary on a long and dangerous trip to Bethlehem, even though she was very near term and about to give birth. It must have been difficult for him to see her discomfort on the trip and be so little able to do much about it.

After the miraculous Birth of Jesus in Bethlehem, Joseph was told to take Mary and the Babe to Egypt to escape Herod’s soldiers. The flight into Egypt was at least as nerve-wracking and uncomfortable as the trip to Bethlehem had been, but this time, it was also perilous, as they were as good as hunted. At any point Herod’s soldiers could have stopped the little family and murdered the Child in front of their eyes.  It is not much of a stretch to imagine the angels remaining with the family for the entire time of their life in Egypt.

As soon as Joseph heard from the angel that Herod was dead, and it was safe to return, he took his little family on another long journey. It is hard to imagine an earthly household at any point in history that was happier, more peaceful, and more loving that the little home in Nazareth behind the carpenter’s shop.

For us today, being like the heroic Joseph will mean trying to fill some very large shoes. Joseph is the patron of workers, fathers, husbands, and also symbolizes marital fidelity, chastity, and trust in God, especially trust for a peaceful death.

Well, THIS Is Sure A Relief!

A Lesson in Foot-Shooting

Seems like the left just can’t help themselves. They behave like amoebae…hell-bent on doing what they are programmed to do, in spite of any threat of danger, annihilation, or mutation. They get their marching orders, and they MARCH. Come hell or high water, they march, even if it means marching over a cliff in a spectacular suicide.

This time, Ben “Nighthorse” Nelson (didn’t he used to come to work in the Senate with his hair in long braids?) has been the lemming who couldn’t help himself. How many will rush to follow him over the precipice? He knows this is the end of his political career. Barring a massive fraud at the ballot box, this presumably pro-life senator just cost himself the next election. For the people he sold out, it will be a sweet victory, but the chances of replacing him with someone who is less likely to do what all the rest of them did for their 30 pieces of silver are pretty much problematic.

On the off chance that this Republic survives this horrific usurpation of power, in spite of the protestations of more than two thirds of the governed, I hope we, and turncoats like Nelson, will have learned our lesson. Selling one’s heritage for a mess of pottage has unintended consequences well into the future.

Kinda makes a feller wonder how those democrats can do all that marching with both feet shot off…

My Christmas Card To All Of You

May you all be blessed and encouraged this Christmas, and may Jesus make His home in your hearts. God Bless you!

More From Climategate

Thus, there is no credible, scientific support for the assertion that the earth has been unusually warming, or for the contention that such warming, if even occurring, is human-caused. None.

Oh, I love seeing this kind of stuff! The more we find out, the more we find out, somebody once said. It certainly is true in this case.

Of course, it IS going to mean that we should probably all start shopping in Woolrich and Sorel. (Maybe the “Alaskan Style” will become the new fashion benchmark!)

At any rate, life is going to get very interesting in the next few years, and a lot of people who believed we were about to burn to crispy cinders are going to learn some real-life lessons the hard way.

Their Lips Are Moving

“Q. How can you tell when a liberal is lying? “
“A. Simple. His lips are moving.” (old joke)

I just love the way we are suddenly finding out so much about the “real” motives of the left these days. If it’s not Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, or Bonnie Fwank, it’s Al Gore, the East Anglia CRU and the falsified data, ACORN, SEIUS, or our lily-white “Safe-Schools Czar,” etc. Now, there’s more coming to light about this administration’s real motives in forcing “health care” down the throats of Americans, Crap & Tax, and any number of interesting other little upshots. I don’t know what is causing all this exposure to daylight, but I like it!

The more desperately the liber, sorry…they like the term “progressive,” scurry around shouting, “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!” the more facts about their plans are revealed. Every day something new comes up.
Elitists are notoriously greedy. That’s why they are elitists, I think. If you want to know who really personifies the goals of their most recent push, look no further than George “Puppeteer” Soros. His excuse for raping the treasuries of the world? “If I don’t do it, somebody else will.”

That “redistribution” and “reparations” we used to hear about? It will be going to them. There will be a few little bones here and there thrown to the people they claim they want to “help.” But the truth is that they are all in this strictly for the money. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Affordable housing, or Countrywide Mortgage, etc).

It doesn’t seem to matter to these people that most of them are already incredibly wealthy (by hook or crook) in the first place. If there’s more out there, they aim to get as much of it as they can. That’s why they are so doggoned persistent. Any ideas we might have had of some starrty-eyed Utopian Grand Ideal they were struggling to serve can be forgotten. Just follow the money. No Grand Ideal here, unless “get all you can get while you can get it” can be construed as a Grand Ideal. How can we know they are lying about their motives? Simple. Just watch their lips.

Every time these people open their mouths, it’s to lie to us. First, they tell us there are no tax increases. Then, they tell us they are only raising our taxes and installing new laws that restrict our freedoms, all in the name of, “it’s for your own good!”

I hope they continue with this ruse, because every time they do it, more of the real truth gets revealed. Us little guys out here in flyover country love it when a smug progressive elitist intones his wonderful plans for everybody else’s money. (Didn’t I hear the current resident say testily today, “We’re paying the bills! Sit down and shut up!” ?) Excuse me? He’s paying the bills? Where’s he getting the money??

The internet and underground press have done wonders in exposing the true purposes, the real EVIL behind the motives of these “progressives” and their rhetoric.

Facts are stubborn things. The progressives’ new motto must be something like, “Who are you going to believe?? Me, or your lying eyes?” Like I said above, if their lips are moving…

We Woof You A Merry Christmas!

Christmas Decorations, Alaska-Style

This time of year, we have crystal clear skies that are such a deep blue they don’t look real. We get frigid temps (it was 1 degree F. when I took these). And we get fog. If it stays around for any length of time, it is frozen to the branches of the trees and becomes frosting like you see here. The combination is stunningly, breathtakingly gorgeous. Clicking on these pictures should give you a bigger and better view.

My back yard is a steep hillside, but it is still covered with trees, brush, and assorted vegetation. When it is covered in this glorious frosting, it takes my breath away. To get the tops of these lovely works of art, I almost have to aim my camera straight up. My little digital camera is nice, but my heart yearns for a DSLR. *(Note to Santa: A Canon, so I can use my Canon-mount 400mm telephoto, too.)

The Right’s “Alpha” Males

(I can’t believe I’m attaching a disclaimer here, but the fact is, I’m not a psychiatrist or a behaviorist, so what follows is only tongue-in-cheek fun. Please take it in that spirit.)

Why are there so many “Alpha” males in Conservative politics? (I know the answer. I’m asking you…) And, current resident excepted (a definite “Omega”), there are none who come to mind on the left. Help me out, if you can…

In the animal kingdom, Alphas are the males who get to mate. They sport the biggest antlers, horns, ruffs, and fluffiest tails, or brightest colors. Younger males challenge them, and almost always lose, because the Alphas are strong, smart, and determined.

Alpha men have wives who are feminine, attractive, and confident, and have smart, good-looking kids. Alphas aren’t afraid of hard work, are manly and physically strong, and confident enough that they don’t have to “prove” anything (good thing they aren’t Dall sheep, elk, or moose…) and have no problem being around other Alpha males. Only males trying to increase their status will challenge Alphas.

During the Bush 43 administration, the President had no problem with surrounding himself with men who were manly, decisive, intelligent, physically strong, and independent thinkers. (He chose smart, competent women, too, but that’s for a dfferent article.) Contrary to what the intelligentsia on the left would like to have you believe, GWB was a definite Alpha, which caused a lot of the BDS that was so evident. Low-status males like the men of the left were constantly feeling the need to challenge him, but the best they could manage was to call him names and accuse him of evil deeds. His Alpha status was strong enough that he didn’t even feel the need to respond.

The funny part is that although most of the Alpha men in Bush’s cabinet didn’t look like movie stars, they had fan clubs of starry-eyed women who followed online their every move, saved pictures of them, and felt the strange attraction that happens to women when they see their favorite Alpha male come into view:

The ladies felt feminine, and they couldn’t help but put it on display. They did feminine, things, like primping, blinking, smiling, and leaning toward the pictured Alpha they are unconsciously trying to “attract.” Even if it was only an image on their computer screen, these women felt a powerful attraction to the men portrayed. It’s the good old natural nature of things…

Who are these men? Off the top of my head, I can think of a few that have caused women on the Right to fan themselves:

George W. Bush

Donald Rumsfeld

Dick Cheney

Mark Levin

Rush Limbaugh

Increasing-in-staus John Stossel

Why John Stossel? He has recently left a far-left media outlet for FOX news, which will put him closer into the view of conservative women who will admire his manly good looks, his brains, and his projected potential strength.

And, the up-and-coming, soon to be most Alpha of them all?

Todd Palin

Why Todd Palin? Because he is married to the most attractive, magnetic woman in politics, he is a four-time winner of the Iron Dog snowmachine race, a gruelling 2,200 mile race across Alaskan wilderness on noisy, smelly, snowmachines. He’s manly. He’s good looking. Being married to a powerful woman hasn’t diminished his Alpha status. He is a good provider. Sarah doesn’t HAVE to work. Todd earns enough at his “regular” jobs to keep the family quite well (as long as jealous, vindictive people don’t try to sue her every time she gets up in the morning). He’s even had job experience. In Alaska, he was known as the “First Dude.”

Alphas don’t have to be gorgeous. They just have to have a quality of command, competence, integrity, and ability about them. They have to be confident and assertive. They are confident in their manhood, and comfortable with themselves, get along well with strong women. They are masculine, good “candidates” to father strong, handsome children. Even “bad boys” can be Alphas if they have the right positive qualities. They will be the “outlaws,” the cowboys, bikers, and hoods who have the same qualities listed above. Some Alpha’s just have to enter a room. (Smilin’ Bob, the Enzyte Man? :o) ) Sorry, all you Betas, Gammas, Deltas, etc…

Someday, maybe I’ll get around to trying to collect the names of the Alphas on the left, but so far, I haven’t seen anyone who quite fills the bill. Who would I choose? What’s his name, the current resident? No, he’s inept, smokes like a chimney, and not even the power of the office he holds can make him an Alpha. Rahm or Zeke Emanuel? Not just “no,” but “HELL, no!” Dingy, hairy Reid? LOLOL!! George Soros? Ye gods. Please… I’m sorry. Examples of real men on the left just don’t occur to anyone, even women.

Don’t blame the women. They can’t help themselves. They know what they know, and they don’t know how or why. Alphas rule. For some very good reasons.

Lusting For Power

Our founding documents talk about the “consent of the governed.” America is a land of laws put into place to protect the rights, property, and lives of individuals. Suddenly, we find ourselves with an administration that believes that the currently-corrupted laws exist to protect the presumed “right” of the government to abrogate and intrude upon the rights of the individual. Through the manipulation of the original law, the desire for elitists to control others has become the main reason for laws enacted in today’s congress. The situation results in such a multiplicity of petty, niggling little regulations and laws that no one can live their lives without being in violation of some law, somewhere; turning us from a nation of free individuals to one of violators and miscreants. What is the drive, the apparently innate urge in humans to control others? “Silva” mind control, propaganda, media manipulation, malevolent cults, all boil down to the need in some people to control the largest number of individuals they can, by any means necessary to achieve that control.

Why do so many of us feel it so strongly? Why are there so many who willingly allow the manipulation of their lives? And, why are there so many people who can resist the impulse and exist with each other without desiring to control? Some people are drawn to be either the one in charge, some seem to believe they fit most comfortably into the mold of the “charged” ones.

For many years in America, people were happy to let everybody else get on with their lives and do whatever they believed was necessary to succeed in achieving the American Dream. There were occasional needy people who popped up from time to time who hungered for power over others, but they were quickly enough stopped in their quest. Freedom, to Americans, was fresh enough in their experience and important enough to their way of life that anybody who held delusions about suppressing that freedom were simply voted out of office, ignored, sent to prison, or made laughingstocks or objects of scorn.

But these days, it seems like we have rounded up every one of those once-ridiculous power-seekers and would-be despots and sent them to Washington on our dime to have their way with us and our money and rights. I don’t know what we have been drinking/sniffing/smoking, but in our deranged hallucinations, we have imagined these people to be “leaders,” with our “best interests” at heart, when in actuality, they are all petty little despots, (like dingy, hairy reid), and tinpot dictators with inflated opinions of themselves and their worth. They can’t stand the thought of not being in control of all the rest us, or as many of us as they can manipulate, bribe, or coerce.

Despotism isn’t just for political monsters like Stalin and Pol Pot. Many people have the urge to command others to their will without ever having the opportunity to wield it over large groups of people. When they get into positions of power in American government, like fetishists or voyeurs, cannot control their lustful desires.

Bastiat’s first sentence in “The Law” is, “The law, perverted!” He quotes the would-be despots at some length. It is apparent from the quotes he chose that the people he is using as examples are elitists who belive firmly that they are the only ones with the intellect and the “quality” to be able to show those sweating masses of people in the “lower classes” how to live correctly; and that the only ones entitled to hold power (and receive largesse) are THEMSELVES, of course…

It even becomes amusing in a couple of instances, because it is so obvious that none of the quoted individuals has ever had the slightest experience building a society, let alone dealing with the varieties of personalities, beliefs, and needs of anyone “beneath” them. it’s one thing to desire a perfect society and to work to that end, but it’s a different one altogether to belive that one is entitled to bend another’s will to his own in order to create that perfect society according to one’s own vision, with oneself set up at the apex as the perfect example of righteous perfection. Taken to extremes, as we have seen in China, Russia, Cambodia, and North Korea, it will be implemented and maintained with deadly force.

The patterns that repeat are the elitism of the despots, their contempt for the rights of others, their greed for the fruits of others’ labors, and their pride and self-aggrandizement. The United States government is full of these people these days, having purchased their staying power by buying votes and greasing the appropriate palms. They have gotten themselves elected and are pressing forward under this administration in a bold move to usurp the rights and income of all the rest of us without our consent, often without our knowledge. Elitists are drawn to this power over the lives of others like addicts to their drugs, and insist the rest of us have no right to exist without their control or to even complain when these actions are taken against us.

Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, the current resident, Barbara Boxer, Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, George Soros, etc. All condescending elitists bent on enslaving the rest of us to provide themselves with status and fortune and garner as much power as they can amass.

The problem is that they don’t understand that the human soul is not something they can control. It was not created to be enslaved. They would be the first to complain, obviously, should their plans be reversed and they be the ones enslaved. In a way, they already are, and their Master is no friend to freedom or individual rights. No matter how much power they manage to achieve over the physical and material lives of Americans, they will never be able to enslave the spirits and souls of their victims, but their Master lashes them with the whip of greed, beats them with the cudgel of envy, and tortures them with hot coals of conceit.

Power over others is intoxicating, but it is a fragile thing, best held lightly and with humility, with an eye to relinquishing it at the least suggestion. A velvet glove is much more effective than a mailed fist. “Hope springs eternal” is not an empty platitude. Hope and the desire to live free are built into the hearts of rational people, and no petty despot or trivial tyrant can kill the spark.