Good on You, Rob Bell

Don't swallow it uncritically. Think about it. Wrestle with it. Just because I'm a Christian and I'm trying to articulate a Christian worldview doesn't mean I've got it nailed. I'm contributing to the discussion. God has spoken, and the rest is commentary, right? - Rob Bell from the description of his book "Velvet Elvis"

I haven't really ever been the biggest Rob Bell fan.  Something about his whole presentation turned me off, so I haven't really ever sought him out.

Perhaps that was a mistake on my part.

He has built up a large following (including among many of my youth minister friends) with his short videos looking at various bible passages or theological hot topics.


His latest book, however, has riled up a lot of people against him.

The book, Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived, apparently takes a universalist approach.

Oh, the horror!

Except, I believe in Universal Salvation.

Can a God of love really ever condemn someone, anyone, to eternal damnation?  I just can't see it.

Rob Bell makes the point in a promotional video for the book that under a traditional Christian understanding of Heaven and Hell and who goes where, Gandhi is in Hell.

Gandhi's in hell? He is?-Rob Bell

The announcement of this book and the promotional video caused Justin Taylor, a blogger for the evangelical website The Gospel Coalition, to respond calling Bell out for "false theology."

The problem is, there is no good proof that Bell's assertion of Universal salvation is actually false theology.

I think that a lot of the problem with this understanding from evangelicals and other Christians is due to the reading that they make of John 14:6.

Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.'

No where does this verse say that only by believing in Christ will you be saved.  You could argue that perhaps Paul and other New Testament writers make that claim, but Jesus himself never says it.  In fact, all that Jesus says is that salvation will come through him, in other words through his actions, not through our actions at all.

And that is what the common Christian view of this Scripture seems to say, that it is our actions that matter, whether or not we accept Jesus differentiates whether or not we will be worthy of God's grace.

It isn't up to us.

The Bible makes that pretty clear.

Telling Rob Bell that his theology is wrong or false just means that yours is equally wrong or false.  Rob Bell is making the argument that God's grace will ultimately be given to everyone.  Taylor is making the argument that only a certain few are worthy of God's grace, providing they perform the requisite steps first, namely accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.

Taylor likes to talk about Paul and his views on false teachers in his post (although he takes the one direct Bible quotation he uses completely out of context, and then his reference to 1 Timothy is referenced as also being by Paul, whereas no modern Biblical scholars actually believe that Paul wrote this letter), but the more common theme throughout Paul's writing is the idea that it is impossible to do any work to gain God's grace, that God's grace is a gift that we cannot earn.

The idea of accepting Jesus Christ has become an earmark towards earning salvation in today's Christian rhetoric, and that is not the point of faith as Paul understood it.  By no means, as he would say.

Salvation is not something that can be earned, and that is the understanding of salvation that Taylor seems to be advocating.

I am completely okay with Justin Taylor, and all of the 26,600+ people who liked his blog post on Facebook, believing that there is a Hell (even if I can't believe in such a place, or at least the fact that anyone would be put there), and I'm okay with them having different understandings of what Scripture says.

I am not okay, however, with Taylor intimating that Rob Bell is a false prophet or teacher, or insinuating that those who listen to him or happen to believe the same as him are destined for Hell.

Just because others don't reach the same conclusions that you do after studying the Scripture doesn't make them wrong, anymore than it would necessarily make you wrong.

When you argue that it does you are guilty of ignoring other Gospel teachings, such as those found in Matthew 7:3.

Why do you see the speck in your neighbour’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?

I for one am looking forward to reading Rob Bell's new book, and perhaps finally giving him the chance he probably deserved all along.

Good on you, Rob Bell.

Quote of the Day

Been a while since we've done this!  I'm still alive, and my New Year's Resolution was to blog more, which currently has had Fat Train getting all of the attention, but I remember this site as well, and promise to give it some love.

I'm actually in the middle of a paper that is due tomorrow right now, but I saw this quote and thought I'd put up a few thoughts on it...

Everything you can imagine is real.
  - Pablo Picasso

I honestly believe that in a way this is true. It is real in your head, at the very least, real to you, if you will, but there is a part of me that believes that it is more substantially real as well.

There is a thought in Quantum Physics that some particles don't exist except when we are looking at them (or for them) at which point they do exist.

Clearly our minds do have some sort of connection to (if not some form of control over) the universe in which we live.

And we clearly don't understand completely the universe in which we live, much less rather or not it is the only such universe that there is.

It is completely possible (and perhaps even scientifically plausible) that everything that we imagine does truly exist in some universe, even if not in ours.

Reunited and It Feels So Good

Quote of the Day

"I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve."
-JRR Tolkien
(The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring)

So I thought I would share this story from CNN.com as I thought that it was quite heartwarming and since there is always so much negativity in the news, a story like this is a welcome change.

From www.cnn.com

DONETSK, Ukraine (CNN) -- A frail Irene Famulak clutched her brother on the airport tarmac, her arm wrapped around him in a tight embrace, tears streaming down their faces. It was the first time since 1942 they had seen each other, when she was 17 and he was just 7.

That was the night the invading Nazis came to take her away from her Ukrainian home.

"I remember it well because I kissed him good-bye, and he pushed me away," she said of her brother. "I asked, 'Why did you do that?' And he said that he doesn't like kisses."

"The Nazis told my mother that I was being taken to work in a German labor camp for six months. But it was, of course, much longer. I was there for years."

Both siblings survived the Holocaust and grew up on different sides of the Iron Curtain, not knowing the fate of the other.

But after 66 years apart, Famulak, 83, was reunited with her long lost 73-year-old brother, Wssewolod Galezkij. They held each other close this time, cherishing the moment.

"I don't believe anyone has ever known such happiness. Now, I truly believe I can die satisfied," Galezkij said.

Famulak made the long journey to Donetsk in eastern Ukraine from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, after being contacted by the American Red Cross. The organization told her they had located her only surviving sibling.

Famulak said she spent World War II in a labor camp in Munich, Germany, working in the kitchens. She had been taken to the camp with her older sister. When it was liberated in 1945, Famulak stayed in Germany for several years, eventually emigrating to the United States in 1956.

She never saw her parents again after that day in 1942 when Nazis separated her from her family. She and her brother still have no idea what happened to their mother and father. Some of their siblings lived through the war, but later died; others, they never heard from again after being separated.

But her younger brother never gave up hope of tracking his sister down. He, too, was sent to a German labor camp, but after the war, he moved back to Ukraine, then a republic of the Soviet Union.

Under Soviet leader Josef Stalin, information on lost relatives was kept sealed, and Galezkij said it wasn't until reforms in the late 1980s, followed by the Soviet collapse, that he started making progress in finding his sister.

Even then, it took him more than 17 years to locate her in the United States. He broke down in tears as he spoke of his overwhelming happiness at finding her.

"When the Red Cross told me they had found her in America, it was such a joy," he said, sobbing.

In fact, he had to be taken to the hospital because he was so overcome when he first learned she was alive. At this week's reunion, there was a doctor on hand at the airport as a precaution.

Back in the United States, there were tears, too.

Linda Klein, the director of the American Red Cross Holocaust and War Victims Tracing Center, said the volunteer who helped the siblings find each other got caught up in the emotion herself.

"When I showed her the picture, she stood there and wept," Klein said. "She was beside herself."

Klein's group has reunited 1,500 families since it began work in 1990. She said the former Soviet Union released records in 1989 of concentration camps it liberated, greatly helping organizers find information on Holocaust victims.

The organization has 100 volunteers -- a third of them Holocaust survivors, Klein said. The group also helps families find information about their loved ones who died during the Holocaust. They have brought together more than 50 families this year. All of their work is free. She says it's often like "looking for a needle in a haystack."

"We're playing beat the clock right now," she said, adding, "It's about families that one day they were together and then they were apart."

"When a connection is made, there are just smiles all around."

That was the case for this family in Ukraine. Years of trauma, of separation, of not knowing what happened to loved ones, have been replaced by celebration.

In a picturesque orchard overlooking rolling fields, Galezkij, his wife and their neighbors laid out a feast for his American sister. As the vodka flowed, he told her how he had survived for a lifetime without her.

"He says he always thought he'd see me someday. He dreamt lots about me," Famulak said, as she sat next to her brother.

"And he wrote a song for me. When he went to sleep, he sang every night and cried."

With that, Galezkij, weakened by illness and age, burst into song. But this time, he sang the words with pure joy.

article by Matthew Chance, CNN

So, this is cool, Quote of the Day, and other stuff

Now I can blog from my iGoogle home page!

Theoretically that should make it more likely that I update more frequently.

However, I think we all know that that won't be the case, but I'm certainly going to try!

Anyway, here's today's Quote of the Day (also available on my iGoogle homepage!)

"Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better."
-Andre Gide

I like that, as I often feel that my best writing came from somewhere greater then myself.

Anyway, I bought John Adams, the HBO miniseries, on DVD a couple of weeks ago and started watching it this last weekend.

The second episode should be required viewing for July 4th, it was quite powerful stuff.

I consider myself a bit of a history buff (for a short period of time I was actually a history major, weird, I know) but I had no idea how instrumental John Adams was in the forming of this country.

If you didn't get a chance to see it on HBO, Netflix it or drop the 40 bucks to own it. It is definately worth it.

Have a Happy 4th if I don't get to talk to you again before then and please try and refrain from blowing yourself up with fireworks. That would suck.

Quote of the Day

From the Chuck Lorre productions note at the end of tonight's episode of The Big Bang Theory...

"I believe that the voices of fear, both from without and within, can only be dispelled by trusting the voice that comes from the heart. Be still and listen to it. If it speaks of love and compassion for others, for the world itself, it just might be the voice of God -- or a reasonable facsimile. If, however, it snarls with fear of the unknown, fear of losing what you have or of not getting what you want, then it just might be the voice of Rupert Murdoch -- or a reasonable facsimile."
-Chuck Lorre

Why I Can Barely Look At Myself In The Mirror

Every morning, I hit up some of my favorite blogs only to discover that they still haven't been updated, days, weeks, sometimes even months after the last update.

And I cry. (Maybe that's a little melodramatic, I don't actually cry, maybe I die a little inside, how about that? Yeah, let's go with die a little inside.)

Then, I realized, that I have become that blogger, the blogger that kills a little bit of me with every passing week of no update. Is there someone out there to whom I am doing the same thing?

Probably not, but there might be someone who is slightly disappointed with no recent updates.

Anyway, sorry about becoming "that blogger", but things have gotten a little hectic and of my three blogs (for baseball, check out 100 Years Later, for television and movie news check out Josue23) this is the one that got short changed.

I'm going to try and do better as time goes on, really I am.

To make it up to you, I present the return of Quote of the Day, from one of our favorites. Perhaps it can help explain why I have fallen off in my duty to bring you retrospective reflections.

"Life is like a grapefruit. It's orange and squishy, and has a few pips in it, and some folks have half of one for breakfast."
Douglas Adams

I think that that says it all.

Tax Day

The return of the Quote of the Day

"A specification that will not fit on one page of 8.5 x 11 inch paper cannot be understood."
-Mark Ardis

I'm told that my taxes are easy to figure out (not surprising since I don't make that much money) but I really have no desire to try and figure it out for myself. After all there are people whose job it is is to do taxes. Why take money out of their pockets?

Anyway, hope that you got your taxes done.

IN HONOR OF MLK

Forty years ago today, the world lost one of its best, the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.

I look forward to the day when the world that he dreamt of becomes a reality.

In the meantime, I leave you with a quote from him, today's Quote Of The Day...

"Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars... Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that."

If only you were still here, for there is still work to be done, and I can only hope that we are strong enough to do it in your absence.

Never Thought I Would Say This, But Thank You Mike Huckabee

The big political news in regards to retrospective reflections backed Democratic Presidential canditate Barack Obama is the release of some of the sermons of his former pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

I've struggled with this, and haven't written about it before because the fact that this is even an issue angers me. It angers me to the point that I can't write about it coherently, it's much easier for me to resort to yelling at the racism of the media covering the issue, other candidates responses, and the stand my alma mater (TCU) took on the issue (which angers me the most). I would like to take a moment to give thanks to Brite Divinity School for their stand on the issue, refusing to back down on their desire to reward Rev. Wright for his 40 years of service to the African American community despite some "disturbing comments". Comments, I feel compelled to add, that if you are going to disparage you should at least look at them in regards to the sermons in full and not just on a YouTube video with the "offensive" comments taken completely out of context.

Before I start yelling incoherently again, let me get to the point of this post, normally I give you a quote of the day from a specific web based location, but today's quote of the day is one that I chose specifically instead of randomly.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

As easy as it is for those of us who are white to look back and say, "That's a terrible statement," I grew up in a very segregated South, and I think that you have to cut some slack. And I'm going to be probably the only conservative in America who's going to say something like this, but I'm just telling you: We've got to cut some slack to people who grew up being called names, being told, "You have to sit in the balcony when you go to the movie. You have to go to the back door to go into the restaurant. And you can't sit out there with everyone else. There's a separate waiting room in the doctor's office. Here's where you sit on the bus." And you know what? Sometimes people do have a chip on their shoulder and resentment. And you have to just say, I probably would too. I probably would too. In fact, I may have had ... more of a chip on my shoulder had it been me.
- Mike Huckabee, offering his perspective on the preaching of Rev. Jeremiah Wright

Mike Huckabee and I disagree on a great many things, but on this we are in step. He says it as well as I could hope to myself.

Thank you Mike Huckabee, thank you.

Are You a Beer Drinker or a Wine Drinker?

Today's Quote of the Day...

Reminds me of my safari in Africa. Somebody forgot the corkscrew and for several days we had to live on nothing but food and water.
-W.C. Fields

Well, we can safely assume that if W.C. Fields were still alive today, he, as a wine drinker, would be voting Democratic.

How do I know? A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll of course.

Anyway, thought you might find that interesting. I wonder if they had done a further survey about the types of beers people drink if the McCain numbers would have been consistant throughout all of them. I'm betting not.

Money, Money, Money, Money

Today's Quote of the Day

A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don't need it.
-Bob Hope

While our President acknowledges that the Economy is facing "challenging times" more and more people are suffering far more then just some challenging times as more and more people are facing the very real possibility of losing their homes.

Not to worry though, Washington Mutual execs can still expect to recieve their bonuses.

Some things make me literally sick.

Dinosaurs Are Cool

Did you miss me? I missed you guys too. I really need to get better about posting on the weekends, but it seems like so far, it is while at work that I am most driven to update my blogs (that's right, plural, if you just can't get enough of thoughts from the brain of Josh Man, go here).

Anyway, on to today's Quote of the Day...

Boys will be boys, and so will a lot of middle aged men.
-Kin Hubbard

There are obviously a lot of places we could take this quote o' the day, but I'm going somewhere different with it, as someone who is nearing middle aged man status and who left boy hood somewhere back in his past, I feel uniquely qualified to talk about something that a lot of boys love that also still holds interest for this almost middle aged man, dinosaurs.

I still remember going to the Fields Museum as a child in Chicago and seeing Sue, the world's most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex fossil.

I remember watching with awe as Stephen Spielberg gave us the awe inspiring sight of dinosaurs walking among us in Jurrasic Park (too bad the sequels sucked, but the original is still the best and most realistic dinosaurs have ever looked on screen).

That's why I still got a feeling of excitement and awe when I read this article on CNN.com today. I look forward to the time when this mummified fossil is unearthed completely and ready to view. I for one will make sure that I am on hand to see it in person.

A Non Political Post. What!?!?!

Let's start with today's Quote of the Day since we haven't done that in a while.

"Not only is the universe stranger then we imagine, it is stranger then we can imagine."
-Sir Arthur Eddington

I'm glad that this is today's quote of the day, because it makes me think of the movie Contact. That, if you haven't seen it, is a film directed by Robert Zemekis(Back to the Future) and featuring Jodie Foster (Silence of the Lambs), based on a book written by atheist Carl Sagan.

I've used this film previously (including this last Wednesday) to talk to high school students in church groups about the idea that Religious Experience can prove the existence of God.

William James wrote about this in his book "The Varieties of Religious Experience". He argued that we can use mystical or religious experiences to prove the existence of God.

I think that it's fun to use Contact to talk about this idea, since Carl Sagan argues that we shouldn't believe in God because such an extraordinary idea such as God would require extraordinary proof, yet in the film based on his book, while there is no scientific proof for Ellie's experience of interaction with Alien life forms, the experience itself is proof enough for Ellie.

If you haven't seen the film, the climactic scene involves a huge machine built off of plans apparently recieved from aliens from the Vega system. Ellie (played by Jodie Foster) is ultimately chosen to go on the trip. Ellie is transported through a wormhole to a distant star and meets the Vegans (as in Alien race, not people who don't eat animal products), the experience takes approximantly 18 hours. However, when she returns, no time at all has passed. The sphere Ellie is in apparently just falls through the machine.

William James defines a mystical experience as having four distinct marks justifying our calling it mystical.

1.Ineffability. "The subject of [the experience] immediatly says that it defies expression, that no adequate report of its contents can be given in words." In the movie, Ellie witnesses what she calls a "celestial event" that is "poetry" and "so beautiful" that it "can't be put into words". This is very similar to James's first mark.

2.Noetic Quality. "[M]ystical states seem to those who experience them to be also states of knowledge. They are states of insight into depths of truth." In the film, Ellie claims a sort of knowledge from her experience that gives her understanding and hope, which she wishes everyone could experince for themselves so that they could share in that knowledge and hope. Again, this matches James's definition.

3.Transient. "Mystical states cannot be sustained for long." In the film, Ellie wants to remain longer and learn more, but the alien informs her that she must go back. In Earth time, the experience lasts even less time, only taking a fraction of a second.

4.Passivity. "[W]hen the characteristic sort of conciousness once has set in, the mystic feels as if his own will were in abeyance, and indeed sometimes as if he were grasped and held by a superior power." In the film, Ellie is alternatively thrown and dragged through a series of wormholes in order to reach her destination and then returned without any choice of her own. Again, the experience as defined by William James is played out exactly in the movie.

At one point in the movie, Ellie is asked if she belives in God. She answers that she does not because there isn't sufficent proof of God's existence, and as a scientist she would require that truth. At the end of the film, the government asks her to recant her position on her experience as there is no proof it took place, and in fact all the "proof" points to her having imagined it. She refuses, says that while "as a scientist" she recognizes the difficulty in taking her word for what happened, having experienced it herself she can't do anything but believe.

William James would have us use the documented instances of Religious Experiences (provided they hold the marks for a true mystical experience that he outlines) to back up or prove our belief in God. While I appreciate and understand where he's coming from, I understand that this isn't an easy thing to do, but it certainly is interesting to think about and discuss. I also appreciate that such an outstanding film like Contact illustrates his points so well, helping to facilitate that discussion.

I wonder if the filmmakers intended the film to come across as an argument for James's stand on Religious Experience, and more I wonder if Sagan intended it. I find it hard to imagine that Sagan intended it, and yet I suppose there are stranger things in the universe, stranger then we could even imagine.

I Was Going to Post Something Non-Political, But Then...

I felt like doing something a little different today, since this blog has been so dominated by politics lately. I decided to check and see what the trusty Quote of the Day had to say, and I got this, which shows that the world is not ready for me to stop the Political Talk as of yet.

Today's Quote Of The Day...

"If we don't change direction soon, we'll end up where we're going."
-Professor Irwin Corey

I don't make these up, folks. I get them right here.

You can't tell me that this isn't a sign, a sign that retrospective reflections needs to continue its support of Senator Obama across the world wide web.

This weekend saw the Wyoming caucus, and another big win for Obama, who typically does better in the caucuses then Clinton has thus far. Tuesday is the Mississippi primary, and a chance for Barack Obama to fully regain the lead he had going into last Tuesday.

In other news, the Democratic party continues to look for ways to re-do the Michigan and Florida votes in a fair and affordable way. One possibility appears to be a mail-in vote, but there are problems to that as well it seems. This continues to be the most interesting story going on the Democratic side as Obama and Clinton look to try and win the nomination.

On the Republican side, McCain has won the requisite number of delegates and recieved an endorsement from President Bush (no word on whether he actually wanted it, however). Mike Huckabee who had been performing well in Republican races since Super Tuesday officially ended his campaign last Tuesday after McCain reached his magic number, apparently deciding that both math and miracles were against him now. Ron Paul, on the other hand, vowed that his campaign is never over, saying that he disagrees with McCain on many issues and is not likely to support him. Could he possibly be inclined to enter the race as a third party candidate (or maybe fourth party considering Nader has already thrown his hat into the ring)? Something else to watch, anyway.

Time To Texas Two-Step

First, let's take a look at today's Quote of the Day since we haven't done that in a while...

"This Country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer."
-Will Rogers

How appropriate today's quote of the day is. After all, Fort Worth holds the Will Rogers Memorial Center, and today Texas votes hoping to change that very feeling.

I love it when the Quote of the Day and what I'm talking about match up so perfectly.

That's right, today is the day of the Texas Two Step. If you live in Texas (or Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont for the first part of this) and you haven't already voted, the polls are open from 7:00am to 7:00pm, so make your voice heard.

Then, (only in Texas this time, sorry Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont) return to your polling place (or head to your polling place if you voted early) to caucus for the candidate you want to win. The caucusing begins at 7:15, or to be more precise, 15 minutes after the poll closes. If there is a long line at 7:00 to vote, they will let those in line vote before beginning the caucus.

Hopefully, today will be a day when we as Texans (and people from Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont, see I brought you guys back into it) can stand up for change, make our voices heard, and make the quote from the esteemed Will Rogers a belief of the past as we return to a Government for and of the people.

I Voted, Have You?

Let's start with the Quote of the Day, since it's been a few days since we've checked in with it...

Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.
-Douglas Adams

I love Douglas Adams, the man who gave us the answer to Life, The Universe, and Everything. (If you don't know the answer, I will kindly provide it to you, 42. Now if only we knew the question.)

On to other things, today, I participated in my civic duty and voted in the primary, taking advantage of Early Voting, which ends tomorrow. Make sure to go and vote today or tomorrow if you live in Texas. If you don't vote today or tomorrow, make sure to go on Tuesday and make your voice heard.

Remember, after the primary ends on Tuesday, the caucus begins. Go to your local precinct on Tuesday evening after 7:00pm for that. You are only eligable to participate in the caucus if you voted in the primary, however.

Tonight, I hope to get in to see Barack Obama in Downtown Fort Worth, Texas. If I get any good pictures, I will share them with you here. I tried to talk my sister into going and taking my niece wearing a "Change Me, Obama!" bib, but alas, she said that 8:00pm was way to late for the 8 month old to be out. My sister has no sense of history (and even less sense of direction, but that's another story completely). What can you do?

One more thing before I go, an old man at the early voting place made me laugh this morning. He raged about the "mean" volunteers not allowing him to vote in the Democratic primary for President and the Republican for everything else. They informed him (calmly, I thought, considering) that he could only vote in one or the other for the primaries, but not both. They noted that in the general election in November he could vote Democratic for President and Republican for everything else.

This was his response.

"I ain't voting for no Democrat in November!"

Ah, small town Texas, how fun you can be.

About Blogged Out

After my massive post yesterday on the democratic debate in Austin (as well as my Oscar Prediction post at josue23) I really can't bring myself to say too much today, but as I'll be out of town this weekend, I felt like I should put something up, so here's the quote of the day.

I was going to buy a copy of The Power of Positive Thinking, and then I thought: what the hell good would that do?
-Ronnie Shakes

I really don't have anything to add, because I think that says it all. Very funny.

Anyway, good debate yesterday as we come down to about a week and half until the primary here in Texas, so if you live in Texas, remember that early voting is going on now. You don't have to wait until March 4th.

In a later post, I'll see if I can explain the odd way that Texas does their Primary/Caucus.

Not Too Much To Say, But A Few Things

I'm not really going to talk about the quote of the day today, because it's a little dark, but I'm putting it up anyway. Do with it what you will.

"A friend is someone who will help you move. A real friend is someone who will help you move a body."
-unknown

Yeah, I wouldn't take credit for it either.

On to some happier news, yesterday I talked about Barack Obama speaking in the city of Houston, well, my cousin and his family went. To see some great pictures of them Ba-Rocking the Vote there you can visit Erica's blog fifth of forever. The picture of Oliver, their beautiful baby, actually made the local FOX news. Check it out here, Oliver's about halfway through.

I'm excited that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton will be debating in the great city of Austin tomorrow and even more excited that Texas is more then just an afterthought in the Presidential Election.

I'd write more today, but I'm about blogged out due to my novel length post on the Top Ten Films of 2007, feel free to check that out if you're interested.

Primaries Plus Democrats in TEXAS?!?!?

The trouble with weather forecasting is that it's right too often for us to ignore it and wrong too often for us to rely on it.
-Patrick Young

Today's quote of the day is rather appropriate, I think. But the forecasting that I'm thinking of today is political not weather.

If you think back to June of 2007, back before everyone knew that Clemens was a steroid user, political forecasters foresaw a couple of things for sure, John McCain was done, the Republican Primary would probably go to Rudy Gulianni, but if Fred Thompson entered the race, he could become a viable candidate, and on the Democratic side, Barack Obama was interesting, for sure, but the race would be over very quickly with Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee.

Well, as we travel from the past back to the present, we can see that Gulianni and Thompson are both out of the race, and with the backing of Mitt Romney and former President Bush, McCain should have the nomination sown up by early next month at the latest. Meanwhile, on the Democratic side, while prognosticators where correct in regards to the interest the nation has taken in Senator Obama, they handed Senator Clinton victory a little too quickly.

Sticking with the idea given us by Mr. Young in the quote of the day, we've seen many projections and polls in politics that have proved to be false. As recently as the New Hampshire Primary, polls showed Hillary Clinton trailing, and yet, she won the Primary.

As it stands right now, Senators Clinton and Obama are polling neck and neck in Wisconsin (the State of Cheese). A victory here would be huge for Clinton as just last week she was given no chance. She appeared to be following a "keep your eyes on the big states" type of strategy looking ahead towards Texas and Ohio next Tuesday and Pennsylvania on April 22nd, conceding everything in between to Obama. Her strategy shifted, however, perhaps due to the critiques her plan was recieving throughout the media, and she began to spend some time and money in Wisconsin.

At the very least, she's made things interesting again. I'm beginning to believe more and more that the Democratic nomination will not be decided until the Democratic convention in August.

Texas remains important, though. If Senator Clinton pulls out a victory in Wisconsin tonight, then getting less delegates from Texas then Senator Obama doesn't become as big of an issue as it would if she gets swept out of February after Super Tuesday.

The interesting thing about Texas is the fact that Clinton could win the overall vote in Texas, but be awarded less Texas Delegates then Obama. The reason for this is that the Democratic delegates are weighted by the amounts of Democratic voters in the county in the last election for Governer. A county in which 75% of the vote went Democratic will award more delegates then a place where only 25% of the vote went Democratic. So, if you're a Democrat in Texas, your lonely vote for Chris Bell might actually have meant something after all. What makes this important is that in that election, the areas with a strong Latino presence, Hillary Clinton's strong constituancy, are in primarily Republican counties.

You may recall the redistricting scandal a few years back when the Republican controlled State Congress redrew the voting lines primarily to break up the strong Latino voting districts (which voted primarilly Democratic) and placed them as smaller pieces into largely Republican districts, removing some seats from Democrats. This is the main reason why the areas with Latino voters will have a smaller number of delegates to give then other areas, areas with younger, more affluent, and better educated voters, and areas with a large number of African Americans, all of whom tend to vote in larger numbers for Barack Obama. Add to that the fact that polls now have Obama nearly spliting the woman's vote and the elderly vote with Clinton, the gender and age group that she used to dominate, and Clinton's one remaining strength (the Latino vote) is less of a strength then one might have originally thought it would be in Texas. So while Senator Clinton is counting on the large number of Latino voters in Texas to propell her to victory here, the delegates will be larger in the areas where Senator Obama has the edge, meaning Clinton might win the state, but Obama's delegate lead will still grow.

But, like I said at the beginning, polls and predictions can often be wrong, at least often enough for us to be stupid to put our faith in them completely, but they also are right often enough for them to be worth paying attention to.

Either way, the fact that today in the city of Houston, Barack Obama will be giving his post primary speech in the Toyata Center excites me. Last week, Hillary Clinton was in El Paso. Thursday they will be debating in Austin. How crazy is this, Democrats who are running for President are campaining in Texas? W.'s state?

Enjoy it while it lasts Texas Democrats, because things like this don't happen too often around here.

You've Got to Have Faith, Faith, Faith

Everyone is born with genius, but most people only keep it a few minutes.
-Edgard Varese

I'm glad this is the quote of the day, because it reminds me of something I heard in the sermon at church yesterday morning. The preacher told the story of a three year old girl who was so anxious to meet her new baby brother. She begged her parents to let her talk to him alone, so they retreated into the living room, but listened on via the baby monitor (the patriot act alive and well in our homes) as the new sister leaned in close to her baby brother and whispered, "Tell me about God, I've almost forgotten."

It was a beautiful story, and it makes me want to reword our quote of the day a little bit...

Everyone is born with faith, but most people only keep it a few years.

Faith is a hard thing to come by, a hard thing to keep, but it certainly seems easier for a child. Maybe all the times that that faith is shaken as we're growing up makes it harder to really believe in something as we get older.

I spoke in my last post about occasionally feeling lost, something I'm sure that many people can identify with. Well, yesterday, I kind of feel like I was handed a GPS system. I awoke with an idea. An idea that I've always had in my head as something I would like to do, but yesterday it was insistent. It was something I felt I had to do. As the day went by, various conversations I had or things people said all forced this idea right back to the forefront of my thoughts.

This post might seem a little divergent, but the whole situation for me is the complete opposite. These things actually seem connected to me, and maybe I actually know where the "location" from the last post is for me now.

Anyway, one last thought before I go, the best part of church yesterday (I wasn't at my normal chuch, I was at a closer one since I overslept) was that I was seated amongst a lot of older people. And by older, I mean nearing ancient status. Obviously none of them could hear very well, and so while they had these conversations amongst themselves during the service, the entire congregation could hear everything they were saying. I'm sure that they thought they were being quiet, but they weren't.

Apparently, I find faith in God in the very young and the very old.