The Fireside Post

Detainee Hypocrisy of Politicians

Sam Brownback (an appropriate name for this man) is busy covering his tracks. He is a Republican Senator from the great state of Kansas. Senator Brownback ran for President and brought the morque of the Republican candidates down about 20 points. (Morque is the scale of combined morals and IQ). Senator Brownback is in a big toot about potentially having the detainees at GITMO being moved to the Federal Prison at Leavenworth, Kansas.

Amazing Grace – Dr. Wintley Phipps

Dr. Wintley Phipps can make an atheist believe. There is no way to listen to this man sing without feeling something divine. We are truly living in a blessed time – a time when this talent can be readily shared across the globe.

Inauguration 2009: Exploring the Hero Myth

The idea of hero is old, and treasured in mythology. The hero metaphor influences our understanding of the world. This ancient value of hero lends credence to the fierce patriotism of America. No Congressman will vote against our military, our heroes.

Jesus: Radical Rabbi or Practical Mystic?

There is a lot of talk these days about being “spiritual” but not being “religious.” We often hear, “I see myself as a spiritual person, but not as a religious person.” This is the mantra of the children of the counter cultural movement of alternative spirituality. It is so much the mantra of a movement that it is no longer counter cultural, but represents the mainstream American thought process.

America Derailed

Rights organizations have historically been a blessing to life as we know it today. While they did not necessarily reflect the ideology of every person in this great country, their purpose was for progression and prosperity of the nation as a whole. Women’s rights, abolishment of slavery, equal opportunity employment and to a good degree, affirmative action have all been for positive change to move our country forward. Now we are stuck in a gravy bowl of economic turmoil and some of these new found organizations are just adding flour.

Sarah Palin, Visibility or Exposure

Sarah Palin is on the airways.  Her tact today is to blame others for her troubles.  She forgot the first rule of politics – Get Visibility without Exposure.  Sarah Palin exposed herself as  a small town redneck, generally ignorant of the world beyond the boundaries of Wasilla, Alaska.  This writer is proud to be included […]

Risk Adverse Politicians

The art of politics is often seen as the art of compromise, the art of the deal.  Politicians ask themselves, “How might I explain decisions made, and please 51% of the people?”  The job of the politician is viewed through two lenses – what is best for the country, and what is best for the […]

Bread or Circus Journalism

Bread sustains our lives, while circus entertains.  We stand at the precipice of change in journalism – debating the choices of bread or circus.  There have not yet been any Pulitzer Prices awarded for blogging – and this writer does not see this happening in the near future.  Pulitizer Prizes in journalism are reserved for […]

Bar Room Brawls in the Middle East

Here we go again.  The fighting in and around Israel reminds me of the metro section of the local news paper on Saturday morning.  The small headlines on page 3B are like this:  “Man stabbed in bar room brawl”  or “Two shot escaping street fignt”  “Lover’s quarel errupts into violence”  – You get the idea.  […]

WalMart Sweat Labor – The Case for Tariffs

My son and I agree on just about everything philosophically – but we differ in problem solution.  He and his friends are on a big toot to boycott WalMart in protest of Chinese sweat labor.  There is no argument from me on the atrocities of the Chinese labor market.  But the idea of boycotting WalMart […]

Drug Court – Systemically Flawed

A quick check of the court briefs in the local newspaper gives startling evidence of losing the war on drugs. The paper reported six people sentenced to prison – all for drug charges – five methamphetamine and one cocaine. We are talking about rural northwest Missouri. The first Drug Court was established in Dade County […]

Selling Your Home Using A Lease Option

The housing market today is in shambles and it’s no secret. You will be hard pressed to sell your home at fair market value. Even if you can afford to sell for less it has become about impossible. So what can we do short of letting the bank take it back? If trying to sell […]

What’s the Matter, Don’t Like Actually Reaching Across the Isle?

To date, the Obama engine has been fueled by a rhetoric of change and hope. The “change” part of that language is not referring to a change in the political party in charge of ruining the government, it is a change in the fundamental way that we approach all of the decisions that we make fromt he top down. Rick Warren invited Obama to speak at his church, and Obama has invited Rick Warren to speak at his innauguration. Some say that this will alienate progressives, and I think that, to some degree, that is true. But let me ask you this: What is more progressive than going beyond sitting around a table together, but removing the table entirely and finding a way to stand together?

Bush and Cheney are WMD’s

George W. Bush, mixed with equal amounts of Dick Cheney, produces Weapons of Mass Destruction. These two men, more than Saddam Hussein or Osama Bin Laden, have themselves destroyed mass numbers of humans. And about 5,000 of the dead are American service men. We can not even begin to count the number of innocent Iraqi’s killed in a war of vengeance.

The lethal combination of Bush and Cheney needed only a spark of inflamation. The entire Republican Party has bought into this mixture of vengeance and lusts after another opportunity to mix their potions of destruction.

The Prophecy of Ohg Rea Tone – 2009

Prophecy is only valuable if it presents opportunity for change.  Absolutes are for the cynical, for those who presume their destiny is predetermined.  Free will suggests we have something to say about our life.  In the tradition of ancient Bible Prophets we will offer some conditional prophecy for 2009: If we reward failure, failure will […]

Pay Day Loans and Porn

There are scavengers among us. They prey on the poor, the oppressed, and, strangely enough, the military. There are some things that the poor, the oppressed, and the military have in common. Loneliness, desperation, and a lack of money. I think that it is time to call a rat a rat. Two of the industries […]

Health Insurance Corruption: Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

The devil is in the details! The Fireside Post reports and comments on a broad range of material, including debt, spending, health care, and social justice – usually at a global or macro, level. But the devil really is in the details. Allow me to attempt to crystallize some details into something manageable for most […]

The Freegan Insurrection

My wife and I have been attempting to evaluate our lifestyle for some time now, hoping to live out our values as followers of Jesus and to create a sense of equity in our lives with the less fortunate. We have taken up recycling and composting, selling off our excess and getting back to the […]

Is Bailling Out the Big Three Like Bailing Out Your Neighbor?

The Senate yesterday failed to reach an agreement on the bailout package for the auto industry, meaning that it will probably be January before the industry can get any help.  This is something that is being “cussed and discussed,” as my grandfather would have said, in many circles.  Everyone has an opinion, and everyone is […]

The Poverty Paradigm – Misunderstanding Charity

We talk charitably about social justice, often with the liberal view of defending the disenfranchised. Taken out of context we might be seen as classic do-gooders who only enable irresponsibility. That is the common refrain for shallow, heartless capitalists who do not realize that there is profit in assisting the impoverished. Dr. Muhammad Yanus, an […]

The Future Is Not What It Used To Be

I studied electronics at The Electronics Institute in Kansas City. That was a long time ago. We studied vacuum tubes. Vacuum tube radios and television and radar systems. It was the dawn of the transistor – we talked about transistors in class, and experimented with diodes in building full-wave bridge power supplies. Resonant circuits were […]

The Staying Power of Hannah Montana – and Miley Cyrus

I have written before that I know more about 1521 C.E. Europe than I do about pop culture in America today. But this magazine of ours has prompted me to look around. I even wrote a post on Lindsay Lohan. Hannah Montana’s name came up recently because she was selling out a concert in Kansas […]

Meanwhile in Chicago

Posted by michaelscherer The Good Governor Blagojevich is back on the job, per the Chicago Tribune. [Spokesman Lucio] Guerrero said Blagojevich is back at work in the James R. Thompson Center and has met with staff to discuss the state budget and short term loans to help alleviate some of the state’s money pressures. Guerrero […]

Tabloid Voyeurism Sells

We are not talking about the National Enquirer here folks.  We are talking about Cable News, Network News, Print Newspapers, Print Magazines, and of course the internet boom in journalistic voyeurism.  We just gave an example  – the use of the term ‘journalistic voyeurism’ is much more interesting than say, ‘Journalistic practice.’ The Fireside Post […]

The Irony of Google Advertising

We operate in a Google world. When the lawyers on Boston Legal want to research something they say, ‘let’s Google it.’ I wrote a post on Googling my name to search my family tree. This online magazine is closely associated with Google. We allow Google to generate advertising based on our content. The results are […]