Regulatory Capture at work in your nation's capital

A fresh coat of Whitening to Radley Balko for linking to this Bit O' Baloney from The Washington Examiner:

The District’s open, all-are-invited taxicab industry is so saturated with drivers that the entire enterprise is threatened, according to a D.C. Council member who has filed a bill to cap the number of cabs allowed on city streets.

Let's translate that. Until now, no one has thought of using D.C.'s taxi industry as a campaign donor base. There aren't enough big players to mess with.

Ward 1 Councilman Jim Graham introduced legislation Tuesday to limit the number of taxicabs in D.C. through either a medallion system, like ones used in New York City and Chicago, or a certification system.

Since it's so easy and inexpensive to get a cab in New York City?

The soaring number of taxicab operators in D.C. -- roughly 8,000, most of whom own their own cars -- is a "pressing and urgent problem," Graham said. There are more licensed drivers in D.C. per capita than any place in the world, he said, and new applicants continue to take the required class, giving them access to the driver exam administered by the D.C. Taxicab Commission. A glut of drivers could jeopardize the chances of any cabbies making an adequate living, Graham has said.

Mr. Graham absolutely and totally misses the point of the free enterprise system, Economics 101, supply and demand, price pressure, and chewing with your mouth closed. Keep out competitors, and prices rise. Let them in, and prices fall. Imagine the outrage if some City Council Messiah began expressing concern over "too many restaurants" or "too many gas stations".

"Whatever system we use, we need to limit the number of operators or this boat is going to sink by its own weight in terms of the number of taxicab operators that we have," Graham said. "We're going to determine which of these two approaches we should take, but we're going to have one or the other."

He is deeply and profoundly wrong. The most efficient taxicab operators will stay in business. The least efficient will go under. Unless of course, government artificially limits the number of cabs. They do this by putting up regulatory barriers to entry, or simply pull an arbitrary number of taxis out of their nether regions. Once that happens, you're stuck with what you've got. The Teleprompter Jesus recently pulled a similar stunt with the tobacco companies.

Taxicab Commission Chairman Leon Swain declined comment Wednesday. But during an April commission meeting, Swain said the key to any industry reform is balancing the need for regulation with the main tenet of the District's cab industry -- an open system that anyone can join as an owner-operator.

Reform. I'm starting to hate that word. Reform. Anytime they want to screw up something, it's in the name of reform. Any day now, look for rapists lobbying for "virginity reform".

"We've now got to the place where an open system is an overbloated system, and we have more people coming," Swain said.

Overbloated?

New York City's medallion system, established in 1937 during the Great Depression in response to a ballooning number of unregulated taxis, artificially capped the number of cabs on the road, to what is now about 13,000.

The medallion program, however, made it very difficult for the average New Yorker to join the industry as an owner: The May 2009 price for an individual medallion, those held by owner-operators, was $568,000. The cost of a corporate medallion was $744,000.

Which raises the following question....What right do these Student Council Refugees have to keep people from going into business for themselves?

D.C. Taxicab Commissioner A. Cornelius Baker said during a recent meeting that the city must move "toward a regulated taxi force" and create a system "that sustains our drivers and also creates wealth for them in the long term."

One of the biggest civic misconceptions in the U.S. is that we benefit when government tries to save jobs by stifling competition. The idea goes all the way back to Adam Smith in 1776. Nations don't thrive when their manufacturing companies or their employees are protected. Nations thrive when their consumers are free to enjoy the results of manufacturers all over the world competing for their dollars.

Jim Graham has some constituents who can no longer compete. These constituents have formed a well-organized lobbying group to limit competition. People who ride taxis in D.C. aren't well-organized.

Guess which group is going to win.

Picture of secret quid pro quo from here.

Best July 4th Video EVER

“It is the duty of every patriot to protect his country from its government”
– Thomas Paine

Ron Paul on the Cap And Trade bill

Here's Ron Paul on the Cap And Trade bill that recently made it way through The House Of Representatives.
Remember the 3 Republicans who voted for the porkulus package, and the ensuing hand-wringing about "what if only one of them had voted differently?"

Nah. If the fix was in. In the words of Big Joe Kennedy, why pay for a landslide?

Check out this old post, written the day after the porkulus package passed the senate. Then listen to what The Good Doctor has to say in this brief message about Cap And Trade:



For the next few weeks, listen for criticism from Dems about their brethren who voted against this scam.
You won't hear a word.
They recruited just enough Republicans to get the thing passed. This allowed the Democrats in tough re-election battles to vote "no" and get some wiggle room.

These folks are representing every rent-seeker, rainmaker, perpetual motion machine manufacturer, academic witch doctor, and productivity capper in the nation. They're representing everybody but you.

Please wake up.

Broadway Baptist Church Chapel Choir Not Welcome In Kentucky

At the last minute, the Southern Baptists Of Kentucky have formally disinvited my church's youth choir from performing or working in their state. The kids were going there on a choir tour and mission project to fix up low-income housing in Appalachia.

Let me give you some background:

The Broadway Baptist Church Chapel Choir is a world-class choral group. These kids are good.
They've sung the National Anthem at I-don't-know-how-many Big League baseball games. They've sung in the National Cathedral. I think they've done a 4th of July concert at Pearl Harbor.
They don't just sing. When they go on choir tours each summer, at least one week of the trip is spent on a mission project. Sometimes it's a Habitat For Humanity house, sometimes it's remodeling other low-income housing, and sometimes it's doing fixup projects on Indian reservations.
The Aggie is a 6-year veteran of these trips and projects, so she can now hang sheetrock and particle board like a pro.

The choir was going to stay at Kentucky's Cumberland University for a week or so during this year's choir tour and mission trip, working with a University housing program called Mountain Outreach. Think Habitat For Humanity in Appalachia.

Here's a link from the College, now known as University Of The Cumberlands, about a previous Broadway Baptist Youth trip back in 2005 when they helped Mountain Outreach build a home for a low income family. (Something tells me that this link might be taken down by the end of the day, so I'm saving it here, just in case.)

It looked like a good relationship, but that was then and this is now.

The kids have now been officially disinvited. The contact person called with the news yesterday, wanting to give plenty of notice. The kids were supposed to leave on the trip in less than a week. Not only that, but several of the Kentucky churches where they were scheduled to sing have also cancelled performances. Why?

It is because our church welcomes gay and lesbian people. (This recently got us kicked out of The Southern Baptist Convention, which you can read about by going here, reading my rant, and then clicking "previous post" and repeating until your eyes bleed.)

The University Of The Cumberlands has the right to invite and disinvite whoever they choose. Perhaps Sixteen-year-old Singing Sheetrockers are a legitimate threat to the doctrinal purity of The University. But they've invited all sorts of people to speak on campus recently. This is from Cumberland's Wikipedia entry:

The university has in recent years, through its Forcht Group of Kentucky Center for Excellence in Leadership, brought several notable guests to speak on campus. In the spring of 2006, in a "Moral Leadership" program, Roy Moore, the so-called "Ten Commandments judge" spoke at the school, and in March 2007, in a "Patriotic Leadership" program, the university hosted Zell Miller, former governor of Georgia and United States Senator. The April 2008 program featured bestselling author Stephen Covey in a "Principle Centered Leadership" program, while the April 2009 program featured Ben Stein in a "21st Century Leadership" program.

This diverse group of speakers was apparently acceptable for the doctrinal purists at the University Of The Cumberlands. So let's look at them one by one.

1) Here's Georgia Democrat senator Zell Miller, speaking at the 2004 Republican National Convention. (He changed sides back when it was fashionable.) Baptists reading this are probably familiar with the apostle Paul's "Roll Call Of Faith". Well, go to the 1:03 mark in this video to hear Zell Miller's "Roll Call Of Funding".

I'll let the rest of the speech stand alone, after asking the brief question "Who Would Jesus Bomb"?


I bet Zell doesn't go to church with any Gays or Lesbians. I'm just sayin'....

2) One of the other guys they've invited to speak is Ben Stein. I like Mr. Stein a lot, and wish I could've been at the University Of The Cumberlands to hear him. I think he's a brilliant economist, a good actor, and he was a fun game show host. His monthly column in The American Spectator gets sorta sentimental, but I read it all the same.
There's just one little problem if you're going to invite Ben Stein to speak at University Of The Cumberlands, but then disinvite The Broadway Baptist Church Chapel Choir because of religious differences....

It's not something I have a problem with, and Broadway Baptist Church sure doesn't have a problem with it because we've often held services with the synagogue next door.

I hate to bring this up, but Ben Stein is Jewish, AND HE DOESN'T BELIEVE IN THE DIVINITY OF JESUS ! ! !

I REPEAT, THE GUEST SPEAKER FOR YOUR LEADERSHIP PROGRAM HAS COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY REJECTED CHRIST ! ! ! (Is this clear? The Broadway Baptist Church Chapel Choir calls itself "Christian". Ben Stein makes no such claim.)

Oh well. Mr. Stein's views on gays and lesbians must have been acceptable to Cumberland. First things first.

3) Then there's Stephen R. Covey, author of "7 Habits Of Highly Effective People". Covey is a great speaker and "7 Habits" is a great book.

But for the doctrinal nit-pickers, there should've been a glaring problem with Covey. He believes that Joseph Smith found some golden tablets in upstate New York, put on some magic Ray-bans, and used them to translate The Book Of Mormon into a bad imitation of King James English. Yep. Covey is a Mormon. He also believes in wearing the holy undergarments at all times, and he believes that an old guy in Salt Lake City is a prophet.
Another dirty little secret.... Mormons dance. Enough said.
Mormons are acceptable to the University Of The Cumberlands. Sixteen-year-old Baptist kids who want to help build low-income housing in Appalachia (and who, for the most part, accept gays and lesbians) are not permitted.
4) Last, we have judge Roy Moore, the famous Alabama judge who displayed a 5,300 pound monument to The Ten Commandments inside his courthouse - a clear violation of the separation of church and state principle.
All the members of the Broadway Baptist Chapel Choir are sane and in their right minds. The unfortunate Roy Moore is, in my opinion, click here to continue....
***********************************
I'm sure that some other churches will eventually come through with performance opportunities for the kids. Give them a gym floor to sleep on for a week anywhere near a Habitat For Humanity project, and you'll be amazed at what they can do. Shunning these kids is a huge black eye for the University, Southern Baptists, and a loss to whoever would've been helped on the mission project.
The University Of The Cumberlands upholds a religious standard that allows them to tolerate Georgia Turncoat Politicians, Brilliant Jewish Economists, Mormon Motivational Speakers, and Alabama Theocrat Judges.
But hosting tolerant Baptists teenagers? You've got to draw a line somewhere. What if it starts spreading?

Video Of A Crazy Man Catching Marlin By Diving From A Helicopter (which has nothing to do with Gays, Lesbians, or Southern Baptists)

Yet Another Picture That I'm Posting Simply To Avoid Consecutive Posts About Southern Baptists

This is a picture of the most recent winner of the "World's Ugliest Dog" contest.

A Funny Picture That I'm Posting Because I Don't Want To Do Two Consecutive Posts About Southern Baptists

The Burning Hell, Part Five, Autoharp Edition

I apologize for posting this so late in the day, since I know that many of you begin your Sunday morning devotions with a visit to this site.
For the last couple of months, I've been posting clips from the evangelical films of Reverend Estes Pirkle. Back in the early 1970's, Pirkle's "The Burning Hell" may have been required viewing for every church youth group in the southeast.

I'm posting these each week because they terrified me when I was a kid, and I've found that this is good therapy.

To recap the previous episodes.... Two hippies, Ken and Tim, have a discussion with Brother Pirkle about the reality of hell. Their preacher has taught them that hell is only a metaphor. Pirkle disagrees.
Pirkle vividly paints a picture of non-believers being burned for eternity in a massive field of mud and slop. Ken and Tim angrily disagree, and leave the church on their motorcycles.

Ken has an accident, and is decapitated.

Rather than wait around for the police or an ambulance, Tim decides to go to church.

You can hit the Pirkle label at the bottom of this post to see each episode in its entirety. Even if you're in a hurry, you've GOT to see episode #4 with the worms.

At the end of last week's clip, Pirkle was telling the biblical story of Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16:19). If you find my commentary helpful, it continues after the video.



:00 - Candid shots of The Mississippi Thespians, on location in Israel with their Sears & Roebuck bathrobes and Amish head scarves. Pay attention to the music. It's an autoharp.

:40 - Pirkle actually gives us a glimpse of the woman playing the autoharp. Wait a minute.... Did they have autoharps in the middle east, circa 30 A.D. ???

1:10 - A zoom shot of the autoharp ! ! In the middle of ancient Palestine ! ! And autoharps weren't invented until the 1890's ! ! Why didn't Pirkle also include someone playing a Fender Stratocaster with a whammy bar ??

1:30 - I think this guy is the one trained actor in the film, and he took an acting class for one semester at Mississippi Delta Junior College.

2:50 - Dives wants nothing to do with the evangelists. The cameraman wants nothing to do with Dives, and doesn't bother to keep his face in the frame.

4:00 - Dives proves that he's a George H.W. Bush "compassionate conservative".

4:20 - Twenty seconds of meaningless dialogue shot at an ancient amphitheatre, to justify the travel budget.

6:30 - We're back in 1970's Mississippi. Ken's headless body is bleeding in the ditch, Tim is in church, and Pirkle is preaching.

6:50 - Pirkle's vision of ancient decadence looks suspiciously like the set of The PTL Club.

That's all for this week. No burning sinners, no worms consuming the faces of heretics, and no headless hippies. All of that will change next week on THE BURNING HELL ! ! !

The Fierce Urgency Of NOW (before everyone figures it out)

This is from David Freddoso, at Beltway Confidential:

By all appearances, the House is about to vote on a very long bill of which it has no completed official copy.

And it's going to have more impact on American manufacturing than any other legislation considered this year.

Texas Republican Reps. Joe Barton and Louie Gohmert have just asked the chair whether there exists a complete, updated copy of the Waxman-Markey carbon-cap bill.

The short answer: No.

"If a bill for which there is no copy were to actually pass this body," Barton asked, "could the bill without a copy be sent to the Senate for its consideration?"

The short answer: Yes. They did it with the stimulus package.

Through a series of parliamentary inquiries, the Republicans learned that the 300-plus page managers' amendment, added to the bill last night in the House Rules Committee, has not even been been integrated with the official copy of the 1,090-page bill at the House Clerk's desk, let alone in any other location. The two documents are side-by-side at the desk as the clerk reads through the instructions in the 300 page document for altering the 1,090 page document.

But they cannot be simply combined, because the amendment contains 300 pages of items like this: "Page 15, beginning line 8, strike paragraph (11)..." How many members of Congress do you suppose have gone through it all to see how it changes the bill?

None. But it's going to change your life more than you can imagine.

Global Warming is apparently so urgent that we can't even wait until members of Congress know what they're voting on.

Yes, and that's because public opinion is shifting on whether or not the whole thing is a scam. Couldn't we go back to changing the weather through prayer? Or throwing virgins into volcanoes? Making sacrifices to the corn god?

If we're going to use superstition to change the weather, is carbon cap the only thing still under consideration?

Picture of superstitious people throwing human sacrifices into a volcano in an attempt to influence the gods came from here.

Rhetoric trumps Reality

Remember The Obamessiah's pledge that there would be five days of online public review of any legislation passing his desk?

That pledge is now horse crap.

The new Cap (the economy) and Trade (favors) bill, like the Porkulus bill that came before it, wasn't read in full by Congress before the vote. It wasn't even WRITTEN in full until the night before the vote.

The clock is now ticking on Cap and Trade, the biggest government job creator since the last war.
If the people programming The Teleprompter really want this to pass, they're not going to give us five days to think about it.

Wagers, anyone?

Has anyone ever delivered pure, refined, high-grade bullshit more beautifully than this?

Enjoy. If you're like most people, you'll get a little misty-eyed just listening to him.

Michael Jackson - R.I.P.

This is my favorite Michael Jackson video, and Michael Jackson isn't in it.
It was filmed at Cebu jail in the Philippines.

Much Ado About Nothing

People occasionally ask "where do you find this stuff?" The most recent email was about the goofy pictures.

The answer is Popurls, an aggregator of aggregator sites, including Digg, Delicious, Reddit, Gawker, and Technorati.

Visit today, and you can learn that a Tennessee couple got into a fight that somehow involved Cheetos.

A company is offering cruises up and down the coast of Somalia, guaranteeing opportunities for tourists to shoot automatic weapons at real live pirates.

An army sniffer dog swallowed an Taliban bomb. And survived.

So how does one keep up with all this diverse info? Easy.

Delicious.

Delicious is a free program that allows you to bookmark every site you choose to remember with key words. Like in the first example, I've saved it under Tennessee, Cheetos, LawEnforcement (you can only use one word at a time), and Weird.

The second is saved under Somalia, Pirates, Tourists, and Overkill.

The third is now at my disposal with the terms Dog, Army, Indigestion, and Bomb.

So any time I see a funny picture of Bill Clinton's Vice President, the one who thinks he can change the weather, I click the Delicious tag on my laptop's toolbar and type in Gore, Pictures, and Funny.

Hope this helps.

Joe Biden, The Porkulus Watchdog

Look to your right. See the link below the Tarrant County Libertarian Porcupine? Assorted Deceptions For A Gullible Public?
Go there, and get back to me.
Have you noticed any projects going on as a result of The Porkulus Package? Anybody out there? Anybody?

Here's the best that Joe Biden could say about the problem, and the "solution", since the economy is failing to respond to money being thrown at campaign donors:

1) "Everyone guessed wrong at the time the estimate was made about what the state of the economy was at the moment this was passed."
2) "The bottom line is that jobs are being created that would not have been there before."

But the bigger question is, at what cost is this being done?

A report due to be released today by a Republican senator contends the Obama administration's stimulus program is fraught with waste and incompetence -- evidenced by a turtle crossing in northern Florida that will cost more than $3 million and a snafu in which thousands of Social Security checks went out to people who had died.

....Will these projects make real improvements in the lives of taxpayers and communities or are they simply pet projects of politicians and lobbyists that never got off the ground because they are a low priority?" the report says.

....The White House pointed out that certain projects highlighted by Coburn have been stopped. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers put out a statement Monday that it would drop plans to spend $1.1 million to repair a guardrail near a dry man-made lake in the Oklahoma panhandle -- project No. 7 in Coburn's report.

Here's something from ReviewJournal.com

Perhaps the police tax issue promised voters the money would be used to "put 500 more cops on the streets." A few years later, when nowhere close to 500 new officers are on patrol, a department spokesman blithely explains some of the money was used to buy new computers, "which are considered to be the manpower equivalent of one-and-a-half new officers."
More recently, remember how all those billions in "stimulus" money allocated in Washington last year were reserved for "shovel-ready" projects, creating new construction jobs and additionally re-building our infrastructure -- roads, piers, bridges, stuff like that?

Well, let the man in the plaid sport coat and the white Corfam shoes explain it all to you, Mr. and Ms. Voter. Turns out you didn't want a bunch of crummy infrastructure, after all. Instead, they found something much better to spend your money on, if you'll just step this way ...
As it turns out, most of that money is going where government always puts most of its money -- into fat paychecks for social service bureaucrats.
"Most of the roughly $300 billion coming directly to the states is being funneled through existing government programs for health care, education, unemployment benefits, food stamps and other social services," The Associated Press reported this week.

Mississippi, of course, comes in for a drubbing....

Instead, in Georgia for instance, two-thirds of the $3.9 billion in "stimulus" funds the state expects to receive over the next 16 months will go to support existing social programs. Mississippi expects to spend only about 13 percent of its $2.8 billion in federal "stimulus" money on highways and bridges. The rest will be spent, as it is in other states, to preserve existing government programs and jobs.

It wasn't supposed to be this way, was it? We were supposed to have a watchdog.




Picture of Joe Biden, The Porkulus Watchdog, came from here.

Caption Contest - Slicing And Dicing Edition

I need a caption for this picture.



ASM826 won the previous contest.

Photo came from here.

Words to live by

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

-Martin Luther King Jr.

Southern Baptists reject (Broadway Baptist) Church

This is from Jon Meacham and Sally Quinn's "Under God" feature in The Washington Post:

Southern Baptists Reject Church
The slowly shrinking Southern Baptist Convention voted on Tuesday to sever 125-year-old ties with a Texas church that allowed homosexual members to have their photos in the church directory.

The overwhelming majority of Southern Baptist church directories have photos of gays and lesbians. Ours is apparently the first one that anyone noticed. Note to Broadway Baptist Church members: Save your church directory ! I get a feeling it will be a collectible, just like Rosa Parks' bus seat.

Messengers (delegates) to the SBC's annual meeting voted overwhelmingly to disassociate from Forth Worth's Broadway Baptist Church, following an executive committee ruling Monday that the congregation "failed to establish its compliance" with the SBC rules that ban churches that "act to affirm, approve or endorse homosexual behavior."

I'm delighted with this decision, but isn't "failure to establish compliance" kind of like "guilty until proven innocent" ? Just wondering.

According to the Associated Baptist Press, "it was the first time the SBC has ejected a church simply because denominational officials perceive that the congregation is in violation of a policy prohibiting affiliation with pro-gay churches."

(Sigh....) Once again, Broadway Baptist is not pro-gay. It isn't pro-straight. It's pro-tolerance, pro-ministry, and pro-King Ranch Casserole.

Since doctrinal conservatives took control of the Southern Baptist Convention in the early 1980s, the association has been getting smaller and more exclusive, at various times rejecting Baptist liberals and moderates, women clergy, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, Mormons and Muslims and Jews, public schools and Walt Disney, and, in 1993, churches that are welcoming and affirming of gays.

Somewhere my friend Dr Ralph is gleefully rubbing his hands together and laughing. I now have something in common with Clinton, Carter, Mitt Romney, Osama Bin Laden, Rahm Emmanuel, and the public school system. We've all been condemned by the Southern Baptist Convention.

This year, for the fourth year in a row, Southern Baptist churches baptized fewer people than last year. The number of annual baptisms per church member -- a key indicator of church growth -- has dropped sharply in the past 50 years. Southern Baptists baptized one person for every 19 church members in 1950, a ratio that dropped to 1 baptism for every 47 church members in 2008. in Salt Lake City where th

I've been reading more and more about the Mormon concept of Baptism For The Dead. They do a ceremony at the temple in Salt Lake City where they baptize people as stand-ins for people who have already died. I don't know if it's effective, but it would help get the numbers back up.

Two years ago, then-SBC president Frank Page said the declining numbers can be blamed, in part, on a perception that Baptists are "mean-spirited, hurtful and angry people" and that the denomination has been known too much in recent years for "what we're against" than "what we're for," Page said.

But....but....but....why would anyone ever think that?

"Our culture is increasingly antagonistic and sometimes adverse to a conversation about a faith in Christ. Sometimes that's our fault because we have not always presented a winsome Christian life that would engender trust and a desire on the part of many people to engage in a conversation on the Gospel," he said.

Gandhi said it better, and without any preacher-speak: "I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."

"All Southern Baptists should recommit to a life of loving people and ministering to people without strings attached so people will be more open to hearing the Gospel message."
That's apparently the approach Broadway Baptist tried to take in 2007, when gay couples who were attending Broadway asked to have their portraits in the church directory. Rather than reject the request, the congregation voted to publish a directory with candid snapshots and group shots rather than with traditional individual or family photos.

That was just a compromise to keep the Southern Baptists in Nashville from running for the smelling salts and ammonia capsules in a homophobic panic. Now that they've kicked us out, in the next directory I want to be photographed with the cast and crew of "A Chorus Line".

"We are disappointed with the decision of the Southern Baptist Convention," said Kathy Madeja, the church's deacon chair, in a statement released shortly after Tuesday's vote. "Our mission at Broadway is and will continue to be consistent with the SBC's stated enterprise of reaching the world for Christ....

The Aggie and I are driving up I-35 toward Fort Worth as I'm writing this. The Aggie and I are fully agreed on this issue: Kathy Madeja is a great lady, a great deacon chair, and she has put up with more crap in the last two years than anyone should ever have to tolerate. Kathy is the best argument against the ridiculous prohibitions against female deacons in Southern Baptist churches.

"We do not believe Broadway has taken any action which would justify its being deemed not in friendly cooperation with the SBC. It is unfortunate that the Southern Baptist Convention decided otherwise and has severed its affiliation with Broadway Baptist Church."

Yeah, especially since we were the ones giving THEM money !

Broadway might not be the only Southern Baptist congregation facing an ouster this week. Influential Southern Baptist pastor and blogger Wade Burleson predicts that the Convention also will be asked to disassociate from First Baptist Church of Decatur, Ga., which recently called a woman to be its lead pastor. The SBC's Faith and Message, revised in 2000, clearly states that "the office of pastor is limited to men."

Go back to the first paragraphs about declining membership. Read them carefully. How many non-Christians do you know who would consider an organization that discriminates against women? Charlie Johnson, Broadway's interim pastor, predicts that women are going to dominate ministerial positions in the next 50 years. Why? 1) women are good at it, and 2) there's going to be a shortage of applicants. Charlie speaks the truth.

"The world may not understand our firm view on homosexuality. So be it," Burleson wrote. "But when half of conservative evangelical Christianity doesn't understand why we would disassociate from churches that call women as pastors, then we lose as a Convention. Let's debate the women in ministry issue. Let's disagree with one another amicably. But for heaven's sake, let's not make fools of ourselves by equating women preaching the gospel with homosexual sin."

It's a little late for that.

Ok, here's the best quote of the entire piece. This is the zinger, and it's brilliant. If you're drinking Coke or coffee or water, put it down, swallow, and back away from your keyboard.

By the way, the theme for this year's Southern Baptist Convention: "Love Loud: Actions Speak Louder Than Words."

The Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee has voted to cease its relationship with Broadway Baptist Church

This was posted on the Baptist Press website a few hours ago. Comments in italics are mine.

Southern Baptist EC recommends ceasing relationship with church over homosexuality
Posted on Jun 22, 2009 by Michael Foust
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (BP)--The Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee recommended in a unanimous vote Monday afternoon that the denomination cease its relationship with Broadway Baptist Church, a Fort Worth, Texas, congregation that has been the source of controversy over its stance on homosexuality.

The Executive Committee's recommendation will be considered by SBC messengers during the annual meeting Tuesday or Wednesday.

I know people whose parents wouldn't allow them to go to movies, because movies were "sinful".

At issue is whether the church is in violation of Article III of the SBC Constitution, which states that churches "which act to affirm, approve, or endorse homosexual behavior" are not in friendly cooperation. Broadway Baptist has approximately five open homosexual members, including two male couples, according to church leaders. Some of the homosexuals serve on church committees.

You may have heard of a dominoes game called "42". Baptists used to view card games as sinful. A couple of Texas kids were busted playing Whist back in 1887, and were punished by their parents. The parents didn't have any problem with dominoes, so the kids invented the game of 42.

The controversy over the church began last year when the question arose as to whether the homosexual couples should be pictured in a church directory. In the end, the church voted 294-182 to publish a directory without family portraits but with candid shots of members involved in various ministries and activities. The Executive Committee got involved after a messenger at the '08 SBC annual meeting made a motion that the convention declare Broadway Baptist not to be "in friendly cooperation" with the denomination. The motion was referred to the Executive Committee.

One of my grandmothers loved to play cards, especially Solitaire. This was back in the 1930's, when preachers went door to door, visiting their "flocks". My grandmother always wore an apron when she played solitaire. That way, if the preacher walked up on the porch and looked in through the screen door (this was pre-air conditioning), she could immediately rake all the cards from the table into her apron.

Various Executive Committee workgroups and subcommittees studied the issue during their September and February meetings but delayed action to further study the issue. Although members of Broadway Baptist appeared at the February meeting, none appeared at Monday's meeting. Some members of the workgroup and subcommittee said in February they would welcome a statement from the church on homosexuality so as to clarify its position on the issue. The church, though, chose not to pass any such statement.

Dancing used to be forbidden at Baptist universities. At Baylor University (in Texas), the ban wasn't lifted until 1996. When Baylor's president danced with his wife, it made the New York Times.
Stephen Wilson, a member of the Executive Committee and vice president for academic affairs at Mid-Continent University, emphasized to Baptist Press that the denomination encourages churches to reach out to people struggling with homosexuality. The issue with Broadway Baptist, though, is over a church allowing members who are homosexual and unrepentant.

When I was in college, I worked in at least one church that wouldn't allow divorced people to have their 2nd marriages performed in the church. The Bible is fairly clear on the issue of divorce.
So people would re-marry elsewhere, and then join the church. Dunno why the wanted to do so under those terms.

"If churches are ministering to homosexuals, they are doing nothing more than what our own convention's task force has asked us to do," Wilson told Baptist Press. "But in Broadway's case … the church was in effect saying that it was OK to have members who are open homosexuals."

Texas used to have "Blue Laws" - an elaborate legal code prohibiting certain items from being sold on Sundays. The intent was to shut down all commerce on Sundays, a clear violation of church/state separation, and in 2009 there are still a few remaining Sabbath prohibitions aimed at keeping the day semi-holy.
In 2009, there's not a Luby's Cafeteria in North America that doesn't have a customer surge immediately after church on Sundays.

The Executive Committee's recommendation says that the committee "recommends that the cooperative relationship between the Convention and the church cease, and that the church's messengers not be seated, until such time as the church unambiguously demonstrates its friendly cooperation with the Convention under Article III."

When Broadway Baptist Church built its magnificent French Gothic-style sanctuary in the 1950's, someone decided to portray the Seven Deadly Sins in the bottom of the east stained glass window. Seven is an odd number; therefore they needed another sin to balance the window. In the 1950's, alcohol was the Baptist 8th deadly sin. So along with the pig of gluttony, the fires of lust, the peacock of pride, etc., there is a bottle of bourbon (?) and a shot glass.

From casual observation in the year 2009, I only know three members of Broadway Baptist Church who do not drink at all. The rest of us wouldn't have turned down any of the wine at The Last Supper.

Wilson noted that some outside observers criticized the Executive Committee for delaying action at two previous meetings. He, though, said he had no regrets and that "it has always been our hope there could be reconciliation."

In the Baptist churches where I grew up, women weren't allowed to be deacons. In most of today's Baptist churches....oh, wait.....never mind. (Broadway has women deacons, BTW.)

"This was not a rush to judgment. We actually wanted -- from the bottom of my heart -- for this to be resolved by the local church where the convention wouldn't have to be involved in any way," said Wilson, who serves as chairman of a workgroup that studied the issue. "… I think [in February] there was a feeling that maybe this could be solved without having to go through the step that we had to do today."

That church where I worked during college had a minister that I respected a lot. But he once told me that he didn't approve of any contemporary or pop-style music in church because its roots were in .... Africa.

The church's interim pastor, Charles Johnson, appeared before an Executive Committee workgroup at February's meeting. Since then, the church has called a new pastor, Brent Beasley.
I used to live next door to an old guy named Mr. Nichols who came to Texas in a wagon train in the late 1800's. Fascinating old man. He mowed his own yard until I took over the job. He would never let me mow his yard (at no charge) on Sundays. He said "it just didn't look right". Many of you have no idea what I'm talking about.

Prior to the February meeting, the church sent a letter to the Executive Committee, which stated in part: "Broadway has never taken any church action to affirm, approve, or endorse homosexual behavior. Broadway Baptist Church considers itself to be in friendly cooperation with the Southern Baptist Convention and has every intention of remaining so." It further stated, "While we extend Christian hospitality to everyone -- including homosexuals -- we do not endorse, approve, or affirm homosexual behavior."

But Wilson said the church's actions ran counter to what it claimed in the letter.

I remember when the Family Christian Stores retail chain decided to open for business on Sundays. The press release claimed that with so many churches operating their in-house bookstores on Sundays, they had to dishonor the Sabbath day in order to survive. Or something like that.

"[I]t was more from what they were actually doing in practice where the conflict was," Wilson said. "While they didn't officially endorse it, they were allowing members and also people in leadership that were homosexual."

I'm old enough to remember preachers who occasionally spoke about the old-time Calvinist doctrine of Infant Damnation. That is, if you have a child, even an infant, who dies without accepting Jesus as savior, the child goes to hell forever. (Mark Twain once quipped that the weather was "hotter than the Presbyterian Hell for dead babies".) Then some wimp invented an idea called "the age of accountability", a doctrine that gave the kid a free pass into heaven if he or she died young. I don't hear much about Infant Damnation any more.

David Lowrie, pastor of First Baptist Church in Canyon, Texas, and president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas, told BP he had hoped Broadway Baptist would do more to make clear it opposes homosexuality. He said he had discussions with church leaders and that his involvement was "more as a pastor than as the president" of the BGCT. Lowrie said he told church leadership "that they needed to take a step beyond just making a public declaration" in a letter.

Baptists used to have another doctrine called "the autonomy of the local church". It meant that each church answered only to God and no one else. I haven't heard much in the last few weeks about the autonomy of the local church.

"They needed to actually express those convictions in some practical way," he said. "They, for whatever reason, weren't able to do that. … I felt that there were things that they could have done to minister to those within their church fellowship that struggled with those issues and other issues."

I know some of the gay members of Broadway Baptist Church. I don't think they struggle any longer with the way that God, or heredity, or environment, made them. They seem reasonably content with it. That's just my opinion, and no one else's. I've intentionally highlighted the word "struggle" in this post. It's almost like the author can't admit there are people who are "homosexual", the way other people are redheaded or left-handed. He has to say THOSE WHO STRUGGLE WITH HOMOSEXUALITY. Not "homosexuals".

He said he thought a ministry within the church to help people with "unhealthy lifestyles" would have helped clarify the matter.

Within the gay and lesbian community, these are called "re-closeting ministries". I think that's one of the funniest phrases I've ever heard.

The pastor who led the church during the church directory controversy -- Brett Younger -- resigned in June 2008 to take a position at McAfee School of Theology in Georgia. He left the church after a vote to oust him failed, 68-32 percent. But the desire by some to remove Younger had less to do with the issue of homosexuality and more to do with a host of other issues, church members said.

None of these issues concerned playing cards, going to movies, dancing, alcohol, remembering the Sabbath Day and keeping it holy, divorce, or infant damnation.

Younger seemingly approved of the acceptance of homosexuality in church life. He delivered a sermon Dec. 2, 2007, explaining both sides of the debate over whether homosexuality is a sin. In the end, he said, God's people will "serve together in the unity of God's diversity."

A damning statement if I ever heard one. As if God tolerates anything like diversity. God's people, and God's doctrines, are the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Always have been the same, and always will be the same.

Michael Foust is an assistant editor of Baptist Press. And in 20 years, he's going to be embarrassed by this article.

Broadway Baptist, The Southern Baptist Convention, Racism, and Praying For Barack Obama To Die

I'm taking a break from the normal Sunday programming.
See the little "search blog" field in the top left corner? People are wearing it out, wanting info on Broadway -Baptist -Southern -Baptist -Brett -Younger -Gays -Lesbians -Church -Directory -Ousted -Convention.
People are sending me emails about this piece in yesterday's Star-Telegram.
I've sworn off of this before, but here goes....

This Star-Telegram article deals with three issues that the Southern Baptist Convention will be dealing with next week: 1) A proclamation heralding Obama's election as a sign of racial progress, 2) my own Broadway Baptist Church, and 3) a former 2nd Veep of the Southern Baptist Convention who is praying for Obama to die.

I'll try to tie all of this stuff together into a neat package at the end of the post.

Fort Worth's Broadway Baptist, Obama's election on Baptists' agenda
By JIM JONES
Special to the Star-Telegram

An effort to expel Fort Worth’s Broadway Baptist Church from the denomination because of its stances on homosexuality and an Arlington pastor’s proclamation of President Barack Obama’s election as a milestone of racial progress will be considered at next week’s Southern Baptist Convention.

This is why I've started telling people that I was raised as a Moonie. Or a Scientologist, or a Druid. Anything less embarrassing than Southern Baptist.




The Rev. Dwight McKissic of Arlington, who says he is a "Bible conservative Republican," can’t imagine fellow Baptists not approving his resolution on "Barack Hussein Obama and Racial Reconciliation" at their meeting Tuesday and Wednesday in Louisville, Ky.
"If Baptists don’t approve this, it will render their 1995 apology for racism hollow, and mean we still have a huge problem with race," said McKissic, pastor of the Cornerstone Baptist Church in Arlington. "This is not about Obama’s politics. It’s about America itself. It’s about fulfilling Martin Luther King’s dream that we judge a man by the competency of his character and not by the color of his skin."

(Ahem....throat clearing and stammering....) Dr. King's quote is about "the content of character", not the "competency of character". Please continue.

His resolution says Obama’s election "provides a new opportunity for people of faith to facilitate racial reconciliation and heal the wounds and scars of the past." It urges Obama "to promote liberty and justice for all people, including the unborn."

Ok, so we have a resolution in place where we will congratulate ourselves for electing an African American president. Please stay with me. I'm going somewhere with this.

Broadway Baptist

....Convention delegates are also expected to decide whether one of Fort Worth’s most venerable congregations, Broadway Baptist, remains in the denomination.
The Rev. Bob Sanderson of Wendell, N.C., criticized Broadway’s stands on homosexuality at last year’s convention and urged that the church be declared "not in friendly cooperation with the Southern Baptist Convention."

It's not "Bob Sanderson" who did this, but Bill Sanderson of Hephzibah Baptist Church. The Star-Telegram is suffering from budget cuts, and this mistake is understandable.
Soon after Brother Bill pulled this stunt, I went to the Hephzibah Church website and explained to Brother Bill that I've known 3 people with his level of homophobia, and that two of them eventually came out of the closet.

Immediately afterwards, Hephzibah Baptist Church took down the Comments section of their website. I continue to hope that Brother Bill is examining his heart.

The matter arose after Broadway members debated whether to allow photographs of same-sex couples in a church directory. The photographs were rejected in favor of group pictures.


A church statements says that one reason for not allowing photographs of gay couples was to emphasize that the church is in line with the Baptist constitution, which does not include churches that "affirm, approve or endorse" homosexual behavior.

As far as I know, Broadway doesn't affirm, approve, or endorse homosexual behavior. Or heterosexual behavior. Or any sexual behavior. I don't think we've ever had a meeting where we affirmed The Missionary Position, Coitus Interruptus, Birth Control, or even Old Testament-style Circumcision.

Broadway has been linked with the Southern Baptist Convention for 127 years, but many of its members support an alternative moderate convention, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. The Baptist Executive Committee will meet Monday and recommend whether Broadway should continue as a cooperating member. A final decision will be made by a vote on the convention floor.

Obama

In contrast to McKissic’s resolution on Obama, the Rev. Wiley Drake of Buena Park, Calif., who was elected second vice president of the convention in 2006, has stirred controversy by saying he is praying that Obama will die unless he repents.
For more details on Brother Wiley, plus the subject of "imprecatory prayer" and my rant on various preachers "praying for Obama to die", you can hit the link.

The remarks were made June 1 on Alan Colmes’ show on Fox News Radio. Drake, an Obama critic known for his headline-grabbing resolutions at Baptist conventions, said he had voiced "imprecatory prayers" against Obama. Imprecatory prayers are based on Psalm 109, in which the Psalmist prays against an enemy, stating, "Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow."
Several Southern Baptist leaders, including McKissic, have repudiated Drake’s statements. They’ve also criticized Drake for declaring that he had voiced similar prayers against Dr. George Tiller, the abortion doctor who was shot to death May 31 while attending church in Wichita, Kan.
"What Drake says is deplorable and despicable," McKissic said. "Nobody who believes in the Bible ought to advocate that position."

Well, this guy thinks otherwise, and lays out a boatload of examples of imprecatory prayers from the Bible, plus this one from another notable source:

We should pray that our enemies be converted and become our friends, and if not, that their doing and designing be bound to fail and have no success and that their persons perish rather than the Gospel and the Kingdom of Christ.
- Martin Luther

Wow.
That's the big picture for the Southern Baptists next week at their annual meeting in Louisville. It should be interesting.
So what does all this mean? And why did you read this far? Thanks for your patience. I'm getting there.
We Southern Baptists don't have a good record on race relations. Why? Well, the Bible tells me that's how it ought to be.
We've used the Bible to justify slavery. Hit the link to read excerpts from "Noah's Curse", a book on how Americans used scripture to justify owning others. Here's Jefferson Davis on the subject:

(slavery) was established by decree of Almighty God... it is sanctioned in the Bible, in both Testaments, from Genesis to Revelation... it has existed in all ages, has been found among the people of the highest civilization, and in nations of the highest proficiency in the arts.

We've used the Bible to justify racism. Ever heard of "The Chosen People"? If you still don't believe me, just ask a Canaanite. If you can find one who was allowed to live.
Today, the overwhelming majority of us are offended by these attitudes. So we have re-interpreted the scriptures in question, re-upholstered them, had them taxidermied, mounted them on the wall, and given them new symbolic meanings. Good for us. Let the resolutions congratulating ourselves for electing a black president roll forth.
Next, here are a few of the comments about homosexuality, from readers of the Star-Telegram article:

I don't know much about ""imprecatory prayers", but I do know it is fine to pray that the righteousness of His word be upheld and vindicated; and His word says, in at least 33 separate and distinct locations in both old and new books, that homosexual acts are a sin and an obomination....

and:

The Bible specifically addresses the issues that are on the table against BB as SIN! However in this age of tolerance and compromise, ala Pres.Obama, I can see why BB would chose to avoid scripture and follow the culture of a vocal miniority.

I wish I'd written this one:

Fatwas: They're not just for Muslims any more !

Can we now agree that parts of the Bible really do condemn homosexuality, just like other parts of the Bible really did condemn wearing clothing from multiple fabrics, eating shellfish, and gathering firewood on the Sabbath ?
Just like other parts of the Bible justify slavery and racism?
Within 50 years, Baptists will look back on their gay-bashing ancestors in the same way we now look back on slave owners and segregationists. First, we will re-interpret the Bible to fit reality. Then we will pat ourselves on the back, issue proclamations apologizing for homophobia, and pretend that we have always been leaders in The Tolerance Parade.
One other thing....Broadway Baptist Church gives out food and clothing to the homeless. They give people shelter on the coldest and hottest Texas nights. What does it mean if the Southern Baptist Convention kicks out Broadway Baptist Church but doesn't kick out Reverend Wiley "I pray that Obama dies" Drake ???
They're going to use scripture to justify prejudice against gays and lesbians, apologize for using scripture to justify prejudice against African-Americans, and then ignore the scriptures that justify praying for the death of a president.

Picture of the T-shirt I want for my birthday came from here. The Brokeback Pastors pic came from here, and requires some context (hope you guys aren't upset).

Ron Quixote

Is there anyone in the world who not only talks the talk AND walks the walk more than Ron Paul? This is from Talking Points Memo:

The House voted 405-1 today for a resolution in support of the Iranian dissidents and condemning the ruling government. And the one man who opposed it was...Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX).

Paul said in his floor speech that he was in "reluctant opposition" to the resolution -- that he of course condemns violence by governments against their citizens. On the other hand, he also doesn't think the American government should act as a judge of every country overseas, and pointed out that we don't condemn countries like Saudi Arabia or Egypt that don't even have real elections.

None of these logical points will make any difference, of course. But it's nice to see someone go tilt at this windmill just the same.

Is there any rational person who thinks it's a good idea for a nation to be run by a bunch of Sand Preachers?

No.

Are we going to intervene in their elections?

No.

So does passing U.N. and congressional resolutions against barbaric theocracies do any good at all, other than giving The Sheeple the impression that our leaders are compassionate?

No.

"It seems our criticism is selective and applied when there are political points to be made," Paul said. "I have admired President Obama's cautious approach to the situation in Iran and I would have preferred that we in the House had acted similarly."

Picture of Ron Paul provided from here. Don Quixote pic provided from here. Bumpersticker provided from here. Ron Paul's compliment of Obama provided with great reluctance.

To my gay and lesbian friends

How is that "Hope" and "Change" thing working out for you? Have you noticed a huge improvement since The Teleprompter Jesus began dwelling among us? I didn't think so.

Remember all the carping about THE FIERCE MORAL URGENCY OF NOW ???



A few proposals can be found here and here.

Here's the money quote from the Andrew Sullivan link:

One way to get the Obama administration's attention on civil rights is for gay people to stop funding the Democrats. That's all these people care about anyway when it comes to gays: our money.

The Libertarians are different, of course. We support your rights on principle, not because you're a dependable constituency.

And we don't have any money.

But let us know if you get tired of throwing money down the DNC money pit.

Yet another coat of whitening to Instapundit for the links.