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Written by: Lake County News Reports

Published: 17 October 2007

Political observers say the “conversion” isn’t a conversion. If they’re sincere, it really must be called a revival, say those who know the history of the Democratic Party. God was in the party from its very beginning (1792, when Thomas Jefferson and James Madison opposed the Federalists). They quoted the Bible in their speeches. God’s name often appeared in their letters, and sometimes even in laws. Party loyalists religiously demonstrated their faith, until fairly recently. It was only in the 1970s when faith in the Democrat Party began to fade. Until this year, it had all but disappeared.

In the 1970s Democrats began to openly support abortion clinics and homosexual marriages. That was also the time they made a strong move towards secularism and shifted a good deal further left on economic issues. Believing Democrats realized their party’s radical new politics had serious conflicts with God and the Bible. They were forced to choose between God and the party. They kept God and became Independents or switched to the Republican Party. Political scientists joke about huge traffic jams in the Bible-Belt-South caused by Democrats lined up at registrars’ offices trying to get out of the Democratic Party. Seculars were left in control. Geographically, the party moved north and west.

Secular Democrats believed God was dead or never existed and led the way to make Darwin’s theory a “scientific fact” throughout the entire country. There was a stampede to get prayer out of public schools and the Ten Commandments out of public buildings. Public school teachers were fired for suggesting intelligent design. Corporal punishment is a Bible remedy for unruly kids so Democrats campaigned, successfully in some states, to ban it. Until now, Democrats are embarrassed to mention God in their campaigns. Times are a changing, or are they?

Believing Republicans are happy to welcome Democrats back into the world of faith but will wait to see if they’re pretending. They know about such things as “fruits of repentance.” They recall former head Democrat, Bill Clinton, had trouble with the meaning of the word “is.” Conservative Christians suspect Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama may be having trouble with the meaning of the words, “God” and “Bible.” They know “God” doesn’t mean adultery, immoral homosexual marriages and the atrocities committed at sadistic abortion clinics. They also know “Bible” doesn’t mean evilution and unruly kids.

What’s more, they’ll ask recovering Democrats if God wants prayer out of public schools and the Ten Commandments out of public eyesight. God doesn’t mean Godless and church doesn’t mean secular. Bible readers will wait to see the “fruits of repentance” before they attend any election-year Democrat revival meetings with Clinton, Obama or Pelosi.

Believing Republicans are not only suspicious of election year Democrat devotion but, sorry to say, they’re beginning to be wary of their own party leaders. Somewhat comforted when President Bush kept God in his politics, they’re extremely disturbed to see Rudy Giuliani and John McCain go lukewarm on abortion and homosexual sins. They’re repulsed when they see GOP candidates promoting the same depraved ideas that caused them to leave the Democratic Party. Early Republican debates show purposeless, empty and soulless candidates, halfway converted to the secularism movement. They’re afraid this election year may show an entire country has fallen off its foundation of faith. Former Bible-Belt southern Democrats, who are now Bush Republicans, won’t know where to go next if there isn‘t a revival somewhere. A number, of course, will keep God and the Bible and may stay home on election day.

Bush Republicans know, houses that don’t have good foundations get washed away in the rain. Voting believers have already shown they won’t stay in political parties built on secular sand. They’ll wait to see if any Republican is serious about traditional American faith. They’re not totally against returning to the Democratic Party if it’s serious about renewal. They know they can’t pack up their Bibles and look for another Mayflower. There’s no place for the Mayflower to go. They may be left, like Christians in the Roman Empire; without a party, sighing, crying and vexing their souls, over the great evil men do.

One good thing about believing is believers have hope one day a Faithful Governor will come to power; one who keeps political promises. They hope that day will be soon. God is in His politics. His political party might be called the “Creationist Party” and will certainly be built on a good foundation of faith.

Darrell Watkins lives in Kelseyville.

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Written by: James BlueWolf

Published: 13 October 2007

Let's begin with water.

Much of the world is already experiencing a crisis obtaining potable water. Human beings are essentially animalized water. If we pour water into ourselves it immediately becomes us. It moves, it thinks, and it forgets that it is water.

98.25 percent of the world's water is saline. Of the remaining 1.75 percent, 80 percent is frozen. That means that less than one-third of 1 percent of all the drinking water in the world is available to all the life that needs fresh water to survive. No new water is being produced. Supplies are finite. Currently, human toxins and practices have poisoned a significant amount of that available water. In the U.S., 50 percent of our drinking water is from underground aquifers that are being pumped dry or poisoned from waste seepage. Those aquifers took 100,000 years to create. They cannot be replaced.

Technocrats insist that science will find a way to desalinate the oceans for our use, meanwhile local governments can't afford to fill the potholes in our streets, let alone balance the federal, state and local budgets. It's estimated that by 2015 many countries will face severe water shortages and in 50 years whole countries may be completely depopulated by the total absence of drinkable water.

How about soil?

It has taken about 100,000 years to build the world's topsoil. Due to the giant shift in agriculture and population growth over the last 5,000 years, 50 percent of the world's topsoil is gone. In 20 years, 30 percent more will have blown away. That's 80 percent of the world's arable soil, gone forever. There have been positive discoveries that could redevelop soils, but not even the slightest interest in actually paying for it.

North and South America have been devastated. Six billion tons of soil is lost per year in the U.S. A Soviet scientist once recommended that the Soviets stop the arms race because he estimated that in 100 years the U.S. could no longer grow enough food to survive. In Asia, 20 billion tons are now being lost annually. Millions of children starve to death annually in reach of this great and modern industrial civilization. Third world countries are encouraged to grow cash crops, harvest resources, or develop industrially so as to pay back their international debts rather than grow food to feed their peoples. In the face of deforestation, development, progress and lack of necessities (like water), 10,000 distinct and irreplaceable species are lost every year. The loss is permanent.

What could be a better indicator of the sanity of a civilization than its desire and commitment to protect the very resources essential to its survival?

Still not convinced?

Let's talk DNA.

The architectural elegance of DNA, the genetic material of the planet, is evidence of the vulnerable quality of creation. All of the DNA molecules of all the humans who have ever lived would fit into one teardrop. That is, 80 billion molecules in a teardrop. Everything that will happen to the future of human beings on this planet depends on the quality and protection of that teardrop.

War on Terror? Here is the real Terror!

There are 264 million tons of hazardous waste spread liberally around the U.S. each year in the form of 70,000 (mostly untested) chemicals and their by-products. To these, add 1,000 more untested chemicals each year.

DNA contains the information and intelligence at the root of an organism. It is known that chemicals can enter the body, and go straight to the cells, attaching themselves and disrupting, modifying, mutating or destroying that information and intelligence. This is damage that cannot be altered and will be part of the human species forever. Some defects can be carried, only to show up in later generations.

Serious birth defects in humans alone have doubled in the last 25 years. The worst effects are not expected to appear for another 10 to 20 years. We will spend billions to fight a war on terror yet to come, and only pennies to fight the daily poisoning of our children and the chemical threat to the DNA of our species. Sanity?

Population growth is the next issue.

Africa has 550 million people, many who lack food and water, as well as basic necessities. In one hundred years it will have 2.5 billion. What then? In hunter/gatherer societies, the ratio was three people per square mile. If we manage to protect our water and regrow our soils – what can the land sustain? Endless population growth is not an acceptable formula. Which governments are committed to determining these ratios and demanding compliance?

Economic systems developed around an endless compulsion for growth are obsolete and must be abandoned immediately for systems which demand society be outfitted with artifacts that last centuries not days or months. Systems that judge their success by gross national product must be outlawed and replaced with systems that operate on renewable resources, recycle nonrenewables at 100 percent and produce no more waste than a local region can dispose of naturally.

The U.S., in order to survive, must cut production and use of resources at a minimum of 50 percent. Third world debt must be forgiven outright or traded for the establishment of wilderness systems. The present economic structures are based on a process that begins with the depletion of finite resources, proceeds to the manufacturing of disposable products which immediately begin to depreciate in value and quality, ending with their disposal as non-renewable wastes which are beyond the natural capacity of the earth to dissipate. Sanity? Common sense?

Each instant, one million new faces appear on the earth – representing many species and forms. The vanity and arrogance of human beings in creating and expanding the role of potentially deadly toxins and weapons points not to a healthy society, culture, or civilization but to a scorched psyche that has become resistant and maladaptive, even sinister. Primary human bonds, which connect families and provide roles that incorporate citizens of all ages into familial relationships, have been replaced with the secondary commercial bonds of consumerism.

The new revelations of quantum science and universe cosmologies demand that those who believe in technology commit to a new understanding of the Universe as one entity – inter-connected, inter-reliant and inter-related in every way. To separate humanity from this cosmology will result in a continued insanity that will bring about nothing less than the suicide of our species.

Scholars have long lamented the destruction of the library at Alexandria at the hands of barbarians who burned the manuscripts to heat their bath water because they were unable to grasp the beauty they cast into the flame.

Those who discount these warnings have only to examine themselves in a mirror to see the faces of those same barbarians.

James BlueWolf is a artist and author. He lives in Nice.

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Written by: Mike Thompson

Published: 04 October 2007

The State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP, known in California as Healthy Families) has a history steeped in bipartisanship. A Democratic president and a Republican Congress created the program, which today covers about 6.6 million American children – 800,000 of whom live in California. They are members of families that make no more than 250 percent over the poverty line – too much to participate in Medicaid and too little to afford private insurance.

This reauthorization guarantees that all of the kids currently enrolled in SCHIP will continue to receive coverage – and gives states the tools and the resources they need to find and enroll almost four million additional eligible children. California alone has identified 200,000 kids that would be immediately eligible for enrollment, if only it had the adequate resources.

This bill provides those resources. It gives states incentives for ensuring that only the neediest children are enrolled. And it is completely paid for. It has the support of 43 governors – including our own – in addition to the support of an unusual cadre of bedfellows: private insurance companies, organized labor, the pharmaceutical industry, and hundreds of leading health and children’s advocacy organizations.

Unfortunately, there is one person in Washington who can turn even this issue into a political football. This week, President Bush vetoed Congress’ reauthorization of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. On the heels of his request for an additional $190 billion for the war in Iraq, he has told Congress to spend no more than $5 billion on children’s health care. If the president gets his way, SCHIP won’t be reauthorized – it will be downsized. This means 20 percent of the children currently enrolled – over 1.4 million kids – will be kicked out of the program.

These are real children who live in our communities. Today, in Lake County, nearly 1,700 kids are enrolled in Healthy Families. They get primary and preventive care – which means that they are less likely to end up in the emergency room. And if they do end up in the ER – they have insurance. Our parents and grandparents used to tell us to be “penny wise rather than a pound foolish.” Investing $35 billion in the SCHIP program today is an infinitely less costly proposition than providing no health care to uninsured children – because, one way or the other, as a nation, we will pay for it later.

Naysayers, with the president as their loudest voice, have concocted a variety of myths about the SCHIP reauthorization. I have long preferred facts to myths, so let me set the record straight: This bill does not increase entitlement spending, because SCHIP is not an entitlement program – it is a capped block grant. This bill doesn’t allow states to cover the children of “rich” parents, nor does it allow them to cover illegal immigrants or parents or childless adults. This bill opens the door to quality health care for 10 million of America’s children. And arguments to the contrary are dead wrong.

The president and his followers can say whatever they like about this reauthorization. But as Republican Senator Charles Grassley, a staunch supporter of this legislation, said on the Senate floor last week, “You can’t call a cow a chicken and have it be true.”

The truth is, the president’s veto of the SCHIP reauthorization is politicking of the worst kind. It directly contradicts the priorities and the will of the American people, who overwhelmingly support Congress’ efforts to extend this program. And it is a shameful move from the president of the richest country in the world – home to more than 9.4 million uninsured children.

In the near future, I will join a majority of my colleagues in casting my vote to override this veto – and we will continue doing so until we prevail. America understands, even if the president doesn’t, that reauthorizing SCHIP in order to expand health care for our children is a fight we cannot afford to lose.

Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena) represents Lake County in the US House of Representatives.

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