I laugh and cry with the same eyes,
Love and hate with the same heart.
I feel my rage and my gentleness,
My sanity and suicide.
When I hide my anger, my joy doesn't seem real.
When I hide my fear, my strength is a fraud.
If I only laugh, I leave no place for your pain.
If I only shout, I leave no place for your tenderness.
I want to be all of myself,
So you can be all of yourself,
And together we can be whole.
By Todd Starnes Published October 14, 2014 FoxNews.com
The city of Houston has issued subpoenas demanding a group of pastors turn over any sermons dealing with homosexuality, gender identity or Annise Parker, the city’s first openly lesbian mayor. And those ministers who fail to comply could be held in contempt of court.
“The city’s subpoena of sermons and other pastoral communications is both needless and unprecedented,” Alliance Defending Freedom attorney Christina Holcomb said in a statement. “The city council and its attorneys are engaging in an inquisition designed to stifle any critique of its actions.”
ADF, a nationally-known law firm specializing in religious liberty cases, is representing five Houston pastors. They filed a motion in Harris County court to stop the subpoenas arguing they are “overbroad, unduly burdensome, harassing, and vexatious.”
“Political and social commentary is not a crime,” Holcomb said. “It is protected by the First Amendment.”
The subpoenas are just the latest twist in an ongoing saga over the Houston’s new non-discrimination ordinance. The law, among other things, would allow men to use the ladies room and vice versa. The city council approved the law in June.
The Houston Chronicle reported opponents of the ordinance launched a petition drive that generated more than 50,000 signatures – far more than the 17,269 needed to put a referendum on the ballot.
However, the city threw out the petition in August over alleged irregularities.
After opponents of the bathroom bill filed a lawsuit the city’s attorneys responded by issuing the subpoenas against the pastors.
The pastors were not part of the lawsuit. However, they were part of a coalition of some 400 Houston-area churches that opposed the ordinance. The churches represent a number of faith groups – from Southern Baptist to non-denominational.
“City council members are supposed to be public servants, not ‘Big Brother’ overlords who will tolerate no dissent or challenge,” said ADF attorney Erik Stanley. “This is designed to intimidate pastors.”
Mayor Parker will not explain why she wants to inspect the sermons. I contacted City Hall for a comment and received a terse reply from the mayor’s director of communications.
“We don’t comment on litigation,” said Janice Evans.
However, ADF attorney Stanley suspects the mayor wants to publicly shame the ministers. He said he anticipates they will hold up their sermons for public scrutiny. In other words – the city is rummaging for evidence to “out” the pastors as anti-gay bigots.
Among those slapped with a subpoena is Steve Riggle, the senior pastor of Grace Community Church. He was ordered to produce all speeches and sermons related to Mayor Annise Parker, homosexuality and gender identity.
The mega-church pastor was also ordered to hand over “all communications with members of your congregation” regarding the non-discrimination law.
“This is an attempt to chill pastors from speaking to the cultural issues of the day,” Riggle told me. “The mayor would like to silence our voice. She’s a bully.”
David Welch, director of the Houston Area Pastor Council, also received a subpoena. He said he will not be intimidated by the mayor.
“We’re not afraid of this bully,” he said. “We’re not intimidated at all.”
He accused the city of violating the law with the subpoenas and vowed to stand firm in the faith.
“We are not going to yield our First Amendment rights,” Welch told me. ‘This is absolutely a complete abuse of authority.”
Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council, said pastors around the nation should rally around the Houston ministers.
“The state is breaching the wall of separation between church and state,” Perkins told me. ‘Pastors need to step forward and challenge this across the country. I’d like to see literally thousands of pastors after they read this story begin to challenge government authorities – to dare them to come into their churches and demand their sermons.”
Perkins called the actions by Houston’s mayor “obscene” and said they “should not be tolerated.”
“This is a shot across the bow of the church,” he said.
This is the moment I wrote about in my book, “God Less America.” I predicted that the government would one day try to silence American pastors. I warned that under the guise of “tolerance and diversity” elected officials would attempt to deconstruct religious liberty.
Sadly, that day arrived sooner than even I expected.
Tony Perkins is absolutely right. Now is the time for pastors and people of faith to take a stand. We must rise up and reject this despicable strong-arm attack on religious liberty. We cannot allow ministers to be intimidated by government thugs.
The pastors I spoke to tell me they will not comply with the subpoena – putting them at risk for a “fine or confinement, or both.”
Heaven forbid that should happen. But if it does, Christians across America should be willing to descend en masse upon Houston and join these brave men of God behind bars.
Pastor Welch compared the culture war skirmish to the 1836 Battle of San Jacinto, fought in present-day Harris County, Texas. It was a decisive battle of the Texas Revolution.
“This is the San Jacinto moment for traditional family,” Welch told me. “This is the place where we stop the LGBT assault on the freedom to practice our faith.”
We can no longer remain silent. We must stand together - because one day – the government might come for your pastor.
Todd Starnes is host of Fox News & Commentary, heard on hundreds of radio stations. Sign up for his American Dispatch newsletter, be sure to join his Facebook page, and follow him on Twitter. His latest book is "God Less America."
1. I'm not saying let's go kill all the stupid people. I'm just saying let's
remove all the warning labels and let the problem work itself out.
2. I changed my car horn to gunshot sounds. People move out of the
way much faster now.
3. You can tell a lot about a woman's mood just by her hands. If they
are holding a gun, she's probably angry.
4. Gone are the days when girls used to cook like their mothers.
Now they drink like their fathers.
5. You know that tingly little feeling you get when you really like
someone? That's common sense leaving your body.
6. I don't like making plans for the day because then the word
"premeditated" gets thrown around in the courtroom.
7. I didn't make it to the gym today. That makes five years in a row.
8. I decided to change calling the bathroom the John and renamed
it the Jim. I feel so much better saying I went to the Jim this morning.
9. Dear paranoid people who check behind shower curtains for murderers,
if you find one, what's your plan?
10. Everyone has a right to be stupid. Some just abuse the privilege.
From Townhall.com
John Hawkins Oct 11, 2014
Liberalism is an ideology of parasites, hypocrites, grievance mongers, victims, and control freaks. Like a tick, liberalism latches onto a victim and sucks him dry. Of course, a single tick can’t gorge itself on so much blood that it does to a dog what liberalism did to Detroit. It doesn’t turn the different parts of the dog against each other. The tick doesn’t tell everyone he’s a victim and that the dog is greedy if he tries to scratch it off.
You can’t be both a good Christian and a good liberal because they’re incompatible and liberalism makes no exceptions for religious beliefs. It demands to be placed first in a person’s life, even above God; a liberal who stands up for his Christian beliefs or who merely asks that Christians not be demeaned will be ostracized for it by other liberals. Churches that adopt liberal beliefs inevitably become such pale imitations of the truth that missionaries should be sent in to convert them to Christianity.
Liberalism is an ideology of tribalism and hatred. It works incessantly to undermine anything that truly brings America together -- like Christianity, the culture and love of country -- so it can try to rebind people together as liberal drones. Relatively minor differences of opinion between liberals and those who disagree with them are habitually elevated to encourage hated.
For example, there’s no logical, rational reason that…
…If you oppose illegal immigration, you must hate Hispanics.
….If you oppose Affirmative Action, you must hate blacks.
….If you oppose free birth control, you must hate women.
….If you’re concerned about radical Islam, you must hate all Muslims.
….If you oppose gay marriage, you must hate gays.
Yet, liberalism promotes those lies incessantly to keep people at each other’s throats. Liberals have to convince their supporters that they’re hated for who they are to keep them from asking uncomfortable questions about why liberalism fails and conservatism works. As long as you’re brainwashed into believing that you’re universally hated by everyone except liberals for something you can’t control, you have nowhere else to turn.
Turning people against each other, lying about your opponents and adopting an ends justifies the means mentality are all interwoven into liberalism. Most liberals aren’t evil, but liberalism is a darkness of the soul and the more fully a person adopts it, the more of an awful human being he becomes.
Liberalism encourages a habitual hatred of people who aren’t liberal. It exaggerates grievances, elevates victimhood, excuses laziness and immoral behavior, undermines success and it pours acid on the pillars that hold up our entire society. To paraphrase Thomas Sowell,
Civilization has been aptly called a ‘thin crust over a volcano’. (Liberalism is) constantly picking at that crust.
Liberalism seems to begin with the assumption that there’s an infinite amount of money, goodness, cultural resiliency and goodwill -- and that nothing people do can have a negative impact on it. We’ll have plenty of money no matter how much liberals spend. People will be good no matter how much evil liberalism condones. Our culture will remain strong no matter how much liberals denigrate it and discourage people from embracing it. There will be no long term consequences of pushing division and hatred, no matter how often liberals do it.
If only they were right about that or if their policies worked. Want to know the consummate liberal policy? It’s Obamacare. It was passed with all Democrat votes and sold to the public almost entirely with lies. Almost every problem with the law was predicted by the law’s opponents beforehand and was vigorously denied by liberals. The law hasn’t worked as intended, it has had disastrous consequences and is extremely unpopular. Yet, liberals STILL support it wholeheartedly and blame the people who begged them not to pass the law for the difficulties it has.
As Talleyrand would say, “They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing.”
That would be tolerable if liberalism confined its hatred, wickedness, stupidity and incompetence to liberal enclaves, but on top of all its other faults, liberalism is an ideology for control freaks. It’s not enough for liberals to bankrupt California and destroy Detroit; they have to centralize their policies to force the people who know better to suffer for their sins. After all, if people are given a choice, they may not choose liberalism and worse yet, they may prove to be bad examples by prospering BECAUSE they didn’t choose liberalism and that can’t be allowed.
However, the most unforgivable thing about liberalism is the sickening way it deceives people to destroy human potential. Liberalism comes in the guise of a friend offering “help” to desperate people. It’s the same sort of “help” a fisherman gives his catch; it just comes with a different sort of hook through the mouth. Liberals get people hooked on welfare and food stamps instead of teaching them to take care of themselves. They encourage people to think of themselves as helpless victims who can’t deal with the world without liberal help. Instead of helping the weak to become strong, they encourage them to be ever more sensitive and to look for new reasons to be offended. There are whole communities of people who’ve been voting for liberal policies for decades with nothing to show for it except poverty, crime, and decay. There are people on welfare today who would have had happy, productive lives if they had been pushed to take care of themselves. There are people who’ve been so convinced by liberalism that the deck is stacked against them that they’ve never tried to get their piece of the American dream. It’s wrong to do that to people. It’s sickening. It’s immoral.
Liberalism empties treasuries, blackens souls, and decimates everything it touches over the long haul. One day, unless the American people wise up to the damage liberalism is causing, it will eventually ruin this nation beyond repair.
Just read this in a daily E-Mail that I receive and thought I SHOULD share it.
If I Fail...
(By John MacArthur)
If I fail to teach my son to fear [reverence] God,
the devil will teach him to hate God.
If I fail to teach my son to guard his mind,
the devil will teach him to have an open mind.
If I fail to teach my son to obey his parents,
the devil will teach him to rebel and break his parents' hearts.
If I fail to teach my son to select his companions carefully,
the devil will choose them for him.
If I fail to teach my son to control his body,
the devil will gladly teach him to give it completely over to his lusts.
If I fail to teach my children to enjoy speech that is honorable to God,
the devil will fill their mouths with filth.
If I fail to teach my children to pursue their work,
the devil will make them lazy
If I fail to teach them to manage their money,
the devil will teach them to waste if on riotous living.
If I fail to teach them to love their neighbor,
the devil will gladly teach them to love only themselves!
One time, when I was a child, I was not picked last for a team; I wasn’t picked at all. The team captain who was supposed to choose the last remaining player declined to choose me. It hurt. Really hurt. But Cheryl, a girl on the other team, said, “Come on, Jennifer. You can be on our team.”
Twenty years later, I walked into a restaurant, and there was Cheryl. Throughout the years I had thought of her and what she did for me that day. She included me. She said that I was good enough. When I saw her, I was so choked up with emotion that I could barely speak. I thanked her for being nice to me when we were in school. Even though she remembered my face, she didn’t remember my name or that day on the playground. That was okay. I did remember, and her compassion still meant a lot to me.
Ecclesiastes suggests that compassion may be returned to us. Even small acts of kindness can make a big difference in someone else’s life. Our compassion is the bread we send out, and maybe one day those who enjoyed that bread long ago will be able to come back and tell us that what we did made a difference.
Those that holler racist the loudest and find racism in every aspect of life – they are the real racists as they look for the black vs white in everything, they don’t just see people they see color.
“I played God today
And it was fun!
I made animals that men had never seen
So they would stop and scratch their heads
Instead of scowling.
I made words that men had never heard
So they would stop and stare at me
Instead of running.
And I made love that laughed
So men would giggle like children
Instead of sighing.
Tomorrow, perhaps, I won't be God
And you will know it
Because you won't see any three-headed cats
Or bushes with bells on...
I wish I could always play God
So that lonely men could laugh!”
― James Kavanaugh, There Are Men Too Gentle to Live Among Wolves
The secret to having a good marriage is to understand that marriage must be total, it must be permanent, and it must be equal.
-- Frank Pittman
A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person.
-- Mignon McLaughlin
Marriage, like a submarine, is only safe if you get all the way inside.
-- Frank Pittman
Motto for the bride and groom:
We are a work in progress with a lifetime contract.
-- Phyllis Koss
If you treat your wife like a thoroughbred, you'll never end up with a nag.
-- Zig Ziglar
Lawrence Meyers | Sep 29, 2014
Gross incompetence at the State Department, likely stemming from decisions by Hillary Clinton, is a primary reason why Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were killed in the Benghazi terrorist attack.
A source who has asked to remain anonymous due to their proximity to the investigation, said that much of the blame for the murders rests squarely within the State Department, then under the command of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
The State Department had final decision-making authority over all of the following:
· The selection of the 17 February Martyrs Brigade, affiliates of terrorist organization Ansar al-Sharia, as security for the U.S. Special Mission Compound, which housed the Ambassador;
· The refusal to provide U.S. Special Forces as security for the Ambassador;
· The location of the compound, which was located next door to an outpost of terrorist organization Ansar Al-Sharia; The “stand down” order that delayed military contractors at a nearby CIA Annex from aiding the compound.
Terrorists as Security Guards
The 17 February Martyr’s Brigade, or 17 Feb, was the largest and most well-known militia group in Libya at the time of the attack. Its moniker refers to an incident on that date in 2006, when Libyan security forces killed a group of people outside the Italian consulate in Benghazi.
The militia was born during the war against Qaddafi, taking advantage of the security vacuum to collect weapons and recruit personnel. After the September 11 attack on the compound, members merged into Ansar al-Sharia, a coalition terror organization whose name means “Partisans of Sharia Law.”
However, there appears to be no explanation for why the State Department chose a known Jihadist group to protect Americans in a war-torn Islamic nation.
At a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in May of 2013, Rep. Blake Farenthold (R – TX) told Eric Nordstrom, the State Dept.’s Regional Security Officer in Tripoli at the time, “I’m stunned that the State Department was relying on a militia with extremist ties to protect American diplomats. That doesn’t make any sense. How does that happen?”
Nordstrom went on to list a host of cases in which local militias, in Islamic countries, had betrayed and murdered their American employers, implying that such poor tactical decision-making was not an unusual occurrence at State.
Despite all this, 17 Feb was chosen to handle security for the Ambassador. Who made the ultimate determination? A source close to the investigation says Hillary Clinton made that decision.
“She could have outsourced that work to anyone,” the source says. “17 Feb was never properly vetted. Even a casual look at Middle East newspapers would have revealed them to be Ansar al-Sharia affiliates. As early as that summer, the Libyan government was conducting air strikes on 17 Feb. Obviously, nobody at State read these reports.”
The source went on to say, “The 17 Feb guys that resided on the compound were paid by us, were fed by us, we gave them cars, they swam in our pool, and they repaid us by participating in the attack.”
“We did not trust 17 Feb”
Kris “Tanto” Paronto, one of several military contractors housed in a nearby CIA Annex who attempted to rescue Ambassador Stevens, says “We did not trust 17 Feb. They were a former terrorist organization and we believed the group had been infiltrated by Islamic Radicals. Even beyond this, though, there is a bigger issue.”
“We normally train directly with local militias in other countries, which is a tactically sound decision. It is critical that a rapport be established with 17 Feb for them to be used as a Quick Reaction Force. While our Chief of Base had spoken to them numerous times, the GRS staff itself – the people supporting the agency at the Annex -- never spoke to, worked with, or trained with any 17 Feb commanders or members.”
Tanto reports that the Blue Mountain Group, a group of unarmed Libyan security guards outside the compound gate, either abandoned their posts as the attack began, and may have even opened the gates for the terrorists to enter. There was no “break-in” as has been falsely reported.
Indefensible Compound
Tanto further says thathe had been in charge of high-level ambassador protection in Iraq on previous occasions. Thus, when he saw the compound, he knew something was “extremely abnormal.” The eight-acre compound was too vast to be effectively fortified and defended.
“I chalked it up to the State Department being idiots, because they never did anything that made sense security-wise,” he said, reiterating his statements from the recently released best-seller, “13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi.”
The sheer indefensible size of the compound was but one mistake. A second fatal error was committed by State Department Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy, who refused to provide U.S. Special Forces security, according to a Wall Street Journal editorial by Gregory Hicks, the former Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy in Tripoli.
A third fatal mistake was the selection of compound’s location. Three weeks after the compound was rented, an outpost of the terrorist organization Ansar al-Sharia moved in next door. The compound’s location was not changed, nor was additional security or rooftop firepower provided, despite requests. It seems unfathomable that the compound was not relocated with terrorists living right next door.
Who Gave Bob the “Stand-Down” Order?
There is no question that a “stand down” order was delivered to Tanto and the operators directly, by their Chief of Base, the CIA official known only as “Bob.” The operators have corroborated that the order was given to them while Bob was on the phone.
Until now, however, exactly to whom Bob was speaking to has been a mystery.
Our source reports that Bob was seeking assistance from none other than the 17 February Martyr’s Brigade – the very group participating in the attack.
“Bob was literally on the phone, calling for help from the guys who were in the midst of attacking our people,” our source says. “Interdepartmental communication was so poor that he didn’t know that he was essentially calling al-Qaeda to save our people from al-Qaeda.”
Additionally unreported until now, was that Bob made a second call while Tanto and his team were in their SUVs, ready to roll to the Ambassador’s rescue.
According to the source close to the investigation, “If the chain of command was followed, and there is no reason to believe it wasn’t, Bob was on the phone with the Chief of Station in Tripoli, who in turn would have been in direct contact with the Seventh Floor at State.”
The “Seventh Floor” is where the highest-ranking State Department officials, including Hillary Clinton, are located.
Why?
Additional military support wasn’t just lacking during the battle, but well after it ended. After evacuating everyone from the compound and CIA Annex to the Benghazi airport, hours after repeated calls for help had been made, no U.S. plane ever came for them.
All that time passed, four men were dead in a terrorist attack, yet not a single US asset showed up.
It was if everyone involved literally did not exist.
I offered the only two logical explanations for this lack of support, both of which Tanto agreed with. Either there was gross incompetence at multiple levels, across multiple assets in multiple regions, including Washington, all occurring at that exact time when help was needed most…
…or that calls for assistance were received, but deliberately ignored.
The former theory is implausible, but not impossible. The latter theory is both plausible and likely.
More than one report suggests that Stevens was in Libya to buy back surface-to-air missiles sold to al-Qaeda groups in Libya, to fight against Qaddafi, and/or Syria to fight against Assad. If so, it raises the question of whether military support could be sent for a mission that Administration or Congressional officials would prefer to deny the existence of. </HREF="#.UGXZZQ6QSED%20&NBSP;">
After all, who wants to tell the American people about missiles being sold to any Islamic terrorists, regardless of who they are allegedly fighting against?
Cover-Up
This theory would explain the cover-up emanating from Washington.
It, along with the pre-election embarrassment of a terror attack, would explain the Administration’s adherence to the ludicrous “offensive video” explanation for days after the attack.
It would explain why the operators have not been interviewed or invited to testify before the Accountability Review Board. The ARB report is Washington politics at its worst – a document filled with bureaucratic nonsense about “recommendations” and references to the operators only facing “a few skirmishes” when returning from the compound to the Annex when, according to our source, “more than eighty terrorists were killed in lengthy firefights.”
It should come as no surprise that Hillary Clinton appointed four of the five people to the ARB.
It would also explain why Hillary Clinton thinks there is no difference between a terrorist attack and a spontaneous demonstration.
The Heroism
Amidst all these new revelations, it is easy to forget the distinction between the Ambassador’s compound and the nearby CIA Annex. This is critical, as it highlights the heroism of Tanto and his comrades.
These brave individuals were hired strictly as security for the case officers at the CIA Annex, not for the Ambassador’s compound. It was only during a routine meeting that Tanto told the compound’s occupants, “if you are in trouble, give us a call and we’ll come get you.”
Civilians intellectually understand that military service is about sacrifice, dedication, honor, and bravery. To men like Tanto, however, those words have a primal, visceral meaning. There was no legal or operational requirement for the operators to risk their lives.
Each man did so for one reason: they gave their word.
That was one reason the delay was so agonizing. The other reason was that nobody else was coming to help the Ambassador and his group, and the operators knew it. They were completely alone. The compound’s house had been set on fire. There was no air support. There was no cavalry.
Coming Forward
Despite the heroic acts of Tanto and his comrades, the U.S. Government and the mainstream media have tried to bury everything having to do with their story. The disrespect shown to them by their former employer, and suppression of the truth, is what motivated the men to come forward.
Tanto said, “We watched on TV, as the news media distorted the facts. The story was being politicized, instead of it being about what was important: the sacrifices of Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty. At one point, I heard on NPR how we were figments of the right wing’s imagination!”
Besides never being asked to testify at any hearings, the men were also denied reimbursement for their losses in Libya…right down to their socks, undershirts, and underwear.
The last straw came when, immediately following the memorial service for their fallen comrades, they were asked to sign non-disclosure agreements.
“We couldn’t stay silent after that. We resigned immediately,” Tanto said. “This has never been about politics. It’s about people hearing the truth, wherever it leads.”
Haunted
As for whether a flood of emotion hit Tanto after the incident, he says it still hasn’t come out. “I’m holding on to it. It’s all still there. I need it to strengthen my resolve for all the naysayers who claim this didn’t happen.”
That’s why the support the team has received on social media means more to them than words can express.
“Please tell everyone how much it means to us to know when Americans have our back, so we don’t have to fight anymore. Any veteran just wants respect for what he did. It is so powerful to see some naysayer on Twitter say something and have a hundred replies bury him. “
“It helps keep the demons at bay.”
Kris “Tanto” Paranto tweets @KrisParanto. His colleagues tweet @MarkGeistSWP and @JohnTiegen
