"So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets." Matthew 7:12, New International Version
"In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets. Matthew 7:12, New American Standard Bible
MAVERICKS WITHOUT A JUST OR HOLY CAUSE ~ YOU BETCHA
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Barack Obama Ad October 5, 2008
Uploaded by campaigntvad
Sarah Palin's Once Church:
A Pentecostal Church
what they believe
WE BELIEVE...The Scriptures are Inspired by God and declare His design and plan for mankind.
WE BELIEVE...There is only One True God revealed in three persons...Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (commonly known as the Trinity).
WE BELIEVE...In the Deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. As God's son Jesus was both human and divine.
WE BELIEVE...though originally good, Man Willingly Fell to Sin ushering evil and death, both physical and spiritual, into the world.
WE BELIEVE...Every Person Can Have Restored Fellowship with God Through Salvation (accepting Christ's offer of forgiveness for sin). [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the A/G]
WE BELIEVE...and practice two ordinances (1) Water Baptism by Immersion after repenting of one's sins and receiving Christ's gift of salvation, and (2) Holy Communion (the Lord's Supper) as a symbolic remembrance of Christ's suffering and death for our salvation.
WE BELIEVE...the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is a Special Experience Following Salvation that empowers believers for witnessing and effective service, just as it did in New Testament times. [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the A/G]
WE BELIEVE... The Initial Physical Evidence of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is Speaking in Tongues, as experienced on the Day of Pentecost and referenced throughout Acts and the Epistles.
WE BELIEVE...Sanctification Initially Occurs at Salvation and is not only a declaration that a believer is holy, but also a progressive lifelong process of separating from evil as believers continually draw closer to God and become more Christlike.
WE BELIEVE...The Church has a Mission to seek and save all who are lost in sin. We believe 'the Church' is the Body of Christ and consists of the people who, throughout time, have accepted God's offer of redemption (regardless of religious denomination) through the sacrificial death of His son Jesus Christ.
WE BELIEVE...A Divinely Called and Scripturally Ordained Leadership Ministry Serves the Church. The Bible teaches that each of us under leadership must commit ourselves to reach others for Christ, to worship Him with other believers, and to build up or edify the body of believers the Church.
WE BELIEVE...Divine Healing of the Sick is a Privilege for Christians Today and is provided for in Christ's atonement (His sacrificial death on the cross for our sins). [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the A/G]
WE BELIEVE...in The Blessed Hope. When Jesus Raptures His Church Prior to His Return to Earth (the second coming). At this future moment in time all believers who have died will rise from their graves and will meet the Lord in the air, and Christians who are alive will be caught up with them, to be with the Lord forever. [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the A/G]
WE BELIEVE...in The Millennial Reign of Christ when Jesus returns with His saints at His second coming and begins His benevolent rule over earth for 1,000 years. At that time many in the nation of Israel will recognize and accept Him as the Messiah, the Savior who died for them and all mankind.
WE BELIEVE...A Final Judgment Will Take Place for those who have rejected Christ. They will be judged for their sin and consigned to eternal punishment in a punishing lake of fire.
WE BELIEVE...and look forward to the perfect New Heavens and a New Earth that Christ is preparing for all people, of all time, who have accepted Him. We will live and dwell with Him there forever following His millennial reign on Earth. 'And so shall we forever be with the Lord!'
Wasilla Church~ Assembly of God
Article about Palin and her church in the Sun Times
Sarah Palin's Present Church ~ Wasilla Bible Church- Statement of Faith
The Sarah Palin interview text below is from www.time.com
Question: Where do you see yourself going? Staying on in Alaska. Washington?
Palin: You know, I don't know. I knew early on that the smartest thing for me to do was to work hard, do the best that I can, make wise decisions based on good information in front of me. And then put my life, get myself on a path that could be dedicated to God and ask Him what I should next. That will be the position I will be in as long as I'm on earth — that is, seeking the right path that God would have laid out for me.
Question: What's your religion?
Palin: Christian.
Question: Any particular...?
Palin: No. Bible-believing Christian.
Question: What church do you attend?
Palin: A non-denominational Bible church. I was baptized Catholic as a newborn and then my family started going to non-denominational churches throughout our life.
This is what Sarah Palin said about the purpose of her life, which is taken from above: "...And then put my life, get myself on a path that could be dedicated to God and ask Him what I should next. That will be the position I will be in as long as I'm on earth — that is, seeking the right path that God would have laid out for me." Sarah Palin
I was raised in a fundamentalist church and what bothers me is that the way Sarah Palin behaves in her campaigning doesn't fit how God would want anyone to behave. Today when she was putting down Barack Obama, a crowd member yelled out to "Kill him!" (When John McCain was doing the same in New Mexico today, a crowd member yelled out "Terrorist!") McCain and Palin are inciting hatred. No fundamental Christian could justify this behavior.
Dodgy Debate
PBS' Ifill, on Palin ignoring some of her questions during the VP debate: "She blew me off, I think, is the technical term. ... The understanding was that we were going to have a debate. ... There are two people on the stage. And their jobs ... are to debate each other. The moderator's job is to control their debate. ... She decided she was going to give a stump speech to the American people, there's very little a moderator can do other than say, 'No, no, no, listen, I asked a question. Please, please answer.' ... 99 percent, I would say, was all about her. Ninety-nine percent of the analyses afterwards were about her. It was if Joe Biden wasn't part of this deal. And if she wasn't challenged on the things she said that were not completely correct, or she wasn't challenged on changing the subject and then answering the questions by her competitor, I had another job to do at the table."
More Ifill: "What I discovered this week, in an uncomfortable way, is that when they throw everything in the mix to change the subject, you can get in the way. I got in the way of it this week. ... It was also interesting to realize that if changing the subject from the stakes of the vice presidential debate meant talking about the moderator instead of talking about the candidate, they would do that" ("Meet the Press," NBC, 10/5).
Meanwhile, Up North
Seven Palin aides "have reversed course" and have "agreed to testify" in the AK Legislature's abuse of power investigation. However, there "is no indication that Palin or her husband will now agree to testify in the legislative inquiry" (Apuzzo, AP, 10/5). AK AG Talis Colberg (R) "said the decision comes in light of Superior Court Judge Peter Michalski's ruling last week rejecting an attempt to kill the subpoenas" (Loy, Anchorage Daily News, 10/6).
Meanwhle, the AK Supreme Court "accepted an emergency appeal" late on 10/3 from six AK lawmakers "who seek to halt" the investigation into Palin's alleged abuse-of-power. The court will hear oral arguments 10/8. The Legislative investigator's report is due 10/10, but that could be blocked by the court (Volz, AP, 10/4).
Meanwhile, T. Palin "is planning to speak" to the investigation being conducted by the Alaska State Personnel Board, "but no date has been set" (Volz, AP, 10/5).
Also, GOP activist Andree McLeod "filed" a lawsuit 10/1 that "seeks to force" Palin to "produce copies of official correspondence she sent and received on private e-mail accounts" (Mosk, "The Trail," WashingtonPost.com, 10/4).
Can You Write Off Folksy Phrases And Well-Timed Winks?
On the afternoon of 10/3, the McCain camp released Palin's '06 and '07 tax returns after "pressure" from the Obama camp following its release of "10 years" of Biden family returns. The returns "are the first glimpse into [Palin's] personal finances."
The documents say the Palins have assets "over" $1M, "consisting largely of an ample retirement portfolio, real estate" and T. Palin's "commercial fishing business." In '06, the family reported income of $127,869, "which consisted mainly" of T. Palin's income from BP "and an income of less than" $5K for Palin from the state of AK prior to her election" as gov. Palin and her husband paid "less than" a 10% tax rate on their '06 income, writing a check to the gov't for $11,944.
In '07, the family's $166,080 taxable income came "largely" from Palin's gov. salary. "The couple paid $24,738 on this income," a rate of "around" 15%. S. Palin "kept her tax rate low" by "putting all of her investments in tax-differed accounts."
Palin did not include the $17K in per diem payments she received as income on the '07 return. The "tax treatment of the payments has drawn considerable interest from tax lawyers, who have written on this subject in various blogs, challenging the campaign's interpretation of tax law."
The couple "reported charitable deductions" of 2.5K in '07 and $4,250 in '06. The "only charity identified" was the Salvation Army, which "received a small amount of goods" from the Palins. The McCain camp "declined to identify" the other charities.
The largest chunk of the $1M in assets comes from the couple's Wasilla house, which "has been value for tax purposes" at $550K. The "remaining estate" consists of "a fishing leasehold on the Nushagak river" and "partial interest in two other parcels of land" (Wayne, New York Times, 10/4).
•McCain "paid more for household help," $270K, in '07 than Palins made in income.
Pentacostal Palin - A Visit to Palins' Current Church
While on the Wasilla city council, Palin "sided with local saloon keepers and cast the deciding vote against a measure to reset pub cloing times to 2:30 a.m. weekdays and 3 a.m. weekends. At the time, bars could stay open until 5 a.m. (Zajac/Secter, Chicago Tribune, 10/5).
Medicare-A-Lot, We Care A Lot
According to a top aide, McCain "would pay for his health plan with major reductions to Medicare and Medicaid" -- a move that independent analysts estimate could result in cuts of $1.3T over 10 years to the gov't programs.
McCain "has said little about the proposed cuts, but they are needed to keep his health-care plan 'budget neutral,' as he has promised." McCain's camp "hasn't given a specific figure for the cuts, but didn't dispute the analysts' estimate."
In the months since McCain introduced his health plan, statements made by his camp "have implied that the new tax credits he is proposing to help Americans buy health insurance would be paid for with other tax increases." But McCain senior policy adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin said 10/5 that the camp has always planned to fund the tax credits, in part, with savings from Medicare and Medicaid. Medicare spending for the fiscal year that ended 9/30 is estimated at $457.5B.
Holtz-Eakin "said the Medicare and Medicaid changes would improve the programs and eliminate fraud, but he didn't detail where the cuts would come from." Holtz-Eakin: "It's about giving them the benefit package that has been promised to them by law at lower cost" (Meckler, Wall Street Journal, 10/6).
Meanwhile, Boston Globe's Wangsness reports, "while there are benefits" to McCain's health care approach -- "especially for some people without insurance, or for those who want to carry their policies from job to job -- there is another effect that has not been much noticed: The switchover, specialists say, would provide fewer benefits to people who live in areas where health costs are more expensive, such as the Northeast, than for people in other regions of the country where healthcare costs are lower" (10/5).
Newsweek's Quinn writes, "conservatives love health plans that throw more of the costs on you. When it's hard to pay the bills, you see the doctor less. Through the 'magic of the marketplace,' that's supposed to slow the rate of increase in medical costs. Friends, there's zero evidence that that works. In the long run, tax credits will raise your costs without changing the game. And we still won't have helped most of the uninsured" (10/13 issue).
Not Since Rutherford B. Hayes Has....
The Charleston Gazette, WV's largest newspaper, endorsed Obama for president 10/6, noting: "Obama is one of those rare leaders who appear in America perhaps once per generation - a deep thinker who inspires people almost in the tradition of Winston Churchill. Obama's mind probes farther than those around him, and he has eloquence to convey his insights to everyone. He stirs Americans to strive for a better society" (10/6).
The San Jose Mercury News also endorsed Obama on 10/4, explaining: "Barack Obama will be such a president. He speaks to Americans' yearning for renewal. He has the ability to restore America's confidence and guide this country toward a more stable and secure future. Not since John F. Kennedy has a presidential candidate so moved a young generation." More: "The differences between Obama and McCain are stark. Only Obama has the temperament, intelligence and ideas to set America right. We enthusiastically urge his election Nov. 4" (10/4).
Hillary Clinton working for Obama and Biden
USA Today's Schouten reports HRC has raised more than $8M for Obama "since July and plans to barnstorm the country for even more cash." Clinton: "I am using every tool that I have to help Democrats win." This weekend alone, she held fundraising events in TX and CA that brought in another $1.5M for Obama and congressional candidates. And later this month, Clinton will "headline Obama fundraisers in Chicago, Philadelphia and Little Rock" (10/5).
Filling in for Biden at a Human Rights Camp dinner, HRC called McCain "not a maverick but a 'mimic' of President Bush." She "spoke by satellite...to a few thousand people who attended the national gay rights group event." Instead of speaking her own mind she told the crowd: "I want to share with you the eloquent remarks that Joe had prepared." She "sought to tie McCain to Bush" and noted that he "doesn't support extending job discrimination and hate-laws to cover sexual orientation." McCain spokesperson Tucker Bounds: "Senator Clinton would be more believable if she'd mimic her own statements that Barack Obama is too inexperienced and lacks the key readiness to lead" (Sanner, AP, 10/4).
The Type Of Guy He Will Be
Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) and brother Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI) "praised" Obama 10/5 and "talked about everything from foreign policy and the economy to Sarah Palin's claim that Obama 'pals around with terrorists.'" S. Levin "dismissed" Palin's comment about Obama's association with Ayers mentioning "it's never been a deep relationship" and that Obama was eight when the "Weather Underground claimed credit for several bombings." C. Levin "called Obama thoughtful and nuanced." He believes "Obama can 'restore the respect of the world for the United States of America" and that McCain is "more of the same" (Bucks, Bucks County Courier Times , 10/ 6).
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It is a fact not debatable that there are some things about Senator Obama's previous associations that we just don't know. And he has been at the least imprudent with the alliances he has had with people of questionable character. That is what Sarah Palin and John McCain are trying to point out, and it's a legitimate point. They are NOT spreading hatred. Please do not mischaracterize what they are doing.
ReplyDeleteAccording to Marc Cooper of the Huffington Post, McCain has a radical pal in his closet as well -- one of the most prominent of Vietnam-era student radicals, David Ifshin, the same David Ifshin who denounced America on Radio Hanoi as McCain sat locked up as a POW.
ReplyDeleteIfshin led the takeover of his Syracuse university campus , aided radicals trying to shut down Washington DC with streets protests in May 1971, and went with folksinger Phil Ochs to Uruguay, where they joined a local university takeover, got arrested and were deported.
Like Ayers, Ifshin grew up and went mainstream following the 60's. Ayers became a university professor, whereas Ifshin went into politics and became General Counsel to the Bill Clinton campaign as well as a leader in pro-Israeli causes. Also like Ayers, Ifshin never renounced nor apologized for his radical past until the day he died in 1996, and apparently McCain had no problem with that.
Cooper writes:
"Senator John McCain forged a close personal friendship with Ifshin, as well as a working political alliance. Together they worked to establish the Institute for Democracy in Vietnam and partnered up on the issue of normalization of relations with Vietnam.
As recently as two years ago, speaking at Columbia College, McCain affectionately and warmly recalled his relationship with Ifshin saying:
"We worked together in an organization dedicated to promoting human rights
in the country where he and I had once come for different reasons. I came to
admire him for his generosity, his passion for his ideals, for the largeness of
his heart, and I realized he had not been my enemy, but my countryman . . . my
countryman ...and later my friend. His friendship honored me. We disagreed over
much. Our politics were often opposed, and we argued those disagreements. But we worked together for our shared ideals."
That John McCain is unrecognizable from the man who today stands behind the scurrilous attacks suggesting that Barack Obama pals around with terrorists because Bill Ayres - when Obama was literally eight years old--stupidly fancied himself an armed revolutionary.
The old John McCain was able to overcome his own repulsion against a young man who went on the radio station of the enemy who was holding and torturing him and built a warm friendship with him. If Obama were to run commercials today criticizing McCain for hanging out with the Tokyo Rose of the Vietnam era, it would be nearly as execrable as the McCain campaign's current smears around Bill Ayres."
I agree.
In case you haven't noticed, in the words of Tennessee Williams, there's "a powerful and obnoxious odor of mendacity in this room... there ain't nothin' more powerful than the odor of mendacity."
You can smell it, hanging all around this election and around Governor Palin in particular ...
Founder Of Group Palin Courted Professed "Hatred For The American Government"; Cursed "Damn Flag"
ReplyDeleteBy Greg Sargent - September 2, 2008 6:10PM
The founder of the Alaska Independence Party -- a group that has been courted over the years by Sarah Palin, and one her husband was a member of for roughly seven years -- once professed his "hatred for the American government" and cursed the American flag as a "damn flag."
The AIP founder, Joe Vogler, made the comments in 1991, in an interview that's now housed at the Oral History Program in the Rasmuson Library at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.
"The fires of hell are frozen glaciers compared to my hatred for the American government," Vogler said in the interview, in which he talked extensively about his desire for Alaskan secession, the key goal of the AIP.
"And I won't be buried under their damn flag," Vogler continued in the interview, which also touched on his disappointment with the American judicial system. "I'll be buried in Dawson. And when Alaska is an independent nation they can bring my bones home."
At another point, Volger advocated renouncing allegiance to the United States. In the course of denouncing Federal regulation over land, he said:
"And then you get mad. And you say, the hell with them. And you renounce allegiance, and you pledge your efforts, your effects, your honor, your life to Alaska."
You can listen to audio of the relevant section of the Volger interview here. Bill Schneider, curator of oral history at the library, verified the authenticity of the interview and the quote to me a few moments ago.
Palin has courted the group over the years.
Three years after the controversial interview, in 1994, Palin attended the group's annual convention, according to witnesses who spoke to ABC News' Jake Tapper. The McCain campaign is disputing her presence there, but Tapper found two people to attest to it.
The McCain campaign today produced Palin's voting registration records, and said they proved she was never a member of the party.
But she has repeatedly reached out to the group. The McCain campaign has confirmed she visited the group's 2000 convention, and she addressed its convention this year, as an incumbent governor whose oath of office includes upholding the Constitution of the United States.
Palin's husband, Todd Palin, was a member of the party from 1995-2002 with a brief exception in 2000.
It's worth noting that Vogler isn't just some figure from ancient history. He is still being hailed on AIP's site this year, the same year Palin addressed the group's convention.
It's worth pondering how big a deal it would be if Obama had ever courted the support of a group whose head had said this kind of thing about America and her flag. Oh, wait...