A Prayer From An Atheist

When there are millions out there caught up in chaos, carnage and corruption, why I am unimaginably fortunate to have personal freedom from such persecutions? What did I do to be blessed with this fortunate life? What did the rest of the world do so wrong to be cursed with such suffering?

Is it because I was born American? Born white? Born male? Is it because I was Baptized and ate the body of Christ? Maybe if I still believed then God would give me the answer. But looking out from these rocks at the sun setting in front of me I found it impossible to believe that this majestic beauty was created by the same God that created us in his own image. That God would have built a big casino with air-conditioning and luxury suites.

These are not new thoughts, they are not profound, but after spending four weeks in an island paradise witnessing the total demolition of it's beauty in the erecting of massive resorts for rich foreigners to come and exploit the gracious (and cheap) labor of the locals for our own selfish escapism... these are important thoughts. Ones that seem very rarely to enter the vacuous heads of our over-privileged capitalist minds. Instead I had conversations with guys who were "amazed" at how easy it is to "make a fortune off these people" and how cheap it was to buy up their property. Not a single thought about where these people will go once you buy their property, not a concern about how this beautiful island they are building on will lose it's beauty once it is saturated in all our "luxuries" we cannot seem to live without. Instead of enjoying the inherent beauty of this place and it's people we must bring our posh resorts, our European restaurants, our McDonald's and Starbucks with us so it feels just like home.

We can't enjoy a foreign land without making it ours... Just like we can't enjoy the earth without making it ours.

Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane. Hopefully the fortunate few will one day learn it is not necessary to keep taking more fortune from those who have little.

Hopefully our earth will be kinder to us than we have been to it.

Another Climate Crisis

A six-to-one plastic to plankton ratio in our ocean is something that seems surreal but is sadly a reality we have created:

In 2002 [Charles Moore] was startled to discover a six-to-one plastic to plankton ratio in the eastern garbage patch: six pieces of plastic to every piece of zooplankton. This past November he was alarmed even more, finding that 600 miles outside the center of the garbage patch, ocean water samples contained a three-to-one plastic to plankton ratio.

We haven’t yet had a plastic-free sample from anywhere in the Pacific Ocean.

According to Mr. Moore's findings about 80% of the plastic comes from humans on land and of that 90% is household pollution. That means that the majority of this plastic filling our oceans is basically litter.

Baby Laysan albatross of Midway Atoll are literally starving to death. Their carcasses litter the beaches, stomachs bursting with plastic bottle caps, cigarette lighters and other recognizable plastic debris. Jellyfish, which thrive on plankton, ingest tiny bits of plastic along with their food.

Dr. Curtis Ebbesmeyer [founder of Beachcombers Alert] has proposed the thesis that all the food in the ocean contains plastic. That’s the alarming possibility.

Very alarming.

God's Word: "Deny!"

It seems the Almighty has become bored with the grand scheme and is once again dishing out advice on business matters to His devoted prophets.

Oral Roberts University President Richard Roberts, says God is speaking again, telling him to deny lurid allegations in a lawsuit.

Yup, the Supreme Creator can't let a 44 year old college get embroiled in a legal scandal that could threaten to expose it's saintly President as a corrupt scoundrel so He's taken on the case personally. Although, His Holiness may not be entirely clean in the matters Himself as he has a history of financial interests in Oral Robert's University in which He threatened Oral himself that he would "Meet his maker" if he didn't round up $8 million dollars and establish this college in his name. Fortunately Robert's followers managed to scrounge up the payoff and saved Mr. Robert's from the crushing grip of God's henchman, a 900 foot tall Jesus.

Most importantly though, we can all rest assured that this institution of "Higher" learning is in God's hands.

Waking From the American Dream

In the eternal tug of war that is our nation's great struggle, a Manifest destiny toward Kleptocracy, it appears the ruling class is confidently dragging the unwashed masses toward defeat.

Personal incomes rose in January at the fastest clip in a year, bolstered by bonus payments to high-income executives. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that personal incomes rose by 1 percent in January while consumer spending was up by 0.5 percent.

While at the same time:

The analysis showed that the number of people living in extreme poverty had grown by 26 per cent since 2000. Poverty as a whole has worsened, too, but the number of severe poor is growing 56 per cent faster than the overall segment of the population characterized as poor - about 37 million people in all according to the census data.

Just how poor is this "extreme poverty" they talk about?

The number of Americans living in severe poverty has expanded dramatically under the Bush administration, with nearly 16 million people now living on an individual income of less than $5,000 a year or a family income of less than $10,000, according to an analysis of 2005 official census data.

How can income and consumer spending be rising if there is such a growing mass of extreme poverty? Here's how:

The richest fifth of US households enjoys more than 50 per cent of the national income, while the poorest fifth gets by on an estimated 3.5 per cent. The average after-tax income of the top 1 per cent is 63 times larger than the average for the bottom 20 per cent - both because the rich have grown richer and also because the poor have grown poorer; about 19 per cent poorer since the late 1970s. The middle class, too, has been squeezed ever tighter. Every income group except for the top 20 per cent has lost ground in the past 30 years, regardless of whether the economy has boomed or tanked.

Yes, that's right, for the last 30 years - no matter what party the government was controlled by - the bottom 80 percent lost ground. Do you really need to ask who truly runs this country anymore?

Media Ignores Victories Against Terrorism.

How is it that in the past ten years over 60 terrorist plots have been foiled and yet not one major TV news station or print newspaper has mentioned this? It's not like they are afraid of sensationalism and putting the fear of imminent death into their viewers - I mean, it's great for ratings. But with all this talk on the Global War on Terror it is really shameful how our media refuses to point out the achievements our country has had in fighting these freedom-hating religious zealots and extremists. Here's a brief rundown of the evil that the liberal media refuses to make a stand against:

In the 10 years since the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing killed 168 people, roughly 60 right-wing terrorist plots have been uncovered in the United States. The plots, all foiled by law enforcement, reportedly included violent plans by antigovernment militia groups, racist skinhead organizations, and Ku Klux Klan members to use various types of chemical bombs and other weapons.

and...

On Sept. 11, 2006, the fifth anniversary of the terror attacks that devastated our nation, a man crashed his car into a building in Davenport, Iowa, hoping to blow it up and kill himself in the fire.

"I am a terrorist," Waagner declared on the Army of God's web site.

I say it's time for the media to stop ignoring these threats to America's security. If these people looked like this you can be sure the press would be all over it!