Looking Back at Israel, Before Looking Forward: With "Friends" Like Bill and Jimmy, Who Needs Enemies?

I have had at least a little time to reflect on the state of Israel since returning home from there last week. And over the next few weeks, I want to work out some my impressions here.

The history of the state we call Israel is complicated, to put it mildly. The geography is even more complex with the Golan Heights, Gaza and the West Bank bandied about regularly.

Whenever I try to grasp the complexity of it all, I find it's like trying to pick up mercury: I think it get it and then it all slips away. I realize what a slow learner I am and understand why so many others seem to be in a similar position. My eyes glaze over.

Understanding Israel for oneself takes time and lots of concentration.

Though I am still low on the learning curve, I unequivocally support the present state of Israel and am, in fact, partial to it---its people, its right to exist, its democracy and its right to defend itself. I do not think it should give away anymore of its land inside its boundaries to Muslims who are unwilling to acknowledge Israel's right to exist.

Israel cannot---and never will be able to---negotiate with terrorist thugs.

It is a democratic state of approximately 6 million Jews surrounded by about 250,000,000 Muslims--both Sunni and Shiite---many of whom want to wipe Israel forever off the map. It's a country that has entered into the peace process in good faith many times with its terrorist enemies and frequently given away far too much.

This needs to stop now. And fast.

I think without a doubt two American presidents have done more in recent history to put Israel at a disadvantage in the world then any others: former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. I'm frankly embarrassed that they're both southerns. I personally think both men are a disgrace to our country.

It's time we know the shameful way they have conducted themselves for their own advantage in the Middle East and to the detriment of both Israel and the United States.

Caroline Glick at the Jerusalem Post writes about Bill Clinton's love affair with Yasser Arafat and how Israel gave up way too much in his so called peace process. I'll post part of her message below, but you can read the whole thing here. She is writing about how Condi Rice is showing weakness for jihad peace, and I agree.

I am disappointed in Secretary of State Rice in this regard. But for now let's remember Former President Bill Clinton's legacy for which he so desperately wanted to win a Nobel Prize and failed to get it.

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I hope you'll stay with me as Glick discusses Secretary Rice current stance and recalls the Clinton Administration's failed policies:

"In behaving thus, Rice is walking in the well-worn footsteps of her predecessors. Indeed, it seems almost axiomatic that when the going gets tough for US administrations, administration officials get tough on Israel.

"AFTER THE Republicans won control of the Congress in 1994, then president Bill Clinton was hard-pressed to advance his domestic agenda. And so Clinton - who had almost no interest in foreign policy in his opening years of office - turned his attention to Israel and the so-called peace process, in which Israel was expected to give land, arms and legitimacy to the PLO in exchange for terrorism.

"Clinton's penchant for forcing Israeli concessions to the PLO in the name of peace became more pronounced as things became more difficult for him during his impeachment hearings in 1998. As the House of Representatives poised to vote on articles of impeachment, Clinton twisted then prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu's arm until he signed the Wye Plantation memorandum, in which Israel pledged to transfer wide swathes of Judea and Samaria to Yasser Arafat's terrorist government.

"Clinton forced Netanyahu's hand in spite of the fact that, by 1998, it was clear that Arafat was actively enabling Hamas and Islamic Jihad to carry out terror attacks against Israel and indoctrinating Palestinian society to wage jihad for Israel's destruction. "

Continue reading it and weep as Glick continues:

"But negotiating with Netanyahu was inconvenient. Netanyahu refused to implement the Wye agreement in light of Arafat's support for terrorism and forced Clinton to acknowledge that Arafat was doing nothing to combat terror. Unhappy with this state of affairs, Clinton set out to overthrow Netanyahu's government.

"IN AN ACT of unmitigated contempt for Israeli democracy and electoral laws, Clinton sent his own election advisers James Carville, Stanley Greenberg and Robert Schrum to Israel to run Labor party leader Ehud Barak's campaign in the 1999 elections.

"The culmination of Clinton's campaign was the failed Camp David summit in July 2000. There, and in subsequent desperate discussions with Arafat at Taba, Barak agreed to hand over the Temple Mount to Arafat in addition to Gaza, Judea, Samaria and a pile of money.

Israel paid dearly for Barak and Clinton's behavior.

"In the Palestinian jihad that followed Arafat's rejection of Barak and Clinton's plaintive offers, more than 1,000 Israelis were murdered - more than 70 percent of whom were civilians. Israel's international standing fell to all-time lows as global anti-Semitism rose to levels unseen since the Holocaust.

"America too, paid dearly for Clinton's behavior. Rather than pay attention to the burgeoning terror nexus which had placed the US directly in its crosshairs - in 1993 at the World Trade Center; in 1996 at the Khobar Towers; in 1998 at the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania; and in 2000 at the USS Cole - Clinton remained scope-locked on the so-called peace process.

Rather than acknowledge the existence and threat of the global jihad to US national security, Clinton pressured the global jihad's primary victim - Israel - into transferring its heartland and capital to the godfather of modern terrorism.

"But while Israel and America bled, Clinton himself paid no price for his behavior. Rather than be blamed for the war he contributed so richly to enabling, Clinton is upheld as a hero at best, or at worst a tragic figure who devoted his presidency to the cause of peace."

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It's time we do the hard work of educating ourselves about Israel and the Middle East and debunk the myths which have predominated our liberal media. Appeasement is not an option. Time is running out, in my opinion. With friends like Clinton and Carter in Israel, coddling terrorists with the unrealistic fantasy that they can be appeased to good end, Israel and the US are only forestalling the inevitable show down.

And it's not going to be pretty.

Western Galilee Hospital: The Little Israeli Hospital That Could And Will Again

For most of the world, there's War and then there's Peace.

But more and more in Israel---a country of 6 million Jews, surrounded by over 250 million Muslims in the Middle East---there's only War and the Preparation for War.

So it is, tucked up in the upper northwest corner of Israel, only six miles from the Lebanese border, near the Mediterrean, lies a little hospital that's existed for over forty years starting as a border birthing center that is perpetually in the zone between War and the Preparation for War.

It's a hospital with a big heart, very tight security, and a deep underground emergency facility that constantly prepares for war, even as it hopes for peace.

Last summer during the war with Hezbollah as hundreds of katyusha rockets flew overhead and bombs and fire spread on the surrounding countryside, years of preparation paid off: life and death went on at this hospital as usual--

---mothers having babies,

---patients undergoing corneal transplants and dialysis,

---men being treated for heart attacks,

---soldiers with battle wounds being bandaged and put back together

---and old people dying of old age.

But, instead of taking place in the hospital's modern, spacious and private above-ground facilities, patient care went on in cramped, dark underground hallways with patients and staff lined up like sardines: medications, IVs, bedpans, heart monitors, trays of food, water went down with nurses and doctors attempting to treat hundreds of patients.

The evacuation took less than an hour, soon after the war began on July 12.

And it all went according to schedule. The hospital had planned for this many times.

However, nothing prepared anyone for the real sights, sounds and smells of birth, death and woundedness all merged for three weeks into a big wartime underground slumber party. Or the setting with its wide underground hallways where emergency ambulances with exhaust fumes drove in and out or generators and air conditioning machines roared endlessly, attempting to cool, clean and filter air and water that was merged and been reused by hundreds of people for days on end.

With its Emergency Facility working at full capacity, last year, this was the best functioning, most overworked hospital in all of Israel.

Today, with a the ceasefire in place, the underground facility stands empty, dark and quiet.

Though the war has ended, the preparation for more war has only just begun here, again.

This is Western Galilee Hospital (WGH) in Nahariya and, with over 4,000 employees,and 700 beds, it serves some 400,000 Jews, Muslims, Christians, and Druze in the northern Galilee region. It's existed for decades with the reality and constant threat of missile attacks from Southern Lebanon and beyond.

"For years we've spent a lot of time and money on war drills," says Judy Jochnowitz, International Liason for WGH. "During war it can mean the difference between life and death whether you're having a baby, undergoing a corneal transplant or hemorrhaging from gunfire."

For this reason WGH is quickly developing a global reputation as one of the best war facilities in the world---for mass casualty events, including injuries from biological/chemical warfare and acute stress syndrome.

"We've had hundreds of people---doctors, administrators, psychologists and government officials---from all over the world visit us since the war ended last year to see how our hospital operates with the kinds of pressures we've been under for years," said Jochnowitz.

"It's gratifying but a bit overwhelming," said Jochnowitz, adding that WGH gives a week-long Emergency Preparedness Course in the fall each year, to teach hospital personnel and staff what they have learned from decades on the frontlines of war and preparation for war.

War drills have enabled WGH to evacuate patients to the underground Emergency facility very quickly. When the war started with a barrage of rockets, Dr. Mosche Daniel , acting director of WGH, gave orders the evacuate patients and staff to the underground quickly.

It was an amazing feat which they had prepared for many times. In addition, a number of children and employees were allowed to take refuge there also for the duration of the war, sleeping and living on mats in cramped quarters.

But Mosche claims it isn't just preparedness that makes WGH a great hospital, it's the eclectic mix of people that makes it feel like a big family:

"What makes our hospital so special," said Dr. Mosche Daniel, "is that both our patients and employees are made up of Jews, Muslims, Christians and Druze. We live and work in a peaceful co-existence. As bad as it got last summer, almost everyone came to work during the war because they love this place. Attendance here in the most dangerous zone was the best of any other hospital in Israel."

But feeling like a big family at work, does not keep WGH from having some of the tightest security of any hospital in the world: No one gets into WGH without going through tight security check points, much like going through airport screening.

"Even patients bleeding on stretchers have to go through extremely tight security," Daniel told me when I visited there recently, adding that terrorists have been known to strap bombs and explosives under their clothes and bags when they're carried in.

No one of any age gets a sympathy pass inside the hospital. So far, WGH's safety procedures have paid off.

All of that is in the past and present. What, then is the future of WGH, the little hospital that started out as a border birthing center over forty years ago?

Expansion of WGH's Emergency Department and underground facility is now on the front burner.

With the ever growing threat of war in Israel, coupled with the explosion of population in the Northern Galilee region---including thousands of Jewish Russian and Ethiopian immigrants, as well as refugues pouring in from Southern Lebanon, expansion has never been more urgent.

It's a race against time. The little hospital that serves so valiently now needs whatever support the world community can muster.

WGH is now working on raising the last $2,500,000 necessary to commence a $25,000,000 renovation of its underground Emergency Department and shielded operating rooms, which include expansion of the hallways for ambulances to drive into. If all goes well and enough pledges and donations come in.

Construction is due to begin this summer. And it can only proceed during ceasefire.

For now there's an uneasy peace at WGH. But they live with a sense of urgency, as all Israel does. They know the preparedness and emergency drills they undertake today, could have major impacts on future wartime functioning of their people in the Northern Galilee.


I, for one, am privileged to know about WGH through the wonderful people I have met there, especially my new friend and "sister" Dr. Malka Yaholom, a cardiologist at WGH I met last year in the Istanbul airport. We have stayed in touch with by e-mails. And I plan to continue supporting this worthy cause and my friends there both now and going forward.

Anyone wishing to support Western Galilee Hospital's Emergency Department expansion in or outside the United States may contact Mark Goldstein (markg@jflv.org) at the Jewish Federation of Lehigh Valley (JFLV) in Allentown, PA. This organization sends 100% of all contributions earmarked for WGH on to the hospital in Nahariya. Donations are tax-deductible.
Or they can contact me.

WGH needs our friendship and support.

The little Israeli hospital that could has big plans, as it hopes for the best, but prepares for the worst of war in northern Israel.

Sunday, Idols to Discard and Prophecies to Embrace Before God Says "Time's Up!"

We are hopeless idolators who put everything on the throne of our lives ahead of Jesus Christ. Today, Lon Solomon at McLean Bible Church talks about idolatry, and the primary powers that lead us away from putting God first: family, stuff and self---just to name a few.

I am guilty on all counts, and without the Holy Spirit's constant intervention, do not have the strength or discipline to daily order my life in a way pleasing to God, even in the slightest. I can make an idol out of any and everything.

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Another outstanding online sermon from last week is the continuation of Chuck Swindoll's series on Revelation. This is Part 3, from chapter 14. It deals with the prophecy of the Second Coming of Christ and the Final Judgment. At that time, our ability to choose will be finished and we will be held accountable for whether we have accepted the gift of salvation that Jesus Christ came to earth to accomplish and offer to each one of us.

It's sometimes hard to believe that God predicts a time of great and final separation. Yet, it is foretold over and over and over and over in the Bible. And we ignore the prophecies at our great peril, according to John's Revelation. And at our eternal final destiny.

Weekend, Evan Sayet: How Modern Liberals Think

Evan Sayet, a liberal New York Jew turned conservative looks back on where he's been and where modern liberalism is today. Pull up a chair and sit a spell.

Can we say "No standards?"

Has it really come to this? Rational and moral thought is a hateful act of bigotry, and it won't be tolerated? Tearing down everything, replacing it with nothing?

I'm on my way out the door for the day, but will have a few further comments on this later.

To Wit: Fever....

"I'm afraid we'll have to remove your head, Sir. No more thinking. And no second opinions allowed......"

First Amendment Freedoms: Barroso Backing the Right to Offend

This from the Daily Telegraph:

Who or what is the greatest threat to freedom in Europe?
Europe should be on its guard against political correctness and moralising politicians, José Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission, has told the Telegraph.

The former Portuguese prime minister is concerned lest freedom be the loser in global culture wars over climate change, cheap air travel, Islam and free speech.

"We should be aware of people who, sometimes for good reasons, try to establish what I call private moral codes, for this or that, be it climate change, religious behaviour or any kind of social behaviour," he said. He also described himself as a "radical" who believes that "if there is an excess of freedom, it is better to have excess than less."

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I couldn't agree more. Political correctness is cultural co-dependency at its worst and threatens all of our freedoms probably more then radical Islam. And in fact it, is something that Radical Islam takes advantage of in our Western culture, both in Europe and the United States.

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Jungle Mom who comments below and often here, has some wonderful posts on her own blog The Jungle Hut on Islam and many other subjects. Please take a look at her writing from Venezuela when you can. It's well worth your time.

A Commenter on the Valerie Plame Affair: Was She or Wasn't She?

I apprecitate and respect this well written comment and want to put it on my front page, however much I still disagree with the contention that Plame was covert. Thank you for sharing this with us:

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post referring to "The Farce Called the Valerie Plame Affair":

"My husband is a military officer. Whether in uniform, or at the grocery store in civilian clothes, or at the gym in workout gear, he's an officer in the US military. Even when he's driving to work. Both of our vehicles have stickers which indicate both where my husband works and his status in the military; I highly doubt Valerie Plame had anything on her vehicle which indicated where she worked or what she did. Valerie Plame stated, under oath, that she was covert according to the IPAA, because she had done work overseas in a covert status within five years of her House testimony, which meant, of course that she was also covert in July of 2003. Besides Robert Novak and Victoria Toensing, neither of whom know Valerie Plame personally or work (or worked) at the CIA, can you name one individual who knows her and worked with her who denies her covert status?As for your contention that 4 star AF General Michael Hayden, Director of the CIA, is "too close to democrats", apparently you don't have too much knowledge of Generals, or the military in general. It's a very conservative, heavily Republican, pro-Bush group of folks. I can understand why the Director of the CIA might not want to be discussing sensitive information with each of the 40 members of the House Oversight and Reform committee, but save his remarks for either the Chair (Henry Waxman) or the Ranking Minority Member (Tom Davis). What was interesting about the hearing was that Tom Davis basically accepted what Hayden said about Valerie Plame's covert status and blamed the CIA for not doing more to protect her identity. By the way, why not acknowledge where those questions came from? I read that op-ed in that well known communist anti-American front - otherwise known as the Washington Post - delivered to my doorstep yesteray. Maybe that editorial was the only "truth" in the whole rag. overt, that is. "

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And her later comment on Saturday:

GEN Michael Hayden was appointed as CIA Director in May, 2006, replacing former Congressman Porter Goss (R-FL). From March, 1999 - April, 2005 he was the Dirctor of the National Security Agency and Chief of the Central Security Service. From April, 2005 - May, 2006 he was the Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence. I'd say the guy has his bonafides in intelligence.So, you're right that he's only been onboard since 2006. My guess is that during his early days as Director required more than just "reading documents written by someone else". I think I've reached the end of this. There is no point in going forward with this topic on this site. No one has provided a single source or link to anyone who says that Valerie Plame was not covert - save for Robert Novak, who certainly has his own personal reasons for wanting to "prove" by offering more questions that Valerie Plame wasn't covert, if only to assuage his guilty conscience for writing the editorial in July, 2003 that led the CIA to contact the Justice Department to investigate the outing. You continue to doubt what the players in this story have said - many times UNDER OATH - believing that Valerie Plame and her outing is nothing more than a "non-story" and a "farce", and that the damage done by outing her, and her front company, are nothing to be concerned about. I can't help but wonder, though, if this had been done in either the Clinton, Gore or Kerry administrations - would you still feel the same way? I can state with certainty that I would. I doubt the same could be said for you.

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Thank you. I'm sure there will be more on this in the days ahead.

Stunning Sun Video from Japanese Spacecraft Hinode

We're about the forget all we've ever known about the sun. Seething and swaying, dazzling looping are just a few of the new descriptions of what we're now able to see on the surface of the sun.

And to me, it's so much more interesting than what's happening down here on planet Earth right now, where people are so bored they're obsessing about Fred Thompson running for president, among many other things.

Fred Thompson will never be president. But he might be a good VP. Maybe it'll be Rudy and Freddy.

Still, give me a new sun video any day!

The Faithful, Getting Baptized By Brother Al in the Jordan?

The day after I returned home from Israel, an old friend called to tell me of the death of a mutual friend and urged me to go to his funeral later that day.

After the service, I was standing in the hallway of the church chatting. I allowed as how I had just returned from Israel.

One of the women standing there said she had been to Israel a number of years earlier with none other than Al Gore.

"To Israel with Al Gore"?" I queried.

"Yes, Al," she assured me. "It was right before he ran for president and he was doing an economic mission thing. Lots of people invited."
"The best part was that some of our group were so in awe of him that they wanted Al to baptize them --then and there-- in the Jordan River....."

There are few times that I am speechless, but this was one of them. Brother Al Gore baptizing the faithful in the Jordan River.

I didn't stay to hear the rest of the story or learn whether the alleged baptisms actually took place. I merely rolled my eyes, laughed out loud, and moved on to the next conversation. I had heard quite enough.

Oh Brother Al, where art thou?

Come to think of it, a right reverend might be just the profession for Al after all this global warming, I mean climate change, hysteria quietens down. Just the thing.

And he can rewrite the book of Revelations while he's at it.

Come to think of it....he already has.

The Farce Called the Valerie Plame Affair

"The blond leading the blind. "

Ramirez nails it again at Investors Business Daily.

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UPDATE:
Waxman and Democratic colleagues did not ask these pertinent questions: Had not Plame been outed years ago by a Soviet agent? Was she not on an administrative, not operational, track at Langley? How could she be covert if, in public view, she drove to work each day at Langley? What about comments to me by then CIA spokesman Bill Harlow that Plame never would be given another foreign assignment? What about testimony to the FBI that her CIA employment was common knowledge in Washington?
Instead of posing such questions, Waxman said flatly that Plame was covert and cited Hayden as proof. Hayden's endorsement of Waxman's statement astounded Republicans whose queries about her had been rebuffed by the agency. That confirmed Republican suspicions that Hayden is too close to Democrats.

Early Sunday Morning in Continental Terminal C at Newark

Arriving from Tel Aviv to Newark before the crack of dawn Sunday at 4:30 a.m., going through immigrations and customs, nothing could not have prepared me for what I encountered when I transfered to the Continental Terminal to make my connecting flight back to the South. A sea of people in lines as far as the eye could see waiting for 3-4 hours just to get to the check-in counter for a boarding pass.

The woman in front of me in the line, had been trying to get out of New York with her family, since 5 am Friday, two days earlier---for 48 hours. Note to self: if possible, don't ever fly through a terminal where snow storms can shut it down during winter months and stack people and planes up for days.

After flying back with almost no sleep, all I really wanted to do was lie down on the floor and sleep or die, rather than go through such unmitigated pandemonium.

Still, it's always an ineffable thrill and a privilege to walk off the plane, under the big, big sign of which there is nothing else comparable in the whole wide world: Welcome to the United States of America.

God bless and save our country for future generations. Including all of us poor wretches standing in line for hours at Newark, Continenetal Terminal C.

Sunday Post

"There is another area in which cultural Christians have faulty thinking regarding authentic faith. It has to do with the role good deeds and living a so-called "good" life play in the spiritual life. The error has to do with placing the proverbial cart before the horse. By that I am referring to the erroneous belief that if you are good enough and practice enough good deeds, that in and of itself is adequate to earn the favor of God and make up for the lack of placing God and His will first in your life."
-----William Wilberforce, Real Christianity

This book, Real Christianity, by William Wilburforce---revised and edited by Bob Beltz---is the only one I took on my trip to Israel. I can honestly say, it's one of the most powerful, convicting books I've ever read. His insights are penetrating to the quick. One of the few books I will read and re-read over and over, until it's threadbare. It also reminds me of how far I have to go in God's economy.

The premise of the book is how many so called Christians are nominal---anything goes---rather than real Christians. Too often we take Christianity on our own terms, rather than on God's. Jesus warns us frequently about where this leads us and encourages us to do God in God's way, and not our own. To accomplish that we have to read and study the Bible and pay close to what it says. Transformation of our will and lives by the Holy Spirit is a lifelong process and not without many internal battles.

Though it was written back in the early 19th Century, it could just as well have been penned today. I highly recommend it to anyone who doesn't mind being moved and challenged in their walk with Christ. Sobering and stunning indeed.

Saturday: Hiking to the Top of Masada

Saturday is our last full day in Israel and we can each choose how we want to spend it before flying back to New York early Sunday morning.

My choice is an easy one: I'm driving down along the Dead Sea to Masada with three of the younger men on the trip from Allantown, PA and we're hiking to the top. They're two doctors and a lawyer---my kind of demographics---and everyone appears to be in good shape.

Interestingly, these men don't have wives who would dream of making this hike and so they can't imagine that I---a mid-lifed woman---can make it to the top or would even want to. Who knows, maybe they're right.

But now that they've hounded, challenged and insulted me, I have no choice but to go and stand up for myself and my age group as best as I can!

Don't throw me in the briar patch, fellows.

Yad Vashem, The Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem

Lest any of us are politically correct enough to believe man has evolved beyond his basic depravity and innate sinful nature, one need only spend a few hours at the stunning new wing of the Holocaust Museum, Yad Vashem, in Jerusalem, opened in 2005.

There is no way to express the intensity of a first visit there or to comprehend the width and depth of human suffering endured by the Jews under Nazi Germany during World War II. One cannot even begin to take it all in in one visit. Or in several. Or perhaps ever.

Six million Jews were exterminated during those years---nearly the exact number of Jews now living in Israel---a country surrounded today by over 250,000,000 Muslims on all sides in the Middle East.

This Memorial is a small way that we can remind ourselves of the past horrors--and man's capacity for the cruelest of behaviors to his fellow man---and commit to supporting the existence and progress of the Jewish democratic state of Israel today.

Israeli High School Students Talk about Their "Journey Through Israel" and Upcoming Military Service

While traveling with the Jewish Federation of Lehigh Valley in Israel this week, we visited several Israeli schools. One highlight yesterday was talking to some outstanding 11th graders in the more remote region of Yoav, south of Tel Aviv. This school at Tsafit is rated one of the ten best in the country because of high academic acheivement and student participation in community services.

There, 11th graders discussed the "life changing" experience of their "Journey Through Israel" last November. Traveling first into the desert near the Dead Sea and then for a week to other important historical and cultural sites in the founding of Israel, these students explained how they were strengthened in both their individual and Jewish identities.

Calling it a "very strong, intense experience," these students talked about the realities of coming of age in Israel today.

With a little over a year before graduation, each and every one of them---male and female alike---will go into the military for a minimum of two years after high school.

At one site on the Journey, they saw the graves of two 18 and 23 year-old brothers killed together in a military operation. It had a sobering effect on each one of them:

"That's the exact age difference between my brother and me," one student said.

"We're going to be in the military soon and any one of us could be next," one said. "Our survival here depends on 18-20 year olds with big guns."

And it's true. With six million Jews in Israel and 250 million Muslims in surrounding countries in the Middle East---many who want to wipe their country off the map--the realities of war and defending their country in order to survive individually and nationally are becoming crystal to these students.

High school students grow up fast in this kind of environment. They were a delight to talk with yesterday.

And not a spoiled, over-indulged one in the bunch. They said they were most grateful to have an opportunity to have an audience of American supporters. And they emphasized how much our support means to them.

The pleasure was all ours. A highlight of our trip, truly.

Global Warming Comes to Jerusalem

Our group---the Jewish Federation of Leigh Valley of Allentown, PA---arrived in Jerusalem Wednesday night and woke up this morning to snow and cold.

It's great fun to be here in this weather. And people seem grateful for the moisture in whatever form they can get it.

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Update: As the day progressed, the snow turned back into a freezing cold rain, with gusts of even colder wind. Still, being in Jerusalem is an amazing experience in all kinds of weather. There's no place like it on earth, in my opinion. No place. It's the center of the world.

The Little Israeli Hospital That Could

Tucked up in the uppermost northwest corner of Israel, only six miles from the Lebanese border, lies a little hospital with a big heart, very tight security, and a deep underground emergency facility it hopes it will never have to use again.

For years it has hoped for the best, but fortunately prepared for the worst.

Last summer during the war with Hezbollah, its preparedness paid off: this hospital was the best functioning, most overworked hospital in all of Israel--even as hundreds of katyushas whizzed overhead and several made direct hits on its facilities.

It's Western Galilee Hospital in Nahariya and serves some 400,000 Jews, Muslims, Christians, and Druze in the northern region.

It's existed for decades with the reality and constant threat of missile attacks from Southern Lebanon and beyond. For this reason it is quickly developing a global reputation as one of the best wartime facilities in the world---for mass casualty events including injuries from biological/chemical warfare and acute stress syndrome.

Surrounded by over 250,000,000 Muslims in the Middle East, many of whom want to wipe Israel off the face of the earth, this little country of 6 million Jews is taking war and casualty preparedness very, very seriously. WGH is leading the charge to take care of its people.

With this growing threat coupled with the explosion of population in the Northern Galilee region---including Russian and Ethiopian Jews and Lebanese refuges---WGH is urgently trying to expand its emergency facilities during the ceasefire, even as Hezbollah rearms itself with supplies provided by Syria and Iran.

"We've had hundreds of people---doctors, administrators, psychologists and government officials---from all over the world visit us since the war ended to see how a hospital operates with the kinds of pressures we've been under," said Judy Jochnowitz, International Liason of WGH. "It's gratifying but a bit overwhelming. In the midst of it all, we're working on an expansion of the underground Emergency Department."

It's a race against time. The little hospital that serves so valiently---and even gives a week-long course on preparedness each year to medical professional and government officials from everywhere---now needs whatever support the world community can muster.

WGH is now working on raising the last $2,500,000 necessary to commence a $25,000,000 renovation of its underground Emergency Department and shielded operating rooms, which include expansion of the hallways for ambulances to drive into.

If all goes well and enough pledges and donations come in, construction is due to begin this summer.

"What makes our hospital so special," said Dr. Mosche Daniel, Acting Director of WGH, "is that both our patients and employees are made up of Jews, Muslims, Christians and Druze. We live and work in a peaceful co-existence. As bad as it got last summer, almost everyone came to work during the war because they love this place and feel like we're all family here."

When the war started last July 12 with a barrage of rockets, it was Dr. Daniel who gave the order the evacuate patients and staff to the underground quickly. Over 400 patients were moved in just one hour.

The underground served as a shelter for patients. Employees as well as their children took refuge there too. With the planned expansion, WGH can take in even more patients and families into its underground.

But no one gets into WGH, or its underground without going through very tight security.

"Even patients bleeding and on stretchers have to go through tight security," Daniel told me when I visited there this week, adding that terrorists have been known to strap bombs and explosives under their clothes and bags when thye're carried in.

So they check everyone, and thus far such check point security has paid off.

For now there's an uneasy peace at WGH. But they live with a sense of urgency, as all Israel does. They know the preparedness and emergency drills they undertake today, could have major impacts on future wartime functioning of their people in the Northern Galilee.

I, for one, am privileged to know about WGH through the wonderful people I have met there, especially my new friend and "sister" Dr. Malka Yaholom, a cardiologist at WGH I met last year in the Istanbul airport and have stayed in touch with by e-mails. And I plan to continue supporting this worthy cause and my friends there both now and going forward.

Anyone wishing to support Western Galilee Hospital's Emergency Department expansion in or outside the United States may contact Mark Goldstein (markg@jflv.org) at the Jewish Federation of Lehigh Valley (JFLV) in Allentown, PA. This organization sends 100% of all contributions earmarked for WGH on to the hospital in Nahariya. Donations are tax-deductible.

Or they can contact me.

WGH needs our friendship and support.

The little Israeli hospital that could has big plans, as it hopes for the best, but prepares for the worst in northern Israel.

Why I'm in Israel with Jews, One Year After Being Here With Evangelical Christians

I am too tired and jet-lagged to make a long and elaborate post today. I have gotten less sleep in the last three nights than I usually get in one at home. Dead dog tired.

But I want to say why I'm back in Israel today with Jews, exactly one year after being here with Evangelical Christians.

Last year at this time, I came to Israel with my daughter and other Christians on a tour of renewal, led by Lon Solomon of McLean Bible Church outside Washington, D.C. We visited dozens of Old and New Testament sites and it profoundly deepened my faith and commitment to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

I will never be the same.

But a funny thing happened to me on that trip, in the Istanbul airport. Little did I know at the time, I was about to be given an opportunity to live this renewed faith in a way I could never have foreseen at the time.

I met a lovely woman, an Israeli cardiologist named Malka Yahalom, who slowly inspired me through friendship and e-mails over the last year, of war and peace, to change---to take my mental support of Israel to a new level---a hands on, real interaction with the land and people I have known since my earliest childhood. A land and people I had known of since I was a toddler --about the time Israel came back into being in 1948.

It had only been 1900 years since the diaspora of the Jews, when the Romans had destroyed Jerusalem, the Temple and dispersed the Jews to the ends of the earth in 70 AD. And now, against all odds, against hate and centuries of persecution, the holocaust, Israel was born again into the land of its fathers.

And my generation was born to see this miracle unfold, and unfold, and unfold, and unfold.

Through faith and friendship, I have been inspired to finally put my support and money where my lazy mouth and mind has been for a long time. Today I am traveling with the Jewish Federation of Lehigh Valley of Allantown, PA, an organization that supports---with friendship and money--some of the more needy and less glamorous charities in Israel today.

This support includes the little hospital with a big heart up on the Lebanese border where Malka lives and works. It sustained more katyushas from Hezbollah last summer than any hospital in Israel.

Today I had the privilege of going to Nahariya with the JFLV and seeing my new friends at Western Galilee Hospital. It is an amazing story.

But that's a story for tomorrow. For now, let it suffice to say, I am happy to be back in Israel with new friends who support the country's right to exist and defend itself.

And, at this time in history, Israel needs our hands-on friendship and support---from Jews and Christians---more than we can ever know.

Haifa in the Haze

My group is getting settled in Haifa where we will base ourselves for the next two days to attend various Israeli missions in the Northern Galilee region. Tomorrow, I will talk about what I'm doing here and with whom I'm traveling.

Sands from the Sahara Desert have blown into the country causing visibility to be extremely limited everywhere we've been today. The scene above looks out to the Mediterrean, but you would never know it. Israel is very green at this time of year and flowers are blooming everywhere.

Landing at Ben Gurion Airport Outside Tel Aviv

Landing in Israel yesterday afternoon, there was just enough light to see how green the country is at the end of the rainy season. Ben Gurion Airport is a dazzling new facility. Very contemporary, easy to move around in.

A great haze has settled on the country as winds have blown sand from the Sahara Desert in North Africa---much like the Mistral in Southern France---into the Middle East. And it has made visibility extremely limited, in spite of sunshine today.

My Night Flight to Israel Seated Next to a Former UN Weapons Inspector in Iraq

You've heard of "Food for Peace," "Oil for Peace." Now there's "Sleep for Peace." One small step for mankind happened last night on our flight to Israel.

It wasn't until the eighth hour of a ten hour flight from New York to Tel Aviv last night that we---I and the very gruff man sitting on the row with me---started chatting in a civilized manner. It was daylight over France. Coffee was being served and we had managed to come through the night basically unscathed.

When we boarded the plane at Newark a little before midnight, I had only one thing in mind: finding a small spot to lay my head and sleep for several hours. Any sleep was better than none. I didn't want wine. Didn't want dinner. And I certainly didn't want conversation. I had spent the prior three hours trying to stay awake at the gate so I wouldn't fall asleep and have the plane leave without me. Standed in Newwark is not my idea of a good time.

The stranger I was seated next to on row 55 of El Al flight 026 was the grinch that stole Christmas. He was so cross that I thought of exiting the plane and forgetting the whole trip. We had an empty seat between us. And he made it abundantly clear he was hoping for the whole row so he could lie down. But then I had appeared to dash his hopes.

I am not given to chit chat late at night and this was no exception. I simply gave a small smile, opened my packaged blanket and pillow, curled up as best I could, covered my entire body---head to toe--with what small cover I had been provided and went to sleep. I tried my best to stay out of the demilitarized zone between us, that he had had his heart set on.

Five hours later, I awakened with a renewed lease on life. Not only that, I felt magnanimous.

The grinch to my right appeared to be sleeping fitfully and his facial expression tortured. I could bare his pain no longer and decided to find another seat for a while and let him have the whole row. When I woke him to tell him the good news, he thanked me and disappeared from sight for the next four hours.

When I returned to claim my seat later hours later, he was a changed man. So convivial in fact that he actually broke out into a smile. We both ordered coffee and, refreshed, began to chat.

First we asked each other about accents: he grew up in South Africa, but was now living in the United States. After a while, we got around to illegal immigration, politics and finally the War in Iraq. I could tell he was conservative. There was hope for this man yet! I was sitting next to a conservative grinch.

Then he came clean: He had been a UN weapons inspector privately contracted in Iraq in 1991 when they had found WMDs. And he was there again in 2003, and one of the last to be evacuated before the start of the war.

"We couldn't find them. Not because they weren't there. They most certainly were. They had been there. Saddam had them, everyone knew that," he said.

So where did they all go? I queried, having heard this many times before.

"Saddam sent a lot of it into Syria. Everyone knew that too. But in Iraq there were so many, many munitions stored in hugh bunkers we went through--it would have taken years to search everything thoroughly," he continued. "It was like looking for a needle in a haystack."

" And there were and are lots of weapons buried underground there too."

"We say in the business, if you go digging in the Middle East, especially Iraq, sooner or later you'll either find oil or weapons."

Yes, yes, we all know all this, yet it was fun hearing from first hand experience. Last question from me was about what he thought about Iraq. now.

"It will never end," he said. "It will never end between the Sunnis and Shiites. It will never end between Israel and Palestine."

Though I didn't agree with everything he said, I left it at that, as our plane touched down in Tel Aviv.

I was satisfied that we both had negotiated a "sleep for peace" on row 55 of El Al flight 026, and left the plane in better spirits than when we got on.

Come to think of it, what if Sunni and Shiite, Palestinean and Israeli got a little more sleep?

Could world peace be just around the corner, after all?

Weekend: Heading to Israel Today

I'm leaving for Israel later today, flying to Tel Aviv tonight.

It is my second trip to the Holy Land. And my first trip taking a computer abroad. Heaven only knows whether anything will work over there, but if all goes well, I intend to do some blogging from this fascinating part of the globe, the Center of the World and History in my opinion.

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If you have a chance this weekend, go and see the wonderful movie "Amazing Grace," about how William Wilberforce fought to end both the slave trade and slavery in the 18/19th century British Empire. We fought it out in the Civil War, but one man with conviction fought the war in Parliament and ultimately won, with the help of a former slave trader and converted Christian, John Newton, and his friend William Pitt, the youngest Prime Minister in that country's history.

An amazing story filled with Grace. In any language, it's still amazing. One of the greatest stories never told, until now. Don't miss it.

Major Eric Egland: The Troops Need You, America!

Michelle Malkin at Hot Air has an interview with Major Egland about his forthcoming book describing how we can support our troops in Iraq from our living rooms. Listen to the intereview and read the book.

We need to get more sophsticated in how we mobilize and ramp up our support. They need us, and we need them. Here's Egland's link.

What a great idea.

The troops need us, America.

The Scooter Libby Conviction Disgrace: Bush Should Do an Intervention

American Thinker expounds on the disgraceful miscarriage of justice in the Scooter Libby case. I couldn't agree more. Many people haven't kept up with this case, but if only they really got it that this is a pathetic political scapegoating of the highest order. We should all be appalled. And Bush should do an intervention.

Here's an except:

"Scooter Libby is a convicted perjurer because the United States Department of Justice grossly abused its power and because politics short-circuited all the safeguards that are supposed to prevent such abuses. This is one of the most appalling perversions of a civilized judicial system since France sent Alfred Dreyfus to Devil's Island because the ruling elite didn't like Jews.

"If the appellate and executive review processes fail as badly as the investigative and trial processes did in Libby's case, Libby will go to a federal penitentiary because Democrats don't like Republicans. There is enough shame in this outcome to go around.

"Patrick Fitzgerald is a disgrace both to the legal profession and to the human race. His partisan allies, such as Senator Chuck Schumer and certain nameless bureaucrats at the CIA, are beneath contempt. The jury was unfit for its task, because it was apparently both prejudiced and intellectually incapable of noticing that the prosecution had no case. The trial judge lacked either the wit to see a gross miscarriage of justice unfolding before his eyes or the courage to stop it. But ultimate responsibility for Fitzgerald's outrageous misconduct lies with his boss.

"George W. Bush could have stopped Fitzgerald's farce at any time. He could stop it today. He doesn't even need to use the pardon power, at least not yet. Fitzgerald serves at the President's pleasure Mr. Bush has every reason to be severely displeased. The President could simply fire him and, for good measure, order the DOJ to start an investigation into Fitzgerald's misconduct in the Libby matter. President Bush could then instruct Fitzgerald's replacement to join Libby's defense in its motion for a new trial. If the court grants that motion the DOJ could then offer Libby its apologies and withdraw the prosecution. If it doesn't the DOJ could join in Libby's appeal. If that fails then the pardon power lies in reserve."

Read the whole thing.

Do You Want Your Free Speech Straight Up, On the Rocks or Watered Down with Your Pablum, Sir?

Are the people of our country man enough for the First Amendment anymore? Or have we become such regressed weenie babies that we want our government to protect us from all real or perceived slights of speech?

Has it come to this: a nation of snivelling hysterical crybabies?

"Boo Hoo, Ann said a bad word, Mommy! Boooo Hoooo!"

Tell me truly.

Ann Coulter made in my opinion a stupid comment at CPAC over the weekend. Some allusion to John Edwards in the same breath with faggots.

It was 150-proof Coulter on the rocks, with a twist of venom.

It was her concoction of hard speech--and not to my personal taste. I prefer red whine myself.

It said much more about her than it ever could about Edwards. I was unimpressed and frankly thought to myself that she must be pretty hard up for attention. Rather than picking up her drink offer, I walked away from the bar. And stayed sober, noting that she is often not my cup of tea. But still, I can take Coulter in small doses from time to time, as an after dinner apertif on a full stomch, like an occasion grappe.

But to many others you would have thought she had announced a suicide bomber had just entered the room with KoolAid laced with vodka and arsenic.

People--liberals and conservatives alike---drank up her offering and started getting drunk and sick all over the room, like drunken, debauched sailors.

The drink she fixed was just too strong for a room full of regressed adult cry babies who can no longer hold the liquor of free speech and know when to stop drinking other peoples concoctions. Cry babies who think they are entitled to having a perfect world where no one ever offends their sensibilities.

When will will we learn we can walk away from the bar and stop drinking when we've had enough? That's part of our First Amendment freedom and responsibility? The burden is on us and not just the person who offers us the drink?

But we endlessly wail " Booo Hooo!"

We'd now rather make everyone else responsible for our happiness in free speech, than taking responsibility for ourselves in the market place of ideas.

And yes, it takes two hands to handle a whooper like Coulter served up.

I propose a 12-step program for people who get perpetually falling down drunk and self-righteous at other peoples' disingenuous words: Free Speech Anonymous.

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What in this country don't we get about the First Amendment? I mean, do we have any idea what it is and what its implications are to free speech?

Praytell.

Again, do we have any idea of the rights and the responsibilities First Amendment freedom bestows on individuals in a country as free as ours? The operative work here is "individual." Not lemmings, weenie babies or herds of hyenias or government buracracies.

It's freedom to consenting adult individuals in a grand, free country like ours. In our country this freedom of speech not only doesn't guarantee that we'll never be offended. It assures us that we will be offended--early and often. And we'd better come to understand that sooner rather than later, or be prepared to give up our freedoms and status as adults who are called upon to develop the character quality of discernment.

We now demand---people of all political persuasions---that every word, every speech, every system of belief--be sanitized for our consumption. No one is allowed to offend us or,
God forbid, our children. And if they do, "Off with their heads!"

Note that the responsibility for not being offended is always "out there." We only know how to respond one way when we're offended--- whine and faint away in horror and righteous indignation. "Somebody else do something!" I'm too weak to walk away, change the channel, focus my attention on something else. Don't ask her back as the speaker.

Boo hoo, Ann Couter said the word"faggot." "Off with her head!" "I'm so offeneded. Boo hoo!"

Whether you agree with her or not, or her choice of words, this is free speech in action. And, in this country, it requires an adult individual response from the receiver, as well as the giver.

We'd better know. And if we don't, we'd better take a crash course to find out. The free speech correcters are getting louder and more demanding in their march towards political correctness and loss of individual freedom of speech. The weeniebabies are getting louder and louder.

And would put us all into a controlled speech straight jacket.

The First Amendment is not for the fainthearted. It's strong freedom and requires adults to handle it wisely. To learn to take what we want and leave the rest. And not get slobbering drunk every time someone says an unbecoming word.

More on this post and others soon.

What Does It Mean That The Fear of God Is The Beginning of Wisdom?

Dr. David Jeremiah continues his series on Joseph and the repentance and redemption of Jacob and his brothers in Egypt. Learning to fear the Lord is shown to lead to repentance and recovery. And it's never too late to turn from our sinful lifestyle and back to God.

It's never too late.

Do you want to believe, but don't know how? Then you can pray a simple prayer acknowledging that you are a sinner, and ask Christ to reveal Himself to you in your heart. And if you are steadfast and sincere in your prayer requests, then at some time--sooner or later in God's perfect timing---He will make Himself known to you.

Jerry Lee, Ray, Fats et al Tearing It Up

Ain't gonna be your low down dog no mo.

Forget all the endless drivel from last week---the campaign, Al's flora and folly, the stock market---and get down. What a dyno combo!

Dazzling New Photos of Saturn

When I was a little girl, I would visit my grandparents in Georgia. One of the things I most loved was to sneak into my grandfather's grand library with my cousin, Allan. There, we would find and peruse some of the most wonderful books on every subject imaginable. It was thrilling for me. His was a true intellectual's library, the likes of which I had never seen. I felt like Alice in Wonderland.

Allan, a year younger, always went straight to the Greek and Roman art books to see all the naked men and women and show them gleefully to me. He had every page marked as to where the next Aphrodite or David or Zeus statutes were depicted. We giggled endlessly at the shameless display of male and female body parts.

But when we had gotten our fill, I would begin to explore other volumes, and inevitably come to my favorite tome of all: the huge astronomy books featuring chapters on each of the planets in our solar system with magnificent illustrations.

There, in that book I would bury myself for hours on end, dreaming of what lay ahead and far out in the universe. And pondering where God might be living out there somewhere. And trying to comtemplate eternity.

Seeing these thrilling photos of Saturn today reminded me of my early fascination with the planets in my grandfather's library and then later in school. These new photos still thrill and dazzle me.

Vanderbilt Chancellor Gee and His Liberal Wife Constance Call it Quits

It doesn't come as a surprise, really, that the Gees are divorcing.
Rumors have been swirling around Vanderbilt University's golden couple---Chancellor Gordon and Mrs. Constance Gee---for months, ever since the Wall Street Journal ran a front page article on them and their extravagant lifestyles last fall.

He---the debonair rock star/chancellor/fund raiser extraordinaire who draws the highest salary of any university head in the country, if not in all of the free world. His supporters say his fund raising track record calls for this stratospheric salary.

She---the liberal/feminist second wife and first lady of the University, as well as tenured professor, who increasingly has used her classroom and official residence as soapboxes for her far left-leaning liberal politics. She ordered the flag lowered to half-mast at the mansion when Bush was re-elected, and protested vociferously the appearance of Condolezza Rice at a university function last year.

They--the popular couple who could do no wrong , early on, remoded the official residence oppulently and then proceeded to entertain and live there lavishly. They have repeated this renovation style project at every university the Gordon has taken on the helm.

All seemed to be going quite well until the bills started rolling in greatly over-budget and her secret marijuana habit started leaking out to the Vanderbilt Board of Trustees and the WSJ.

Suffice it to say, no one was amused, though the University went into damage control with the media and alumni, after the WSJ left no stone unturned in revealing their secrets.

Their marriage's sad and probably inevitable end was announced to the world this week.

I got my two cents worth in last fall here on Webutante after the WSJ story broke in early October.

While, I am sorry for any divorce, theirs included, I can't help thinking this will be best for my old alma mater Vanderbilt University---its students and alumni---in the short and long run. And I can't help wondering if Chancellor Gee's job will be the next to go.

But stay tuned.

And Now a Word from Our Sponsor

For the past week-and-a-half, I've been struggling with Comcast, my wireless internet provider. My service, which has been fairly decent up to now, has recently gone from existent to non-existent to sporadically existent back to existent but painfully slow. I have been on the phone, or cued up, to talk to their well trained (with exasperated customers) representatives at least 10-15 times over the past eight days. And they've sent men out to my home to try to figure what's working improperly on three occasions.

Now, I think it might be fixed, finally, though I don't want to get my hopes up too much.

In any event, after a recent sinking spell because of internet woes and winter blahs--I'm hopelessly dull at this time of year--I plan to get back into the groove of writing soon, not just waiting to speak to another Comcast customer service representative.

But first, a good night's sleep is in order.

Tim Keller on Idolatry

Tim Keller, pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York, defines idolatry thusly:

"Idolatry is taking a good thing and making it an ultimate thing."

What is in our lives--if suddenly taken away--would affect us to the point that we might not want to go on living? A tough question that gets to the heart of what we organize our lives around for meaning, identity, significance, and love other than God.

Thomas Chalmers the 18th century Scottish Presbyterian pastor talks about idols and personal transformation: "There is not one personal transformation in which the heart is left without an object of ultimate beauty and joy. The heart's desire for one particular object can be conquered, but it's desire to have some object is unconquerable. The only way to dispossess the heart of an old affection is by the expulsive power of a new one."

In another wonderful sermon---which I can't link directly to---Keller talks about finding transformation and dismantling idols---through the power of Jesus Christ working in our lives. Scroll down to the sermon entitled "Christ our Life," based on a Scripture reading from Colossians 3:1-14.

It doesn't get much better than Keller.

My Vote for Best Picture Oscar: The Queen

My hands-down favorite movie this year. Long live "The Queen."

John Kenneth Galbraith on Conventional Wisdom

"The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking."

And the conventional view is rarely, if ever, right., I might add. It's like an executive being on the cover of TIME or another big national mag, it usually means the man or company has already peaked and on the downhill slide. So it goes with the rise of conventional, often hysterical thinking---like global warming. Or the population bomb or global freezing of yesteryear.

Whenever conventional views reach such a crescendo as we see today, with people everywhere jumping on the bandwagon of "truth," the smart money and people have long since moved on from the hype.

Learning to think for oneself, outside the buzz of "undisputable" wisdom, has got to be one of life's greatest but worthwhile challenges.

I believe the latest mass group-think--global warming--will prove to be the shibboleth of the century and will never come to pass. But not, unfortunately, before Al Gore is crowned king of the mythical One World Kingdom. Stay tuned for his extended coronation...

Feminism and Female Oppression over at The American Thinker

I often wonder why feminists in our country are silent when it comes of the total opporession of women abroad, especially in the Middle East. This article puts it well. They have reframed oppression into a new brand of feminism. Wow, what a little relativism can do for one's perspective these days.

Then why a staunch Southern pro-lifer is backing Giuliani. It's short and sweet and well worth reading. I, as a conservative, Christian woman, strongly support Rudy because I think he's undoubtedly the best man for the job at this time of global war.

Being Online Verses Being Off

I suppose everyone has to reassess how much time they spend online verses off.

And for the first time I'm doing that in my life.

Since starting this blog last October, I have spent more time online than I ever dreamed possible. Because I'm also an online investor for many years and do much of my research and chart reading on the web, the amount of time I now spend on the computer has doubled or tripled in the past year.

Is it healthy for me? Can I sustain it? Can I add anything really unique to the political and cultural conversation in substance or style? Or can and should I only offer a rehashing and reframing of what's already out there from some really good online minds? And is it really worthwhile?

But most of all, do I want to? And am I too addicted too stop?

I love to write and read and since starting to read some of the more conservative political blogs last year--especially the likes of American Digest, Roger Simon, Works and Days, Powerline, Atlas Shrugs and Neo-neocon---all found on the right side links bar here--- I have feasted on sophisticated daily opinions and enjoyed it all immensely. I've loved reading, thinking about, commenting and then writing my take here at Webutante.

But lately, I am beginning to get bored and overwhelmed with all the daily blather--- wonderful as it's been---and dread the upcoming election. I'm finding myself griping a bit about the long lengths and numbers of posts, and often the nasty tone and the tenor. Some of it comes as across as self-righteous.

Even Victor Davis Hanson is starting to be laborious to me, as he writes longer and longer pieces, especially over at Works and Days. When people write too much---like talking too much--- I tend to tune out and walk away, even though they have important things to say.

I can better handle Roger Simon's work on a dailybasis because it's usually short and to the point. And the comments are often interesting.

With a presidential election coming up, just how involved and invested in all this do I really want to be? It's gonna get really, really mean-spirited out there in politikland. We ain't seen nothing yet.

I find online blogs to be very sticky---easy to get hooked on and very hard to get away from. And there's very little online support for someone like me. And for the most part, that's okay cause I still have plenty of real life friends and family, most of whom spend very little time online reading or caring about blogs---good for them!

Still, perhaps because I have just returned from a prayer retreat in Arizona, I am starting to question my priorities during these cold, dreary weeks in February. Aren't there people I want to spend more time with face to face? And offline projects? And more time outdoors?

Yes, yes and yes.

Most likely, I won't can this blog, but rather scale back from daily posting to writing several times a week, with Sundays still reserved for a good sermon. I want this to be a small part of my life, but not the centerpoint of my life. And--like all things addictive--it's a slippery , seductive slope and could become that.

I don't think that's ultimately healthy for me and will seek to find more balance in the weeks and months ahead between virtuality and reality.

Thanks for reading, I'll keep you posted. Am on my way out the door to breakfast with a friend.

If You Only See One YouTube Video This Week, Watch This One

This is Rep. Sam Johnson of the 3rd District in Texas. He is a former fighter pilot in Korea and Viet Nam where he was shot down and captured as a POW for seven years. Here he argues for supporting the troops in Iraq in the House last week.

Touching, poignant and eloquent. Listen to the whole thing.

One of My Favorite Former Presidents: John Adams

John Adams, 1735-1826
President of the United States, 1779-1801

Founding Father, Foreign Diplomat and Ambassador, Husband Extraordinaire to Abigail---his equal and best friend, first Vice-President of the United States under George Washington, and its second President, John Adams remains one of the foremost characters in early American history.

He is the only early American President who still has no memorial in Washington D.C. dedicated to his service to our country and its founding. A man of less tact and gentility than his more sauve friend and rival, Thomas Jefferson, Adams, a Federalist, was nonetheless a man of the highest intergrity. With Adams one always knew where one stood, like it or not, and that was rarely the case with the more sneaky Jefferson.

Like our current President, John Adams served in turbulent times, and though his controversial foreign policies were ultimately successful, he was perceived as being less effective by the media and his enemies, including Jefferson, his VP.

Jefferson worked diligently behind the scenes to undermine Adams who lost his election to a second term to his unfaithful Vice-President.

Adams departed the White House and Washington, not even staying to attend Jefferson's swearing in as the third President.

Recalling that turn of event years later, Adams noted: " No man who ever held the office of president would ever congratulate a friend on obtaining it."

I'm sure George Bush might agree with Adams at this point. But Adams would tell Bush, if he were still alive, that history has a way of vindicating a great President sooner or later.

Today, I salute a former under-loved and under-appreciated President from our past: John Adams., whose son, John Quincy Adams went on to become the fifth President of our country.

Adams, like Bush today, held on to his principles to the end, even though it cost him popularity in the polls and with the people. My kind of man. Our country needs more like him today.

My Least Favorite Former President

Nuttin nice to say about this nut. Nuff said.

Sunday, Home and Two Important Sermons

Bitter cold and windy weather followed me across the country all week.

Yet, coming home, even in this weather and road weary as I was, was wonderful. I always give thanks for safe traveling. This was a superb trip: lots of hiking, prayer, some good company and a good friend for much of the time. And it's always fun to wander around in this great and vast, vast country.

And now home.

But with a twinge of sadness that Laura is not here anymore to listen to tales of my adventures. I miss her.

Today, Dr. David Jeremiah continues his series on Joseph who suffered as much as any man in the Old Testament: sold to slavery by his brothers, falsely accused of adultery with an Egyptian woman and thrown into prison. Yet, because he had a strong relationship with God, nothing could do him in and he continued to rise to the top in everything he did and wherever he was placed. In the end, he rose to second-in-command in Egypt under Pharoah.

Not bad for a little Jewish kid abandoned by his brothers and thought to be dead by his bereaved father.

But he remained under God's watchful protection every step of the way.

Present problems are often training grounds for future leadership positions. Right behavior isn't always rewarded promptly and sometimes we must suffer terribly for it---and still refrain from bitterness. Not an easy road.

But all things work for good--ultimately--to him or her who love and obey Christ. Though things often don't always work out the way we think or plan.

The life of Joseph should give us all hope and perseverence.

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A second semon I'm posting is today's at McLean Bible Church. Lon Solomon talks about doing things our way verses God's way here.

It is well worth noting that Solomon uses an example of prayer at the Constitutional Convention in the summer of 1787 and a speech advocating continued fervent prayer by Benjamen Franklin in ending the gridlock at that convention, so that the country could be successfully founded. Many say it was one of the most important turning points of the convention.

Our nation was founded on and by the Grace of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and through the power of prayer.

Joel Rosenberg on How the Dems Are Trying to Tie Bush's Hands in Iran; Defeat Us in Iraq

There are times when I just can't click on Joel's blog because he is so perceptive and prescient.

It's scary. He writes about issues in the Middle East with such foreknowledge that I almost can't look. He says what he writes is all predicted in the Bible. And I believe him.

According to Joel, things continue to line up according to ancient Bible prophecy, especially the book of Ezekiel. Russia is lining up with Iran. And Iran wants to wipe Israel off the map.

Don't miss his posts and especially today's.

Nancy Pelosi continues to ignore the reality of war and pass resolutions condemning Bush's new plan in Iraq. She's a lightweight. What's it going to take to get it that we're in a war with countries and peoples that want to destroy us? And destroy us sooner rather than later?

And so Pelosi and company continue to fiddle and play politics and in doing so only embolden those who want to clean our clocks. Frightening beyond words.

God help us all. And God forbid that we elect a new president that seeks to appease our enemies.