Socialism and Plumbing :)

I have studied a great deal about history and there has never been a time when a socialist program, however ideal-looking, has worked the way it says it's going to.  If men were angels, sure.  We could live a higher law when we all just grow, take, or eat what we need (not want) and then share the rest.  To force men, to redistribute it for them--that is to take the power to do so and place it into the hands of falliable men, men who once endowed with that power and those resources, do not always deliver in a very angelic way.

Socialism has always ended the same way.  Why do we think we will be any different?

I really enjoyed this analysis of our country's recent "venture" into socialism: Obamacare.

Only weeks after leaving office on Jan. 20, 2017, former President Barack Obama discovers a leak under his sink, so he calls Troy the Plumber to come out and fix it.
Troy drives to Obama’s new house, which is located in a very exclusive, gated community near Chicago where all the residents have a net income of way more than $250,000 per year.
Troy arrives and takes his tools into the house. He is led to the guest bathroom that contains the leaky pipe under the sink. Troy assesses the problem and tells Obama that it’s an easy repair that will take less than 10 minutes. Obama asks Troy how much it will cost. Troy checks his rate chart and says, “$9,500.”
“What?! $9,500?!” Obama asks, stunned, “But you said it’s an easy repair. Michelle will whip me if I pay a plumber that much!”

Troy says, “Yes, but what I do is charge those who make more than $250,000 per year a much higher amount so I can fix the plumbing of poorer people for free. This has always been my philosophy. As a matter of fact, I lobbied the Democrat Congress, who passed this philosophy into law. Now all plumbers must do business this way. It’s known as the ‘Affordable Plumbing Act of 2014′. I’m surprised you haven’t heard of it.” In spite of that, Obama tells Troy there’s no way he’s paying that much for a small plumbing repair, so Troy leaves. Obama spends the next hour flipping through the phone book calling for another plumber, but he finds that all other plumbing businesses in the area have gone out of business. Not wanting to pay Troy’s price, Obama does nothing and the leak goes un-repaired for several more days. A week later the leak is so bad Obama has had to put a bucket under the sink.
Michelle is not happy as she has Oprah and guests arriving the next morning. The bucket fills up quickly and has to be emptied every hour, and there’s a risk the room will flood, so Obama calls Troy and pleads with him to return.
Troy goes back to Obama’s house, looks at the leaky pipe, checks his new rate chart and says, “Let’s see, this will now cost you $21,000.”
Obama quickly fires back, “What? A few days ago you told me it would cost $9,500!”
Troy explains, “Well, because of the ‘Affordable Plumbing Act,’ a lot of wealthier people are learning how to maintain and take care of their own plumbing, so there are fewer payers in the plumbing exchanges.
As a result, the price I have to charge wealthy people like you keeps rising. Not only that, but for some reason the demand for plumbing work by those who get it for free has skyrocketed!
There’s a long waiting list of those who need repairs, but the amount we get doesn’t cover our costs, especially paperwork and record-keeping. This unfortunately has put a lot of my fellow plumbers out of business, they’re not being replaced, and nobody is going into the plumbing business because they know they can’t make any money at it.
I’m hurting too, all thanks to greedy rich people like you who won’t pay their ‘fair share’. On the other hand, why didn’t you buy plumbing insurance last December? If you had bought plumbing insurance available under the ‘Affordable Plumbing Act,’ all this would have been covered by your policy.”
“You mean I wouldn’t have to pay anything to have you fix my plumbing problem?” asks Obama.
“Well, not exactly,” replies Troy. “You would have had to buy the insurance before the deadline, which has passed now. And, because you’re rich, you would have had to pay $34,000 in premiums, which would have given you a ‘silver’ plan, and then, since this would have been your first repair, you would have to pay up to the $21,000 deductible, and anything over that would have a $7,500 co-pay, and then there’s the mandatory maintenance program, which is covered up to 17.5%, so there are some costs involved. Nothing is for free.”
“WHAT?!” exclaims Obama. “Why so much for a puny sink leak?!”
With a bland look, Troy replies, “Well, paperwork, mostly, like I said. And the internal cost of the program itself. You don’t think a program of this complexity and scope can run itself, do you?
Besides, there are millions of folks with lower incomes than you, even many in the ‘middle class’, who qualify for subsidies that people like you must support.

That’s why they call it the ‘Affordable Plumbing Act’! Only people who don’t make much money can afford it. If you want affordable plumbing, you’ll have to give away most of what you have accumulated and cut your and Michelle’s income by about 90%. Then you can qualify to get your ‘Fair Share’ instead of giving it.” “But who would pass a crazy act like the ‘Affordable Plumbing Act’?!” exclaims the exasperated Obama.
After a sigh, Troy replies, “Congress… because they didn’t read it.” (link to source)

While I don't agree with all the comments and context found in the link above, the analogy was appropriate.  Makes one think, anyway, and I love to think!

Character and the American Commitment to the Greater Good

 The following is just to beautiful to not share. I believe that our America today still has many of these virtues, these ideals, this character.  We just need to rise up and use it.

(The following is a excerpt from "A Patriot's History of the United States" which is actually available online at http://uscrow.org/downloads/A%20Patriots%20History%20of%20the%20US%20-%20Ytsewolf.pdf which is where I obtained a copy of this longish quote so I didn't have to type it :)...)

Throughout much of the twentieth century, there was a subtle and, at times, obvious campaign to
separate virtue from talent, to divide character from success. The latest in this line of attack is the
emphasis on diversity—that somehow merely having different skin shades or national origins
makes America special. But it was not the color of the skin of people who came here that made
them special, it was the content of their character. America remains a beacon of liberty, not merely
because its institutions have generally remained strong, its citizens free, and its attitudes tolerant,
but because it, among most of the developed world, still cries out as a nation, “Character counts.”
Personal liberties in America are genuine because of the character of honest judges and attorneys
who, for the most part, still make up the judiciary, and because of the personal integrity of large
numbers of local, state, and national lawmakers.

No society is free from corruption. The difference is that in America, corruption is viewed as the
exception, not the rule. And when light is shown on it, corruption is viciously attacked. Freedom
still attracts people to the fountain of hope that is America, but freedom alone is not enough.
Without responsibility and virtue, freedom becomes a soggy anarchy, an incomplete licentiousness.
This is what has made Americans different: their fusion of freedom and integrity endows
Americans with their sense of right, often when no other nation in the world shares their perception.
Yet that is as telling about other nations as it is our own; perhaps it is that as Americans, we alone
remain committed to both the individual and the greater good, to personal freedoms and to public
virtue, to human achievement and respect for the Almighty. Slavery was abolished because of the
dual commitment to liberty and virtue—neither capable of standing without the other. Some
crusades in the name of integrity have proven disastrous, including Prohibition. The most recent
serious threats to both liberty and public virtue (abuse of the latter damages both) have come in the
form of the modern environmental and consumer safety movements. Attempts to sue gun makers,
paint manufacturers, tobacco companies, and even Microsoft “for the public good” have made
distressingly steady advances, encroaching on Americans’ freedoms to eat fast foods, smoke, or
modify their automobiles, not to mention start businesses or invest in existing firms without fear of
retribution.

The Founders—each and every one of them—would have been horrified at such intrusions on
liberty, regardless of the virtue of the cause, not because they were elite white men, but because
such actions in the name of the public good were simply wrong. It all goes back to character: the
best way to ensure virtuous institutions (whether government, business, schools, or churches) was
to populate them with people of virtue. Europe forgot this in the nineteenth century, or by World
War I at the latest. Despite rigorous and punitive face-saving traditions in the Middle East or Asia,
these twin principles of liberty and virtue have never been adopted. Only in America, where one
was permitted to do almost anything, but expected to do the best thing, did these principles
germinate.

To a great extent, that is why, on March 4, 1801, John Adams would have thought of nothing other
than to turn the White House over to his hated foe, without fanfare, self-pity, or complaint, and
return to his everyday life away from politics. That is why, on the few occasions where very thin
electoral margins produced no clear winner in the presidential race (such as 1824, 1876, 1888,
1960, and 2000), the losers (after some legal maneuvering, recounting of votes, and occasional
whining) nevertheless stepped aside and congratulated the winner of a different party. Adams may
have set a precedent, but in truth he would do nothing else. After all, he was a man of character.

Service distinguishes

Today is Wednesday, our Eureka day.  Eureka is a concept that we seek to discover truth using both inductive and deductive reasoning...scientific and mathematical.  I like to seek for evidences of truth of the principle we are studying on this day, so today this is what I used:

First we discussed the two great commandments and how all other commandments are "hinged" on them:
-to love God
-to love our neighbors as ourselves
We used reasoning to show how the 10 commandments are simply ways to honor those two.

Then I brought into the discussion the section in Matthew 25 where the King is separating the righteous and the unrighteous...simply based upon the acts of service they rendered to their fellow man.  I had the younger group act out each act of service as I read it and you could see the emotion on their faces change as they acted out serving verses withholding their services. (This is a great video about this that we had watched before but I did end up bringing it into the "older" group...The Old Shoemaker by Tolstoy.)

I then showed the following two clips:

"Love thy Neighbor"

The first was a witness of the truthfulness of the joy that comes from giving selfless service dn the second an example of it.

It is truly service that will distinguish our righteousness, our willingness to love and obey God.  As leaders, like in "The Old Shoemaker," we must keep our eyes lifted for opportunities to serve, opportunities to visit with our Savior, even as we work.  The opportunities will not always come knocking at our door.

*Sorry if this is a duplicate posting for some of you...it fits both with "my thoughts" (Lazarus blog) and "homeschooling ideas" (Homeschooling is for the Bees blog).

The first law of sacrifice

Yesterday for devotional, we watched Christ and the rich young ruler.  Pipalicious was bothered that even though the rich man had kept all the commandments, Christ said he couldn't get to heaven unless he gave away all his money too.  "Isn't he a good man?" she asked.

It is a good question. I have had it on my mind much since then.  I have thought about how we can do so much, but if we keep anything back, or make anything more important to us than what God asks us to do, it will keep us back.

I remember an old saying from my youth: "Christ doesn't really ask us to sacrifice anything: he simply asks us to give up our old tattered cloak for a new and glorious one."  This morning I read about Adam and Eve and how the first thing they were asked to do upon leaving the garden of Eden was to offer up sacrifices. I thought about the necessity in the Law of Moses to offer up the firstlings of the flock.  In my mind I realized that I had always thought that a shepherd would have a whole bunch of sheep and then take the first one that had been born and sacrifice that.  This is not the case.  They would offer the first one before they knew that any more sheep were coming...the first one without blemish.

Abraham was commanded to sacrifice Isaac, his link to the promise of "seed without number":

Why is it, when we are doing so much, that God still asks us to sacrifice?  Could it be because we are caught up in lesser things and He wants to free us of that?  Like in the first video linked above, Christ promises that with God, all things are possible: accumulation of wealth, good health, children, time, etc.

Upon reflection on the rich young man's situation, I realized that Christ never said that "you will never have wealth again."  He just asked him to give it up for now.  In fact, I know that the earth is the Lord's and all the bounty therein.  Who knows but that immediately upon giving up his all to the poor that he wouldn't have had a multitude of blessings pour out to fill all his needs, taking away the burden of obsessing about wealthy and acquiring it?

It make me wonder, what comes first in my life?  What does He want me to sacrifice?  Does God and His will truly come first in my life, or, like the rich young man, do I hold things back as well?

There is also that scripture that keeps floating in my mind: "to obey is better than to sacrifice"...hmmmm. Definitely food for thought.

Warning: Science as a religion

I am a scientist at heart.  I love the spirit of inquiry, the spirit of creative exploration that comes with it!  The true scientists doesn't take other people's observations at face value, but asks "how?" and "why?"

However, that is not the spirit in which science is being taught to millions of students and adults, the "congregation" of the religion of science.  Sure, to "ask questions, discover, explore!" is paid lip-service, but is that really what is being taught?

Imagine, a child sitting down to a science test in grade school, writing down the "wrong" answer, and then telling the teacher that, based on his own observations, he doesn't believe the "current interpretation of the evidence" and believes his answer could be right.

What would that child be told?  In most cases, I submit, this would be the response: "You are wrong.  It has been scientifically proven."

Don't believe me?  What would happen if you went into an elementary classroom and said that it was possible the dinosaurs did not in fact roam the earth, but that their presence in the archeaological record is due to our earth being comprised of the matter of other, extinct worlds, where dinosaurs had roamed?  Does that fly in the face of current scientific "dogma," or what has been accepted as scientifically proven?

Dangerously powerful words, "scientifically proven."  Words that teach to not question, but to accept...and to accept that which is so often proven wrong in a matter or years or even hours!

Think about it.  What happens when a "ground-breaking new idea!" comes out in the field of science?  Textbooks and tests world-wide are re-written, articles are published, and the scientific "facts" are changed...that easily.    Scientists may understand and embrace the difference between theory and law, but that is not how it is presented.  Millions accept anything "scientific" instantly as the latest "fact" in the religion of science.  The "foundations" of science are so easily changed...and so faithfully believed.

That is what happened in 1935 when Japanese physicist Hideki Yukawa changed our currently accepted understanding of the atom.  He challenged, interpreted, and creatively spun a new twist on an old theory and voila! New "truth" was found and mesons became part of our current model.

In a more personal example, I remember distinctly holding my first child in my arms 17 years ago and being firmly instructed by nurse clothed in the mantle of authority that I must, for the good of my baby, be very careful to clean her umbilical cord in a specific and regular manner.

Fast forward 12 years and I found myself in the same situation: cradling a new infant in my arms and being told firmly and authoritatively that I must not touch the umbilical cord in the best interest of my child.

It had been "scientifically proven" both times.

Now, don't get me wrong.  Remember, I love science!  I love the pursuit of truths and patterns in the world around me!  However, I am concerned with how it is being taught to the public at large: theories as facts.  As a grade schooler, I was taught "facts" about dinosaurs and evolution.  In junior high and high school, the depth of indoctrination went deeper with "truths" and "facts" being taught and tested into me.

Lo and behold, I hit Yale University Evolution 260 and all of a sudden these "facts" become theories?  Why was I not taught the problems with and options to radiocarbon dating?  Why was I not clearly schooled in the difference between mirco-evolution (changes of a creature to adapt to their environment--well documented) and macro-evolution (the change from one species to another--never "documented")? How could I not see that the "evidence" for evolution of years past was the same small collection of bones, being re-discussed and re-visited with new sub-theories, with specimen so far and in between that they are individually named?

Remember, I call myself a scientist (although after reading this, I am sure some would love to differ :)...).  I love discussing evolution and other scientific theories!  I think it is exciting to consider possibilities!  However, I am frustrated that those who would like to explore all possibilities of man and his origins and explanations for the world around us are shouted down as "religionists" and figuratively burned at the stake. 

For instance, I just read the commentaries on an article titled "Creationism vs. Evolution" for a science class the other day--the commentaries, not so much of the article itself, ironically enough. Even if you don't understand everything they discuss in the commentaries, the mood is obvious. The words used to verbally attack those who tried to share the viewpoint of "creationism" (belief that God created the university) were similar to those I imagine used by the authorities of the Catholic Church who attacked Galileo and Copernicus...ironically enough.  They were attacks based largely upon belief systems and not facts, from people indoctrinated in the "authority" of the "religion of science" that is currently preached and never questioned. 

Interesting.  The beliefs of the "religion of science" are questioned, but not the authority of it.  Hmmm...an interesting riddle.  Food for thought.

My purpose in writing this is to hopefully wake people up to what they are being taught through media and in the academic world, subconsciously and religiously: that science can prove anything and is the ultimate source of truth...science, which is built upon the observations and limited perception of imperfect people like you and I. 

I celebrate science and what that field has discovered and how it has blessed my life.  However, I do not believe everything that is "scientifically proven" at face value.   Nor should we complacently accept what modern science demands of our children and the public at large: childlike faith and belief in anything it offers.

Moment of humor :)

Looking around

As I have looked back over the past few months, I am grateful for the peace and calm that has been a part of our family life.  I have seen great strength and patience in my children and husband as they have watched me struggle...and struggled to know what to do themselves.  There was an outpouring of security to surround me in my inner turmoil and I look back with gratitude.

It was interesting that the turning point, I felt, was an answer I received while listening to my mother's homecoming talk in December.  She shared how some of the Germans they visited were very depressed and lonely.  "If only they would reach out and visit each other!" she testified. "They would have felt joy and friendship with each other!"

As I listened to her say that, I felt that it was part of my answer...part of the solution to my problem, my turmoil.  Reach out.  Visit.  Take that first step.  That is not what a depressed person wants to hear :).  It requires action.  It requires putting yourself out there.  It requires thinking of others when it is so hard to even deal with thinking about yourself.

However, God's ways are not our ways and that was His answer.  My choice was whether or not to do it.

Tentatively, I started reaching out, sharing, and asking a few people to do things with me, spend time with me, and, --on that occasion when I felt more willing than at other times-- I gently reached out to seek for some help, hesitantly offering a bit of what I was going through inside.  It was humbling to see the result.  So many of us are hurting, alone, and wanting others to reach out to seek us out, to show us that we matter, that others are thinking of us.  Just think of it: so many of us feeling isolated, living side-by-side.

While I don't understand it myself, God's ways are not my ways and I am finding that when I follow these strange and hard solutions He sends, peace eventually comes...in His time. 

Finding a measure of peace

It has been an interesting journey so far, but I have found some peace...ahhhh, joyful peace.

The Savior offers peace, not as the world giveth peace, which is how I was seeking it.

I found a measure as I listened to the following talk:

I was particularly struck by the following part:

What are the sources of peace? Many search for peace in worldly ways, which never have and never will succeed. Peace is not found by attaining great wealth, power, or prominence.²² Peace is not found in the pursuit of pleasure, entertainment, or leisure. None of these can, even when attained in abundance, create any lasting happiness or peace.

Emma Lou Thayne’s beloved hymn asks the appropriate questions: “Where can I turn for peace? Where is my solace when other sources cease to make me whole?”²³ The answer is the Savior, who is the source and author of peace. He is the “Prince of Peace.”²⁴

How do we stay close to the Savior? Humbling ourselves before God, praying always, repenting of sins, entering the waters of baptism with a broken heart and contrite spirit, and becoming true disciples of Jesus Christ are profound examples of the righteousness that is rewarded by abiding peace.

 Daily or even hourly repenting when those negative, unhealthy thoughts come to mind has been a balm.  For some reason, I had convinced myself subconsciously that I needed to "fix it" and then repent...and then it would be conquered.  I keep doing that!  To turn to the Savior, needing Him and seeking His power every moment I need it has been humbling but has brought a measure of peace I have not felt for a long time.  I can seek to obey commandments and repent and strive...those are things I can do, even if I do not feel that I have the emotional control and mental control that seems to be slipping and gone :).