So, if you might harm us and might have superweapons that we speculate about, then we will go ahead and invade your country and put our young men in harm’s way.
But, if we are considering a system that would defend innocent people from nuclear attack by a method that doesn’t involve pre-emptive bloodshed and risk to the lives of our young… well, then, we just need to sit tight and do nothing until we have positive proof.
One speaker at the forum recalled a man who explained why taxpayers shouldn’t have to pick up the bill: “The government should pay for it.”
With this sort of idiocy, all a politician has to do is lie and say the universal healthcare is possible without raising taxes. It will be too late once anyone figures out the truth.
“Doctors are not up at night crying” in fear of their next mammogram, Trisha Stotler Meyer, a 37-year-old woman who had a double mastectomy three weeks ago, told the Associated Press. “I don’t want to have to deal with the stress.”
I don’t blame her at all. It is amazing to me that people are still reduced to this sort of choice in the midst of all our med tech progress.
Barb has a great round-up post on Christians debating the proper teaching on divorce. Below is the quotation I’m stealing from her from Christian OT scholar, James Jordan.
The occasion for the master’s mistreatment of his slave-wife is his marriage to a second woman. Clearly, however, mistreatment of the woman for any reason would be grounds for divorce. And clearly this is a divorce, the grounds being maltreatment. Those who insist that the wife should remain with her husband, even if he beats her and otherwise abuses her, are completely out of line with Scripture at this point.
If a slave wife can get a divorce for maltreatment, how about a free wife? This is a hard question to answer. A free wife in Israel had certain privileges, particularly access to considerable monetary property (the bride money). Having this property gave her a position of power with her husband. Indeed, free women in patriarchal times had their own tents and servants. The wife in Canticles had her own quarters. Thus, perhaps a free woman could not sue for divorce on the grounds of maltreatment. On the other hand, maltreatment probably could not even arise in the case of a free woman.
To apply this law today we need to ask whether the modern American wife is more like the Israelite free wife (with lots of independent power and property), or more like the slave wife. Without intending any insult, I think the modern wife is more like the slave wife, having relatively little independent power. The proof of this, for me, is the fact that men so frequently beat their wives in this society, and get by with it. Thus, extending the equity of this law, by ethical analogy, I believe that women today should be permitted to sue for divorce on the grounds of serious maltreatment. (The Law Of The Covenant [Tyler, TX: ICE, 1984])
You can find more of Jim’s material here.
Note to self: acquire and read Peter Leithart on 1 & 2 Kings.
So here are five books on writing for a living.
What I find interesting about these authors is that they have pretty different views of where writing for articles fits into the plan of becoming a successful writer. Some think it is essential. The first thing you do is go buy Writers Market, and then start writing and proposing. But for others, writing articles is only helpful in that it distracts other capable writers from competing in the ad copy business. Articles are fine for PR and self-promotion, but they pay far too little to be pursued as a real source of income.
For myself, I did buy a copy of Writers Market in a fit of hysteria, but after looking at it, I couldn’t understand why I did so. The pay is way too low, the time between acceptance and payment way too long, and you are supposed to be motivated enough to work on a proposal without knowing for certain that you have a customer. Maybe some people are able to do this often and fast enough to build a business, but my sense of things is that you would be far better off finding a couple of people who will let you write a brochure for them (for free if necessary) so that you can make a portfolio and try to get some business clients.
I talked to a publisher of a news magazine recently who was an editor about fifteen years ago when I did a few stories and book reviews for his publication. I asked him casually if he still did any journalistic assignments, as he did back when I worked for him. His answer didn’t surprise me. “Writing is for young people.” The people who write for those rates are those for whom writing is still somehow romantic as an activity. For those of us who are trying to make a living, it simply doesn’t make sense.
Of course, I’m sharing my opinion on the premise that I began a writing business earlier this year–that I am a “beginning writer” as of 2007. But I got my first job based on previous work I did part-time while a solo pastor. And I got that work based on relationships I built up before seminary when I did that low, low paying work. So I can’t deny that a history of writing can help–including a history of writing articles.
It all depends on your needs. If you have an income and can do some work on the side part time for awhile, then it might be worth investing a year of barely-worth-it writing so you can get a portfolio going (“Here are my two most recent projects,” is always technically true). My strong advice is to do some non-controversial pieces on health or technology or something that might be perceived as translatable into sales writing.
By the way, I’ll soon be cross posting this entry to my business blog, which I have revamped.
For the record, I personally found all of the above books worthwhile, even if I disagreed with a couple of them about the usefulness of writing articles for magazines.
I find it much easier to blog for personal reasons here or to blog for clients than to blog on my business site. Nevertheless, I have revamped it and will try to keep it interesting from now on. Promise.
And since the latest chapter is out (no double entendre!), I just want to assure everyone that despite being creative and aesthetically discerning, Garyth not only shows heterosexual desires throughout the novel, but my dad won’t be revealing any secret orientations in any other forum either.
Soldiers of Christ, at ease.
Tony Felich says some dismissive things about Harry Potter in light of the recent Dumbledore outing, but in the process says all that a Christian appreciator of the story needs to say.
I understand the age we live in, such “outings” of people are considered progressive and en vogue, but come on already. Can you imagine, In Lewis’ day, readers wondering about the sexuality of the professor because he’s single, living alone? How about the readers of Tolkein wondering about the sexuality of Gandalf (OK…never mind that one..)? But you get my drift. Such a decision by Rowlings is so boring and typical of our pop culture.
Pretty much it. Rowling goes into my Susan Howatch category of worthwhile liberal Christian authors, except that Howatch’s problems are actually in the stories. Rowling’s story is untainted. As far as I’m concerned, her opinion on Dumbledore right now is no more important than anyone else’s. It is like Ray Bradbury insisting that Fahrenheit 451 is not about censorship.
Sadly, for the movies, I think all bets are off.