Long ago God gave His people dire warnings. “Don’t let foreign gods find a place in your land”. There is a consequence for doing so. To do so meant destruction for the land and the people. Though cultures change, or evolve, if you will, God’s laws never change. The technicalities of certain rules and regulations have changed or been superseded over the centuries with the advances of science and technology, and even from Moses’ time to Jesus, the absolutes never changed.
Even the secular world recognizes and pays some respectful acknowledgment to The Ten Commandments and the commandment ” Thou shalt have no other gods before me” has never been repealed. Modern culture may dismiss it but such does not nullify the Command.
When Israel let other gods creep into their society, they removed themselves from under the hand of protection of God and they suffered the consequences. God put a hedge of protection around them and they purposefully stepped beyond the boundaries and suffered the consequences.
The United States as a nation was not founded on principles of Buddhism. Nor on Hinduism. Most certainly on Islam. This nation was founded on Judeo-Christian principles and worldview.
Now we have all but thrown that precept out the window. We are not only allowing foreign gods to infiltrate our land, we are actually celebrating those gods and their worshipers. It’s not enough that we make movies celebrating the search for “spiritual enlightenment” which instead of that “enlightenment” being God, is Eastern Mysticism or some other strange god. We see the resurgence of ancient pagan religions and count ourselves tolerant for accepting the embrace of such by others.
For the most part, the surface affects of such religions within our culture, though morally corrupting of the culture’s value systems, have had a minimal physical impact on the structure of the nation. They are not innocent of the destruction earned by disobedience to God’s commands but we don’t see the followers of Buddha preaching the subjugation of the world from within their temples. Theirs is more of a “live and let live” life style and philosophy. Other foreign religions are the same. Of themselves, little threat. So what is the harm?
God gave the warning for a reason. Let one in and you will in another. Let in another and that will b followed by another. In time they will overwhelm you. We let one false god into our land and now another false god begs admittance. God said, “if you let them in, they will destroy you” and now we have Islam making headway and Islam is not an innocent community of believers in a common religious faith. Other religions are happy enough to co-exist within their specific communities within the nation as a whole. Islam is not. Islam is not about being just another faith people may choose to follow. Islam is about total domination. Don’t believe that? As them. Look at their history and look at their founding literature. It’s there in black and white. It is ingrained within the founding principles of Islam.
We have to take the blame for letting it happen. We turned away from the God of the Bible, the God of the Jew and the Christian, and we embraced strange gods and welcomed them into our tent. Now we are seeing the destructive affects. Islam will soon set up its flag of conquest over New York City and eventually over the land.
If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, he will turn and bring disaster on you and make an end of you, after he has been good to you. (Josh 24:20)
If you ever forget the Lord your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed. (Deut 8:19-20)
Do not make a covenant with them or with their gods. 3 Do not let them live in your land, or they will cause you to sin against me, because the worship of their gods will certainly be a snare to you.” (Ex 23:32-33)
When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations — the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you — and when the Lord your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods, and the Lord’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you. (Deut 7:1-5)
Over the last several days I’ve had the opportunity to observe and photograph a phenomenon from nature which draws an interesting if not eerie political parallel. I observed an adult male Northern Cardinal feeding what I initially thought was one of its young. The slightly smaller bird was among a group of assorted sparrows, house wrens, and house sparrows picking at the sunflower seed which commonly falls from the bird feeder we have hanging from a tree branch above. The bird being fed by the Cardinal didn’t look like a Cardinal but at the time not being sure what a fledgling Cardinal looked like, I made the assumption. I did find it interesting that this young bird was almost as large in physical size as the adult Cardinal and that it had been observed actually feeding itself by plucking seed from the ground like all of the other birds around it.
Nevertheless, when the adult male Cardinal was any where in its vicinity, it would perform a ritual of flapping its wings at a high speed and approach the Cardinal with open beak. The Cardinal would pick up a sunflower seed and deposit it into the other bird’s mouth. Now we have observed the ritual of mate feeding in which the male Cardinal will place seed into the female Cardinal’s beak. That is understandable. She is his mate and part of the Cardinal (and some other birds as well) instinct for caring for the mate during the mating season. It is also a part of the mating ritual and when observed it is actually a tender, romantic looking gesture. This thing with the other bird was something different.
A little research into the habits of the Brown Headed Cowbird reveals a sinister and all too familiar behavior pattern. The Cowbird is very much the Liberal victim class of the bird world. The Cowbird is the bird example of the non-producers in the bird society living off of the good heartedness of the producing class.
The Cowbird does not build its own nest to lay its eggs in. Why should it? It will use the nests other birds have labored to build. The Cowbird gets free use of the nest without any effort expanded on its part nor contribution to the nest building process. The Cowbird then proceeds to lay its own eggs in the nest built by other birds. Not satisfied with that, the Cowbird will often eject one or more of the eggs of the host bird. The Cowbird does not incubate its own eggs. Why should it? The host bird will do that job. The host bird takes over the job of bringing to life the young of the Cowbird. This can easily come at the expense of the host bird’s own young which are reduced in number by the Cowbird to make space for the Cowbird eggs.
The Cowbird does not feed its own young. Again the question, why should it? The host bird will do that as well. If it seems like a generous and thoughtful gesture on the part of the host bird, we must realize that it is often at the expense of the host birds own young. The Cowbird young are more aggressive in their feeding demands and the efforts to feed them by the host bird will often result in the neglect of feeding of the host bird’s own young. It is not uncommon for the hatchings of a host bird to die of starvation while the parasitic Cowbird’s young are fed and thrive.
This parasitic activity continues as the young Cowbirds grow. As I observed on the lawn in our back garden, the fledgling Cowbird continues to sap the resources of the host bird even when it is fully capable of seeing to its own well being. There may be as many as three or four fledgling Cowbirds on the ground at the same time and all will perform the “feed me, feed me” ritual and the obliging Cardinal will do just that. In the meantime, if the Cardinal is there to see to his own eating, his eating time is interrupted by the demands of the always hungry parasite birds. If the Cardinal has a mate and young on a nest somewhere, relying on him for their sustenance, they are being neglected in the process.
The lesson of the Cowbird is a vivid picture of much of human society. There are producers and there are non-producers. While the producer is working overtime to provide for the needs of his own family and his offspring – the future generation of producers – the demands of the non-producers create such a distraction that the producer is detoured from meeting the needs of his own dependants. That weakens the producers and often negatively impacts the future generation of producers. Just like the host bird who may lose its own offspring thus reducing the future population of productive host birds the population of parasite cowbirds flourishes. In the human realm, the population of producers is slowly decimated while the populations of the parasite cultures flourish and grows.
While the producers practice birth control to the extreme resulting in negative population growth in the producer cultures, the parasite culture populations experience high birth rates and exploding populations, slowly but surely taking over and enjoying the fruits of the labor of the producing classes. Of course the biggest shame is that the producing classes let it happen and even, it seems, encourage it. Thus Liberals love illegal aliens and illiterate, uninformed lower classes which they can make forever dependant. Dependants are easy to control and are even comfortable with greater control over their lives. It affirms the security of provision and social welfare. The unanswered question remains, how does this all work when the remnants of the producer class have dwindled down to nothing?
Dan W. Dooley
In the world of photography, or “picture taking” there are those who photograph for the sake of creating beauty or “art” and those who are the recorders. My mother was a recorder. I believe that there is a recorder in every photographer, but some go beyond simply wanting to make a visual record of events, scenes and people. My mom would have been in hog heaven with today’s cameras. No, she would have little appreciation, understanding and interest in the technical wizardry today’s cameras possess, but for her to be able to shoot, and shoot and shoot and share her pictures would be a dream for her. She would have loved the ease of use and the economy of modern digital cameras. No more purchasing expensive rolls of film and then paying again to have them processed after the shooting. Instant enjoyment of pictures? She would have loved it.
She started out – or at least that is the first camera in my memory – with an old box camera. Whether it was a Brownie or Kodak, I don’t recall. It was the classic old brick shaped box with two sets of view windows allowing for either portrait mode or landscape mode. The film was roll style in typically 620 format. The camera had no controls other than a knob to roll the film to the next frame and a shutter release lever. Yes, it was possible to forget to roll to the next frame before shooting thus ending up with a double exposure.
She recorded one thing and one thing only. People. She had no concept of artistic appeal and certainly had no understanding nor even appreciation of the technicalities of composition, exposure, lighting, or anything of that sort. She thought nothing of the balance of elements within a picture. Neither did she consider anything of artistic appeal. Had we taken a holiday to a locale of majestic mountain scenery, such a majestic view would have served her only as a backdrop to stand us kids up against and make sure that our shirts or blouses were buttoned properly, our hair straight and that we smiled for the camera. In her later viewing of the picture, she would have made no notice of anything in it other than whether or not we had looked right for the camera. As a result of my mom’s prolific picture taking, there is a significant collection of old black and white photos
My dad never took pictures. Other than the few forced upon him by mom as she needed to be in the picture and she put the camera in his hands. He simply had no interest in it. I don’t think any of my sisters picked up the bug beyond that which most people possess to casually record a few events and scenes for the sake of memory.
I received my first camera as a Christmas gift when I was in my mid teens. It too used roll film but more “modern” than my mom’s old box camera. It actually had a built in flash and was more compact than her old camera. Needless to say, it did not take her long to claim it as her primary camera. No of course she did not take it away from me. She simply borrowed it quite often. Later when I left home to join the Army, I left that camera with her and bought a Kodak Instamatic 126 for myself. It was much more compact and better suited for travel and portable use.
Most people can go places and take in the scenery, experience the events and be happy with the accumulated memories. Others, if not able to record the event on film or digital sensor feel lost and partly undressed. I feel not quite all equipped without my camera with me and I know my mom felt the same and thus hers always accompanied her wherever we went and she was ready to stand us kids, or other relatives in a line and tell us “look pretty now.”
Everyone with the most minimal exposure to American history, and especially Texas history will know that much of the Southwest, Texas included was part of Mexico long before it was part of the United States. I am not making that obvious statement of fact to be PC or to make some sort of excuse for the actions and attitudes of any pro-illegal immigrant or so-called “Pro Hispanic” movements. Quite the opposite. I am saying that I believe the culture of the real American of Hispanic descent has been hijacked by something which only resembles to the slightest degree by identification, that culture and which does not have its roots in that culture at all.
The majority of people of Hispanic descent living in what is now states such as Arizona, New Mexico, California and Texas have never lived in Mexico. Their parents never lived in Mexico. Neither did their grandparents. None of their families, going back for generations, have never lived south of the Rio Grande River. They have never been “Mexican” in any sense other than I can say that because of my ancestral heritage I am English, or I am Irish. At one time my forefathers immigrated to this land from England and Ireland. I have never lived in either of those countries and neither have my ancestors for at least several generations.
The Hispanic portion of the population is not new to this country. Living in Texas, I can say the Hispanic portion of the population is not new to Texas. It has always been a part of Texas and makes up much of the flavor of the culture which is Texas. So what is new? The Hispanic culture we seen now is new. How can that be if the Hispanic or Mexican-American culture has always been here? Because what we see now going on in our streets, in our criminal justice system and making demands to the favor of willing political opportunists is not the proud and cultured Latino culture of the American Southwest. It is something new and something quite inferior to that proud heritage.
Certainly there have always been elements of a lower class and lawlessness within that community but so have there been in any ethnic community. Those elements did not reflect the attitudes and actions of the community as a whole. Now, however, they seem to define it. How did that happen? I believe it can be summed up in one term. Illegal Immigration. Now to be linguistically correct, I have to point out that the use of the words “Illegal” and “Immigration” used together violate the definition of the word in all of its meanings, “Immigration”, but that is another topic for another time. The American Hispanic, or Latino, community has been overrun by foreign invaders for that is by truth of definition, a more accurate description of what they are. We know them simply as Illegal Aliens.
I think it is wrong, but easily understood, to lump the entire Hispanic community into the mess of the illegals. We try not to. Conservatives by our nature strive to separate the wheat from the chaff. Unfortunately, it often happens that the innocent elements of a community get caught in the fray.
My wife worked at the store of a major retailer for almost thirty years. By the time she retired from that employer a couple of years ago, after having spent all of that working time on the sales floor, she was able to observe a major social shift within the customer base. It was not an increase in the number of Hispanic shoppers. It was a total change in the type and character of the Hispanic shopper. A totally different type of individual Hispanic shopper from those of previous decades.
What was different about this new type of shopper? Granted, across all ethnic and racial groups, Anglo (white), Black, Hispanic, or whatever, there has been a general and significant decline in what can best be described as civilized behavior. No one race or ethnic population has been exempted from the affects of social decline. In one community it seems to have been markedly exaggerated and that is in the Hispanic community.
This is the same Hispanic community which has been a part of American culture for many generations. What happened? Where did the social skills of the Third World come from? Where did the total disregarding of the most basic of civilized behavior come from? What goes on in the fitting rooms and on the sales floors of retail stores is totally out of character for the Mexican-American culture which has been a part of this community for close to two hundred years. What we see going on out in public is representative of the overwhelming invasion of the rejects of Mexico who are being encouraged by both the government of Mexico and apparently even the ideologues making up the political ruling class within our own government to flood this country and dilute the fabric of the rich cultures which have made this country the great land that it is. The American Hispanic community did not change. It was invaded and has to a great extent overrun by the hordes of illegals who have no understanding nor regard for the culture they fancy themselves a part of. If you are an American of Mexican or other Hispanic descent, my question to you is, why are you letting this happen? It is doing you a great disservice as it is to the country which is your native home.
One thing I have noticed in modern culture is that we simply don’t talk to each other. That does not mean we have stopped talking and the phrase “talk at each other” applies, but we just don’t have back and forth, two way exchanges with each other.
To be fair, the above statement is somewhat broad and doesn’t tell the whole story. Put two people in a room together and chances are there will be some two way talking. Let me define it this way. Dianne makes a comment about a particular subject to Lynda. Lynda hears that comment and thinks about what Dianne said and forms an opinion about what was said. Figuring that Dianne may want to hear what Lynda thinks about the subject, she makes a statement related to what Dianne had said. And, it goes on. We have the semblance of two way talking or communication. Put those same two people apart and give them a method of communication and chances are though they will continue to talk at, they will not likely talk TO each other. They will still consider it communicating.
There are some who are quite expert at not talking on the telephone. I know someone who in past years often rang me. I am not one to care for telephone conversations but if you have something to discuss with me, fine. We’ll have a discussion. This person never had anything to discuss with me. For that matter, she was little interested in hearing anything I might have to say. She simply wanted a one way dialog consisting of what was of interest to her at the moment and that interest revolved solely around the latest drama in her life. If I did get a moment to inject something of note from my end I could easily detect the impatience on her end for me to stop talking so she could tell me more. She never heard or acknowledged a word I said. I was glad when those telephone calls finally tapered off and ceased.
A few years ago I started receiving invites from individuals who might be at the least, acquaintances to join them on Facebook. I declined all such invites knowing that Facebook is a huge time sink and if there is something I don’t need is another outlet to claim its share of my time. Besides, I had a hint of a suspicion about the nature of the “communications” taking place on this, and all other for that matter, social networks. I had already had enough experience with non-communication over email to form a good judgment about what one could expect on Facebook.
Email is another source of communications frustration for me. It is, outside of a face to face presence, the mode of communication I am most comfortable with. It is the closest to the old, and now all but dead, art of Post correspondence. Remember the old hand written letters spanning several pages we composed and mailed off to someone and we waited anxiously for many days, weeks even, for the return letter. We’d hardly get the pages all the way out of the envelope before we’d begin to read it. You don’t remember that? You’ve never exchanged a written letter by Post? Of course not. Your parents did. And their parents. And theirs.
Email can be a little like that. Not quite the time wait, but there is still the anticipation of the wait until the reply arrives in your in basket. Alas, even email correspondence has strayed from a means of two way communication and is now all too often a method of making one way broadcasts.
After resisting while everyone else in the civilized world now has a Facebook page, I elected to give it a go. Not without my original suspicion and not for the reason of joining in the world of one way, one sentence broadcasts, but rather as an attempt to add a new dimension to my Dooley’s Treasure Chest web site marketing effort. So many other business web sites are now on Facebook, why not? Perhaps it will open up some more avenues of exposure to the business.
My original impression of Facebook, and what transpires there in the name of social communication is fully vindicated. Regulars on this network have learned well and made an art of not talking to each other. It seems that the number one activity in terms of popularity and participation is game playing. Members don’t chat with each other. They post updates on their latest steps in the games which look to be reality to them. And then there are the “Likes” posts. If you’re on Facebook, you know what I’m talking about. Don’t bother posting more than a ten word post to someone. No one will bother to read it beyond the tenth word even if a few words down you’ve added the comment “and you’re ugly”. Don’t worry. No one will see that statement.
So, for anyone so interested, Dooley’s Treasure Chest now is in the twenty first century and you can share the web site pages with your friends on Facebook and yes, you can follow my activities on that network as well. If you really want to experience a two way conversation with me, however, a nice long email will do the trick.
Dan W. Dooley Dooley’s Treasure Chest
A huge selection of rare and beautiful Collectible Dolls for sale. Most of these dolls are limited edition. Many of these dolls, you will find no where else. Daddy's Long Legs, Maryse Nicole, Ashton Drake, Madame Alexander, Barbie, Effanbee, Susan Wakeen, Anastasia's Porcelain Dolls by Mazie Pennel and more. See all of our listings at: Dooley's Treasure Chest
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