65 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 3-1-16”

  3. Back home from voting. We were third and fourth in line. At least there will be two early votes for Ben Carson in this liberal area.

    My leg aches now, I guess from waiting out there in the cool air of early morning. The sky is a grayish white so it looks like we could get some rain, again. Our yard is so saturated that I need to tread lightly so I won’t sink in.

    The tulip magnolias are in bloom, so I wonder if ours, the Birthday Tree, will hold out until the 11th to bloom. At least, so far, it has survived the Great Digging that happened near it last year when our neighbor had the plumbing problem.

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  7. I get to vote today. I suppose I ought to get dressed and go. I think I will wait until about 9:30 or 10 when it isn’t as crowded. I just talked to a friend. She was at the polls and said she is going to vote for Rubio. I don’t think I will know until I get there and have to make a decision.
    Interesting that I talked to me ex mother in law last week. She is what is known as a “yeller dawg Democrat”, she also volunteers at the polls each time. She said she is going to vote for Trump.
    What a 3 Ring Circus!

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  8. A little humor for Donna and any of my other co-Criminal Minds fans.
    “50 Shades of Grey is only romantic because he is a billionaire. If he was living in a trailer it would be a Criminal Minds episode”.

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  9. Good Morning…caucuses tonight…I’m not going 😦
    I’ve got to get this house organized….I’ve had so much going on lately I feel as though I cannot think straight…I need to sit and be still, regroup, then forge ahead….It’s March 1st…how’d that happen?!

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  11. I’m starting to think like a conspiracist–or a novelist– there’s something definitely fishy to me about the smear that evangelicals are behind Trump. I suspect it’s really crossover Democrats claiming to be evangelicals. I’ll be in my ivory tower until June, inkwell and pen in hand . . .

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  12. I got an audio lesson on reading and studying the Bible which I found worth a listen. It was in the Navigators monthly newsletter.
    http://www.navigators.org/Tools/Newsletters/Featured%20Newsletters/Disciple-%20Monthly/March%202016/March%202016/Studying%20the%20Word%20of%20God?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DJ151602%20-%20Disciple%20Monthly%2003-16&utm_content=DJ151602%20-%20Disciple%20Monthly%2003-16+CID_1465b11a0e5e87a8783a508f785702d6&utm_source=Campaign%20Monitor&utm_term=Listen%20now

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  13. Just received two more emails from church about people passing away. One was a Santa. They had only been in the church for a couple of years. I think he was at church sometime within the past few weeks and I shook his hand during fellowship time. I feel badly for our pastor having so many funerals to perform right now after his week old granddaughter passed away so recently. 😦

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  15. I am agreeing with you Michelle. I am tired of hearing about the “Evenangelical Vote”. I really wish they would do away with that term. They make it sound that they may as well be calling them the “Nuttier Than A Fruitcake” vote

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  18. I think Trump probably appeals to a good many blue-collar Dems whose party, which has swung so far leftward, isn’t particularly identifiable to them anymore. 😉 I heard the Trump voter described as the “Archie Bunker” types.

    I hear that Colorado isn’t selecting a candidate in their caucuses this year, that they decided to leave the delegate pool “open” and uncommitted (which could give Colo. some clout in the convention).

    As for evangelical voters, these would be people who “self-identify” as that, of course, so they may not be evangelicals in the same way that we would identify that.

    But the block clearly isn’t monolithic anymore, say what you will. It is distressing that so many who call themselves that are voting for Trump.

    We don’t vote until June.

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  21. I put a long post on the news/politics thread explaining why I think you should vote for Ted Cruz. I like Ben Carson, but he hasn’t a chance at this point. Cruz is the better choice between him and Rubio, though either one is far better than Trump. Anyway, go read my post if you haven’t voted yet.

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  22. My sympathies with you all this Super Tuesday. Most of my acquaintance and indeed much of the media up here is mesmerized by this election cycle’s drama. One hopes for a pleasant surprise in the outcome. As for the ‘evangelical’ question, I get the FB feed of Dr. Mohler and Russell Moore and neither of them question the idea that it is the evangelical vote. Both seem to recognize what I have personally witnessed over the years, that a great many birds nest in the branches of the mustard tree and a great many tares grow among the wheat (Matthew 12 references). When the likes of Jerry Falwell Jr., who presides over what is claimed to be the largest Christian university in North America, endorses Trump, it is hard to deny that it is the evangelical vote behind him.

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  24. i’m juggling a slew of phone interviews today, all on a high-profile waterfront development project that will be rolled out at a community meeting Wednesday night (though we’ll get the preview at a news conference a few hours earlier).

    Busy days ahead.

    Meanwhile, I got some new furniture covers that I’m debating over … the backs of the old ones were disintegrating. The new ones are “ok,” I think they’ll hold up longer, but they don’t provide as much coverage as I’d hoped (wish they were more oversized) and the style is very casual looking … Not that I’ll be hosting the Royal Family anytime soon.

    The downside of life with animals in the house. But I really don’t want to have to buy new furniture for many, many years if I can at all help it.

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  25. I hear what you’re saying, Roscuro, but a ground swell of opposition to Falwell rose up from the students and alumni of Liberty University, which made me really wonder what is going on. Call me a skeptic. The Lord knows my heart and how I will vote–or not.

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  26. Donna, you could always have animals in the house that have their own furniture instead of being on yours. One of many reasons I chose not to allow Misten on the furniture is what happens to furniture that has dogs on it. I also didn’t want to contend with the fur, to have to fight for space, or to get a dog used to sleeping on my bed and then have to get kicked off if/when I married.

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  29. Donna, by early, they did mean early this a.m. and not as in the other early voting that occurs before the voting at the poll day? I was surprised that I did not see as many as expected there this morning. I like to vote on the actual day, but we sometimes go the other route.

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  30. Peter, I like Cruz, too, but wanted to remain loyal to Carson because I think he would make an excellent President. He has not really been treated fairly for various reasons, but you’ve never ever heard him pull out the race card. I think Cruz may have had someone on his team that did not work out so well (I don’t know the details of that firing). I just know that some of the emails I got from the Cruz campaign struck me as a bit pushy. I did love getting to hear Cruz’s father speak. He was great!!! My brother supports Cruz.

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  31. Michelle, I understand what you are saying. Perhaps it is because I’m a survivor of one of the prominent evangelical ‘Moral Majority’ movements (IBLP’s peak was in the late 70’s to early 90’s) that I understand behind every evangelical charlatan there are equally unscrupulous followers. Remember what Paul said, that the time would come when people would not endure sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they would gather teachers to suit their own wants (II Timothy 4:3). In other words, the prevalence of false teachers in any given society is indicative of the real desires of that society. In questioning why Trump is so popular among evangelicals, I would point to a whole list of popular Christian leaders and their movements whose moral, ethical and spiritual train wrecks in the past decade have exposed the dark underbelly of evangelicalism:
    1) Mark Driscoll, Mars Hill, and the Young, Restless and Reformed movement
    2) Doug Phillips, the Vision Forum, and the Biblical Patriarchy movement
    3) Jack Schaap, Hammond First Baptist Church, and the Independent Fundamentalist Baptists (to this could be added the recent G.R.A.C.E. investigation of Bob Jones University)
    4) C. J. Mahaney and Sovereign Grace Ministries
    5) Bill Gothard and IBLP
    6) Ron Luce and Teen Mania
    Any one of these men still have evangelical supporters, people who at best admit the wrongdoing but claim misunderstanding, at worst, deny any wrongdoing and claim conspiracy. In C. J. Mahaney’s case, The Gospel Coalition supported him and never has apologized, even though the youth pastor whose crimes were covered up has been convicted of his crimes, and even though Mahaney’s successor, Joshua Harris (yes, that Joshua Harris) came forward about his own abuse and resigned from his leadership position. To these could be added the simmering problems of Doug Wilson (plagiarism and covering sexual abusers); Franklin Graham’s continuing support and promotion of Saaed Abedini who is a convicted domestic abuser (not to mention Graham’s endorsement of Trump’s idea); and Pat Robertson (who has endorsed Trump). No, it is no surprise that the evangelicals are blinded by Trump.

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  32. “Stragegically” speaking, probably makes most sense to vote — if it doesn’t violate the conscience — for either Cruz or Rubio in these upcoming primaries as they have the much stronger chance of becoming an alternative to Trump.

    And just to be clear, dogs aren’t on the furniture — and I barricade it when I leave the house (or else they would be). But the cat? She can go anywhere she wants — because that’s just what cats do. They can leap and get around any barrier.

    My sense is that office holders who come out and support Trump now will be sorry in the end.

    See ya, Chris Christie. 🙄

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  33. And remember, pollsters go on voters who are essentially “self-proclaiming” themselves as evangelicals, I don’t think that is defined any further than what people say they are (whether they’re really believers or not).

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  35. roscuro, I think it was Hume this morning who said this election for him (and others in the media) is like a spectacular train wreck. You just can’t turn away from the the unfolding horror.

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  37. I voted to reinstate the tax millage for the school system that we lost last year because of the stupid way the county did it.
    I followed a friend’s advice and voted to return Richard Shelby to his duck blind.
    I voted against a woman named Twinkle who has run for everything in this state from dog catcher to governor for as long as I can remember. I am tired of seeing her name.
    Deep Breath….I voted for Trump. Alabama suffers enough ridicule without all of us voting for Trump

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  40. Janice:

    http://www.ajc.com/news/news/state-regional-govt-politics/georgia-early-voters-break-record-ahead-of-march-1/nqZ4W/

    Absentee

    A total of 417,491 early ballots — 391,090 in-person and 26,401 by mail-in absentee — were cast in Georgia ahead of Tuesday’s presidential preference primaries.

    This year’s early voter turnout broke the state’s previous record for early voting in advance of the presidential preference primary. It was set in 2008 with a total of 271,418 early votes.

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  44. Somehow this ended up on the prayer thread posted by Anonymous. Which is me this time, I guess, since I remember writing this.

    AJ,

    A very nice photo. I’m curious, though–how did you get both the starlings and the moon in focus? I have a Canon PowerShot (different model from yours, but I believe that is what you have) and I can get a shot that has the details of the moon but doesn’t have stuff in close range in focus, or I can get a shot that has stuff in close range in focus, but the moon is just a ball with no detail. I can’t get both at the same time, and I’ve tried several different ways. Or was the moon that big and bright and you didn’t zoom in at all and thus it’s at “infinite” focus?

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  47. 😦 Electronic filing can be almost as irritating as paper.
    I filed federal electronically, but it was rejected. TurboTax said, “not to worry, we’ll step you through it and you can refile.
    So? I went through the routine again. I really changed nothing. But it seems to have gone.
    I’ll know if a few days.
    I attempted to file the NC return electronically. They charge $19.95 for the privilege. That bugs me because it’s time saving for them. But since I didn’t have a refund on federal taxes, for some reason they wouldn’t deduct the filing fee from my refund. I had to do something else that would cost $34.95. That’s a total of $55 to file electronically in NC..
    I could handle that, but it just irritated me.
    I sent it by USPS for $1.20.

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  49. My state had primaries today too. I didn’t vote. I will get set up to vote in November even though everything is usually decided long before they count the absentee votes. My nightmare is a Trump vs either Hillary or Bernie. I’m really not sure which of the three I’m most afraid to see in office. I’m just praying Cruz and Rubio or Carson will get together and take Trump out of the picture. All I can say is sometimes we get what we deserve.

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  52. Cheryl,

    Truth be told, it took several shots and only two were any good. In the rest either the moon or birds was out of focus. The moon was big and bright, even though it was like 3 in the afternoon. I was using the zoom (the tree’s about 300 ft. away) , but I switched to the auto setting on the camera, put my green box in the center of the tree and moon, and the last two weren’t bad. I just got lucky mostly. 🙂

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  58. Chas, I’m assuming AJ didn’t think to flag that he was the one who added “100,000th comment” to the post.

    So, is there a prize for being the 100,000th?

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