Merry Christmas and a Happy Hobbitdays!

Well, it's that time again. we try to do a Christmas card every years that has a special theme. This year it is J. R. R. Tolkien theme; Happy Hobbitdays! My son, Tyler has done his usually great job at putting our families faces on Lord of the Rings Characters with a fair amount of humour. I especially liked the effort of Jesse and Amanda as hobbits trying to pass themselves off as Gandalf the White Wizard. I am, of course, old Bilbo, admiring his ring and dylan is a bruding Frodo. Ty is either Pippin or Merry and Jeff is either Pippin, Merry or Sam. Karen, Heidi and Ingrid are lovely hobbit ladies at a Bilbo's birthday celebration obviuously having a good time. You can also read our Christmas letter to catch up on the family.

Meniere's is My Nemisis

I have not blogged for some time and the predominant reason is I am suffering from frequent bouts with Meniere's Disease. I am seeing a specialist on Monday next week ans will see what my options are. Since I have not been molested much by the condition for 24 or so years until moving to Utah and taking my current job, I have not seriously considered surgery. But since I have had little relief over the better part of two months, I see surgery as a promising light at the end of a very dark tunnel. Wish me luck and pray for me.

Music, Art, Hope and Change

I have been working pretty hard as of late on my recording and sculpting. I continue to add more songs to my list of tunes for proposed CDs. I think my next blues CD has now stretched into two. Just as was the case with my “Blue Mundy” CD, I have accumulated more good material—in my opinion—than can fit on a single CD. So, I will probably pick a couple of my older blusier tunes from the Randy Mundy Band and Mundy Mundy days to touch up and include on what will likely be two distinct CDs. I would like to have at least one ready for Christmas. And, I still have the latest Mundy Mundy project with Karen and the Karen Mundy solo CD—actually a compilation of all of our songs that feature her as lead vocalist. The members of my band keep telling me I need to slow down the song writing so we can get caught up, but I can’t help it if the spirit of inspiration will not let me alone. A writer worries that the eventual writer’s block will come and he will not be able to force out a quality piece, so I feel I must strike while the iron is at least warm.

On the sculpting side, I am currently trying to get the mold done for my Joseph Smith bust. The latex part is done and I started the fiberglass outer shell last night. If I get in a little bit of work on it every day or two, I could possibly have the mold ready to cast something in roughly a week. Then I’ll post pictures of the pieces I have finished so far.

I might say here that I am beginning to have “hope” and feel that a pleasant “change” is on the political horizon. Polling seems to indicate a Republican landslide for the off-years election coming in three weeks or so. I pray that it will be the case. Thomas Jefferson once opined that—I am paraphrasing here—we, as Americans would surely make mistakes, but that we would surely recognize it when it happens and take corrective actions. I am beginning to believe that the American electorate has realized that they made a huge mistake two years ago in putting Obama and the Democrats in control of the White House and both houses of Congress. I just “hope” it is not too late.

Can You Go Back? Yes and No.

I took some vacation time this past week. I was able to do some work on my music and sculpting and then Karen, Dylan and I flew to Kansas to participate in the Mundy reunion. We had a reasonably good time. I was able to spend time with the usuals and also with the unusuals—perhaps it would be better to say the family members I do not usually or normally get to spend time with. I was able to see my brothers, Tom and Dan, and their kids and a lot of their grandkids. And I was able to see my younger sister, Janna and three of her kids—her married kids and grandkids were unable to make it this time around. My oldest sister’s—Anna, who passed away about 29 years ago—kids were represented by her two oldest kids. My next oldest sister to reach adulthood, Sharon, and her family were unable to attend. I got to play some golf with my oldest son, Jesse and his fiancée, Amanda, and my daughter, Ingrid’s husband, Jeff. We swam and barbecued, hung out, talked about old times, and went to church. I came home physically tired but spiritually refreshed.

Family is very important to an individual’s growth and development and continues to be a source of strength as you continue through life. By the same token, the individual is important to the well-being of the family. It is good to touch your base once in a while to reflect on the connections we have and appreciate who we are and who the most important people in our lives really are. Families should be for ever.

On the other hand, I also dropped in on my 40-year high school reunion which happened to be going on one of the nights I was there in Topeka and I was a bit surprised that I only recognized three guys, who happened to be brothers—twins and a younger brother, by one year—and whom I had seen a few years earlier while I was living in Kansas again for a stretch. It was nice to see them of course—we had been good friends—but, it was not a big thrill for me to be there. Just about everyone there, besides Karen, Dylan and myself, were swigging on their alcoholic beverages and chatting amicably and watching the newcomers who entered to see if it might be someone they could recognize. I faked recognizing one gal after my friend, Dave Boyles, told me who she was. It was kind of mean to put her on the spot, because she clearly had no idea who I was, but I am not above that kind of stuff if I can get a little self-satisfied chuckle out of it. I owned up to the deception though, and when I told her who I was, I was not convinced that she remembered me. Most of my very best friends, with the exception of Danny Wood (my best friend), are people I have known outside of my high school setting. They are people with whom I have shared mutual interests in music, art, literature, politics and faith. I guess I have moved on and there were no serious ties that bind in regards to school to make me very nostalgic.

Ignorance Is Blistering! (edited version)*

* (note: my earlier version of this blog posted a few days ago had some inadvertent spellcheck errors-it had Obama spelled "Osmam". Apparently a computer has a hard time telling the too apart since they both apparently are doing their best to destroy the America we know and love.)Well, it has been awhile since I blogged. What can I say? I’ve been occupied. I’ve been working and paying taxes, trying to develop my music and sculpting projects, and scratching my head—most of my hair on top continues falling out because of it, I think—about why the country is in the dire straights it finds itself in. But, it’s probably time to spout off a bit, to preserve what bit of sanity I have left. Ignorance may be bliss, but it is also dangerous and the reason, I believe, for I current state of affairs.

I read quite a bit. I read books about politics, religion, biographies, etc. and I try to squeeze in a fun read when ever I can from my favorite novelists (Jim Butcher, Terry Ratchet, and Vince Flynn, amongst others). At the moment, I am reading Michelle Malkian’s expose on the Obama’s: Culture of Corruption. It is a great book, by the way, but it has me hopping mad because it reminded me that most of the public is unaware of the stuff in this book. If they had been, the Obamas would not likely be living in the White House at the moment. Of course that would mean that McCain would be living there now and would not be a completely happy thought for me either, but that is another issue for another time, perhaps. Of course I already knew that Bark and Michelle Obama were corrupt. During the elections of 2008, I had done my homework. I read a lot about them and their connections with shady characters and radical leftist, and I wondered at the fact that the “mainstream news media” was ignoring such newsworthy stuff. If you check my earlier bogs at the time, you’ll see that I was all over Obama’s case for his friendships with a multitude of outrageous and unsavory people, so the information was clearly out there for interested people to see. However, the news media largely ignored the treasure troves of negative information on the Obama’s.

Of course I knew, or at least I thought, that it could be chalked up to simple media bias—an unconscious prejudice against conservatives by the “elite” majority of news media types. However, the recent uncovering of the “Journalist” memos shows that there was conspiracy at foot. Some of the evil—and I do mean EVIL—journalists and journalism professors were not only willing to turn blind eyes to news stories that might be damaging to Obama’o election chances, but they were also encouraging the use of slander—calling critics racists—to stifle questions from more conservative media. This clearly shows that deception is part and parcel to what the radical left—this would include a fair amount of the mainstream news media at this point—is willing to do to achieve their agenda.

Now, I have some several liberal friends. And, I believe them to be good honest people who desire the best for their fellows, and, who would not knowingly be a part of destructiveness. But, in all honesty, they tend to be prejudice in their liberality. For example, they will refuse to believe that conservatives are caring and non-prejudice. An extremely liberal friend of mine asked me before the election, in a slightly superior tone, if I were ready to have a black man as president. Of course, the implication was that, as a conservative (and obviously a bit racist), I would be uncomfortable with a “black man” as my president. My response was that I would be more than happy if I had the choice of a “black man” like Thomas Sowell—one of the most brilliant minds in America today—but that my aversion to Obama was because of his obvious radical leftist background and his abundant connections with unsavory characters.
Liberals also tend to be extremely ignorant when it comes to history, economic theory and who their political leaders really are. This is clearly not all their fault due to the agendas of left-leaning college professors and the negligence and conspiratorial efforts of the mainstream media. But, it dose not free them from the obvious responsibility they have as voters to become informed. I think enough red flags have been waved by non-mainstream media to get their attention. The negligence of the Obama administration’s justice department to be evenhanded with the New Black Panther voter intimidation case and the SEIU beating of a black Tea Party member case screams for attention by morally superior liberals. And what about the ACORN travesty? This leftist organization which gets 40% of its income from the federal government and is tied at the hip to the Obamas is constantly involved in voter fraud cases and was recently shown to have endorsed the scamming of the government to help fund teenage prostitution rings. Then there is the recent uncovering of memos in respect to doing end runs around congress—a favorite pastime of the Obama administration—to give amnesty to illegal immigrants. No matter how you feel about the amnesty issue, you should be able to see that such machinations would be wrong.

It is time for my liberal friends to educate themselves, to read a few books by conservatives, like Michelle Malkin, who are doing their homework and listen to some conservative radio talk, like Glenn Beck, who has doing amazing research. They need not be afraid of Fox News. You can study other sources of information as well. Study and Compare. As they say, “the truth will make you free”. If enough people know the truth, and act upon it, it might keep us free as a nation.

The Fool on the Hill

Paul McCartney has disappointed me. “Sir” Paul was at the white House this past week to entertain and receive the Gershwin award from President Obama. Paul tastefully sang his Beatles hit, Michelle, to the first lady, but then un-tastefully took the opportunity to throw a cheap shot at President George W. Bush, suggesting that the ex-president did not know what a library was. What possible reason could Paul McCartney have had to say such a stupid, inappropriate and awkward thing about Mr. Bush? As far as I know, Bush has never insulted Paul McCartney. Frankly, I’m pretty tired of the “Bush is a Dummy” nonsense from critics on the left. Do we know how many books Paul McCartney has read? Did he get an MBA from Harvard? Has he ever been entrusted to fly a fighter jet by the US government? Fighter pilots are not normally nitwits, but it seems to me that most of the people in the entertainment industry are. Don’t get me wrong. I think that Bush was less than brilliant in respect to spending and schemes to get a long with liberal democrats on a number of issues, but there is nothing he has done or said that has demonstrated less intelligence than Al Gore, John Kerry or Barack Obama.

I suspect that Paul McCartney was only trying to ingratiate himself to Obama and other the other entertainers at the awards affair, but his clumsy attempt to be cute—he obviously had been thinking long and hard, maybe days and weeks, on how he might work the library comment in there—did not cut Bush as much as it hurt his own image. You expect such ignorant behavior from the likes of Kanye West and Bill Mahr, but not so much—at lest I would not have—from Paul McCartney. Obviously, I attributed more class to him then he deserved. I guess my musical hero, Paul McCartney, is just one more self-important entertainment knucklehead.

Seriously though, why do these people think they know anything or have special insight into politics? And why do they always have to deride the intelligence of those they disagree with? Granted, I just referred to nitwits and knuckleheads, but let me clearly state that it is their ungracious and hateful language that supports my opinions. As far as I know, most of these folks are high school graduates at best. I have suspected for a long time that people in the art and entertainment industries are afflicted with several self-image problems which compel them to act as they do. I think that many are driven to their field of employment because they want people to love them and they want to feel accepted. Occasionally, you see people turn away from the spotlight because they determine that there are other things more important than self-aggrandizement and being in the public eye, but more often it seems that entertainment folks feel a need to be accepted by their peers and keep crawling to the top. Since the movers and shakers in the industry are mainly radically left in their politics, it stands to reason that the up-and-comers are going to want to join in the fun with the “me too” mentality. Even if they are not all that secure in their own political beliefs, they will go along to get along—this is clearly the same case with the news media and the education systems. They might actually believe the tripe, but it is clearly to their benefit, career wise, to believe it. Along with that, you have a group of people who have seemingly fallen into financial success with obvious feelings of inadequacy, who deep down do not believe they deserve it. The natural response to such feelings, as I see it, is to try to be especially liberal in your social and political beliefs. They often live immoral lives, from a traditional perspective, but they crave morality on some acceptable level. They think, I must be a good and deserving person because I am concerned about “AIDS”, or ”The Planet” or “The Oceans” or “I’m a Liberal!” Logic never enters into it, so ad hominem attacks from the left, like McCartney’s, are the norm.

So, I am disappointed in Paul McCartney. I have always liked his music. The Beatles were my heroes when I was a youngster. Clearly, John Lennon was the better lyricist of the two songwriting partners and probably the greater intellect in my opinion, but I always thought that McCartney was probably a good and decent person as well as a talented musician. I still feel the same way about his musical talents, but I guess I have to rethink the “good and decent” part. He behaved like an ass and I calls them as I sees them. In fact Paul acted the Fool on the (Capital) Hill.

Beck's Founding Fathers Fridays

Lately, Glenn Beck has been doing specials on his television show each Friday concerning America's "Founding Fathers" and the history about them that is not taught to our children any more. I was actually riding on that bandwagon quite awhile ago. I planned to do a book of short historical vignettes about Leadership and the true leaders, in my opinion, who showed it. It was a couple years ago that I started posting them on this site to let people check them out. One of the early ones was about George Whitefield. He seemed to me to be an historic figure of great import in America, but of little renown in today's history books, and deserving of a place in my little book and blogs. A couple weeks ago, to my great pleasure, Beck focused one of his Friday specials on George Whitefield. It was sad to see how many people in the studio audience had never heard anything about him, but it was satisfying to see that Glenn and his guest historians felt much the same as I do about Whitefield and his contribution to the founding of our nation. So, since he was a topic on one of my favorite programs I decided to post my Blog on George Whitefield a second time.

TUESDAY, MARCH 18, 2008
GEORGE WHITEFIELD
There are some today that reject the notion that religion is, or should be, an important element of the American experience. They may even deny the importance of religion in the founding of our nation. Of course the fact is that religion was paramount, not only as a motivator to colonize America, as in seeking religious freedom, but as an empowering agent, convincing our ancestor's that they were compelled to create this nation by Divine inspiration. Thus I offer my third installment of Profiles of leadership in America:


George Whitefield
December 16, 1714 - September 30, 1770



The American Revolutionary War was fueled by various differences of opinion between England and its American Colonies. For example, taxation without representation is accepted as a major contributor to the harsh feelings held by England’s American colonists. However, religion may be as big a contributor to the war as any thing else, and traveling preacher George Whitefield may have unwittingly helped to prepare the way.

Since the time of Henry VIII when the Church of England had broken from the Roman Catholic Church, many other variations of Protestant Christianity splintered away from it (The Church of England). From the Anglican Church came the Puritans (Congregationalists and Separatists), Presbyterians, Baptists, Quakers, and Methodists. Each group dissented from an earlier dissenting group until there remained less and less common philosophical ground amongst the various Protestant Faiths and even less good will from one group to another. By the early 18th Century, North America had become a place where religious misfits such as Roger Williams and William Penn and their various followers could worship as they wished without persecution. America was becoming a hotbed of religious dissent.

George Whitefield, born December 16, 1714, in Gloucester, England, became a preacher in the Church of England and leader in the Methodist movement. Though he was not particularly physically attractive—he was severely cross-eyed, judging by portraits of him—Whitefield was a gifted and passionate orator with a penchant for theatrics, often reenacting scenes from the bible during his sermons. Because of a poor economic background, his education at Oxford was tuition free in return for working as a servant for other students. After his ordination he preached throughout England, establishing several churches in his name. Whitefield was a follower of the Wesleys’ Methodist teachings but later condemned John Wesley’s doctrine of “free grace” becoming the acknowledged leader of “Calvinist Methodism.”

In 1732 George Whitefield came to Georgia acting as the catalyst of the “Great Awakening” in the American Colonies. In the age when traveling across the Atlantic was anything but easy and comfortable, Whitefield was indefatigable, crossing over the Atlantic seven times. He traveled up and down the colonies preaching his evangelical message, often in the out of doors, to thousands and thousands of rural Americans—an obvious precursor to modern stadium preachers and evangelists—who thirsted for the religious guidance that the Anglican Church was unable, if not unwilling, to provide. Whitefield’s message and his style of delivering it impressed many thoughtful Americans, including young Benjamin Franklin who, though he disagreed with Whitefield on some religious tenets, became a close friend, helping him with publishing. His colorful and powerful oratory and his willingness to preach repentance to the leaders of the Anglican Church made him both the most popular (to the dissenting masses) and most unpopular (to the Anglican leaders) religious teacher of his time. Whitefield also organized numerous schools and established the Bethesda orphanage, but he is equally noted for contributing to inter colonial unity. His attacks against the State’s official church and his travel throughout the colonies helped create an alliance of dissenters from New England to Georgia.

A few decades later the majority of Americans would not only largely reject the religious dictates of the Church of England, but would also reject the economic and political dictates of the government of England as well. And with George Whitefield as a possible example of righteous indignation, patriots like John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin would, with evangelical zeal, call for independence. Just as George Whitefield was able to do with the religious-minded, Franklin and his friends were able to unite the diverse and seemingly at-odds American colonies to a common purpose. Though they may not have intended to start a revolution, George Whitefield and religious leaders like him may have started the colonies in that fateful direction.