Amazon recommended a book called The Evolution of God to me because I “have ordered Christian books in the past” or something like that. According to one of the reviews, the author argues that the God of the Bible starts out as a vindictive tribal god and evolves into an almighty God by the time of Moses and into a loving God in the writings of Paul. He suggests that even Jesus did not think of God as a God of love. I have a little hint for the author if this is the case: The red letters in John 3:16 mean the words were spoken by Jesus, and if you’ll see Genesis 1:1 you’ll find that the “tribal god” of Israel created the universe.

One of the biggest twisting of the facts that goes on in the healthcare debate is the insistence by supporters of nationalized healthcare of using “health insurance” and “health care” interchangeably. That’s another topic all together, but I wanted to highlight something Star Parker mentioned in her latest column:

Health insurance, so far, is not mandatory by law, and we’ve got 16 percent of the population – 47 million or so – without it. Auto insurance is mandatory by law, and according to the Insurance Research Council, 14 percent of drivers nationwide still don’t buy it.

So, again, the question is, do we want or need a nanny state? I don’t want the government telling me what I can eat or how much I can weigh, so I don’t want nationalized healthcare. I don’t need the government stepping in to “save” me from the consequences of my own decisions.

Parker also cites a recent study showing that in many cases people are making the choice not to purchase health insurance:

…According to a new study from the Employment Policy Institute, authored by two economists from City University of New York (one, Dr. June O’Neill, spent four years as head of the Congressional Budget Office), 43 percent of the 47 million can afford insurance and choose not to purchase it.

And that doesn’t even take into account the 10 million that are illegals. Should Americans pay for health insurance for illegal immigrants?

Pulling immigrants out of the equation, we’re left with an uninsured population that can’t afford insurance about a third the size of the widely quoted 47 million. It’s a population that is generally poor, young, uneducated and not working.

We’re already set up to deal with these folks. Either through Medicaid or covering their emergency room visits. The operative question is do we want to further institutionalize this reality into a new national health care plan involving trillions in new taxes and programs.

Her solution is more in line with the spirit of our country’s founding than a nationalized healthcare system:

Open the door to millions of poor kids out of broken families, broken public schools and the cycle of poverty through school choice. Give them the opportunity to go to church schools.

Rather than perpetuating poverty through further institutionalization of the welfare state, expose poor kids to the values and education necessary to enable them to make the right choices for their lives.

There is no future for a nation of victims, whether we’re talking about health care or anything else. But there is a great future for a country of responsible, free people.

Today I listened to a debate between J.P. Holding and Ken Humphreys on the existence of Jesus. Humphreys argued that Jesus did not exist, but he did take it for granted that the Apostle Paul was a real historical figure. Holding did a nice job of showing that the same unfounded tactics Humphreys was using to discredit historical evidence for Jesus could be used to discredit the existence of practically any other historical figure, but my question is if Paul existed then did Peter exist? If Peter existed, did the other disciples exist? If the other disciples existed, then who was discipling them if not Jesus? If we agree that Paul existed, then how can we doubt the existence of Peter who was spreading the Gospel at the exact same time and, at least in one instance (Greece), the same place (Galatians 2)? If Peter did not exist, did the people in Galatia think Paul was crazy for suggesting he did? Was Paul speaking of a fictional character? Did Paul write Galatians but this passage was a forgery? Was Galatians itself a forgery? Who made up the existence of the disciples? Paul? Is church tradition completely unreliable (i.e. the martyrdom of the disciples)? To me, the suggestion that Jesus did not exist is beyond absurd.

In case you missed it, I just had to share this little observation from Jay Nordlinger:

Do you remember back when right-wingers used to joke, “If a liberal Democrat is elected president, and commander-in-chief, we’ll be reading terrorists their Miranda rights”? Do you remember that? It was funny, wasn’t it?

Yes, I remember that. I’d have to say I found it more frightening than funny. I also remember people telling us not to worry, that Obama was serious about keeping our nation and our soldiers safe…

The NYT reports that on Monday, Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, wrote a letter to President Obama in which he said, “I cannot overstate the pain that we feel as human beings and as families when we read an argument, presented in federal court, implying that our own marriages have no more constitutional standing than incestuous ones.”

I’m wondering, what is the difference between a sexual relationship between two men who are unrelated and two men who are brothers? Why is one acceptable and the other not? If two brothers wanted to get married where gay marriage was legal, what would be the reason for denying it? If the brothers were then allowed to marry, what would be the reason for not letting a brother and sister get married?

For several years I’ve used a basic mobile phone here in Japan with a very limited data plan just so that I can meet up with people and be able to make emergency calls if the need were ever to arise. Some time ago, however, I realized that having a mobile phone on which I could check my e-mail would make things a whole lot more convenient. Since I work from home, the inability to check e-mail away from my computer was keeping me tied to my desk even when I would otherwise be free to run errands or whatnot.

Anyway, SoftBank, the mobile carrier here in Japan that has an agreement with Apple, was running a campaign a couple of months ago called “iPhone for Everybody” in which they were giving the phones away with a 2-year contract. I decided now was the time, and so I got one. They advertise it as the world’s most advanced mobile platform, but I wonder if anyone at Apple has ever even looked at a Japanese mobile phone.

The very first thing I noticed was the inability to use infrared to send your contact information to another phone by just putting them next to each other. Then, when I started to type e-mails I realized it had no copy and paste function. Next, I took a photograph with the camera and realized there’s no flash or zoom. I also tried to scan the barcodes at shops to get their website info and stuff and, surprise, surprise, the iPhone can’t scan barcodes (not very well, anyway)! Moreover, e-mails sent to my phone do not come immediately, because the “push” e-mail function does not work yet.

In Japan, even the most basic phones come with copy and paste functionality, infrared, camera flashes, barcode scanning, push e-mail, etc. How on earth can Apple reps even describe the phone as “modern” with a straight face? A phone without copy and paste functionality is not advanced. It’s obsolete. Phones in Japan can be used to buy things from vending machines and convenience stores, pay utility bills, watch television, ride trains, find directions, surf the net, etc. In almost every respect, the iPhone is inferior to the majority of mobile phones in Japan.

There are certainly some things that I like about the iPhone: there are apps for tracking jogging routes, the GPS function can help people like me without a sense of direction find stores and, most of all, I can check my work e-mail on it. All of these things are available with Japanese phones, though, so if I had it to do all over again I’d probably go with a different phone.

WND reports that recent research has shown that children raised in homosexual homes are seven times more likely to develop “non-heterosexual preferences” than other children. The discoveries are apparently also being covered up because they do not fit with the politically correct position, i.e. that homosexuality is hereditary not learned behavior.

I think it’s possible that there is a genetic connection, but I also find it very improbable. As homosexuals generally will not have children, it is unlikely that the genes would be passed on, so eventually they should disappear from the population. If it were a recessive trait carried by heterosexuals, it obviously does not provide a reproductive advantage (in fact, it is a disadvantage reproductively speaking), so you would think it would be selected out in that case as well. The research described in the WND report would seem to support the conclusion that homosexuality is indeed a learned behavior.

Japan Today reports:

Japan on Friday welcomed the news it had topped the world longevity ratings, but with its citizens living increasingly longer lives it may soon become hard for the government to find enough young taxpayers to support them.

The statistics for 2007 published on Thursday by the World Health Organization put Japan on top of the longevity list, reporting that the average life expectancy was almost 83 years—86 years for women and 79 years for men—up from 81 years in 2000.

“A steady increase of Japan’s longevity reflects good medical care, nutrition and successful economic development, and that alone is a good thing,” Norie Handa, a Cabinet Office official in charge of aging issues, said Friday. “What we really have to look at is whether we can live long in good health, and peacefully.”

However, in a country where the birth rate has been declining for decades—the population fell by 51,000 last year, the sharpest decline ever—a longer life expectancy means a disproportionately large elderly population.

The number of people over the age of 65 has reached 22.5% of the population and in a dozen years will likely to surge to nearly 30%, according to government estimates.

By contrast, the percentage of children in Japan is expected to fall to below 11% in the next decade or so from the current 13%. The country already has the smallest percentage of children among 31 countries, trailing Germany and Italy, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications report.

According to the last statistics I read, however, 3 out of every 4 babies in Japan are aborted. That means Japan is aborting itself into extinction. The solution to their aging population is quite simple, actually: start encouraging women to carry their babies to term. It’s certainly a politically incorrect thing to suggest (I noticed that a comment suggesting just that has mysteriously disappeared from the above site), but it’s fairly obvious all the same.

Just thought I’d share this interesting “demotivator” sign Jay Nordlinger mentioned in his blog today. It was created by a guy who works (poor soul) at a state environmental agency.

The promises of people promoting socialized medicine sound good at first. It’s too bad they’re based on naïveté. A lot of liberals are promoting the British system as a positive example of government-run healthcare. British parliament member Daniel Hannan, however, warns us not to go down the same road.

HT: Flopping Aces