1. Some thing that Joe Biden will play good cop while Obama’s new chief of staff will play bad cop.
2. One person writes on why Obama should include McCain in his cabinet. I think this is the BEST idea I have head in a while and hope that others will encourage Obama to do the same.
3. Will females be represented on Obama’s Cabinet? This is question we all should be watching closely for in the announcements next week.
4. With the holidays coming up, Jonathon brings up the catch-22 involved with retailers this Christmas. On the one hand, we don’t want to be consumed by consumeristic tendencies, but on the other hand not buying will hurt our economy overall. See the New York Time Article on the economy for more.
5. Over at FP Passport, I am happy that Obama is considering a regional approach to Afghanistan, but am still angry that he is considering a bailout for automakers (Jordon Cooper seems to share my anger…while you’re there also look at what Starbucks would look like if it were a church). I would encourage everyone again to read about the famine in Afghanistan and get president-elect Obama to help fix the conditions which lead people towads terrorism in Afghanistan.
6. Lord, we pray for Wilmington and the 7,000 who have lost their jobs in this unfortunate layoffs at DHL. Please help Clinton County recover this and get them back on their feet.
7. The New York Time also deals with the catch-22 of foreign policy having to do with Pakistan and the Taliban. Now that Pakistan is actually taking action, the times reports that it is much more difficult for Pakistan than they originally thought it would be. They have to destroy elaborate tunnel system to get to the Taliban. This would not be so difficult if they could resort to what the times calls “the scorched early policy,” but this type of fighting alienates the neutral Pakistanis and throws them further into the hands of the Taliban. If we support Pakistan by giving them more resources, they will use it for more money in a war that, even with full sustained military action as in the region they are in now, is much more difficult to “win” because of the elusive nature of the enemy. The soluation? Humanitarian aid and decisions made by non-western leaders from Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Taliban. This is the only way to get the aid in to the people who need it most.
9. The president of Iran sent a letter to congratulate Mr. Obama upsetting conservatives and receiving praise from moderate politicians. It will be interesting to see how things turn out for Ahmahenjad in the upcoming election in Iran. Lord, we ask for your divine presence to be in Iran. We ask for your spirit to speak to these people. We ask for your power to present in all of these situations.
10. Father Stephen quotes Kallistos Ware’s Cosmic Christ and it is worth reading to get an Eastern Orthodox perspective on creation.
11. More talk about Shane Claiborne at Evangelical Political Analysis.
12. Alan Creech gives a timely post on St. Martin in the midst of veterans day.
1. This article from the New York times is especially helpful if you want to have a beginners look into the complexities of the Middle East and espeically Saudi Arabia. The article talks about how Muslim extremists are being rehabilited in a new program in Saudi Arabia. I have always been fascinated by the idea behind jihad, and the article brings a unique perspective from Muslims.
2. I am growing increasingly frustrated, as I wrote here, with the call to bail out the auto industry. Obama’s new chief of staff, Rahm Imanuel, is trying to play a bail-out of the auto industry as a chance to help upstart and “retool” to create more energy efficient cars. What do you guys think of this? I don’t think it will make a big difference. I think that if the auto industries had looked at the rising gas prices and tried something innovative and cost effective, there would have already been more results in this industry. Am I wrong?
3. Marty notes that American companies ignored our inreasingly changing world and kept producing SUV’s, while Japanese company took stock of the world and created more reliable cars.
4. MGM is teaming up with Youtube to put full length movies and TV shows online. While the initial stages don’t sound that exciting, this is a big development for the internet world.
5. This video about “what it means to be Christian” is well made and worth looking at:
6. Over at seeking alpha, there are demands being made if an auto bail-out is to occur. What do you think of their demands?
With the era of good feelings coming with the election of Barack Obama, there are some good things like the beginnings of electricy coming to the Helmand Province.
While, such good things are happening, thanks to google blog search I was also able to find out through Michael’s blog that there is an humanitarian crisis going on in Afghanistan as a result of a coming winter famine. Approximately a third of the country will be without food and water.
The LA Times has shown that there is an increasing call to abort central government and begin working with tribal warlords:
Confronting the prospect of failure after seven years in Afghanistan, the U.S. military is crafting a new strategy that is likely to expand the power and reach of that country’s tribal militias while relying less on the increasingly troubled central government.
The solution seems relatively simple: give them food. What’s the problem? Well, taliban leaders and other people within Afghtanistan keep killing humanitarians aid workers. Michael explains further on his blog that:
Part of the reason for the increase [in humanitarian aid worker deaths] has to do with the fragmented nature of many conflicts since the end of the Cold War. In places such as Afghanistan, Darfur and Somalia, there are a bewildering array of warlords and armed groups, and community acceptance isn’t much of a security guarantee if bandits control the surrounding roads…Furthermore, many Western aid agencies have agendas, such as support for women’s rights, which put them directly at odds with religiously motivated insurgents like the Taliban – who, for instance, go to great lengths to attack girls’ schools.
What’s more? These aid workers are considered part of the occupying western forces. It is very difficult to combat these types of things in our world. There is very little you can do except try to make deals with the warlords that kills the least amount of people, but what should the Christian response to this conflict be? Over at the council on foreign relations they say:
“[David Patraeus calls for] possible government reconciliation with the Taliban; and cooperation with neighboring countries, including Pakistan and Iran. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, speaking on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Budapest in October 2008, said he favored some form of reconciliation in Afghanistan, though he acknowledged not knowing “how it would evolve.” A week later, during a speech at the U.S. Institute for Peace in Washington, Gates was unequivocal in his support of bringing tribal elements into the fold. “At the end of the day the only solution in Afghanistan is to work with the tribes and provincial leaders in terms of trying to create a backlash … against the Taliban,” the defense secretary said.”
It appears that our duty as Christians is at is has always been: to serve Christ in all things. If we go as workers to Afghanistan we will give our two cloaks until we have only one, we will take any form of persecution and return it with love, and we will LISTEN. I cannot overemphasize that we will listen instead of talking so much.
There is more talk of Amazon Kindle on the web (thanks to Jim West for pointing me to it). I think it is important for people to be up to date on issues of the e-paper revolution (see the BBC’s comments here). Microsoft is no longer in this race to try and compete with google books. Let me make a few predictions based on this latest information:
1) The richest person will be the one who combines the iPhone with the kindle and can do it at low cost.
2) Google and apple will team up to create an online library that can be accessed through their cellular device. There will be previews of books and the ability to buy books online.
3) There will be more decentralized books being written and desiminated via cellular devices than ever before. Writing will become more free-form in nature. Novels will be writen for niche audiences and complex artistic books will be much cheaper to make and print for visual enjoyment (i.e. comics)
4) Just as news has become individualized, books will also become individualized and the amount of books will increase because of the relative decrease in start-up costs.
2) Jesus manifesto is dealing with issues of dispensantionalism and eschatology. Sam argues on there that the dispensationalist view of the second coming holds a paradox: the first time Jesus comes to save the prostitute and the second time he comes to kill them. He struggles with how to make the two different missions of Jesus come together. He brings up the point that our end-times eschatology influences of practice of church (for the intellecutal: ecclesiology). Often a dispensationalist theology, he argues, makes us unconcerned with the present world. Do you agree?
3) Visit here for up to date news on decisions for Obama’s cabinet. I personally would like to see Colin Powell in his cabinet. What do others think about this? Some think John Kerry will be the next secretary of state? Really? What do you think?
4) The New York Times writes on the difficulties Obama will face after his inaguration. What is the main issue that you want to see Obama address in his first one hundred days?
5) FFF argues that education is a socialist regime. I argued in my letter that Obama should provide more reforms and more resources for schools, but do you think the federal government should just take a step back instead and let states deal with these issues?
