Reckoning Weiner

Judge not, that ye be not judged. Matthew 7:1

If there is one verse in the Holy Bible universally known by liberals, even if they have never cracked a Bible for themselves or ever set foot in a church, it is this verse.

That there is no more self-righteously judgmental creature in the entire universe than a modern day liberal is without any semblance of doubt an understatement. Yet liberals without the slightest embarrassment, bandy this oft-tortured little verse about as if they were themselves Matthew Henry.

Generally employed as a cudgel by the left to stifle any argument made on moral grounds—it has become a cliché completely unrelated to the point being made by Christ when He uttered it. At no point does the Jesus Christ revealed in the Holy Bible suggest that people are not to judge other people’s negative or immoral behavior—yet that is what it has come to mean in the minds of the ignorant.

It is clear when one takes the time to read Matthew 7:1 in context, Christ is very clearly stating that one ought to be prepared to be judged by the same criteria one uses to judge others. If you yourself are guilty of the sin you are highlighting in someone else, you had better recognize the one finger you point at another has four fellows curled back pointing at you. The much neglected verse 2: “For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.”

This is a warning against self-deception and hypocrisy, not a blanket condemnation of the act of judging! After all, Christ said we are to judge righteously and teaches that we are to reprove and correct each other when we err. One cannot reprove or correct until after it has been determined such measures are necessary—this is impossible to do without first making a judgment.

All that to lay the groundwork establishing the poignancy of this exchange caught on video:

The former teacher in the video makes an incredibly valid point. If you are seeking the office of Mayor, you are the Chief Executive of the municipality you oversee. If you are guilty of behavior grievous enough to cost you your position in Congress and you are later found to be engaging in the same behavior again while you are seeking the Chief Executive office of New York City, how do you then supervise an organization that would fire individuals guilty of your misbehavior in clear conscience?

A teacher working for the City of New York would most certainly be let go if found to be tweeting inappropriate images and messages. It would seem the moral thing to do would be to recuse oneself. 

This does not mean Anthony Weiner should not be forgiven for his actions, or denied the right to make a living. However he should recognize there are consequences for inappropriate behavior—like not being suitable to serve in the authority he seeks.

We all sin and fall short, none of us is perfect, we all need forgiveness for something and sometimes those sins cost us what we desire. Sometimes those failings reveal we are in fact not the right man for certain jobs.

Anthony Weiner seems more interested in earthly power than humbly serving others, this is made abundantly clear by his decision to continue his campaign—I realize I am making a judgment, but Christ taught we can know a tree by the fruit it bears—some fruit good, some bitter. It is by such judgments we know in truth who a person serves.

“(For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.)” Philippians 3:18,19

Digital Publius

© Hassan Nurullah

Keep it Chris

Originally posted at Clash Daily

"I'll just tell you one thing and I'm speaking now for all white people but especially those who have tried to change in the last 50 or 60 years—and a lot of them have really tried to change—I'm sorry for this stuff. That's all I'm saying."

I am sure there will be many commentaries from the right this weekend opening with Chris Matthew’s self-righteous apology on behalf of “all white people” for the incidents of racial profiling black men have had to endure in the United States. As a Christian American black man, I feel the need to respond individually to Mr. Matthews: You can keep it! I am not interested in empty gestures.

“But let every man prove his own work, and then shall he have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another. For every man shall bear his own burden.” Galatians 6:4,5

I am perfectly willing to accept such an apology from Mr. Matthews on behalf of himself if he is directly responsible for wrongfully profiling black folks. But to think he can offer contrition or even remediation for the prejudices of others speaks to the messianic self-image far too many leftists suffer from and a fundamental lack of understanding of what it means to be a responsible person and an American.

This is a result of a collectivist mindset, socialist proclivities that at their very root reject the Biblical concept of personal responsibility, while at the same time intimating that men like Matthews are better than others morally. Matthews is saying; I know you have tried to elevate yourselves bless your hearts, though you may not be there yet, I am!

I should think one would be hard pressed to find a more diabolical example of conceit. The Bible passages from Galatians 6 quoted above are an example of many affirming the idea a man must account for his own actions and only his actions and again a quintessential aspect of American Republicanism culled from the Word of God. The first 3 verses in chapter 6 describe the snare men like Chris Matthews fall into and give verses 4 and 5 their context, v1-3:

“Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.

For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself.”

Here we have the formula for avoiding and not indulging ones’ personal conceit and self-righteousness. We are told to exercise forbearance regarding our fellow travelers, who do the wrong thing, not to look upon ourselves as having more wisdom and therefore fit to dictate to others. Those who do, deceive themselves with empty gestures like Matthew’s blanket apology, folly which will never make him rise in the estimation of truly moral and thinking men and certainly not the God of the Holy Bible, that is if you are to believe what God reveals about His character.

Only Christ was fit to serve as a ransom for the sins of others, not fallen men overburdened with our own sins. Does racial profiling exist? Certainly. Is it a great evil? Well that depends.

There is a reason God admonishes us to: “Abstain from all appearance of evil.”  In other words if you do not want to be mistaken for a wrong doer, don’t imitate wrong doers. If you are not in fact a gangster, why would you want to look like one whether it be in social media or the real world? In fact, it is your duty not to.

I have no problem with the authorities checking me out if a short, fat middle-aged black guy just robbed a bank in my general proximity. It’s simple enough to prove who I am and where I have been. But I do not like the idea of being followed as a matter of policy just because I happen to be black. That being said, it is what it is.

The idea we can’t look for types when a particular type of crime is committed or is suspected of being committed by a consistent type like terrorism or breaking and entering in a certain area is patently absurd. Sadly too many young people in the black community celebrate and unfortunately propagate negative images.

As long as there are people in the world there will be prejudice. But to suggest that people should not or will not be judged by appearances belies the lessons we teach our children to be mindful of the company they keep and the image they project.

“Make no friendship with an angry man; and with a furious man thou shalt not go: Lest thou learn his ways, and get a snare to thy soul.” Proverbs 22:24,25

Profiling has been around a lot longer than the United States of America and to suggest it is peculiar to our place and time speaks directly to liberal hypocrisy and the victimhood mentality they work tirelessly to cultivate amongst the people they exploit.

Digital Publius

© Hassan Nurullah

The Tyranny of Lies

Mark Twain said: "It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled." I don’t think I have ever seen a more striking example of the truth of that old saw than the Zimmerman/Martin case.

It took only the merest manipulation of the 911 call George Zimmerman made to the Stanford police on the tragic day of Trayvon Martin’s demise to make it appear as if race was the motivation. A lie brought this horrible death to the nation’s attention and stoked the flames of racial tension and hatred.

Doctoring the call and creating a false racial narrative was indeed enough to garner a comment from the President on the matter and bring the gruesome weight of politics into an already tragic event. It doesn’t matter the intentional editing of the 911 call which lead to the cries of racism quietly meant jobs were rightfully lost at NBC—It is not the least bit important to the people who were manipulated that they were in fact manipulated—the narrative is all that maters.

It wasn’t until after the die was cast by NBC they learned to their chagrin, not only was George Zimmerman in fact a self identified Hispanic but a registered Democrat to boot, heads were audibly heard exploding at 30 Rock. This would have undone their narrative if it were made widely known—but once the lie is told, as I mentioned earlier, it is nigh impossible to unseat in the minds of those it was meant to enflame. Not when you need so desperately to believe your people are still suffering in the Antebellum South.

People are so intrinsically vested in ideas like victimhood, distrust and racial identity that the truth is completely irrelevant. The fact NBC was forced to fire the folks responsible for the malicious manipulation of the Zimmerman 911 call seems not to matter to those who would sow the bitter seeds of racial cynicism in America. Firing those who lied at NBC through their actions meant what they did was wrong! And the wrong they did was crafting Zimmerman a racist.

Subtly changing the truth to make it appear as if someone said something they did not is one of the enemy of mankind’s greatest weapon of division, first recorded in the Garden of Eden when he subtly changed the very words of God to entice Adam to sin. The action divided man from God, it’s a shame it still works so effectively.

NBC was no less adroit, they turned a man who has mentored young black kids, welcomed them into his home, raised money for their churches, sharing his time and treasure, a man who was described as the first person to welcome black neighbors into the community (Even before other black folks did so, according to testimony).

A man that spent his own time and money to create and distribute pamphlets in Stanford when a black homeless man was savagely beaten by the white son of a police officer on the Stanford police force. His actions on the homeless man’s behalf lead to the exposure of real malfeasance and the forced retirement of the town’s police chief. Yet we are made to believe this same person was a bitter racist who killed Trayvon Martin in cold blood for no reason other than his race.

You don’t need chains, fire hoses, attack dogs and the hangman’s noose to keep people perpetual, self-paralyzing victims. Not when you can employ a more passive aggressive form of tyranny—the left today creates shackles in the minds of black folks by continuously affirming the idea we can never depend on justice.

Due to this conditioning, the only concept of justice that would have satisfied far too many black folks and a good measure of emotionally driven whites in this country, would have been a conviction for the state against George Zimmerman. Doesn’t matter what the evidence suggests, any other outcome ratifies the belief the system is unjust.

Though no one has access to what really happened on that dread occasion when Martin lost his life save Zimmerman and God, you still have black folks saying idiotic things like it’s “open season on young black men in Florida.” They make such statements as if young black guys’ shot by young white guys is normative in gated communities all over the “Sunshine State” and the rest of the nation.

The reality is the Zimmerman case serves as a medium to absolve the black community of what IS normative—the very real open season on young black men at the hands of other young black men. The left keeps you focused on the aberrant, while you ignore the normative, because it is the normative that keeps the left and the media in business.

As long as the left can keep you from recognizing it is not the white man or injustice that is responsible for most of the numberless killings of black folks in America, as long as you see yourself as a victim, you will be a victim. The only true tyrant responsible is you!

At what point do we shake off the yoke of apathy and both spiritual and temporal immaturity that keeps us blaming others for our own shortcomings? When will we wake up to the fact it’s not the George Zimmermans that constitute the greatest threat to black folk? Even if they happened to be card-carrying members of the Aryan Nation, they are not the ones wreaking havoc in our communities and decimating our population that would be us!

“And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:32

The truth can and will make one free—but first you have to know it! In order to know it, the truth must be important enough for you to want to apprehend it. As long as you make judgments and base what you believe according to what your heart wants to believe as engineered by those you allow to manipulate your emotions, you will never be able to “Judge not according to appearance, but judge a righteous judgment”

This is why God says: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Jeremiah 17:9 No one knows this more than mankind’s enemy and so he uses our emotions more than anything else to divide and conquer, just as he did at the beginning in the Garden.

I don’t know whether Martin was murdered, or if he was the aggressor and Zimmerman acted in self-defense—none of us do. I do know the black community I count myself a member of needs to save some tears for the Trayvons that die at the hands of other Trayvons every single day! We need to acknowledge what is the far greater problem and it’s not white on black murder.

Our sons need to learn it’s not a matter of being more vigilant in white areas as not to be profiled and shot for no other reason than being caught black in a white area. Rather be vigilant period, because the odds are far greater they will come to harm at the hands of someone who looks like them!

Rightly or wrongly, it was a lot easier for the jury to believe Trayvon could have been the aggressor and therefore justifiably killed in self-defense from the track record he created himself, he composed the lawless narrative publicized by the defense. He may have truly been a victim of Zimmerman’s vigilante overzealousness—but only those vested in racial identity above reason deny the fact Trayvon had demonstrated dubious character and it worked against his memory.

“Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers,” I Timothy 1:9

“Abstain from all appearance of evil.” I Thessalonians 5:22

Teach those principles to our youth, not that they can never expect justice! If you walk uprightly, even if unjustly harmed, no shame can be spoken of you, the shame can only alight on those who falsely accuse you! If Zimmerman was indeed guilty and got away with murder, God will see to that, make no mistake.

Digital Publius

Is Empathy Needed In Education?

Many people talk about the need for "empathy" when it comes to working in the field of education, particularly when it comes to being able to relate to, and therefor reach the hearts and minds of the students, ESPECIALLY YOUNG BLACKS.  

Definition of EMPATHY

1: the imaginative projection of a subjective state into an object so that the object appears to be infused with it

2: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner; also: the capacity for this 

I stopped and thought about that (there's a tip for you), and then I remembered a scene from the movie "LEAN ON ME", and it occurred to me that, prior to the arrival of Principal Joe Clark, the teachers and administrators in the school were full of "empathy" for the students. Yet, the students didn't learn a doggone thing. 

It reminded me of a quote from THAT DUDE, Dr. Thomas Sowell, when he said, "The problem isn't that Johnny can't read. The problem isn't even that Johnny can't think. The problem is that Johnny doesn't know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling." It seems to me that far too many people in the education industry are much more concerned with the FEELINGS of the students, rather than teaching them HOW TO THINK!!

I thought about it a little more (there's another tip for you), and I remembered a particular quote from Henry Louis Gates, Jr., when he said, "The sad truth is that the civil rights movement cannot be reborn until we identify the causes of black suffering, some of them self-inflicted. Why can't black leaders organize rallies around responsible sexuality, birth within marriage, parents reading to their children and students staying in school and doing homework?"

Individual parents, the Black community as a whole, and society in general seem to not quite understand it when someone like Dr. Thomas Sowell says, "Each new generation born is in effect an invasion of civilization by little barbarians, who must be civilized before it is too late." Shame is we are now at a point where we have barbarians giving birth to and "raising" another generation of barbarians.

I think about how folks like to say "racism" is the #1 thing keeping Black folks back/held down, but then I think about something that was said over 100 years ago by THAT DUDE, Booker T. Washington, who was born a slave, and dealt with REAL RACISM. He said, "The individual who can do something that the world wants done will, in the end, make his way regardless of his race."  Which lead me to think (it's become a habit) about something I heard from Ms. Danica McKellar, when she said, "Math proficiency is the gateway to a number of incredible careers that students may never have considered." I thought about this, because math knows no color. There is nothing subjective about math. Either you get the right answer, or you don't. No one can logically inject racism into math. When you learn how to do math, you learn HOW TO THINK LOGICALLY.

But even in subjective areas like literature, I agree with Ms. Bell Hooks, when she stated, "I'm so disturbed when my women students behave as though they can only read women, or black students behave as though they can only read blacks, or white students behave as though they can only identify with a white writer." Do you have any idea how limiting it is to the mind of a person, to be conditioned to primarily see everything through the lens of race, color or gender?? 

Bottom line, there is more than enough "blame" to go around, but as THAT DUDE, Dr. Walter E. Williams said back in 2003, "The route to greater academic excellence is nearly a no-brainer. There are three vital inputs to education: parents, teachers and students. You tell me: How much money does it take for teachers to assign homework, and for parents and teachers see to it that it gets done? How much money does it take to see to it that kids get a good night's sleep, come to school on time, don't fight in school and respect authority? If these no-brainer things aren't accomplished, there's no amount of money that's going to make much of a difference.

 The education establishment likes to blame poor parenting and rowdy and lawless students for educational mediocrity. Without a doubt, that's part of the problem, but incompetent, uncaring teachers are also a part of the problem."

Well, the more things change, the more they stay the same. It's funny, because back in the 1980's, Joe Clark basically said the exact same things...but since YOU PEOPLE refuse to study and learn from the successes (and failures) of the past, here we are, once again, back where we were. "It's deja vu all over again"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKR_Tli5hbU

By: Christopher Harris. Follow on Twitter at @BlackSheepDawg