Wildflowers in Breeze

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Wildflowers in Breeze, 9X12" watercolor on Arches 140lb cold press cotton.

 

CoExist

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Says It All

Patience

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NewLife74  

 

Patience

I am having a very hard time with my hobby/business direction. I find it very difficult to wade through tutorials and listening to the endless droning on and on of the presenter. Then they constantly pound you for money to buy more of their teachings.

As you might have noticed, I am developing my painting and photography talents. I am at a point in my life that due to age and medical issues, this area is my retirement, if you will.

The pinnacle for me is to paint people. Its not as easy as you might think, especially if the model is, well....beautiful.

Stay tuned as this develops.

Ok enough of my ranting.

Im watching a video right now from BP Earthwatch. Now I do like this guy, he has a wonderfully deep voice and he's graphically descriptive. One area of his expertise is space. He is very well informed on space related areas. He is also very well versed on the Cern collider and Fukishima nuclear disaster.

So here is a shout out to you all for Jesse's channel. Please take a moment and check him out.

BP Earthwatch

Today BP Earthwatch posted a vlog about the newly discovered Bubonic Plague outbreak in Arizona. Yeah friggin Bubonic Plague.

Stay safe folks.

Politics and Violence

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August 13, 2017

Who Really Cares?

As I sit here, it's Sunday morning. I've had a couple cups of coffee, my son and daughter are sleeping, we are now past the time of making church service on time...another typical Sunday day.

The news services this morning are doing their boringly typical anti-Trump hate screed again. The Washington com-Post's lead story is (drum roll please) 

Trump lit the torches of white supremacy in Charlottesville. We must extinguish them.

 

Again, its more of the same. There is a surge in violence right now in this nation. The violence is PURELY POLITICAL in nature.

 

If you would insert the 'same ole same ole' gun violence of Chicago and Baltimore, most people would quietly roll their eyes and say "Who gives a shit?" And really, who does give a shit? 

 

I know I don't. 

 

The thugs in Baltimore and Chicago are killing each other over turf and drugs. That's been going on since the 50's in the slums of New York City, if you are looking purely at ethnic violence. Now if you factor in the Italian/Irish immigrant violence, You know, the Mob/Mafia etc, then this has been going on for a lot longer.

 

So, who cares?

 

Have we all become so accustomed to the killings that it just doesn't mean much any longer? Has the Justice system in this nation become a Lock 'em up-Throw away the key, lets build more prisons type thing? 

 

So, now the violence has turned political in nature.

 

Predictably so.

 

It is understandable that if you have a belief system in where your 'god' is politics. Then you will fight, bleed and die for your 'god.'

 

If your 'god' is nature, then you might hang yourself in a redwood and dare the loggers to cut it down, or maybe pound in spikes so the mill workers can eviscerate themselves when they go to work.

 

Is your 'god' one without any borders or restraints? Then protesting a barrier along the US southern border may be a good thing to get killed for. I mean why would anyone put up a barrier for anything?

 

Unless that barrier is on the border of a forest, then we need barriers so as to keep these pesky humans, not just 'humans', but white Euro-centric humans out of the land. 

 

This is where we as a nation have come. 

 

It's not a pretty picture. 

 

A day or so ago, a protest for/against whatever the soup du jour of the day is/was, happened in Charlottesville Va.

 

I don't know the intimate details, and I don't really care....it's political and smacks of Liberal/Right clashes. Which I find terribly juvenile and boring. So a guy drives his car into a crowd, kills one and injures plenty. And...he didn't yell 'Allah Akbar.' Fancy that.

 

So what's the cure?

 

Is it Gun Control?

Is it Global Warming actions?

Is it more effective Race Awareness?

Is it Get Rid of President Trump?

Is it Russia?

Our national symptoms are, increased violence, lack of respect for each other-our nation-our standards, increased drug usage (indicates a tangible withdrawal from society) 

The Rx is God thru Jesus Christ. This also means that our history as Americans needs to be revisited and studied. our nation was founded on Christian principles. The founding documents state that each man is a creation of God, and that Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness is our core . Our history wasn't pretty nor perfect...and there was violence. 

However, this won't mean much to those who out of hand reject God and what HE offers to each of us.

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 Painted on Kilimanjaro 140lb Cold Press paper 5x7"

Rumors Of Wars

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The rumors of impending war continues to grow louder.

The North Koreans have successfully made nuclear weapons AND the missile delivery systems to use them.

Recent tests have the Pentagon concluding that the NK's can reach Los Angeles, Denver, Chicago, Boston...possibly Washington DC.

Now, when their leader Kim Jong Un spews his rhetoric against the US, it has taken on a new tone.

God says in His Word in Ezekiel 13: 12-14

¹² The word of the Lord came again to me, saying: ¹³ “Son of man, when a land sins against Me by persistent unfaithfulness, I will stretch out My hand against it; I will cut off its supply of bread, send famine on it, and cut off man and beast from it. ¹⁴ Even if these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they would deliver only themselves by their righteousness,” says the Lord God.

So God says that He will judge the land because of their unfaithfulness towards Him. He even gives three of the most righteous men the Bible as an example. God says that they (Noah, Daniel and Job) would survive but their sons and daughters wouldn't. This alludes that the sons and daughters might be unfaithful, but are covered by their fathers faith. God normally protects the family of the righteous believer, but in this case no. Remember Lots wife?

So, could we (the USA) be ready to get a judgment from God Almighty? Have we (the USA) gone away from God? Have our leaders made laws and decisions against God? I think that anyone who is thinking clearly knows that the answer is yes.
What would a judgment from God look like? Well, looking at Israel's past we see the judgments of God as invasions from the Assyrians, the Babylonians and finally the Romans.
The Babylonians took basically everything, gold, silver and mostly people. God saved His faithful through this invasion. Remember Daniel? Ezekiel etc.
There wasn't the technology that we have here in the 21st century.
Imagine a EMP attack, which would disable the electronics of this nation. No ATM's no credit cards no electronic money. Water supplies and sewage would not work, not to mention refrigeration and transportation and garbage disposal. Do you think that most people have food storage? or even the ability to purify their water or grow food?
Now combine that EMP with the Biblical Rapture. Remove millions of believing Christians and the Holy Spirit...and you have the start of the horrors of what the Bible portrays aas the End Times. The resultant worldwide confusion and turmoil would usher in the anti-Christ. People would do ANYTHING for peace and safety. Imagine if North Korea fired off a nuke on South Korea and got one or two off on the US.
Horrible, right?
The attacks on Israel, which is outlined in Ezekiel 38 and the destruction of Damascus described in Isaiah 17 would put Israel on the front  page of the worlds news for the next seven years.
Anyway you shake it, we are on a thin foothold. 
The Russians have a saying, "May you live in exciting times"
It's time to get right with God if you haven't.

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Tomato Hornworm and Wasp Eggs

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Do Not Be Deceived

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February 6, 2017

Do Not Be Deceived

Two stories caught my attention this morning.

Both are the result of deception, intentional? or unintentional?

First is this from the Brits;

Exposed: How world leaders were duped into investing billions over manipulated global warming data 

The Mail on Sunday today reveals astonishing evidence that the organisation that is the world’s leading source of climate data rushed to publish a landmark paper that exaggerated global warming and was timed to influence the historic Paris Agreement on climate change.

A high-level whistleblower has told this newspaper that America’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) breached its own rules on scientific integrity when it published the sensational but flawed report, aimed at making the maximum possible impact on world leaders including Barack Obama and David Cameron at the UN climate conference in Paris in 2015.

The report claimed that the ‘pause’ or ‘slowdown’ in global warming in the period since 1998 – revealed by UN scientists in 2013 – never existed, and that world temperatures had been rising faster than scientists expected. Launched by NOAA with a public relations fanfare, it was splashed across the world’s media, and cited repeatedly by politicians and policy makers.

But the whistleblower, Dr John Bates, a top NOAA scientist with an impeccable reputation, has shown The Mail on Sunday irrefutable evidence that the paper was based on misleading, ‘unverified’ data.

For More click here

You do understand this right?

All the hand wringing, protests, legislation and social pressure caused by manipulated data.

Deception

Lies

Manipulation

Nice way to start the week eh?

Next lets look at the one place where we NEED honesty, the Pentagon.

The U.S. military's stats on deadly airstrikes are wrong. Thousands have gone unreported

The American military has failed to publicly disclose potentially thousands of lethal airstrikes conducted over several years in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan, a Military Times investigation has revealed. The enormous data gap raises serious doubts about transparency in reported progress against the Islamic State, al-Qaida and the Taliban, and calls into question the accuracy of other Defense Department disclosures documenting everything from costs to casualty counts.

In 2016 alone, U.S. combat aircraft conducted at least 456 airstrikes in Afghanistan that were not recorded as part of an open-source database maintained by the U.S. Air Force, information relied on by Congress, American allies, military analysts, academic researchers, the media and independent watchdog groups to assess each war's expense, manpower requirements and human toll. Those airstrikes were carried out by attack helicopters and armed drones operated by the U.S. Army, metrics quietly excluded from otherwise comprehensive monthly summaries, published online for years, detailing American military activity in all three theaters.

Most alarming is the prospect this data has been incomplete since the war on terrorism began in October 2001. If that is the case, it would fundamentally undermine confidence in much of what the Pentagon has disclosed about its prosecution of these wars, prompt critics to call into question whether the military sought to mislead the American public, and cast doubt on the competency with which other vital data collection is being performed and publicized. Those other key metrics include American combat casualties, taxpayer expense and the military’s overall progress in degrading enemy capabilities.

To read more click here

Now, I am a fan of our military, I am also a Viet Nam era vet.

There is NO REASON for the Pentagon to do something like this, NONE.

You shoot at someone, it needs to be on the record. I can understand a few misses...but THOUSANDS?

Again, its deception.

Now, I'd like to share something with you.

Late in Jesus' ministry, as He was with His disciples in Jerusalem. The disciples were astonished at the size and scope of the buildings and specifically the Temple.

It was truly a magnificent sight. No different than a first time tourist in New York City in awe over the sky scrapers or in Washington DC marveling at the marble government buildings.

The disciples said to Jesus, this is recorded in Matthew 25

"24 Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple. ² And Jesus said to them, “Do you not see all these things? Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down.”

So the Lord is saying that all the building that they see will be destroyed, and dismantled. Obviously the disciples were blown away at His statement,

The Signs of the Times and the End of the Age

³ Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”

Naturally the next question is "When?" and "What are the signs of the End Of The Age?"

The End Of The Age...when it all winds down, or ramps up depending on your point of view...and here is Jesus first and crucial statement.
⁴ And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you.

Understand?
Deception, lies, manipulation, aversion, confusion...

The prophet Isaiah said 750 or so years before Jesus. Is 5:21

"Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, And prudent in their own sight!

Deception

If you like this blog, then pass it on

Shalom

Jerry

 

ttptarytimesclick herene place where we NEED honesty, the Pentagon.

A Recap In Crazy Land

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January 29, 2017

A Recap In Crazy Land

Last week we had two protest marches on Washington DC. The first was from the liberal womens side.

In watching the interviews of these women, who are identified by their pink cat eared (cat ears symbolizing a 'pussy') hats, the women cannot really say what they are protesting against.

Usually when you protest, you have something you protest against. In my day it was the Viet Nam war. Then we had women protest by burning their bras. It was a sexual protest against lack of birth control which morphed onto the Rowe v. Wade abortion law.

We've killed over 50 million babies since. But I digress.

The second protest this week was more of a march. It was the Right To Life March

'Life is winning': Pence fired up March for Life crowd

Vice President Mike Pence fired up the crowd at Friday's March for Life in Washington, telling the pro-life throng their movement is succeeding.

"Life is winning in America and today is a celebration in that progress," Pence said at the Washington Monument, before the march stepped off just after noon. "We’ve come to a historic moment in the cause of life and we must approach it with with compassion for every American. Life is winning in America because of you.

"Let this movement be known for love," he added to thunderous applause. "Not anger. For compassion. Not confrontation."

The 43rd annual event was the third major event in the nation’s capital this week, and drew activists from around the country. There was no immediate estimate of the crowd size.

In addition to Pence, speakers included key adviser to President Trump Kellyanne Conway, Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, and others.

Participants told Fox News getting to the event was a must.

“There is no more important issue for me," said Amanda Fowley, 33, who traveled with her husband from Rhode Island and has attended every year since she was 13.


And the liberal Snowflakes say:

Now you'd think that all this anger and bitterness would be divisive to our nation as a whole.

You are right.

There has been so much going on this week that its almost impossible for me to keep up with it, and to live my own life. Its a tsunami of kept campaign promises.

Wow

If you  like this blog, please pass it on

Shalom
Jerry

A Word Of Wisdom For Mexico

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January 28, 2017

A Word Of Wisdom For Mexico

You cant read an article from the press about the issue with Mexico and the Wall where the United States and specifically President Trump comes off as a bully and Neanderthal.

The media portrays the people who voted for Trump and agree with him that we need to protect our southern border, as cowards who are anti-Mexico, anti-trade and anti-human.

Typical media set up.

Make something that is important to law abiding folk out to be irrational and ridiculous.

Lets look at this wall for a minute and specifically what it represents to the US citizens.

First of all the President of Mexico is in trouble in his country.

Unemployment is rampant, rising gas prices have actually caused riots and then there's the ongoing drug war. When you combine that with the Mexican political system of looking out for the wealthy and screwing over the poor you get a brew of shit. Mexico is as messed up as it gets.

Now, stir in some "Mexican Pride", and that's a recipe for trouble. Ec=xpect the media to sling that mud.

From the LA Times:

Mexican president rejects Trump's border wall -- and says he won't pay for it

Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto said he rejects and condemns U.S. President Trump's plan to immediately begin construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. 

In a televised address Wednesday night, Peña Nieto said Mexico "does not believe in walls." His voice rising, Peña Nieto repeated his promise that Mexico "will not pay" for construction of a border barrier. 

Peña Nieto is facing considerable pressure from other Mexican leaders to boycott a planned meeting with Trump in Washington next week. 

On Wednesday, Trump directed the Department of Homeland Security to begin building a wall along stretches of the southern border where a barrier does not already exist. 

In what political analysts and many Mexicans viewed as a stinging insult , the order came the same day that Mexico’s foreign secretary, Luis Videgaray, arrived in Washington for talks with White House officials on trade and other issues ahead of Peña Nieto’s planned visit. 

In his address, Peña Nieto didn't say whether he planned to attend the meeting, saying he would make that decision after consulting with Videgaray and the delegation of officials currently in Washington.
Peña Nieto, who has repeatedly called for dialogue with Trump, left a door open for attending the meeting, saying he feels a "responsibility to defend and take care of the interests of Mexico and Mexicans." 

"It is my duty to address the problems and to face the challenges," he said. 

Dozens of Mexican leaders have called on Peña Nieto to cancel his trip, saying Trump's bold actions on the border wall prove he is not interested in dialogue. 

Ricardo Anaya, president of the opposition National Action Party, or PAN, said the timing of Trump's announcement just before Peña Nieto's visit to the U.S. "is an insult." 

"There are no conditions for a meeting with Trump," he said. 

From that purveyor of conservative thought (sarcasm mine), USA Today says:

4 reasons Mexico hates Trump's border wall

 

PHOENIX — President Trump on Wednesday signed executive actions ordering construction of a border wall with Mexico, and ramping up deportations, fulfilling two of his signature campaign promises.

Within hours, Mexico’s president, Enrique Peña Nieto, abruptly canceled a meeting with Trump scheduled for Tuesday after reiterating there was no way that Mexico will pay for the wall, despite Trump's vow to the contrary.

Trump’s executive orders have sparked protests in the United States and in Mexico. Here are four reasons why Mexicans hate Trump’s border wall.

1. A fence is not the same as a wall

Mexico and the United States share a border that is nearly 2,000 miles long. Until recently, a wall existed along several parts of the border, including Nogales.

The old wall was built from military-surplus metal landing mats and was easy to cut through. It also was easy to climb over. In 2011, construction crews ripped out the old, rusting landing mats and replaced them with bollard-style fencing. The new fencing is higher, and is capped by a 5-foot south-facing metal sheet, making it more difficult to climb over. It also extends 5 feet into the ground, making it harder to burrow under.

Border Patrol agents prefer the new fencing. It allows agents to see what is happening on the other side, making it harder for smugglers to hide. It also reduces the chances of agents being hit by "rock throwers," a common problem.

"You can look through and see that no one is over there, or what's going to come at you in the next few seconds," Border Patrol Agent Eric Cantu told the Nogales International in 2011.

 

President Trump signs an executive order to start the Mexico border wall project at the Department of Homeland Security facility in Washington on Jan. 25, 2017. (Photo: Nicholas Kamm, AFP/Getty Images)

The see-through fencing also was welcomed by Mexicans. It restored the feeling that Mexico and the United States are neighbors, not enemies. That is why there was not the same outcry when the U.S. completed 720 miles of new fencing along the border in 2011, says Marco Lopez. He was mayor of Nogales, Ariz., from 2001 to 2003 and chief of staff of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which includes the Border Patrol, from January 2009 to September 2011 when the fencing was being installed.

"It was not as offensive," he said.

Trump's border-wall plan sends the opposite message. After all, nothing says "stay out" better than a wall.

2. It reminds Mexicans they lost half of their country to the U.S.

Americans often forget that a large part of the United States once belonged to Mexico. But most Mexicans are keenly aware that the United States, eager to expand West, invaded Mexico and the two countries fought a war from 1846 to 1848.

When it was over, Mexico lost half its territory to the United States, including the present-day states of California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and parts of Colorado, Wyoming and New Mexico. The war followed the U.S. annexation of Texas.

"I don't think Mexicans wake up every morning and think about that," said Francisco Lara-Valencia, a Mexico-born professor at Arizona State University's School of Transborder Studies.

Still, he sees evidence that Trump's plan to wall off the entire border is stirring nationalist feelings in Mexico, which led to Peña Nieto's decision Thursday to cancel his meeting next week with Trump.
"Obviously, there is a strong nationalist sentiment among many Mexicans, and (Trump's executive order to begin building a border wall) simply reminds Mexicans of the complicated relations that Mexico has had with the U.S., including the war ... and the many other tensions" since then.

3. It's a slap in the face to Mexicans working in the U.S.

Peek inside the kitchen of almost any restaurant in America, no matter what type of food is being served, and you probably will find Mexicans, along with Central Americans, doing much of the cooking and cleaning.

Every restaurant in America would "shut down" if the U.S. deported them all, chef and television personality Anthony Bourdain has said. The same would happen to the U.S. agriculture industry, Darin Dykstra, owner of a 3,000-cow dairy farm in northwest Iowa, said in a 2015 interview.
"Americans just don't want to do the work," he said. "If you are going to take the labor supply away in agriculture, dairy particularly, it's going to fall apart."

Which is why Mexican workers such as Rosalva Hernandez feel insulted when Trump talks about building a border wall. The Mexican immigrant, who came illegally but is now a legal resident, has milked cows on a dairy farm in northwest Iowa for more than 13 years. She has had teeth kicked out and a finger broken while milking cows.

"When I started working here, a year after, I got pregnant,"  Hernandez said. "I worked my nine entire months in here ... doing everything. In the middle of the night, next day, I had my baby. Twenty days later, I was back at work. Who would do that? No one."

As for Trump and anyone else who thinks Mexicans are bad, "they are not bad," she said, adding, "And I bet they cannot come in here and do one hour milking cows."

4. It implies only Mexico has benefited from trade agreements

While some Americans complain about Mexican immigrants importing their language and culture to the U.S., Mexicans often lament the same about the United States' influence in their country.
In the two decades since the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, American businesses have proliferated in Mexico. There are now at least 402 McDonald's restaurants in Mexico, according to data collected by the Guardian. Need a Starbucks fix? Mexico now has more than 500 stores, according to the company's website. More than 4 million Mexicans shop daily at Walmart, which in December announced plans to invest $1.3 billion to build more stores in Mexico, according to Fox News.

To Mexicans, however, Trump's border wall implies the United States has not benefited from NAFTA, said Lopez, who now runs a consulting firm, Intermestic Partners, that helps American businesses invest in Mexico and vice versa. In reality, 14 million jobs in the United States are tied to trade, commerce and investment with Mexico, including about 110,000 jobs in Arizona, he said.

"That is the biggest frustration" Lopez hears when he travels to Mexico. "When they see the wall," Lopez said, "it implies that there is no benefit or that there is no positive impact from their relationship with their southern neighbor."

Follow Daniel González on Twitter: @azdangonzalez

Ok so if you read this article you'll come to the conclusion that our protection is just in our minds.

You'll see that Mexicans are just doing us a favor by doing the crap jobs that "American gringos" wont do. We've heard this for years.

It has been said that Joesph Goebbels, Adolf Hitlers Propaganda Minister said "that if you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes truth."

Sadly that has a ring of truth in it. Just look at the slogans the liberal Progressives use.

Now I'd like to offer Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto some advice.

First of all, pick your battles carefully. If you decide to do battle with President Trump on this issue you will lose. The people who voted Trump into office have emphatically stated they want border protection. We want to know who is coming into our country and we want the troublemakers kicked out. We want to have better protection against drugs being smuggled into our land. So if you cannot see that, we as a people say, fuck you.

We the people will not buy any goods from Mexico, your produce will rot as its being searched. Your people will cry out as they are being searched, the trucks and rail cars will sit idle as they are scanned for drugs or illegal immigrants.

So who loses here? Your Mexican Pride? Your people? The only winners here are the media, who will be more than happy to throw copious amounts of gas on this fire.

Now, IF you would accept that this is what we want, and say to President Trump "You know, maybe you are right. We DO need a wall, so let US help you build it." I guarantee you that you will find the American people to be behind this effort.

Who would win then? Your Pride? Your people? Your economy?

All of us.

If you like this blog, then by all means share it.

Shalom

Jerry