I’ve been informed my news updates are too loooooong, so let’s try a shorter version today.
THE DEBATE
TARIFFS
ABORTION
WAR IN UKRAINE
CHRISTIAN LEADERS SIGN POLITICAL STATEMENT
SOUTH AFRICA’S HEALTH TRAIN
THE IG-NOBEL PRIZE
ARE MEGACHURCHES GOOD?
THE DEBATE
As I posted earlier, there’s not much to say here. I don’t think there was much new information, and the candidates are basically what we thought – he’s rambling, focused on personal grievances, and has no clear plan. She’s new, slightly left of center, and sounds like a career politician. All the commentators I’ve seen, both conservative and liberal, have said she won the debate.
Did it change anyone’s mind? Probably not, but polls do say that Harris rose and Trump fell a little, and she raised something like 47 million dollars right after. So, maybe it was good for her. And Trump says he won’t debate her again, so take that for what it is.
One comment I would make is that many of the conservative commentators said two things:
1 – Harris must have gotten the questions early because she had answers ready. My friends, this is what’s called “being prepared.” I get that Trump supporters haven’t seen that for a while, but this is what accomplished people tend to do. Her team prepped, probably guessed 90% of what the questions would be (i mean, we ALL knew inflation was going to be on there), and they got answers ready. That’s what experienced politicians do. They work. They study. They prepare. And they have answers ready. To me, that’s not a sign of cheating, it’s a sign of a good team.
2- The moderators ganged up on Trump. A couple things on this one. I get that people who support Trump don’t like that he gets fact-checked all the time. My friends, that’s what happens when you constantly say non-factual things. Maybe if he doesn’t want so many fact checks, he could get the facts first.
Secondly, i do think it’s true that Harris stretched some things. To me, there’s a difference between stretching things “politically,” and all politicians do, and the outright fabrications or conspiracy theories Trump throws around. It’s not just one or the other – there’s a spectrum here.
I also do think the moderators lean towards Harris. Again, everyone has a bias, that’s why we often have multiple debates with different moderators. Trump can rectify this one if he chooses, but as I said, he appears unwilling to face her again.
Finally, I just want to point out what I think is a very troubling aspect of Trump (and his supporters). It’s NEVER his fault. He NEVER does poorly. It’s either he “destroyed them,” (as in Biden’s case), or he was robbed, or the other side cheated. It’s possible to prefer a candidate and still admit they have faults. It’s still ok to say “yeah, that wasn’t my best debate.” But Trump can’t do that. He seems unwilling to admit any failing or error on his part. EVER.
And i think that is a very troubling sign for any leader.
FACT CHECKS
TARIFFS
https://www.reuters.com/business/us-locks-steep-china-tariff-hikes-many-start-sept-27-2024-09-13
Who would’ve thought tariffs would be the big news of an election. I thought those days were long past, but here we are. So, couple of thoughts.
1 – Yes, Biden’s administration uses tariffs. People seem to think (probably because Trump says this) that Trump is the only one “smart enough” to use tariffs. That’s just not true, no matter how many times he says it. What other people DO know is how a tariff works, and Biden’s team has announced a 100% tariff on Chinese electric vehicles, and pretty stiff ones on other sectors. The article above has more details.
2 – Quick tariff explainer – the people who pay the tariffs are NOT the chinese (or any foreign country). It’s the people who import them into the US – usually American importer/exporter businesses. (yes, importers are the ones who do the importing. Hope you’re keeping up.) Typically, they then raise the prices of the imported goods, passing the cost on to consumers.
So, for example, if a Chinese electric car costs $10,000, and a US EV costs $15,000, now we have a 100% tariff on the Chinese car. That car now costs $20,000 dollars. The goal is that consumers in the US will buy the $15,000 US car instead. But note what happened – the US consumer just spent $5000 more than they would have.
This is how a tariff works – you raise the price of the foreign goods, so that consumers buy the cheaper US one, but overall the consumer pays more.
So, I’m actually fine with tariffs if people know how they work, know who they benefit (US companies), and know who they hurt (US consumers). Sometimes, the government decides that they are needed to help US businesses, and that’s fine. We can debate that, or which businesses need help, and so forth.
What is NOT true is that somehow China is paying the tariffs. That is just not how tariffs work. Either we pay higher costs, or US importers pay higher fees, and US businesses benefit. That’s it. For some reason, Trump does not understand this concept, and keep repeating that he got billions from the Chinese for tariffs. I’m not sure if he’s just ignorant, or if he’s hoping his supporters are.
Either way, short sumup is the US ALWAYS uses tariffs, no matter who is president, and the US consumer most often pays them.
ABORTION LEGAL IN NORTH DAKOTA
https://www.reuters.com/legal/north-dakota-judge-overturns-state-abortion-ban-2024-09-12
Here in my home state, abortion was banned in April 2023, but that law has now been overturned. The ruling states that the state constitution guarantees a woman’s right over her own body, and an unviable unborn human can’t over-ride that.
North Dakota is one of 20 states that have passed laws restricting abortion, and 9 of those have measures on the ballots this november to add abortion rights to their state constitutions. (including one in Florida that Trump first supported, and then doesn’t support, and then is unclear on) In other words, Republican legislatures are trying to pass abortion laws, but the people in the state are (possibly) not behind it, so we’ll see what happens in those states.
Again, i’ll just say I think this is the wrong battle. In North Dakota, the only abortion clinic in the state was in Fargo, and it just move like 2 miles east into Minnesota. So, North Dakota’s abortions went down a little (not gone), and Minnesota’s went up. Is that the “win” we’re looking for?
I think we need to be fighting to make abortion unappealing. We need to value life, we need people to “want” to have babies, we need to have hope for the future, and financial support for single mothers (or any mother). That’s what will lower abortions in the US, not legal maneuvering. The legal part will follow the culture.
WAR IN UKRAINE
The big change this week is that the Netherlands has lifted restrictions on weapons use. Basically, up till now, when NATO countries have supplied Ukraine with weapons, they have said they can only use them for defense, inside their own borders. Ukraine has been asking for permission to use those weapons against Russian territory (to take the fight to Russia, essentially), and this week Netherlands agreed and urged other NATO allies to do the same.
There were subsequent drone attacks against Moscow and other Russian targets. Putin has “hinted” that he sees the use of NATO weapons inside Russia as the same as NATO attacking Russia, an indication of an escalation in the fighting.
I’m really not sure where this will go. Will the attacks in Russia be enough to raise national opinion to force Putin to back down? Or will he just keep escalating until all of Europe is involved (and possibly the US?) Hard to say.
CHRISTIAN LEADERS SIGN POLITICAL STATEMENT
You may have heard there is some tension in the evangelical church about politics lately. A bipartisan, multiethnic group of pastors have created a “confession” of how evangelicals can faithfully engage politics, including “encourages Christians to consider each candidate’s “character and not merely their promises or political success.”
I am encouraged that pastors are speaking up a little, and admitting that politics affects people’s spiritual lives, and vice versa. It’s also important to note that there will be strong Christians voting for Harris, voting for Trump, and other candidates (#Kev2024). We need to be able to see that faithful Christians are on both sides of the aisle, and no party is the “Christian” party. I’ve been very disheartened to see all of the “no REAL christian could vote for…” Yes, my friends, REAL christians will vote for both major candidates. And they will vote based on their Christian convictions.
Somehow, you will have to reconcile that. This statement can be helpful.
SOUTH AFRICA’S HEALTH TRAIN
https://apnews.com/article/south-africa-health-train-9731c495b4c3e0d5573a019be0f38704
I don’t have much to add to this, except i think the idea of a mobile hospital reaching into poor rural areas is awesome.
THE IG-NOBEL PRIZE
If you don’t know what the Ig-Nobels are, I strongly suggest you do a quick google. They are prizes given out for…umm..questionable scientific studies. This year’s recipients include:
Scientists who showed a vine from Chile imitates the shapes of artificial plants nearby and another study that examined whether the hair on people’s heads in the Northern Hemisphere swirled in the same direction as someone’s hair in the Southern Hemisphere, a group of scientists who showed that fake medicine that causes side effects can be more effective than fake medicine that doesn’t cause side effects and one showing that some mammals are cable of breathing through their anus.
Good info to have.
ARE MEGACHURCHES GOOD?
I had to weigh in on this one, because I wrote a whole book about it (Chaos Ministry, available on Amazon. 85% free of grammatical errors.) Ed Young, pastor of one the US’s largest churches, claims that people are being hypocritical when they criticize megachurches, because they don’t mind big concerts or big sporting events.
So, here’s my response: churches are not concerts or sporting events.
Hard to follow, I know, but one thing is not another thing. A church is not there to present a product for us to consume, but to be a family that trains and forms us, that is us coming together to worship our Creator together.
In a practical sense (and this is what I go into in my book), I think churches should strive to be between 100 to 250 people. Consider the scenario: if you have a church of 20,000 people, as many of these mega churches do, that means you have one worship team with let’s say 10 people on it and one preacher on a sunday morning.
On the other hand, if you have 100 churches of 200 people, you have 100 people preaching, and 1000 people on the worship teams. To me, that is the goal. We should not be asking “how do I have the best service,” but rather “how do I get the most people involved?” I think one of the easiest ways to do that is to split large churches into 2 or more, once they cross 250 or 300 people. It “forces” people to get involved, and yet is big enough that people can rest as well. That may mean churches are less “professional,” and more “chaotic.” As any family should be.
So, I disagree with Ed here. I think churches are meant to be places to train and serve one another, and “smaller” churches do that better with more opportunities than large ones.
I stand prepared for your criticism