While you were crawling out from under that rock Missouri representative Todd Akin was busy crawling under it. In a recent interview, in the context of an abortion discussion, Akin said: It seems to me, first of all, from what I understand from doctors, [pregnancy’s] really rare. If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. The entire conversation since has spun–in every way–around the phrase “legitimate rape.” It is pretty clear, even without knowing what he was trying to say, a poorer choice of words could not conceivably be strung together. Predictably, the backlash has been fast and furious, prompting Akin to apologize more than once. One writer claims he knows nothing about female biology (which might be true), a rebuke as a “gutless little twerp” from that manliest of men, Piers Morgan, and a call from Republican presidential frontrunner, Mitt Romney, for Akin to drop out of his congressional race.
Help make my blog better…
I have been blogging for nearly 9 years, and truly enjoy the medium. It has provided a way for me to engage others, hone my writing craft, and develop ideas. Debate has been fruitful, lively and, mostly, forward moving. Recently I read Platform by Michael Hyatt (click here to see on Amazon.com). Hyatt is one of the most widely read bloggers in all of evangelical life. I could not begin to carry his keyboard. Or iPad. His blog, his tools, and his way of blogging have become somewhat of a “gold standard” for serious bloggers. One thing he mentioned in Platform is to find a niche or focus and stick with it. Too wide a variety does not allow for a strong readership to build. Too much variety on a blog is like buying Good Housekeeping to find one article about home decor, another about spark plug gaps, and another about the difference between true north and magnetic north. Such an effort would not sell much because the topics are not related in any way. (Unless you need to set your spark plug gaps to drive back from Bed, Bath and Beyond, to your home at the North Pole, perhaps.) That poses quite a quandary for me because I have so many interests. My curiosity drives me to an every widening sphere, to which many people feel very little draw. This is somewhat frustrating since, like most writers, I desire readers, and would like to increase the number of readers who frequent Kingdom in the Midst.
The strangest search phrase ever or SEO can’t help you now
One of the cool things about blogging having the ability to see the search terms people used to find your blog. Daily Kingdom in the Midst gets hits from all over the world, many finding old articles, and some finding images I have used in posts. One of the most popular searches leading to this blog is “presidential seal,” which leads to this post from a few years ago. I also get a lot of hits from people researching Haiti, foreign aid and a poem by Mother Teresa (discovered today by a searcher from Armenia). Today I had the strangest search phrase ever to lead a person to my blog. Here it is in full: you will write a five-page argument on same sex marriage. controversial topics are often what people look for to write about, but using local issues, issues you are familiar with, or issues less controversial (whether to use a real christmas tree or a fake one, for example) work just as well. sometimes using less controversial topics are easier to work with than highly charged topics, but in any case, choose a topic you already know something about. the focus here will be on how well you can pr It sure looks like a student copied and pasted their entire homework assignment into a search bar and went for it. I sure hope they found something they could use.
Six reasons to have regular team meetings
The current wisdom on having team meetings (staff meetings) is generally dependent on the timeframe of current. Thoughts in 2012 different than in the 1990s than in the 1950s. Does it matter whether you have regular meetings of your direct reports, or should you just “hire the best and turn them loose”? I have been in a number of different staffing situations during my various careers. I was on a team of package delivery personnel, was the single paid staff member at a small church, served on the pastoral leadership team at a mega-church, was a part-time pastor at a mission church, led a team of pastors and support staff at a medium sized church and currently work as a member of a small team in a much larger company. Having done some things right and some things wrong over the years, here are six reasons why I think it important to have regular team meetings.
When your book goes out of print…
Amazon.com has long been on of my favorite websites. We order books, pet supplements, Christmas presents and download music with regularity. One unique thing about Amazon is their marketplace where Amazon, for a fee, promotes their own competitors. Don’t want the new book from Amazon? There is a very good chance you can order it used from a competitor from the same page.
Is the Muslim Brotherhood crucifying opponents in Egypt?
According to a report in Algemeiner, and reported by WND.com, numerous sources reported protesters in Egypt were crucified on trees. From a translated Egyptian site: The Sky News correspondent in Cairo that the Arab protesters belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood crucified opponents of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi naked on the trees in front of the presidential palace, while torturing others. Other demonstrators also closed doors Brotherhood Media Production City in the October 6, and assaulted the well-known journalists. They chanted during the demonstration against Chairman Lafraain Canal Tawfiq Okasha and call them to “inform the corrupt remnants”, and a number of them attacked the editor of Media seventh day Khaled Salah. Witnesses said groups of members of the Muslim Brotherhood and arrived at a number of buses and private cars carrying banners attacking “media sedition.” These had to divide themselves into groups took some prevent entry and exit to and from the city of production.[All translation from Arabic via Google translater.]
Mixed-doubles tennis as a metaphor for marriage
The Olympics brought tennis to my mind for the first time since, oh, Wimbledon two weeks prior. But, as the games progressed producing Serena Williams as the first person in history to win all four Grand Slam events and capture Olympic gold medals in singles and doubles tennis, it set me to thinking about mixed doubles tennis as a metaphor for marriage. I’m sure more examples could be drawn, but here are a few. 1. Each person must serve. In mixed doubles each player must rotate the opportunities to serve. If you are the man with the most dominant serve in the world, you are not allowed to be the only one to serve. In marriage each must serve. There is no place for slavery in marriage. 2. Each has the same objective. Both players should have only one goal: to win. If either player has self-promotion or reputation as a goal over winning, the team will not be able to perform to maximum capacity. Similarly, in marriage both husband and wife must be of one mind. For Christ followers the kingdom of God should be the priority, followed by their roles of ministry in it.
Great tweets from the Obama, Biden, Clinton meeting
After vice-president Joe Biden’s recent gaffe about Americans going back into chains, a Twitter comedy was born. Over the last day or so a number of hilarious tweets with the hashtag #OverheardAtBidenObamaClintonMeeting have made their way into circulation. Here is a sampling:
The Great GM Bankruptcy, Round 2?
A friend of mine asked, “Have you seen the commercials about GM’s “record year” and heard Obama bragging about what a great success the bailout was? Uh, not so much.” It was this article in Forbes to which he was referring.
More federal government shenanigans: Trapwire, hollow-point ammo, and more
Have you heard about Trapwire? Do not feel bad if it has escaped your attention. Chances are very good it has not been brought to your attention. And for good reason. According to recent reports based on documents provided by Wikileaks the federal government of the United States is installing a massive surveillance system across the country. Using facial recognition software the potential for tracking every person at all times is increasing. Every few seconds, data picked up at surveillance points in major cities and landmarks across the United States are recorded digitally on the spot, then encrypted and instantaneously delivered to a fortified central database center at an undisclosed location to be aggregated with other intelligence. It’s part of a program called TrapWire and it’s the brainchild of the Abraxas, a Northern Virginia company staffed with elite from America’s intelligence community. The employee roster at Arbaxas reads like a who’s who of agents once with the Pentagon, CIA and other government entities according to their public LinkedIn profiles, and the corporation’s ties are assumed to go deeper than even documented. The details on Abraxas and, to an even greater extent TrapWire, are scarce, however, and not without reason. For a program touted as a tool to thwart terrorism and monitor activity meant to be under wraps, its understandable that Abraxas would want the program’s public presence to be relatively limited. But thanks to last year’s hack of the Strategic Forecasting intelligence agency, or Stratfor, all of that is quickly changing.” So: those spooky new “circular” dark globe cameras installed in your neighborhood park, town, or city—they aren’t just passively monitoring. They’re plugged into Trapwire and they are potentially monitoring every single person via facial recognition. In other news the provision 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act is proving worse than many had feared. From the U.K. Guardian, Tangerine Bolen (one of a group suing the U.S. government over the provision in the NDAA), writes: In the earlier March hearing, US government lawyers had confirmed that, yes, the NDAA does give the president the power to lock up people like journalist Chris Hedges and peaceful activists like myself and other plaintiffs. Government attorneys stated on record that even war correspondents could be locked up indefinitely under the NDAA. […] This past week’s hearing was even more terrifying. Government attorneys again, in this hearing, presented no evidence to support their position and brought forth no witnesses. Most incredibly, Obama’s attorneys refused to assure the court, when questioned, that the NDAA’s section 1021 – the provision that permits reporters and others who have not committed crimes to be detained without trial – has not been applied by the US government anywhere in the world after Judge Forrest’s injunction. In other words, they were telling a US federal judge that they could not, or would not, state whether Obama’s government had complied with the legal injunction that she had laid down before them. To this, Judge Forrest responded that if the provision had indeed been applied, the United States government would be in contempt of court. For those wondering how in the world the feds protect themselves against raging retirees and the citizenry at large a few federal departments seem to be stocking up on hollow-point ammo: 174,000 of .357 rounds to the Social Security Administration, 450 million .40 rounds to the DHS, and 46,000 rounds to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Getting ready to shoot fish in a barrel, I suppose. Finally, more on the government gathering generic information it might you against you later department, William Binney, since retiring from the NSA, has warned that agency’s data-mining program has become so vast and pervasive it could “create an Orwellian state.” From an interview transcript: JUAN GONZALEZ: And the differences in the [Bush and Obama] administrations? WILLIAM BINNEY: Actually, I think the surveillance has increased. In fact, I would suggest that they’ve assembled on the order of 20 trillion transactions about U.S. citizens with other U.S. citizens. AMY GOODMAN: How many? WILLIAM BINNEY: Twenty trillion. AMY GOODMAN: And you’re saying that this surveillance has increased? Not only the— WILLIAM BINNEY: Yes. AMY GOODMAN: —targeting of whistleblowers, like your colleagues, like people like Tom Drake, who are actually indicted under the Obama administration— WILLIAM BINNEY: Right. AMY GOODMAN: —more times—the number of people who have been indicted are more than all presidents combined in the past. WILLIAM BINNEY: Right. And I think it’s to silence what’s going on. But the point is, the data that’s being assembled is about everybody. And from that data, then they can target anyone they want . . . That, by the way, estimate only was involving phone calls and emails. It didn’t involve any queries on the net or any assembles—other—any financial transactions or credit card stuff, if they’re assembling that. I do not know that, OK. Feel better now? Happy Friday!