Heritage Foundation Drops Soap

Every year the American Conservative Union puts on a conference, the Conservative Political Action Conference (how creative) ... basically a bunch of conservatives get together and listen to speakers and go to discussion meetings and it’s a really big deal. Everyone who is anyone is there ... until this year. The much touted Heritage Foundation has pulled its support of the event. I spent quite a while trying to figure out how to explain the Heritage Foundation to you and then I realized that the best way would be to let them explain it to you ... so here it is,“Founded in 1973, The Heritage Foundation is a research and educational institution—a think tank—whose mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense. We believe the principles and ideas of the American Founding are worth conserving and renewing. As policy entrepreneurs, we believe the most effective solutions are consistent with those ideas and principles. Our vision is to build an America where freedom, opportunity, prosperity, and civil society flourish.” 
... unless you’re gay. And then you’re not invited to the free enterprise prom, and there will be no limited government or individual freedom or strong defense for you.
The Conservative Political Action Conference is a big deal, if you want to run for president or just be somebody, you have to speak there. Last year it attracted 10,000, for its largest audience yet. This year, The Heritage Foundation will not be attending. For the first time ... ever. Why you ask? Because GOProud will be there. That’s right, the gay conservatives are invading and taking over the conference. There’s no place left on earth for the true conservatives anymore! These liberal, pro-gay democrats are taking over ...so what’s the deal with GOProud any way, what do they stand for? Well, I let Heritage talk for themselves and so I’ll let them explain it,
“GOProud represents gay conservatives and their allies. GOProud is committed to a traditional conservative agenda that emphasizes limited government, individual liberty, free markets and a confident foreign policy. GOProud promotes our traditional conservative agenda by influencing politics and policy at the federal level.”
I have never heard such radicalism, I can not believe that CPAC is allowing such a divergent organization ... oh, really? You’re right, it is exactly the same as what Heritage Foundation said they were all about. So it means only one thing, Heritage Foundation found out that GOProud is influencing the conference by adding pro-gay workshops, titles like “Traditional Marriage as a Cure for Poverty” and “Next Steps: The Pro-Life Movement’s Plans and Goals” and “Repealing Obamacare”. I mean it might as well be the Democratic National Convention at this point. The origin of GOProud is even more interesting, they founded when their previous gay conservative group, The Log Cabin Republicans, were found to be too liberal. GOProud are uber-conservative ... the CPAC speakers are Ann Coulter, Ron Paul, Sarah Palin and good ol’ Ollie North. There is only on conclusion to be drawn from Heritage Foundations’s withdrawal, they hate gay people. They should be ashamed of themselves, stick to your vision statement, Heritage and GOProud should be allies and fighting side by side, they believe the same things. I don’t even know what to say about all of this, but it sure shines a light on the true feelings and priorities of certain people and certain organizations, I think that it is an embarrassment to the conservative movement and everyone who has advocated on behalf of Heritage (Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity) should publically withdraw their support. The only funny part is that it would be the perfect opportunity for the democrats and the mainstream media to attack the conservatives and expose the giant skeleton in their closet, but they won’t because they don’t want anyone to know that there are gay conservatives ... they want people (gay people) to think that there is only one party. And honestly, if the republican party doesn’t stand strong on this issue, the democrats might be right.


"As more fringe organizations rise in prominence then you start wondering if this is what we want to be associated with as strongly we have," said Heritage spokesman Jim Weidman.

Bottled Water on Ice

This morning my 3 year old helped me arrange bottles of water and capri sun juice boxes in a cooler as we prepared to celebrate her sister’s 5th birthday ... she was clean, she had dinner last night, she slept in a clean bed and had breakfast this morning.  She was wearing clean clothes, a warm jacket, shoes and socks and had a ribbon in her hair.
We not only own a cooler full of clean drinkable water, we will be giving it away without hesitation because there’s more where that came from, much, much more. My 3 year old is just having fun “helping” Daddy, she does not realize the immense weight of the blessings which have laid upon us. I love my daughter in ways that it would take an entire book to describe ... suffice to say she is fantastic and rude and mean and sweet and helpful and free with her thoughts and emotions and every second with her is a wonderful second. I know many parents, and there are plenty that really love their children and love spending time with them. So there we were loading clean potable water, the essence of life itself, into a cooler filled with ice ...
On the outskirts of Mexico City there is a man who is my age and he has a 3 year old daughter and she is having fun helping her Daddy while they root through a landfill looking for enough food to stave off starvation for one more day. It is hot and the air is saturated with the smell of rot, flies crawl in their eyes and ears, the little girl has no shoes and no socks, her hair is unkempt, her skin dirty, she had no dinner last night and no breakfast this morning. When they find water to drink, it is not in bottles ... it is not clear, and it might quench their thirst or it might make them deathly ill ... she has a sister and no one knows when either one of them was born. There is no birthday.
In Port-au-Prince there is a father who is holding his beloved 3 year old in his arms as she succumbs to the fever and the dehydration of cholera in a tent that has been their home for a year, since the earth shook and brought the roof of their house down upon his family, killing his wife and his other children ... the doctor told him he is a few hours away from being completely alone in this world, his last remaining child gone before sunrise.
Yesterday in the Ivory Coast as living father buried his 3 year old daughter, caught in the cross fire, killed by a bullet meant for an AK-47 wielding rebel ... she had been playing in the street in the village while her father tended to the fields ...
And a father in Afghanistan ...


And a father in Somalia ... 


And a father in Gaza ...


And a father in El Salvador ... 


And a father in Mongolia ...

I don’t know what to do with the guilt I feel for God pouring out such blessings on my neighbors and myself and my family, I am so overwhelmingly grateful, I am completely undeserving. I have done nothing to earn a life of peace and safety and health and abundant food for myself or for my children. Do you think you’ve earned this? Do you think that they have earned that? Does that explain our foreign policy? I pray that God will show us what it is that we are supposed to do with our abundance, I pray that we will do what it is we were intended to do and I pray a deep and sorrowful prayer of thanksgiving that God chose to spare me the life of my peers, that He chose to spare my children and I pray that I will do a satisfactory job teaching them that we have not earned this.