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Month: June 2012


East versus West

For a few years now, I’ve had a thought going that counters what we’re told in the media concerning the “war on terror,” including that which is put out by FOX News and other neo-conservative outlets: the real geo-political battle we face and have always faced is two major empires battling it out for resources, land, and economic superiority. That battle is East versus West and more specifically, the Western empire, consisting of the US and Europe as well as Australia, versus the Eastern empire consisting of Russia, China, Iran, Syria and a few other smaller nations. We are now seeing signs that these theories are proving to be true. I don’t mean to say I have exclusively thought of these things, because I haven’t. There are a number of commentators who have made similar calls long before I have.

After the Cold War and collapse of the Soviet Union, there was a political and economic restructuring they had to go through. This took time and it took a while to get on their feet again after such a great fall. But it’s been two decades now. They never lost their nuclear status and have maintained some semblance of a core infrastructure from which to build upon. On top of that, China has risen strong and mighty, a nuclear power, extremely technological, and innovative themselves (or at least really good with corporate and military espionage in the West). Iran is still peeved at us for our CIA’s 1953 coup d’etat. And Syria just thumbs their noses at us and calls on Russia to bow up to us, especially in the wake of our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. I would expect more to join this Eastern bloc in the near future.

We have a very strong staging area in the Middle East now, but for what? Looking back over the past 15 years, reading over information even before 9/11 occurred, we had the Middle East in our sights all along. 9/11 sped that process up, whatever the causes and forces were that brought that event about. The Iraqi invasion was planned in the late 1990’s. The Patriot act had also been written in the same time frame, before 9/11. Yeah, I was shocked to find these things out too. There are a number of other things I won’t go into. But long story short, we have bases in Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel of course, UAE, Kuwait, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and I’m sure I’m missing some. On top of this, we are setting up even more missiles pointed in an offensive posture toward Russia in Eastern Europe and a number of other places. So militarily we have them surrounded to some degree. We’re at the very least lining Russia’s southern and western borders.

Now with all of that said and barring the lack of humanity the Syrian government has toward its own people and the authoritarian nature of that state, how ironic it is for Krauthammer, on FOX News tonight, to get so agitated and offended that Putin would bow up to the US and essentially say, “Syria is ours.” This is exactly what we’ve been doing throughout the Middle East for more than a decade! And even before that, it’s the very thing we tried to do in Iran in 1953, which back-fired in 1979 (or what the CIA calls “blowback”), and to this day is one of the reasons they hate us, cited even by Ahmadinejad! Of course, when it’s us doing the empire and resource building for our own interests, it’s right, right? Iraq and Afghanistan then become “humanitarian” missions or “freedom” missions for the “cause of liberty,” PR and marketing designed to persuade the masses into acquiescing to whatever our elite, empire-building leaders want. “You love this country don’t you? Then you’ll see the necessity of war and spreading democracy. And support the troops in our endeavor! If you don’t you must not love this country.”

Al Qaeda is a pawn in our chess game with the other rising super powers who are consolidating power. When it suits us, we buddy up with Al Qaeda and use them as tools (like in Egypt and Libya over the past year), who we essentially created, trained and funded beginning in the 1980’s to fight (oddly enough in this discussion) the Soviet Union. There again, when it suits us we attack Al Qaeda when we need to gain more ground “for the cause of liberty,” aka empire-building and creating a defensive posture toward the Eastern bloc of power.

Why do we Americans think we’re somehow any different as an empire than other empires that have come and gone throughout history? Granted, we have had a great thing going with our Republic in its Constitutional form, but we’re quickly losing that. What remains then? Power, exerted by forces outside of democratic control.

Magento 1.7 Upgrade Issue Resolved – Products Display Zero When Selecting Product Options

I have now gone through a production upgrade of Magento from version 1.4.1 to 1.7. As expected, since I did a test run in my own environment, I encountered quite a few issues along the way, not merely limited to database upgrade issues which were a big enough of a problem themselves.

One of the issues I ran into that is now resolved was related to the individual product pages. When you selected a customized option for a product, such as a certain size, color, or other option, the price would change to zero. After researching the issue for a while, I came up with only other people having the same problem, but no solutions. Until this evening.

I came across this thread: http://www.magentocommerce.com/boards/viewthread/280283/P0/

I’ve also updated another thread in which I posted where someone else had the same problem: http://www.magentocommerce.com/boards/viewthread/284168/

The fix:

Replace

app/design/frontend/[YOURTEMPLATE]/catalog/products/view/options.phtml

with the same file located in:

app/design/frontend/base/default/template/catalog/product/view/options.phtml

 

Cold War Redux

Cold War Redux http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iIgesHH9fg (New Russian ICBM test-fired) … I mean there are more spies in this country now than at the height of the Cold War after all http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-57431837/more-spies-in-u.s-than-ever-says-ex-cia-officer/ … sending a message to the US/European/NATO alliance? Still makes me wonder if the real geo-political chess battle is merely East versus West and the Middle East has always just been caught in the middle. We have a NATO missile defense shield in Eastern Europe, we have bases in Iraq, Kuwait, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Turkey(?) to the south of Russia. Iran, China and Russia are regularly meeting, trading arms, having joint governmental conferences. Russia has been doing war games exercises near the arctic circle recently. Two Russian subs were spotted off the Atlantic coast last year doing reconnaissance. It has been reported that Russia is sending arms to Syria. If you want to see what is really going on in the world, you forget what the leaders say and watch what they do.

God is Sovereign Over Blindness That His Glory Might Be Displayed

“And his disciples asked him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.”
(John 9:2-3 ESV) … in other words, “he was born blind” “that the works of God might be displayed in him.” Let that sink in. Jesus said this. God gave him life, with blindness, for an overarching purpose: His own glory, namely that Jesus might be shown and evidenced to be the Son of God, to the glory of the Father.

Turns Out “A Statement of Traditional Southern Baptist Understanding of God’s Plan of Salvation” Isn’t so Traditional After All

A recent formal doctrinal statement on the nature of salvation (or in technical theological terms, soteriology, or the study of salvation) signed on to by none other than Paige Patterson, president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (as one example), amongst others, like Emir Caner, is making quite the stir, even amongst classical Arminians (click to read). The statement was meant to counter what they view as the “threat” of Calvinism spreading in the SBC. At best, it is theological and historical sloppiness. At worst, it is theological and historical revisionism and an open slide toward heresy as it relates to the nature of man’s will as a result of the transmission of the sin of Adam to mankind.

The authors and signers claim they are speaking for the traditional view of the SBC on the issue of salvation. However, as Tom Ascol from Founders Ministries points out, this is hardly the case. Hopefully this will bring to light some issues that have been brewing for quite some time. They have drawn a line in the sand and either need to repent or split in my opinion. Yes, it’s that serious. These issues go beyond Calvinism versus Arminianism into the issues of Original Sin and the nature of the will, pre/post-fall, no less. In addition, I’ve included Tom Ascol’s response. Read on:

First of all, here’s the original doctrinal statement in question

Part 1 – Tom Ascol (Beginning of Response)

Part 2 – Tom Ascol

Part 3 – Tom Ascol

Could W.A. Criswell have signed this statement? – Tom Ascol

Part 4 – Tom Ascol

Part 5 – Tom Ascol

Part 6 – Tom Ascol

Part 7 – Tom Ascol

Part 8 – Tom Ascol

Part 9 – Tom Ascol

Part 10 – Tom Ascol

Part 11 – Tom Ascol

Part 12 – Tom Ascol

Part 13 – Tom Ascol

Semi-Pelagian/Pelagian Point in Question: The Recent SBC Statement on Salvation: A Point of Concern – John Aloisi

The Traditional Southern Baptist View of Salvation? – James White (MP3)

And finally, for a historical, theological background on what the early church concluded pertaining to not only Pelagianism but Semi-Pelagianism, you just have to read the Canons of Orange from 529 AD.

Where Does Jesus Claim to be God?

OT background text: “God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM.’ And he said, ‘Say this to the people of Israel, “I AM has sent me to you.”‘” (Exodus 3:14 ESV) … and then, “Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.’ So [the Jewish people listening] picked up stones to throw at him…” (John 8:58-59 ESV).

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