Archive for October, 2008

It must be a nice world Obama worshipers supporters live in, one where everything has an easy explanation and when that’s challenged invoking the Johnny Cochrane defense (when there is no defense for the accused, attack the accuser) is perfectly legitimate.  Jew-hating racist pastor for twenty years?  He missed all those services, thus proving it’s possible to be a devoted member of a church without ever actually attending.  Best buds with domestic and international terrorists?  He’s never seen them kill anyone.  Repeated comments about redistributing wealth?  Why, that’s not socialism; he’s talking up a middle-class tax cut!  R-i-g-h-t.  No wonder Ralph Barbieri, one of the sports blab bozos at KNBR in San Francisco which carries among other teams the Giants, is such a fervent Obama supporter.  To be one requires the same level of disconnect from reality as that which permeates his favorite baseball team’s fan base, the one which for years insisted the only juice connected with Barry Bonds was maybe orange — team color, y’know — and besides we’ve got Tim Lincecum who’s not only going to win the Cy Young award every year for the next twenty or so seasons it’ll be renamed after him.  World Series for sure!

Although presenting reality to such people has the approximate effectiveness level of splashing water on the Rock of Gibraltar in the expectation it will immediately dissolve, if for no other reason than the sheer joy of being able to officially say “I told you so” when their world comes crashing down let’s take a look at one of Jeremiah Wright’s recent missives.  Yeah, yeah, I know; just because someone attended someone’s church for two decades and has called him a mentor and friend doesn’t mean his thinking or whatever it’s called has any influence.  But of course.  However, indulge me for a moment.  As a sidenote, you might want to take a moment to peruse the words of the guy whose church I attend.  Back to Wright; this comes straight from a church bulletin dated July 23, 2006.  And he didn’t even wish me a happy birthday.  Harrumph!

There is a two-ton gorilla sitting in the living room and nobody wants to acknowledge its presence!

God have mercy on me if I ever used the word ‘gorilla’ in any sense whatsoever when speaking of the black church or any member thereof.  But since I’m a McCain supporter, obviously I’m a racist bitterly clinging to my guns and religion.

We not only will not talk about it.  We pretend we don’t see it!

But enough about the mainstream media and Obama.

Jews and Muslims are killing each other in Lebanon, Beirut and Israel.

At the time this was written, Israel had invaded Lebanon in retaliation for Hezbollah terrorists having used bases in southern Lebanon to launch rocket attacks at Israel along with staging raids to kidnap Israeli citizens.  Obviously the whole thing was the fault of those Jews, right?

Sunnis and Shiites are killing each other in Baghdad and Afghanistan.

As they have been for centuries.  Your point?  And just for fun try preaching tolerance to those zany kids.  Let me know how that works for you.  But before you give it a whirl, try looking up the history of the two sects.  Then get back to me on how you’re going to put an end to this.  I’ll be waiting… just like I’m still waiting for an Obama supporter to provide justification for why someone should vote for him based on his qualifications and experience.

Muslims and Christians are killing each other in Sudan and northern Nigeria.

It’s mostly Muslims killing Christians.  And in case you haven’t noticed, it’s about the oil, stupid.

Faith (what people believe) is causing more deaths than HIV/AIDS, the world’s fastest growing pandemic!

Number of AIDS-related deaths in 2007: two million.  2.2 million in 2006.  Estimated deaths from war per year in recent history: 36,000.  Good thing to know Wright’s math skills equal his theological acumen.  Oh, and thanks for telling us what the word ‘faith’ means.  Never would have known if you wouldn’t have told us.  And if your congregation is so stupid to need the definition, you’ve done a really suck job of teaching them.  Now haven’t you.

Faith (what people believe) turns family members into lifelong enemies.

Okay, kiddies, read along with Uncle Jerry.  From the Gospel of St. Matthew, chapter ten, verses thirty-four through thirty-six: “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth.  I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.  For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law — a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’”  Don’t like it?  Go argue with Jesus.  Be prepared for it being rather one-sided.  And not in your favor.

Faith (what people believe) leads some people to hatred of others, murder and demonization of God’s other children — those not like “us” or those who don’t believe what we believe.

Quite true… about some religions.  Jesus?  He was into this “love your enemies — do good to those who hate you — bless those who curse you” thing.

Where has the tolerance of those who are not like “us” gone?

You tell me, Mr. US of KKK-A G-D America.

Is it possible to live on the same planet with people whose faith is different from ours?

Is it possible to pose a stupider rhetorical question?

Is it possible to live in the same country?

Yes, despite the efforts of racists such as yourself.

Is it possible to live in the same state?

If San Francisco and Los Angeles can do it…

Is it possible to live on the same block?

You’d let me move next door to you?  I mean, what with my bitterly clinging to guns and religion and all.

Is it possible to live in the same family or the same house?

I do believe Jesus addressed this already.

Can faith (what we believe) and tolerance (allowing others to believe what they believe — without denigration, condemnation, demonization or subjugation) co-exist?

Every time I hear the word ‘tolerance’ Ezekiel 13:9-11a comes to mind: “My hand will be against the prophets who see false visions and utter lying divinations.  They will not belong to the council of my people or be listed in the records of the house of Israel, nor will they enter the land of Israel.  Then you will know that I am the Sovereign LORD.  Because they lead my people astray, saying, ‘Peace,’ when there is no peace, and because, when a flimsy wall is built, they cover it with whitewash, therefore tell those who cover it with whitewash that it is going to fall.”

This world does not define tolerance when put into action as St. Paul defined it for the believer in Hebrews 12:14: “Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.”  To be holy means living in the truth as well as speaking the truth.  So what is truth?

Inconvenient though it may be, there is absolute truth.  There is right and wrong.  This world defines tolerance as every everything being equal and equally valid, including all religions.  This is not how Jesus defined it.  Not only did He declare Himself to be the Son of God, He also said, “I am the way and the truth and the light.  No one comes to the Father except through me (Jn. 14:6).”  Sorry, everything is legitimate crowd, but that doesn’t leave much wiggle room.  As in none.

Dr. Martin Luther King said we need to learn to live together as brothers and sisters in this world, on this planet and in this country (and I would add in this city and in our families!)

He also extolled the virtues of integration.  I’ll keep that in mind as I see you segregate and isolate yourselves then cry discrimination.

We need to learn tolerance.

Just as long as it doesn’t include suffering fools lightly, which is the only way you’ll get off the hook.

We need to learn to live together as God’s family or we will all die together as God-forsaken fools!

Being a fool doesn’t always lead to death.  You’re still breathing, aren’t you?

Think about that this week.

That’s the problem.  We do think.  You?

Pray about it and then do something about it!

I just did via illustrating through Scripture and facts you are a babbling bigoted moron.

Which says what about someone who attended your church for two decades?

Three reasons:

1. He’s actually done something in life.
2. He’s a better speaker.
3. He’s honest about what he believes.

Let’s look at these one at a time.

1. He’s actually done something in life.

Despite having used Microsoft software pretty music exclusively since the days of Windows 3.1, my next PC… will be a Mac.  Why?  Having used one at work for a while, I state from experience it simply works better.  It’s faster, more reliable, far less prone to freezing up or crashing… it just works.  Which is all I want from a computer.  Now, who co-founded Apple and came back to lead it back to the forefront of personal computing?  Jobs.  Who in his spare time developed a keen eye for talent along with the wherewithal to know how to get things started without getting in the way.  Which movie studio consistently puts out instant classic films?  Only one: Pixar.  And who started Pixar?  Yup.  Jobs.

Now, exactly what has Obama ever accomplished professionally other than give the occasional pretty speech?  Speaking of speeches…

2. He’s a better speaker.

Content, not the wrapping it comes in, determines the value of the spoken word.  Oratory skill can mask vapid fluff for a while.  But only for a while.

Compare any of Obama’s supposedly great speeches with these excerpts from the commencement address Jobs gave at Stanford University in 2005:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Stay hungry. Stay foolish.

Compare that, backed by deeds, to Obama’s empty words of hope.

3. He’s honest about what he believes.

What’s currently the first item on Apple’s home page?  Something extolling the virtues of the recently designed MacBook?  Positive stories about the iPhone?  Maybe the iPod or iTunes?  Nope.

It’s about Apple’s opposition to Proposition 8, the California state initiative on next week’s ballot that if passed would reverse the recent state Supreme Court decision allowing gay marriage in the state.

The issue in question aside, Apple led by Jobs (I believe it can be safely assumed he either approves of the front page content on his company’s Web site) is stating what it believes.  No apologies, no playing dodgeball.  Here’s our stand.  Take it for what it is.

When has Obama ever been anything other than disingenuous about his relationships with people such as Bill Ayers or Jeremiah Wright?  His politics?  His proposed policies?  His fundamental political and social views?

{{listening to the soothing sound of chirping crickets}}

This is why I like Steve Jobs more than Barack Obama.