Mountain Views News          Saturday, October 17, 2015

16

OPINION

 Mountain Views News Saturday, October 17, 2015 


OUT TO PASTOR 

A Weekly Religion Column by Rev. James Snyder


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I’M SO ITCHY I DON’T KNOW 
WHERE TO START SCRATCHING

In our house, we have an ongoing debate. The 
Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage claims I 
am the king of procrastination.

 At first, I did not quite understand what she 
was talking about and asked if I could get back 
to her on that question.

 She has the idea that I put things off until 
the last minute, then, according to her, I’m in a 
panic to get it done.

 I am not saying she is right; she just might 
have a good point there. I’ll get back to you on 
that.

 Before I do anything, I like to give it plenty 
of thought, sit in my chair and meditate 
on that project until I really have it clearly 
developed in my mind from beginning to end. 
The problem is my wife thinks my meditation 
is closer to taking a nap than meditation. She 
just does not understand the dynamics of 
meditation. Sure, when I am meditating on a 
project, it may seem like I am taking a nap.

 It takes an awful lot of meditating on a 
subject for me to form a good plan. I like to 
know what I am going to do every step of the 
way and I do not like to get started until I have 
it completely fixed in my mind.

 This is particularly true when it comes to the 
infamous “honey-do-list.” Sometimes that list 
is so long and complicated I just do not know 
where to start. Starting, as you well know, is 
the first step in getting it done.

 If you do not start a project right, it will not 
end up right. That is the argument I try to give 
to my wife who counters with, “The first step in 
doing the project is to start doing the project.”

 I am trying to get her to understand my 
“starting a project” begins with some deep 
meditation on that project. I cannot help it if 
that meditation period is comprehensive. 

 “Could it be,” my wife suggested, “that 
you’re so itchy you don’t know where to start to 
scratch?”

 Well, I could not have been more offended 
in my life. When I am itchy I know when and 
where to scratch. In fact, right now I am getting 
a little itchy on the subject of procrastination. 
However, I will wait until tomorrow to do 
anything about it.

 I must confess I do put things off at times. I 
learned one thing in life; sometimes when you 
put things off long enough, they do not need 
doing. I do not know how many times I tried 
doing something and by the time I got it done 
it was no longer necessary. I want to be very 
careful that what I start needs to be finished.

 My wife, if you will permit me, is super 
ambitious. When a project comes to the 
forefront she wants to get it started and 
finished right away.

 For example. Take Christmas shopping.

 When it comes to Christmas shopping for 
myself, I usually wait until Christmas Eve. That 
is the traditional time for me to do Christmas 
shopping. Then, if you shop on Christmas Eve 
and they run out of something you can always 
say, “I wanted to get you this, but they were all 
out at the time.”

 Not so for the other resident in the house. 
She begins Christmas shopping in the month 
of January. Yes, I said January!

 Before we put away all the Christmas 
decorations she has prepared a list for next 
year’s Christmas gifts. I really do not know 
how she does it. Even while people are opening 
their presents, she is thinking of what to get 
them next year.

 Land sakes alive!

 Sitting around the Christmas tree opening 
our presents, I am literally amazed at some of 
the gifts. I never would have thought somebody 
would want the present my wife bought. They 
all thank her and are appreciative and do not 
know how she knows exactly what they want.

 I well remember when we first got married 
and the first time I took her grocery shopping, 
I was stunned. I had never gone grocery 
shopping in my life.

 We got a shopping cart and she began piling 
that shopping cart full of food. I noticed she 
had a two-page list of groceries that she needed 
to buy and little by little she cross them off.

 When we got to the counter, we had a 
shopping cart and a half of groceries and the 
person behind the counter just stared with 
open mouth.

 What my wife had done, and I have never 
seen it before, she bought groceries for the 
entire month. How did she know what we 
would be eating for a month?

 Her motto is simply, “Never put off buying 
tomorrow what you can buy today.”

 As the cashier was ringing up the groceries, 
she would sneak a glance and smile at me. It 
finally dawned on me what she was smiling 
about. Not my good looks. But my checkbook 
that was going to have to pay for all of these 
groceries. I did not see that coming.

 I was reminded of what Solomon said. “The 
thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; 
and that which is done is that which shall be 
done: and there is no new thing under the sun” 
(Ecclesiastes 1:9).

 Procrastination never scratches where it 
really itches.

 Rev. James L. Snyder is pastor of the Family 
of God Fellowship, PO Box 831313, Ocala, FL 
34483. He lives with his wife, Martha, in Silver 
Springs Shores. Call him at 1-866-552-2543 or 
e-mail jamessnyder2@att.net. His website is 
www.jamessnyderministries.com.


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LEFT TURN/RIGHT TURN 

JASON Stanford 

MICHAEL Reagan Making Sense


TIME FOR THE 
BENGHAZI 
COMMITTEE 
TO STAND 
DOWN

At least they're not 
pretending anymore. 

The Benghazi Select 
Committee is 
nothing more than a 
taxpayer funded opposition research group 
determined to stop Hillary Clinton from 
becoming president. Investigating the attack 
on our consulate in Benghazi might have 
started as a way to show that Barack Obama 
was weak on national security, but after seven 
investigations and 13 hearings, Benghazi has 
become Hillary Clinton's Whitewater. 

Until McCarthy's gaffe, however, 
congressional leaders did a good job of 
pretending the Benghazi Select Committee, 
which has spent $4.5 million over 72 months, 
was seeking the truth about Benghazi. Now, 
that's impossible.

What happened was that Fox's Sean Hannity 
was pressing McCarthy for a single reason 
why Republican voters should not feel 
betrayed by their congressional leaders. 
McCarthy flailed. He offered up the 50 
votes to repeal Obamacare. Hannity scoffed. 
McCarthy mentioned the shrinking deficit. 
Hannity talked over him, which in retrospect 
might have been a blessing.

Finally McCarthy found an accomplishment 
that passed muster with Hannity: 

"Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was 
unbeatable, right? But we put together 
a Benghazi special committee, a select 
committee. What are her numbers today? 
Her numbers are dropping. Why? Because 
she's untrustable," said McCarthy.

"I agree," said Hannity. "That's something 
good. I'll give you credit." 

It's easy to forget that the email scandal is a 
byproduct of Benghazi, which was the first 
attack on our country that instantly became 
grounds not for unity but for partisan 
politics. 

The speed at which Mitt Romney blamed 
Obama for the Benghazi attack was shocking. 
He appeared so suddenly before the press 
that night on September 11, 2012, that he 
didn't even take the time to straighten his 
hair. Romney was so quick to seek political 
advantage from an attack on an American 
consulate that not only did he not wait until 
the bodies were buried but he didn't even wait 
until they were counted. Partisan politics 
went well beyond the water's edge that day.

Obama won, but Benghazi lives on. The 
Benghazi Select Committee has devolved 
into a naked attempt to bring down Hillary 
Clinton. The Select Committee has not yet 
held a hearing with anyone from the Defense 
Department, but has questioned eight 
current or former members of the Clinton 
campaign. 

The Select Committee isn't trying hard 
to hide what it's up to, but it's a model of 
discretion compared to the Republican Party. 
In 2014, the GOP's congressional arm put 
up a fundraising webpage to "hold Hillary 
Clinton and Barack Obama accountable for 
their actions." Rep. Trey Gowdy, the chairman 
of the Select Committee, complained at the 
time, but the website only came down last 
week when the Clinton campaign pointed 
out that they were still raising money off 
Benghazi. 

The last time we went through all of this 
was late in Bill Clinton's second term, when 
congressional Republicans investigated 
Bill Clinton for an old real estate deal 
but impeached him for lying to a special 
prosecutor about cheating on his wife. What 
the Republicans could not do at the ballot box 
they attempted to do by perverting the legal 
process, turning politics into prosecution. 

Now here we are again. Republicans are 
not even waiting for Hillary to win before 
ginning up a political prosecution. And 
they've long since lost interest in parsing the 
details about what happened in Benghazi. 
This is Whitewater, except with emails. 

The Select Committee has been meeting for 72 
months, making it the longest congressional 
investigation ever, longer than congressional 
probes into Watergate, 9/11, Pearl Harbor, 
and the Kennedy assassination. The beatings 
will continue until polling improves. 

The problem isn't the Clintons. The real 
scandal is that Republicans are so outraged 
that they can't beat them that they'll do 
anything to stop them, and they're only too 
happy to use your tax dollars to fund their 
political operation. If there's a grownup left 
at the Republican National Committee, it's 
time to give the Benghazi Select Committee 
a stand down order. Jigs up, fellas.

Jason Stanford is a regular contributor to the 
Austin American-Statesman, a Democratic 
consultant and a Truman National Security 
Project partner. You can email him at 
stanford@oppresearch.com and follow him 
on Twitter @JasStanford.

TIME FOR SENSIBLE 
BACKGROUND 
CHECKS 

In the wake of the recent homicidal shooting 
rampage at an Oregon community college, I’m 
forced to come to the conclusion that it is high 
time for common sense national background 
checks for journalists. 

 It’s time we closed the political loophole and prevented biased, 
ignorant political operatives from getting their hands on a dangerously 
misleading national microphone. 

 RedState has a perfect example this week. Former Bill Clinton 
White House aide, and current Clinton Foundation donor George 
Stephanopoulos, is the host for ABC’s This Week. He uses his “bully 
pulpit” to bully conservatives and Republicans. 

 During an interview with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, 
Stephanopoulos interrupted Christie to assert, “But there’s no 
question the pace of mass shootings is accelerating, happening more 
frequently than anywhere else. If it’s not the gun, then what is it?” 

 This is a perfect example of leftist thinking. As Dennis Prager 
points out, the left always blames the inanimate object and never the 
user. 

 During the Cold War the left wanted to ban atomic weapons rather 
than condemn and work to overthrow totalitarian regimes that 
could use The Bomb to further their ends. Leftist–in–Chief Obama 
continues to be fixated on nuclear weapons and behind the scenes is 
working to render our nuclear deterrent impotent. 

 Now the left is fixated on the gun. Blaming the user of the gun is out 
of the question, because that involves individual responsibility. 
Once America starts thinking in terms of individual responsibility 
again, it has the potential to open up a line of questioning that is very 
uncomfortable for big government leftists. 

 For example: Why can’t you find a job? Where is the father of your 
children? How did your home enter foreclosure? What do you spend 
your money on? Why have we lost the War on Poverty? 

 After demonizing the gun, leftists like Stephanopoulos use false 
data from anti–gun pressure groups to contradict defenders of the 
2nd Amendment. 

 First they change the definition of “mass shooting.” Before the 
numbers started to trend against them, the definition was at least 
four deaths NOT counting the shooter. Now gun grabbers use 
three deaths as a minimum or they include the wretched shooter 
in the total. Naturally, as if by magic in a cloud of cordite, there are 
more mass shootings, but even doctored statistics can’t support the 
“accelerating” claim. 

 The RedState graph shows mass shootings peaked in 2004 and have 
not reached that peak since. Since 2008, mass shootings have been 
trending downward. 

 I’m certain rabid Democrat defenders of media bias will block my 
common sense background checks for journalists bill in the Senate. 
So in the meantime I can only advise you to beware leftists bearing 
statistics.

Michael Reagan is the son of President Ronald Reagan, a political 
consultant, and the author of “The New Reagan Revolution” (St. 
Martin’s Press). He is the founder of the email service reagan.com 
and president of The Reagan Legacy Foundation. Visit his websites 
at www.reagan.com and www.michaelereagan.com. Send comments 
to Reagan@caglecartoons.com. Follow @reaganworld on Twitter. 
Mike’s column is distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper 
syndicate. For info on using columns contact Sales at sales@cagle.com.

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