Bottom Line

March 2016 The very fact that our upcoming presidential election could pit Bernie Sanders against Donald Trump has given us a much-needed measuring stick to attempt to calculate how truly divided this nation really is. My answer is, “beyond imagination.” That such a gap is now beginning to more fully manifest tells us a number…

February 2016 Anyone regularly reading these Bottom Line newsletters of mine probably has two things in common with me: 1) you recognize the deepening instability of our culture, and 2) you too may have trouble staying “balanced.” Sometimes the level of nonsense going on is like a very bad dream, at best, and a hallucination,…

January 2016 As virtually everyone in the public conversation knows, President Obama and others are vociferously maintaining that Islamic Jihadists are not “real Muslims.” I am certainly not an expert on Islam, but like many others, I have been through the Quran and have heard a number of real experts on this subject lecture and…

December 2015 The U.S. Pledge of Allegiance declares us to be as a people, “under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” Obviously, there is a great deal of contention among us as to exactly what that means and its veracity. Indeed, like any patriotic platform, it is both a statement of intent and…

November 2015 Conventional politics has been currently trumped by Donald-the-Trump’s entry into the Republican Party’s quest for the oval office. Uninvited and carrying with him a dazzling ability to insult his way into the mainstream media’s constant attention, he presents a host of problems to the party who previously set forth Mitt Romney as their…

October 2015 The following is an excerpt from Dennis Peacocke’s book, On the Destiny of Nations: In a significant section of our population, children are seen as an impediment to freedom and lifestyle choices, so they must be aborted. Historically, they have been seen as the hope for the future, a blessing, and a means…

September 2015 As many of you know, at the formative meetings of the Founders of this nation in Philadelphia, a chair was present with a carving on its back of a sun on a horizon. The question at the time was, “Is that sun rising or setting?” George Washington and Benjamin Franklin mused upon that…

August 2015 Man has struggled for countless centuries with the phenomenon of the “problem of evil.” Where does evil come from and can it be “cured?” Many theories and opinions abound. The ancients blamed animal spirits or evil spirits; even demi-gods sent from capricious Gods. Modern man in his attempt to rationally dispense with ancient…

July 2015 Life and reality are not a Hollywood movie with clear “good guys” (who are really good) and “bad guys” (who are really bad) battling things out for cosmic reasons. Certainly there are both really good people, really bad people, and cosmic battles in play, but many situations do not neatly fit into this…

June 2015 President Obama is currently overseeing the most major change in US Foreign Policy in the last seventy years. He is personally driving an agenda of US non-involvement which only political libertarians and hard-left policy people understand or agree upon. Though these two groups couldn’t be further apart economically (free market vs. government driven…

May 2015 Ancient Israel was established by God on a very deep social and personal set of cycles. Every seven days there was a mandatory Sabbath; every seven years a “reset” of loans and collateral securities; every seven years there was to be a sabbatical year for the land and all related agricultural activity; every…

April 2015 As multiple millions know, Iran is in the process of trying to negotiate its way out of crushing economic sanctions designed to thwart its development of nuclear weapons. Here is what we know surrounding the process for sure: 1) Oil rich Iran doesn’t need nuclear power as an energy source. 2) Iran has…

March 2015 The foundations of Western civilization rest squarely upon its Judeo-Christian roots. While Greece and Rome contributed to that foundation, their contributions were housed and contextualized in the theological shell of the church’s interpretation of Scripture. Granted, the Church did stumble more than once, to be kind. Nevertheless, the early fathers gave to the…

February 2015 This is not another critique of President Obama nor an endorsement of conservative or liberal political perspectives. It is far more important than that. It is an attempt to deal with three of the root issues most afflicting us as a nation and, to some degree, the greater part of western culture. It…

January 2015 On the subject of poking things with sticks, we may find wisdom in the old adage, “Let sleeping dogs lie.” This usually means, don’t provoke something unless you are fully prepared for both their responses and your own. Provocation of someone or a situation should not be done without strategic thinking—unless, of course,…

December 2014 As wonderful as life is, it is frequently a challenge and often filled with deep disappointments. As we celebrate the birth of Christ this month, even He, as the Scripture reminds us in Isaiah 53:3, was “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” The fallenness of mankind and reality of human suffering…