As I think back over my first weekend in Jakarta, I have a couple of observations that I'd like to put down here.

I was struck by the level of security here. In America, the citizenry would be up in ARMS if we instituted the same level of checks and counter checks that they have here. Every hotel that I've been to (and that's where most of the bars/restaurants are) literally have a checkpoint where your car is stopped and armed guards come, look inside the glove box, the trunk, under the car with mirrors and profile the passengers. If the passengers are bule (white people), we are typically admitted without a fuss. I am told that if they are dressed in traditional Indonesian or muslim garb, they may be asked to step out and endure a pat-down.

After negotiating the security checkpoint, you are allowed to proceed to the entrance where you pay your cabbie the 20,000 rupiah or so that the ride costs (around $2 USD) and then pass through a metal detector and your lady has her purse examined. After that, you are home free and can enter the establishment. This is done not only at hotels, but also at the shopping malls and many restaurants.

I asked myself - what if this were America? I still feel somewhat violated when I am patted down at a baseball or football game. I am somewhat outraged at the car blockades around the Capitol and White House. I can't help but feel sometimes that the terror "alerts" are timed politically. Yet here, the threat is real - and no one seems to mind the extra security. In fact, if anything, the ex-pats I've run into will only frequent places with the extra security for safety.

Very interesting.

For more, visit www.dcoffline.com

Also, many of you have asked me for pictures. I am putting pictures up this afternoon on my Ringo site. If you are connected to me, you will get an automatic update. If not, reply to this post and request to be added to my network. I'll do my best to process the requests quickly.

News Analysis: 'Islamic fascists'? Bush sees a war of ideology - Americas - International Herald Tribune

Every morning here in Jakarta, I wake up and head up to the 18th floor to eat breakfast, drink some excellent coffee and read the International Herald Tribute - a fascinating paper out of London that you can find online at www.iht.com. One of the articles today that cought my attention I have linked to above.

A critical debate in the United States today - among political candidates and among national security experts - is whether five years of war declarations and war-making have helped to make the country more secure. Or, even in the absence of a major attack on the United States since Sept. 11, 2001, has this strategy created greater danger by providing terror groups with exactly what they crave: the sense that they are a unified army of jihadists? And has the strategy radicalized large swaths of the Muslim world in ways that were not imaginable as recently as 2003?

For more, visit www.dcoffline.com.

I read the whole debate before I say anything on the previous post.  I don't want to enrage anybody, but a story just came out today which discusses the conflict between business and religion, and law each supports.  Wal-mart and co. are pushing for more and more alcohol in it's stores, including political campaigning in dry counties throughout the south.  It is increasingly difficult to talk about any religious beliefs in any sphere without bumping into government regulation and control.  Here in Ohio there has been a long sustained push for gambling, you know, to help the children.  The only groups organized enough to fight gambling (i.e. a calculated extraction of cash from typically the poor that goes straight to big business with a cut to the state) are the churches.  If Christians, etc. are model citizens but sit on their hands politically, they may find family members in debt and broke, and that affects them personally too.

That being said it is tacky to have jets flying and an American flag in a church.

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/08/10/cheney-ct/

Cheney reaches new depths of lunacy as he outlines why Lieberman's loss Tuesday actually helps the terrorists.

Is it me, or is his fear-mongering actually becoming transparent? Is he saying the democrat voters of Connecticut should be ashamed of themselves for helping the terrorists?

I guess the new mantra is "Vote for Bush policies or DIE."

Read more at www.dcoffline.com

E

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110AP_Underage_Sex_Pact.html

Fear you'll lose your boyfriend while recuperating from surgery? Do you (a) play upon his sympathy, (b) have doctors give your scars sexy dressings, or (c) arrange for your 15-year-old daughter to have sex with him for a couple months?

Life's all about the tough choices, I guess . . .

I'm going to have to give this woman the Dumbass award of the day.

Read more at www.dcoffline.com

E

Ok, I just want to lay down a rule, right here in public, for all the world to see.  If you fill a 12 oz. glass with Vanilla Ice Cream before you even put the root beer in, that is not a "small" root beer float, and other people should not be obligated to finish it.  This is a deep koan on so many levels.

This guy may be my new hero. Since I grew up in a conservative church, this speaks to me on several levels. I'd love to get your feedback.

Visit www.dcoffline.com for more . . .

E

Disowning Conservative Politics, Evangelical Pastor Rattles Flock

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN

Correction Appended

MAPLEWOOD, Minn. — Like most pastors who lead thriving evangelical megachurches, the Rev. Gregory A. Boyd was asked frequently to give his blessing — and the church's — to conservative political candidates and causes.

The requests came from church members and visitors alike: Would he please announce a rally against gay marriage during services? Would he introduce a politician from the pulpit? Could members set up a table in the lobby promoting their anti-abortion work? Would the church distribute "voters' guides" that all but endorsed Republican candidates? And with the country at war, please couldn't the church hang an American flag in the sanctuary?

After refusing each time, Mr. Boyd finally became fed up, he said. Before the last presidential election, he preached six sermons called "The Cross and the Sword" in which he said the church should steer clear of politics, give up moralizing on sexual issues, stop claiming the United States as a "Christian nation" and stop glorifying American military campaigns.

"When the church wins the culture wars, it inevitably loses," Mr. Boyd preached. "When it conquers the world, it becomes the world. When you put your trust in the sword, you lose the cross."

Mr. Boyd says he is no liberal. He is opposed to abortion and thinks homosexuality is not God's ideal. The response from his congregation at Woodland Hills Church here in suburban St. Paul — packed mostly with politically and theologically conservative, middle-class evangelicals — was passionate. Some members walked out of a sermon and never returned. By the time the dust had settled, Woodland Hills, which Mr. Boyd founded in 1992, had lost about 1,000 of its 5,000 members.

But there were also congregants who thanked Mr. Boyd, telling him they were moved to tears to hear him voice concerns they had been too afraid to share.

"Most of my friends are believers," said Shannon Staiger, a psychotherapist and church member, "and they think if you're a believer, you'll vote for Bush. And it's scary to go against that."

Sermons like Mr. Boyd's are hardly typical in today's evangelical churches. But the upheaval at Woodland Hills is an example of the internal debates now going on in some evangelical colleges, magazines and churches. A common concern is that the Christian message is being compromised by the tendency to tie evangelical Christianity to the Republican Party and American nationalism, especially through the war in Iraq.

At least six books on this theme have been published recently, some by Christian publishing houses. Randall Balmer, a religion professor at Barnard College and an evangelical, has written "Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America — an Evangelical's Lament."

And Mr. Boyd has a new book out, "The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church," which is based on his sermons.

"There is a lot of discontent brewing," said Brian D. McLaren, the founding pastor at Cedar Ridge Community Church in Gaithersburg, Md., and a leader in the evangelical movement known as the "emerging church," which is at the forefront of challenging the more politicized evangelical establishment.

"More and more people are saying this has gone too far — the dominance of the evangelical identity by the religious right," Mr. McLaren said. "You cannot say the word 'Jesus' in 2006 without having an awful lot of baggage going along with it. You can't say the word 'Christian,' and you certainly can't say the word 'evangelical' without it now raising connotations and a certain cringe factor in people.

"Because people think, 'Oh no, what is going to come next is homosexual bashing, or pro-war rhetoric, or complaining about 'activist judges.' "

Mr. Boyd said he had cleared his sermons with the church's board, but his words left some in his congregation stunned. Some said that he was disrespecting President Bush and the military, that he was soft on abortion or telling them not to vote.

"When we joined years ago, Greg was a conservative speaker," said William Berggren, a lawyer who joined the church with his wife six years ago. "But we totally disagreed with him on this. You can't be a Christian and ignore actions that you feel are wrong. A case in point is the abortion issue. If the church were awake when abortion was passed in the 70's, it wouldn't have happened. But the church was asleep."

Mr. Boyd, 49, who preaches in blue jeans and rumpled plaid shirts, leads a church that occupies a squat block-long building that was once a home improvement chain store.

The church grew from 40 members in 12 years, based in no small part on Mr. Boyd's draw as an electrifying preacher who stuck closely to Scripture. He has degrees from Yale Divinity School and Princeton Theological Seminary, and he taught theology at Bethel University in St. Paul, where he created a controversy a few years ago by questioning whether God fully knew the future. Some pastors in his own denomination, the Baptist General Conference, mounted an effort to evict Mr. Boyd from the denomination and his teaching post, but he won that battle.

He is known among evangelicals for a bestselling book, "Letters From a Skeptic," based on correspondence with his father, a leftist union organizer and a lifelong agnostic — an exchange that eventually persuaded his father to embrace Christianity.

Mr. Boyd said he never intended his sermons to be taken as merely a critique of the Republican Party or the religious right. He refuses to share his party affiliation, or whether he has one, for that reason. He said there were Christians on both the left and the right who had turned politics and patriotism into "idolatry."

He said he first became alarmed while visiting another megachurch's worship service on a Fourth of July years ago. The service finished with the chorus singing "God Bless America" and a video of fighter jets flying over a hill silhouetted with crosses.

"I thought to myself, 'What just happened? Fighter jets mixed up with the cross?' " he said in an interview.

Patriotic displays are still a mainstay in some evangelical churches. Across town from Mr. Boyd's church, the sanctuary of North Heights Lutheran Church was draped in bunting on the Sunday before the Fourth of July this year for a "freedom celebration." Military veterans and flag twirlers paraded into the sanctuary, an enormous American flag rose slowly behind the stage, and a Marine major who had served in Afghanistan preached that the military was spending "your hard-earned money" on good causes.

In his six sermons, Mr. Boyd laid out a broad argument that the role of Christians was not to seek "power over" others — by controlling governments, passing legislation or fighting wars. Christians should instead seek to have "power under" others — "winning people's hearts" by sacrificing for those in need, as Jesus did, Mr. Boyd said.

"America wasn't founded as a theocracy," he said. "America was founded by people trying to escape theocracies. Never in history have we had a Christian theocracy where it wasn't bloody and barbaric. That's why our Constitution wisely put in a separation of church and state.

"I am sorry to tell you," he continued, "that America is not the light of the world and the hope of the world. The light of the world and the hope of the world is Jesus Christ."

Mr. Boyd lambasted the "hypocrisy and pettiness" of Christians who focus on "sexual issues" like homosexuality, abortion or Janet Jackson's breast-revealing performance at the Super Bowl halftime show. He said Christians these days were constantly outraged about sex and perceived violations of their rights to display their faith in public.

"Those are the two buttons to push if you want to get Christians to act," he said. "And those are the two buttons Jesus never pushed."

Some Woodland Hills members said they applauded the sermons because they had resolved their conflicted feelings. David Churchill, a truck driver for U.P.S. and a Teamster for 26 years, said he had been "raised in a religious-right home" but was torn between the Republican expectations of faith and family and the Democratic expectations of his union.

When Mr. Boyd preached his sermons, "it was liberating to me," Mr. Churchill said.

Mr. Boyd gave his sermons while his church was in the midst of a $7 million fund-raising campaign. But only $4 million came in, and 7 of the more than 50 staff members were laid off, he said.

Mary Van Sickle, the family pastor at Woodland Hills, said she lost 20 volunteers who had been the backbone of the church's Sunday school.

"They said, 'You're not doing what the church is supposed to be doing, which is supporting the Republican way,' " she said. "It was some of my best volunteers."

The Rev. Paul Eddy, a theology professor at Bethel University and the teaching pastor at Woodland Hills, said: "Greg is an anomaly in the megachurch world. He didn't give a whit about church leadership, never read a book about church growth. His biggest fear is that people will think that all church is is a weekend carnival, with people liking the worship, the music, his speaking, and that's it."

In the end, those who left tended to be white, middle-class suburbanites, church staff members said. In their place, the church has added more members who live in the surrounding community — African-Americans, Hispanics and Hmong immigrants from Laos.

This suits Mr. Boyd. His vision for his church is an ethnically and economically diverse congregation that exemplifies Jesus' teachings by its members' actions. He, his wife and three other families from the church moved from the suburbs three years ago to a predominantly black neighborhood in St. Paul.

Mr. Boyd now says of the upheaval: "I don't regret any aspect of it at all. It was a defining moment for us. We let go of something we were never called to be. We just didn't know the price we were going to pay for doing it."

His congregation of about 4,000 is still digesting his message. Mr. Boyd arranged a forum on a recent Wednesday night to allow members to sound off on his new book. The reception was warm, but many of the 56 questions submitted in writing were pointed: Isn't abortion an evil that Christians should prevent? Are you saying Christians should not join the military? How can Christians possibly have "power under" Osama bin Laden? Didn't the church play an enormously positive role in the civil rights movement?

One woman asked: "So why NOT us? If we contain the wisdom and grace and love and creativity of Jesus, why shouldn't we be the ones involved in politics and setting laws?"

Mr. Boyd responded: "I don't think there's a particular angle we have on society that others lack. All good, decent people want good and order and justice. Just don't slap the label 'Christian' on it."

I recently spoke with a brilliant young man with a somewhat lucrative job; he only had to work for three months out of the year and spent the rest of the time traveling to Europe and telling friends and college students how great his job was.  Just a couple of years out of college and had little savings and no credit card.  I talked with him a little bit about the rules of the game that big institutions, like banks and the IRS, set up for peons like us to follow.  He asked me if there were some book he could read so he could know what the rules were.

Well, there are some books out there, usually published by modern-day get-rich televangelists, and these investevangelists have the same purpose as ordinary televangelists, that is, to seperate fools from their money.  At best they want you to buy their book, at worst there are 200$ board games and 1500$ seminars to attend.  I've always felt these talks were helpful but I never want to pay a dime for them.  Similarly, I felt I learned a lot about big business when I attended an Amway meeting, at the ripe age of 17.  However, I didn't want to invest the time or money (I didn't have any!) trying to persuade others to invest their time and money etc. etc.

A good barometer for the legitimacy of the investevangelist is their promixity to Amway and other pyramid schemes.  Suze Orman, for example, has an audience participation part of her programs.  Often these audience members stand up and talk about how they ruined their credit buying tons of stuff in an attempt to get rich off of some pyramid scheme, and she has often set these people straight.  On the other hand, Robert Kiyosaki does not distance himself from the pyramid schemes as he wants their business.

Probably the most reasonable of the investevangelists is David Bach, who writes and talks about the "latte factor".

If anyone wants to learn about the mindset and techniques of getting rich, you can easily get a copy of their work at the local library.  Usually it is in CD, Video, or book format.  At it's worst this kind of stuff is still more educational, and has fewer plot twists, than an episode of 24 or Lost.  But, most likely, if you find someone successful in business, you can find out pretty much everything you need to know from them that are covered in these infotainment shows.  Although I am not rich or wealthy, not even a success story yet really, I've made some mistakes and learned from them and have a plan that doesn't deviate from these guys too much.  And as a one time offer I will void the logipundit gold member subscription fee (50$/month) required for this special money making content guaranteed to double or triple your income within the next ten years.  You've heard of Donald Trump and Warren Buffett right?  Don't you want to learn their secrets?  Well just keep reading silly, and you'll find out the true secret to ultimate riches.

Rule #1.
(Are you ready)


(Drum roll)


GET A JOB
What did you expect?  People will just give you money for nothing?  Think everyone can just flip houses for a living with a zero $ down payment?  What planet are you on?  Sure, this can work, if you make a full time job out of doing your homework of knowing the neighborhood you are buying in, knowing what is a good house, catching any problems, and knowing the demographics of customers, this might work.  Flipping houses also might work in a big city like NYC or DC, but less likely in the "Columbus metropolitan area", and for most of the heartland.  By the way, anyone interested in a 1200 square foot 2 bedroom home for $300,000 here in Columbus?  It's only about  30 years old.Yeah, I didn't think so.

Ok ready for Rule #2

THIS IS A BIG ONE...READY?

GET AND/OR PAY OFF YOUR CREDIT CARD

 In today's society, there are simply too many benefits to carrying a credit card.  Having a line of credit is something banks look for when you buy a car or home.  Old school of thought was that you buy everything with cash on the barrelhead, but it is unheard of to cash out a house these days.  Having a line of credit for a long time tells banks that you are playing the game and not sitting on the sidelines.  Also, good luck getting a plane ticket, renting a car, and getting a hotel room with your debit card.

  Another old school way of thinking, which is really admirable, honestly, is to just keep the credit card for emergencies.  Unfortunately, it kind of works out that you should spend a good bit on your credit card and pay it off at the end of the month.  The trick is not to put more on your credit card than you can afford to pay off at once.  Pay off your credit card at the end of every month all the way down to zero.  Pretty soon you can get dividends and frequent flyer miles, we got a $300 of dividend from our credit card, which was basically 1% to 5% of our purchases sent back to us, spending money on stuff we were going to buy anyway.

  Also, using the credit card in this way helps you itemize your purchases, which can help you come tax time.

Ok now time for the big one:

Rule #3: Don't eat out if you can cook it yourself.
 Ok, this one's real metaphorical.  But seriously, when YJ and I take an opportunity to eat out, we aren't going to eat omelettes, spaghetti, or anything with chicken.  These are staples of our diet.  I am the omelette master, and I've calculated the price per omelette of my one-of-a kind masterpieces.  For a kickass omelette it costs ~$1.50.  Why would I pay $7.50 for something I can do better myself?  I know many eligible bachelors are saying, "Ha, I can't cook anything".  Well, I hope you enjoy microwave pizza.  Get some Ragu and learn to boil noodles, or else pay 6+$ per meal to someone else.  Or, ask your Mom how to cook something.

But the cook it yourself principle applies to many aspects of life, specifically investments.  I used to invest in Edward Jones, and was pretty passive about the process.  Well, after getting my savings thoroughly trashed at the hands of a trusted investment specialist, I took charge of my own money and did substantially better at a no frills investment house than going with $50 per transaction investment gatekeepers.   I estimate I gained about 10% in a bull market, and I'm skeptical, really, about how I can do in a Bear market.  But probably betting on big blue chips with fat dividends is a good start.  Anyway, as our fellow contributor Reagan Gahagan attests, Citibank and others are getting aggressive about offering 5% savings accounts, which is better than nothing and is FDIC.

We plan on taking the same approach to buying a house when the time comes (i.e. when we leave Columbus).  Hopefully soon it will be just as easy to buy a house as a stock.

Update ( I got a little tired at the end there.  Of course buying a house will never be as easy as buying a stock.  I am trying to allude to the shift from using the services of a gatekeeper (realtors and real estate agents) to using online resources, which should drive down the hassle and cost of buying a home some.

This is just insane.  Apparently Pat Robertson experiences a few hot days, and all of a sudden he's a "convert" for global warming.  I don't know what's most asinine, the idea that somewhat can be "converted" by a few record hot days, or the idea that because there's a few hot days means it's humanity's fault.


Plus, if it's the sign of the second coming...(if I recall my Revelation, I believe REALLY HOT temperatures is part of the deal), then why wouldn't it be human's fault?  That would kind of make sense.  So why did he need this week to come up with this conclusion?  That would be a really good connection that would have people sending money to the 700 Club wouldn't it?


Personally, I'm pretty sure the debate on whether humans and our polution are to blame is still going (even though many seem to make the conclusion that "the debate is over" and "all scientists agree", when all they really agree on is that it's getting hotter...not why.)


By the way, if anyone wants to lay out an argument either way, I'd love to hear it, but please don't tell me a few hot days in the dead of summer that broke records by about 1 degree provides "evidence" of human causes of global warming.


It's almost like the abortion/pro-choice debate.  Both sides continually talk past each other, because one side is talking about the sanctity of life and the other side is talking about the sanctity of personal freedom, and in both cases they both actually agree with each other but avoid the true scientific question:  when does human life begin?  And since noone knows the answer, all we hear is:


"Environmentalist Wacko!" or "right-wing greedy capitalist"

All that being said...DAMN it was hot today.

This Article tells us why Raul Castro will be more of a reformer than we think...by telling us that we really have very little reason to believe that he's going to be a reformer at all, other than that he just might.  What a non-story for such a headline.