So I am toodling around the blogs and I see that Mexico is a little upset with President Bush’s plan to send the National Guard to the border. Last Night on the O’Reilly Factor, Bill said:

After hearing President Bush order 6,000 National Guard troops to the southern border earlier this week, Mexico’s Foreign Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez, went on a radio program in Mexico and said, “If there is a real wave of rights abuses, if we see the National Guard starting to directly participate in detaining people, we would immediately start filing lawsuits through our consulates.”

Where does the Foreign Secretary get off? Does anyone else think that they would have no right to walk into our courts and sue our government? One of the biggest miscommunications of our system is that rights are for noncitizens. This is a constant issue. Who all has a right to a license, education, free health care (which I don’t get), etc? Now because we, as a nation, are trying to secure our borders the Mexican government is going to sue us. Now I don’t take quite as a hard line as Bill O’Reilly, who says if they sue boycott anything from Mexico. But I do think that something has to be done. According to a news story from KFOXTV in El Paso, the Mexican government has sent armed soldiers over the border. Some claim it is to investigated what we are doing but others fear for the safety of the people living on the US side of the border. Given all this, I think that if the Mexican government doesn’t help to secure the border and deal with illegal immigration, we should seal the border. What all would that entail, I am not sure. But, something has to happen. When one nation decides to violate another country’s border we call that declaring war. This is no longer just individuals wanting for a better life but it appears to a nation trying to invade our space and way of life. What are we going to do about it?

(HT: Two Babes and A Brain)

So last week I was at Bible Study and we were studying Philippians 3. One of the things being discussed was Philippians 3:8-9:

8What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.

One of our study questions was, “What does faith look like to you?”. Someone said they trust science and math so believing in anything unquantifiabled was faith. Our leader was talking about God being the same today, yesterday and forever. Suddenly it clicked. Living with God leading your life is like a Calculus problem. Before we go any further you have to know that I loved calculus. There is nothing more satisfying than working on a problem that takes at least a page to solve (ok, at least academically).

So how does this work in my twisted little mind? When you are sitting in a classroom you are assigned a problem. Your teacher knows that you have the tools (books, past problems, class notes, etc) to solve the problem but you are not sure. This is similar to God. God put’s things in our life (problems, obstacles, growth opportunities, etc) but He has equipped us with all the tools we need to get through it (the Bible, prayer, wisdom of other mature Christians, etc). When you start to solve a complex math problem you review all the details and occasionally diagram the problem. Then using your various tools, take it one step at a time. When you take the first step, you take blind. You do not start a complex calculus problem knowing what the answer is. Frankly, you don’t even always know what you 2nd step is until you take the 1st step. That is similar to faith. You have to believe that you have the tools to complete the task you have been given. You just have to take it one step at a time until you reach completion. You will just frustrate yourself if you look to far ahead. God will never give you anything that you don’t have the tools for. You have to also remember that one of the biggest tools is prayer because that is how we communicate with God. Just like our math teacher is always there if we need help, so is God. So while people think that math and faith are at odds, really math can teach you how to have faith.

The new Carnival of Family Life is up! There are so sweet and funny family stories.

The Homeschooing Carnival is up over at Home Sweet Home! Melissa has done a great job. I am looking forward to reading all the great posts when I get home from church! Go check it out!

While aimed at our secular friends, this primer of Christian terms contains a few facts some of my fellow Christianists might not know. Such as:

• The first Baptist was John the Baptist, who was said to eat locusts and honey, although contemporary Baptists generally prefer barbecue.
• The Bible was so successful that God wrote a sequel, “Bible II: On to Rome,” now generally called “The New Testament.”

From holyoffice: The Interpretative Dance Theocrats:

The NerdBug is going into kindergarten next year and I am a little daunted in the planning of our year. So I just rechecked out So You’re Thinking About Homeschooling by Lisa Whelchel from the library. I have already read it and it is a great book full of encouragement. That is providing me with the “You go girl!” that I need but it doesn’t do the work for me. In the book there are various ways to homeschool mentioned. I will be honest, the more I look around to see what there is, the more my head hurts. Right now I have decided to just look at 2 ways and then move on to the next options, so first up is Classical and Unschooling.
(A side note, when faced with many choices I usually look and compare 2 at a time. Take the winner of those 2 and then compare it with the next. It stops me from getting overwhelmed, as much.)
Unschooling, in a few ways, naturally draws me. To start with, I don’t think traditional school is working so isn’t all unschooling from there? According to the Family Unschoolers Network:

Our primary purpose in unschooling is to keep alive the spark of curiosity and the natural love of learning with which all children are born. We want our children to accept learning as a natural part of living, and an ongoing process that continues throughout life. We want their learning to remain an integrated process in which all subjects are interrelated. We also want to allow them the time to pursue a subject as fully as they want, rather than imposing artificial time constraints on them.

I was very self driven to educate my self on many things as a child. I would hear my parents discussing a historical or political issue and I would go research it. Then the next time it came up I could join in the conversation (Now really was this my quest for knowledge or fitting in, who knows?). In reality, this drove my stepdad nuts. He would give me a hard time about “having to know something about everything”. This gives me some faith that children want to know about everything so if they are self directed they won’t just learn nothing. But how are you to accomplish that? According to Unschooling.com:

Read, play, sing, dance, grow things, write. All of these things and more are things unschoolers do. We do them because they interest us and bring us joy or because they help us accomplish our dreams. We do the things that have meaning in our lives and contained within those activities is real learning.

To me it appears that the children pick out what they want to learn about. In many ways, as I stated before, I think that might work but..(there is always a but). If college has taught me anything it was seeing that many people choose to have tunnel vision. I know many(not all are this way) wonderful, brilliant engineers but the only thing they really know about is engineering, math and science. They probably know who is President and what party they are a member of but that is about it. If you want to discuss any political issue, historical event or religious history they are at a loss because it never interested them as kids.
Classical is another method that really interests me. It seems to also include the Charlotte Mason theory. According to the Well Trained Mind:

Classical education depends on a three-part process of training the mind. The early years of school are spent in absorbing facts, systematically laying the foundations for advanced study. In the middle grades, students learn to think through arguments. In the high school years, they learn to express themselves. This classical pattern is called the trivium.

This makes a lot of sense also. Both NerdDad and I read so much as kids and memorized so much, we both reap the rewards (both of us separately read the dictionary and the encyclopedia). It is logical that if you have a rich base you can build anything. This method does appear to be stiff and a bit rigid. According to many sources I found, the kids should be doing Latin and Greek very young and that has a lot to do with the logic development. I admit that intimidates me a bit. The other side is, I see the lack of logic in the world and the price is very high.

Now, I admit I feel a little burned by the Unschooling method already with my kids. I took some of this approach with potty training my eldest. Everyone said, “don’t push a boy, you will scar him for life” and I listened. I waited, he was 2 no interest, I waited, 2 1/2 no interest. Finally at 3 NerdDad said, “Sit on the potty and try”. We had to give him a schedule and structure to at least try or he wouldn’t at all. This creates a fear in me that the children may not be willing to do the work to acquire the needed logic, math and reading skills. Can you marry these 2 styles to encourage a love of learning? Maybe use classical education very young with a little unschooling on the side and as the kids get older shift? As I am looking at books and planning out the year I am scared. While frankly, I know I will do fine in comparison to public school, will I be giving my son all that he needs to be his best. Hopefully, I will get copious amounts of input from all of you in the blogosphere and with that and prayer we will muddle through.

So the other night a friend of mine and I were talking about a variety of historical and citizenship issues. Real quick we both said that we thought that it was unreasonable to automatically give someone citizenship simply because they are born on US soil. I thought that was true but something that would not be approached for a long time, as far as a policy change. Well this morning, by way of the Corner, I found a blurb on Free Republic that talked about this in New Zealand.

Changes to the Citizenship Act mean there are tighter rules on children acquiring citizenship at birth.

It will only happen now if at least one of their parents is a New Zealand citizen or is entitled to be in New Zealand, the Cook Islands, Tokelau or Niue indefinitely.

I think that this would be a great policy here. We don’t want people scheduling their vacation visa to coinside with delivery time. Also, this has been a common theme in illegal immigration. Because, if an illegal has a baby who is a citizen, do we strip the parent away and send them back? That doesn’t seem reasonable but neither does rewarding illegal behavior. So why can’t we pass legislation to take care of this problem? Some people just say that it is because we have to many democrats, and sure that is a problem. Could the other problem also be that the Republican Party is scared? Scared of seeming mean, uncaring and losing the minority vote? Maybe the Republicans should do this just because it is right? Just some musings.

The Media Research Center has rated the top 10 left wing scenes from The West Wing.

My personal favorite:

Donna, played by Janel Moloney, as she and Josh walk down a hallway: “We have a $32 billion budget surplus for the first time in three decades. The Republicans in Congress want to use this money for tax relief, right?”

Josh: “Yes”

Donna: “Essentially what they’re saying is we want to give back the money. Why don’t we want to give back the money?”

Josh: “Because we’re Democrats.”

Donna: “But it’s not the government’s money.”

Josh: “Sure it is. It’s right there in our bank accounts.”

Donna: “That’s only because we collected more money than we ended up needing.”

Josh: “Isn’t it great?”

Donna: “I want my money back.”

Josh: “Sorry.”

Later, they pick up the argument:

Donna: “What’s wrong with me getting my money back?”

Josh: “You won’t spend it right.”

Donna: “What do you mean?”

Josh: “Let’s say your cut of the surplus is $700. I want to take your money, combine it with everybody else’s money, and use it to pay down the debt and further endow Social Security. What do you want to do with it?”

Donna: “Buy a DVD player.”

Josh: “See.”

Donna: “But my $700 is helping employ the people who manufacture and sell DVD players, not to mention the people who manufacture and sell DVDs. It’s the natural evolution of the market economy.”

Josh: “The problem is the DVD player you buy might be manufactured in Japan.”

Donna: “I’ll buy an American one.”

Josh: “We don’t trust you.”

Donna: “Why not?”

Josh: “We’re Democrats.”

Donna, exasperated: “I want my money back.”

Josh, snickering: “You shouldn’t have voted for us.”

If that doesn’t sum it up what does;).
(HT: Hugh Hewitt)

Am I just boring or are people crazy? Electic Shock Roulette is a game where the participants put their finger in and the light starts going around. Then it slows and finally shocks one participant. I just found this interesting!

(HT: Gizmodo)

An article called “Why We Haven’t Met Any Aliens: A radical explanation for a conundrum about extra-terrestrial life, and what it means for the future of humanity” attempts to answer Fermi’s paradox: If there is intelligent life among the stars, there should be a lot of ETs running around and so we should have met one by now.  Where are they?

Most bright alien species probably go extinct gradually, allocating more time and resources to their pleasures, and less to their children.

Note: “Most species”. The rest?

Heritable variation in personality might allow some lineages to resist the Great Temptation and last longer….Christian and Muslim fundamentalists and anti-consumerism activists already understand exactly what the Great Temptation is, and how to avoid it.

Is this good news for my lineage, or bad news?  It does sound like the lead-in to a joke, “The Pope, Osama, and Ralph Nader walk into a bar?”