Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Pastor's fodder: THE BIBLICAL DEFENSE OF BEARING ARMS

Pastor's fodder: THE BIBLICAL DEFENSE OF BEARING ARMS: "Can you imagine how people would react today if you told people that while their mouths were filled with praise to God, their hands should be filled with weapons? Yet that is exactly what David wrote in Psalm 149:1-7
Praise ye the LORD. Sing unto the LORD a new song, and his praise in the congregation of saints. Let Israel rejoice in him that made him: let the children of Zion be joyful in their King. Let them praise his name in the dance: let them sing praises unto him with the timbrel and harp. For the LORD taketh pleasure in his people: he will beautify the meek with salvation. Let the saints be joyful in glory: let them sing aloud upon their beds. Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a twoedged sword in their hand; To execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people."

Google People Operations: The secrets of the world’s most scientific human resources department. - Slate Magazine

Google People Operations: The secrets of the world’s most scientific human resources department. - Slate Magazine: "Yet it would be a mistake to conclude that Google doles out such perks just to be nice. POPS rigorously monitors a slew of data about how employees respond to benefits, and it rarely throws money away. The five-month maternity leave plan, for instance, was a winner for the company. After it went into place, Google’s attrition rate for new mothers dropped down to the average rate for the rest of the firm. “A 50 percent reduction—it was enormous!” Bock says. What’s more, happiness—as measured by Googlegeist, a lengthy annual survey of employees—rose as well. Best of all for the company, the new leave policy was cost-effective. Bock says that if you factor in the savings in recruitment costs, granting mothers five months of leave doesn’t cost Google any more money."

Contraceptives and the ACA: Going over the Mandate Cliff | Ilya Shapiro | Cato Institute

Contraceptives and the ACA: Going over the Mandate Cliff | Ilya Shapiro | Cato Institute: "If we’re to respect religious belief, why does the motive of those espousing them matter for whether the government gets to trample them? The owners of Hobby Lobby donate plenty to charity out of the profits they make, possibly having greater impact than many of the nonprofits that are (or will be) exempt. [Even] if they didn’t, however, this country was founded on ideals of religious liberty that went on to be enshrined in the First Amendment, so why would we just ignore them?"


"when health care (or anything) is socialized or treated as a public utility, we’re forced to fight for every “carve-out” of liberty."

"The more government controls — whether health care, education, or even marriage — the greater the battles over conflicting values."