Death Row

So, in Houston, we have a horrible problem with the DNA crime lab, what with mislabeled evidence, corrupted evidence/samples, and all kinds of other missteps. Someone (I can't recall from the news I just saw) has called for a moratorium on all death row executions until the evidence is re-tested. At least two people in the past two months have had their convictions overturned, one of whom will be released in the next few days. The D.A. intends to retry the case against the man because the rape victim is sure it was him, even though the DNA sample proves the man didn't do it. The D.A.'s reason aside from the "eyewitness" identification? Just because there have been mistakes made doesn't mean a mistake was made in this case. Maybe I'm missing something here, but they proved a mistake was made and that the guy should not have been convicted.

As a supporter of capital punishment, I fully endorse the moratorium on the executions in these cases. If there be any question as to the validity of the evidence used to convict someone, what harm is there in verifying the results and delaying the execution? None that I can think of. Closure cannot be a reason, as it's been so many years for the victim's and their families, a few more weeks or months cannot matter. Expediency of doing justice is an extremely lame excuse, as, with the numerous appeals and attempts to change the outcomes, years go by from initial sentencing to carrying out the sentence. Again, what harm can there be in waiting?

If you are truly interested in seeing justice done, I cannot see any reason why holding off on executions in these cases is a problem. Isn't it far better to prove "yea" or "nay" than to make everyone wonder and call into question your motives for wanting to press forward with the execution if there is a chance the convicted person is actually innocent? I know that "everyone" is innocent in prison, and most are truly not innocent despite their protestations to the contrary. This is serious business, the taking of one's life. How can we be flippant in denying them a chance to prove their innocence, especially in these cases?

Gifts

We've been doing a class for the single adults at our church that involves discovering our spiritual gifts, our passions, and things we're interested in doing. I was kind of shocked to find out my top spiritual gift according the to the survey I took: prophecy. That's quite a shock for a (dreaded) Southern Baptist boy, as SB's are quite well known for their prophetic gifts. That was followed by teaching and wisdom. Don't laugh at the wisdom part. Is there such a thing as artificial wisdom? It would go so well with my artificial intelligence.

I was not too shocked by the teaching one. I expected it to be high. Ever since I was a little kid, my mother felt I would be some kind of teacher. And I have been for years, in some form or fashion, either just helping people, tutoring, writing, or actually teaching. I noticed something else today about the teaching. I've been teaching other single adults for over two years now. I don't get much feedback about my teaching, so from a purely human standpoint, I'm not sure if I do a good job or not. Sometimes I feel particularly moved in the Spirit; sometimes (usually) I'm well aware of my own inadequacy; sometimes both at the same time. Yet, I have never based my worth on my teaching. I'm glad to be used of God in any small way, and I hope I don't get in the way too much. I take comfort in the fact that I try to remain open to what the Spirit moves me to say, and that is more than sufficient.

In other areas of my life, I automatically assume I suck because I hear no positive feedback  (once a year doesn't count in my book; it is better than nothing, but only by an extremely small epsilon -- it's virtually identical to nothing). There is nothing in me that allows me to look objectively at what I do and consider what I did worthwhile. Telling myself I did a good job doesn't fill that void in my life. With teaching, I see myself somewhat divorced from the process (since God is doing it); with everything else, I find it dependent upon me.

Movie Update

The Son
This was a very interesting movie. The premise is that a shop teacher (carpentry) takes on student who was responsible for the teacher's son's death years ago. Yes, a little twisted, but worthwhile. There's no music in the foreground or background; the sounds of the carpentry shop serve that purpose. The ultimate question becomes, What would it take for you to forgive someone? We're so interested in vengeance that we forget that people are involved all the way around. I'm not at all advocating a lack of justice or being soft, but our job is not to destroy a person. There is hope.

Universal Soldier: The Return
Let me just say that I was not at all expecting a film of any artistic merit whatsoever. The original Universal Soldier was a fun little romp, a totally mindless piece of candy; I figured that the sequel would be somewhat along the same lines. It's hard to believe that this film failed to live up to no expectations! It was so horrible. The redeeming feature of the movie? it was only 82 minutes, including credits. This movie had lots of characterization, the full gamut of which was demonstrated in each main character every minute or so. It's really bad when Jean-Claude Van Damme is the high point of the movie. There were actually a couple of nifty parts, to be fair, one of which was when some of the "uni-sols" came down the ropes in the big warehouse. That must have been a fun scene to shoot.

And has anyone heard of the band, Pig in a Can? Their style is best classified as Industrial-Techno-Blues. Yeah, you read that right. A very different kind of a sound.

An Example of it Being Easier

A little over a month ago here in the Houston area, a 10-year-old boy
shot his father who had just picked him up for his weekend visitation.
The mother of the boy claims the ex-husband molested both of their boys
repeatedly. Needless to say, the divorce between the parents was
extremely bitter. My gut instinct is that there was no abuse, but what
better way to destroy someone, in particular a man? Regardless of any
proof or not, he's considered guilty by most everyone.

But that is not the point of this post.

The man had his own house and a live-in girlfriend/common-law wife. Now,
there is no documentation at all, as is common in common-law situations.
The only "proof" the g/f has is that he signed a piece of paper for her
daughter and signed it with "step-father" as the relation, whence he
must be her "husband". Well, his parents are coming in to stay for a
while, and they're taking his house. A judge agrees with the parents and
has ordered the g/f out of the house. She wants control of his estate,
but the guy's mom was named as the executor of his will.

How much easier would it have been for them to go ahead and get married?
Then she wouldn't be out on her ... whatever appendage appears
appropriate to you. Why do we complicate things? Why do we assume we
know better, that whatever we can come up with, because it sounds good
to us, must be okay, and that there will be no consequences for the
decisions we make?

God has set up standards for us to live by, not to control us, not to
keep us from having fun, but to protect us. Yet, like impetuous
children, we can't think ahead five seconds to consider anything beyond
how we feel at the time. We, who have no experience and don't understand
everything (or much of anything), automatically know better and know
what's best for us. What we know is that we don't like to be told, "No",
or even, "Wait".

Apology?

CBS and Dan Rather have now massively back-pedaled on the authenticity of the documents. They claim they followed the highest journalistic standards in exposing these documents. BULL! If that were true, they would have verified the authenticity of the documents rather than taking the word of a person with an axe to grind. But no, because Bush is Republican, they have somehow excused themselves from having to uphold the same standard of journalistic excellence, and I use the term "excellence" very loosely here. I'm sure ABC and NBC are quite thankful (but thankful to whom?) that they didn't jump on the story, too. Jane Fonda was more sincere in her apology.

If only this would wake people up to the predations of the press, that objectivity only shows up in how they view themselves and nothing else.

Blog Slog

So much to write, and I've done nothing. So many things I could talk about, and instead I just waste time watching TV. Not even movies. Just TV. Some things I enjoy immensely: The Simpsons, King of the Hill, Stargate SG-1 (no cable or satellite, so I only see what's in syndication on broadcast TV), Dharma & Greg, Alias. Some things I enjoy quite a bit: Extreme Makeover Home Edition, Arrested Development, America's Funniest Videos, COPS, Keeping Up Appearances, Are You Being Served?, Mad TV. And some things I watch just because they're on in the middle of other things I like to watch: Drew Carey, Malcolm in the Middle (which I've actually grown a little fond of), Last of the Summer Wine (really not very good at all), The Outer Limits (again, in broadcast syndication), whatever show Dame Judy Dench is on.

Last Wednesday, my (local) church started a 26-week program for men called Men's Life. There is finally something for men in the church that doesn't involve taking a day off work to participate. Not that our focus is numbers at all, but:

• 170 men pre-registered
• we estimate 240 men showed up
• 50 pre-made binders for the pre-registered men were not picked up

That tells me that men are hungry for something to tell them their worth, to find their place in this world (thanks, MWS).

I got pulled into a different group than I was originally assigned to: the new group leader knows me pretty well and wants me to sub for him when he's not able to be there. He's taking a class at a university in Scotland, and has to be there two or three times over the course. He's also expecting his second child, a little girl, any day now. And, he's serving as the interim missions minister. He will have his hands full all the way around. Anyway, I know that my being pulled into this group is better for me from an instinctive, spiritual, level. I'm the oldest one in this group by far; I'm the only single one; and they all have or are about to have at least two children. Part of what I must deal with is my own feeling of inferiority, of being somehow less than all other males. This is my big drawback that I let keep me from doing all that I wish or should.

Yet, I must conquer this Goliath in order to move on with my life. I've not been able to do it alone, and I've not had faith enough to allow God to work it out. It wasn't even until this year that I could acknowledge any worth of myself (assigned by God, not inherent worth). To go further than that, though, is a step I've not been able to make.

For me, love is something I've come to accept as a fact of life, a fact that I am loved. People act in ways toward me that are indicative of loving me. Yet, it's not a real thing for me. I'm appreciative of people's efforts, don't get me wrong. But it's more a logical premise than anything deeper. And I've come to the point where I can live with this type of love. And for now, my worth assigned by God is just a fact I accept, not something I truly experience. And I can't settle for that in my life. I must experience this worth as something tangible I can point to in my life, not just one of a long litany of facts about my life.

Update

I know I've not posted much of anything lately, but there's been too much to post and not enough to inspire me to write it down. Revelations from God about who I am and what I do or don't do, it's all kind of hard for me to process at this time. I feel like an emotional wrecking ball, or maybe the building the wrecking ball smashed into. I'm not sure which.

I still don't know what's coming exactly, future-wise. I did pick up a book at Sam's Sunday a week ago entitled, Good to Great, that studies how some companies have managed to go from being just good companies to maintaining success for a sustained time (15 years). They started out explaining the role of the leader in these successes. What they found was that the "big" personalities were negatively correlated to running a successful company for a sustained period. Some of the common characteristics of the "great" leaders include quietness, unassuming, almost background type of people. (I'm very tired and can't come up with the other traits off the top of my head.) Suffice it to say that these things describe my personality pretty well, and that gives me hope that I wouldn't be a total loss at running my own company. Not that these make me a great leader inherently, but that does answer a big question for me, that my basic personality is not necessarily an obstacle to overcome.

And let me just say that I still hate sinus attacks. I guess a doctor visit is coming up for some nice antihistamines and antibiotics if this doesn't go away in the next day or so. :::sigh:::

Update

I know I've not posted much of anything lately, but there's been too much to post and not enough to inspire me to write it down. Revelations from God about who I am and what I do or don't do, it's all kind of hard for me to process at this time. I feel like an emotional wrecking ball, or maybe the building the wrecking ball smashed into. I'm not sure which.

I still don't know what's coming exactly, future-wise. I did pick up a book at Sam's Sunday a week ago entitled, Good to Great, that studies how some companies have managed to go from being just good companies to maintaining success for a sustained time (15 years). They started out explaining the role of the leader in these successes. What they found was that the "big" personalities were negatively correlated to running a successful company for a sustained period. Some of the common characteristics of the "great" leaders include quietness, unassuming, almost background type of people. (I'm very tired and can't come up with the other traits off the top of my head.) Suffice it to say that these things describe my personality pretty well, and that gives me hope that I wouldn't be a total loss at running my own company. Not that these make me a great leader inherently, but that does answer a big question for me, that my basic personality is not necessarily an obstacle to overcome.

And let me just say that I still hate sinus attacks. I guess a doctor visit is coming up for some nice antihistamines and antibiotics if this doesn't go away in the next day or so. :::sigh:::

This end

Man, what a way to end the week: sinus attack. The last three hours at
work were pure misery. I toughed it out as much as I could, but 5:30
came, and I was finished. I wonder if eating outside at lunch is what
led to this attack.

nothing new to report otherwise... lots of thoughts, but nothing that
sticks in my mind. New cartoons tomorrow morning! I bought the second
season of Rocky & Bullwinkle and have been enjoying the 1.5 hours I've
watched so far. I enjoy it much more now than I did as a child.

Contemplate the Emptiness

One of my favorite albums is Entertaining Angels, by Jimmy A (aka, Jimmy Abegg), released 1991 (which is when I moved to Houston). I can listen to this album repeatedly; I think it might be one of the ones I could listen to for the rest of my life if I could only choose one. For me, pretty much everything is perfect: vocals, instrumentation, lyrics, etc.

One song in particular, "Contemplate the Emptiness," I cannot get past, and it is probably one of my favorite songs on the album, if not one of my all-time favorite songs (certainly in my top ten). For anything to get past Eurythmics or DC Talk is pretty amazing. Anyway, here are the lyrics, used without any kind of permission other than I wanted to share them with you:

What do you do when the night falls hard on you
And you're all alone
And the TV set's on and the light that it brings
Is the only light shining on you
And the voice in that box
Is the only thing that talks
To comfort your soul

Contemplate the emptiness, my friend
Contemplate the emptiness, my friend

What do you do when the last drink is gone
And the smoke burns your eyes
And the thrill has worn off and your friends have gone home
And you're coming down
And all that is left is to pick up the glasses
And empty the ashes

Contemplate the emptiness, my friend
Contemplate the emptiness, my friend

What do you do when she walks out on you
And you're holding the tab
And you say "What about all those promises we made
What about them?" and she says
"Didn't you know there's no such thing as promises here"

Contemplate the emptiness, my friend
Contemplate the emptiness, my friend
Contemplate the emptiness, my friend
Contemplate the emptiness, my friend

Do you remember riding that greyhound
Across that grey town
And thinking this isn't it. Like a voice saying
"There's something more" Like Jesus whispering to you
He was whispering to you...whispering to you