For many the American dream is ownership of a home. “Owning a home lies at the heart of the American dream.” So declared President Bush in 2002, introducing his “Homeownership Challenge” — a set of policy initiatives that were supposed to sharply increase homeownership, especially for minority groups.

It would seem that the U.S. should top the list, but it does not. According to NationMaster, http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/peo_hom_own-people-home-ownership the U.S. falls to seventh place in the world, behind even its closest neighbor, Canada.

The housing bubble that burst in the U.S. has crippled the economy in many ways. More than 2.3 million homes have been repossessed by lenders since the recession began in December 2007, according to RealtyTrac. The firm estimated more than 1 million American households were likely to lose their homes to foreclosure last year.

Among states, Nevada posted the highest foreclosure rate last month, with one in every 84 households receiving a foreclosure notice. That’s 4.5 times the national average.

Rounding out the top 10 states with the highest foreclosure rate in August were: Florida, Arizona, California, Idaho, Utah, Georgia, Michigan, Illinois and Hawaii.

Foreclosures…one every 13 seconds.. are contributing to a growing housing supply that may add as many as 12 million homes to the U.S. market.

The blame game continues as to who was responsible for this mess. First it was the Bush administration…then it was easy lending by banks to those whose income could not justify the rising cost of home ownership… finally, it was the belief that home ownership was preferable to renting in many cases, especially when the ownership term is expected to be at least several years.

I’ve been reading Walden Pond, by Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862). He notes in his introductory remarks http://thoreau.eserver.org/walden1c.html the following:

“When I consider my neighbors, the farmers of Concord, who are at least as well off as the other classes, I find that for the most part they have been toiling twenty, thirty, or forty years, that they may become the real owners of their farms, which commonly they have inherited with encumbrances, or else bought with hired money — and we may regard one third of that toil as the cost of their houses — but commonly they have not paid for them yet. It is true, the encumbrances sometimes outweigh the value of the farm, so that the farm itself becomes one great encumbrance, and still a man is found to inherit it, being well acquainted with it, as he says. On applying to the assessors, I am surprised to learn that they cannot at once name a dozen in the town who own their farms free and clear. If you would know the history of these homesteads, inquire at the bank where they are mortgaged. The man who has actually paid for his farm with labor on it is so rare that every neighbor can point to him. I doubt if there are three such men in Concord. What has been said of the merchants, that a very large majority, even ninety-seven in a hundred, are sure to fail, is equally true of the farmers. With regard to the merchants, however, one of them says pertinently that a great part of their failures are not genuine pecuniary failures, but merely failures to fulfill their engagements, because it is inconvenient; that is, it is the moral character that breaks down.”

Thoreau believed in living frugally…the land for his cabin was funded by Ralph Waldo Emerson who offered him free use of his woodlot along the northern shore of Walden Pond. Thoreau began planning for his 10′ by 15′ house in March. The frame went up in May. And he was ready to move in on the 4th of July. The interior of the house was furnished with a bed, a table, a small desk and lamp, and three chairs — “one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.”

Last February, my wife and I finished paying off the mortgage on our home. Newly built back in 1970, the cost was $25,000 for a modest ranch style house with attached garage and basement. However, raising a family of eight, holding jobs in private and public schools, and engaging in investing in the cherry industry by new plantings five years after the house was built, the debt load on our house had risen to six figures. Simply put, it took us 40 years to become debt free and own the house unencumbered.

I did a little calculation on the cost of a mortgage on a new house…a very modest $210,000 one, indeed. Quicken Loans advertises a 4.5% 30 year fixed loan for a monthly payment of $1064. That’s a total payment, over 30 years, of $383,054, of which $173,054 will be paid in interest.

Consider how much of a mortgage payment is applied toward loan interest throughout the life of a 30-year fixed loan:

Years % toward interest
0-5 ~80%
6-10 ~70%
11-15 ~60%
16-20 ~50%
21-25 ~35%
26-30 ~10%

Also, homeowners must pay property taxes, homeowner’s insurance, and maintenance costs. Renters pay a fixed amount each month.

If a young married couple buys the above home and one loses employment, will they be able to continue to make the monthly payment? If one or other is promoted to a job forcing a move, will the present home be able to be sold in a timely fashion? Will the other spouse find a job in the new location? What about buying a home in the new location? What about the cost of having children?

There are countless variables involved in home ownership. Recent anecdotal studies have shown that, on average, investment in the stock market over a 30 year period will yield a higher return than investment in a home. In a mid-July article in the Wall Street Journal, Robert Bridges concludes that owning a home is a “lousy investment.” http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304259304576375323652341888.html?KEYWORDS=Robert+Bridges

So is renting a better choice? If one is only interested in money, probably. If one is willing to gamble on the uncertainties of life, does it become an issue of morality?

Consider the hypothetical case of a young couple with two children who purchased the above home. Over a four year period they owned the home, the bank has received $57,000 plus a hefty down payment. They still owe $197,000. $13,000 has been applied to principal and $44,000 to interest. Property taxes and maintenance have taken their share. Let’s say one spouse lost a job recently, and the couple is expecting their third child. It is becoming impossible to maintain their mortgage payments, and the bank may be encouraging them to miss payments and go for a short sale or something short of foreclosure. No matter what happens, all things being equal, the bank will come out ahead, in my opinion.

I think you can see where this is leading. The couple’s credit scores have dropped to the point where not even a $50,000 mobile home can be financed. Their only option appears to be renting.

Maybe that’s going to be the wave of the future and the American dream of home ownership will go the way of 300 hp autos and gas-guzzling SUVs.

In a blog by Damien Cave in the Oct. 9th edition of the New York Times, Cave wrote a post on Mrs. Migliorino Miller, an associate professor of theology at Madonna University in Orchard Lake, Michigan. Miller has probably posted more pictures of aborted fetuses than any other person.

In an age when we as humans are concerned with endangered species of birds and animals such as the Arakan Forest Turtle, the Brazilian Merganser, the Alagoas Curassow, the Black Caiman, and a host of other of God’s creatures, it seems to me that it is a good wake-up call to see how we humans treat ourselves. Not that we are in danger of extinction, but I question where we put humans on the scale of living things.

Director of Citizens for a Pro-Life Society, Mrs. Migliorino Miller said she had firsthand experience retrieving fetuses after abortions and photographing them. Cave met Miller in her university office and she handed him proof: a series of 4-by-6-inch prints that she shot, which have been turned into portraits by Stephen McGee.

The first image in the pile gave Cave a clue to the source. It showed a cardboard box with six or seven large, sealed plastic bags with something red inside. There were names on the bags in black ink and, on the box, there was a date written with felt-tip marker: Feb. 27, 1988.

Mrs. Migliorino Miller said this was one of the many boxes filled with fetuses that she, her husband and several others pulled 21 years ago from a loading dock in Northbrook, Ill., a suburb of Chicago. Acting on a tip, between February and September of 1988, she said they retrieved around 4,000 fetuses that had been shipped there from a dozen or so abortion clinics nationwide.

The incident sounds gruesome, but the images Miller took dwarf the story. If you have ever been to one of the some 60 Holocaust museums around the world (25 in our country alone), Miller’s images give one similar feelings of horror. If you are interested in this documentation of man’s inhumanity to its most vulnerable,check out Damien Cave’s blog here.

With over 51,000,000 abortions in our country alone since Roe v. Wade, AND OVER A BILLION WORLDWIDE, what have we humans evolved into? We are far worse than the Sparta of old where unwanted infants were disposed of by abandonment and exposure. We are creating a holocaust of unthinkable proportions.

We may condemn Iran’s president for his denial of World War II Holocaust, but if we look the other way and deny this continuing holocaust, are we any different? If the most precious of human life has been rejected and destroyed hundreds of millions of times, it seems to me that the Author of life has been rejected as well and this might well explain the rise of agnosticism and atheism around the world.

It is no wonder that the human race is losing its moral compass and is drawing itself farther and farther away from its Creator.

Not only does he deny that the Holocaust occurred, but he has vowed to destroy Israel. Iran’s nuclear ambitions are clear to the U.S. government, and much ado has been made by Israel, Europe, and the U.S. about the need for Iran to stop its pursuit of a nuclear weapon.

However, perhaps the strangest element of this leader’s world view is his staunch adherence to the mahdaviat, which is “belief in and efforts to prepare for the Mahdi.”

The Mahdi is the twelfth and final imam, and those who believe in the historical succession of the imams are called “The Twelvers.” According to the theology of Twelvers, twelve successors of Islam’s founder, Muhammad, have an infallible gift not only to rule over the Shia branch of Islam with justice, but to be able to keep and interpret the Sharia, or body of Islamic religious law. The prophet and imams’ words and deeds are a guide and model for the community to follow; as a result, they must be free from error and sin, and must be chosen by divine decree through Muhammad.

For the most part, each imam was the son of the previous imam. Being an imam was risky business, because all but one of the first eleven were poisoned. The twelfth imam is still alive, however, and has been alive since 872 AD, ready at the appointed time by Allah to come forth and usher in the end of the world.

What is of interest is that the Shia branch of Islam is composed mostly (85%) of Twelvers and most of the Twelvers are found in Iran.

If you’re interested in “end-times” prophecy, Ahmadinejad has suggested that ‘Jesus would return to the world along with the emergence of the descendant of the Islam’s holy prophet, Imam Mahdi’. It is well known that Ahmadinejad sees himself as the chosen one to bring forth the 12th Imam, to ‘pave the path for the glorious reappearance of Imam Mahdi’. The suggestion that Jesus and the 12th Imam would return to earth at the same time is something new and quite disturbing.

Ahmadinejad sees Jesus and Mahdi working together to ‘wipe away every tinge of oppression, pain and agony from the face of the world’. The Mahdi ‘will reign on earth for seven years before bringing about a final judgment and the end of the world’.

The Islamic Republic of Iran broadcasting website said in a program called “The World toward Illumination,” that the Mahdi will form an army to defeat the enemies of Islam in a series of apocalyptic battles, in which the Mahdi will overcome his archvillain in Jerusalem.

The Mahdi’s far sightedness and firmness in the face of mischievous elements will strike awe. After his uprising from Mecca all of Arabia will submit to him and then other parts of the world as he marches upon Iraq and established his seat of global government in the city of Kufa.

Then the Imam will send 10 thousand of his forces to the east and west to uproot the oppressors. At this time Allah will facilitate things for him and lands will come under his control one after the other…

And when will the 1137 year-old Mahdi come to be revealed? Ahmadinejad got the message that it would have been in 2007.

“These are the signs of the appearance of the Imam Mahdi who will appear within the ‎next two years,” the president said as quoted in Aftab News on November 16, 2005.

Such remarks by the president (which have been followed closely by the public since the ‎distribution of a video clip of Ahmadinejad in which he claims to have been surrounded by a ray ‎of light when giving a speech at the United Nations General Assembly) have gone so far that he ‎has recently criticized those who have cast doubts on the validity of his beliefs and remarks ‎about the Imam Mahdi. For example, following his trip to the United States and his ‎controversial speech at Columbia University in New York, the president has claimed that the ‎Imam Mahdi “managed” that meeting and accused those who doubted this claim of being “close ‎minded.” “I know that close minded people don’t believe these things,” he said, “but I was ‎certain that the Imam Mahdi will come and manage the meeting. I said, ‘Oh Imam! I want to ‎witness your miracle.” (Raja News – November 12, 2007) In a more pointed attack, ‎Ahmadinejad has likened those who poke fun at his remarks about the hidden Imam to goats: ‎‎”the entire universe has been created for that holy event to take place; the day when all the ‎prophets and martyrs will come to help the Imam. Some people make fun of these beliefs; this is ‎because their hearts are devoid of faith. These are modern day pagans and heathens. They ‎pretend to be intellectuals but don’t have the understanding of a goat” (Fars news agency- ‎November 11, 2007).

‎

In other words this soul-shaking revelation that the ‎president who heads the Iranian government in one of its most critical moments in history is a ‎person who “really” believes that the hidden Imam is accompanying him when eating food, and ‎that the Imam will eventually reappear before the end of his presidential term, should shed new light on Iran’s continued march toward the development of a nuclear warhead.

After all, why not hasten Armaggedon, if you have the power to hasten the day when the Mahdi and Jesus will rule the world under sharia law? We have more than a crazy man in Ahmadinejad. We have a man who could pull off his own Holocaust in his lifetime. ‎

On Wednesday (Sept. 23^rd), the President laid out his four goals for the world in his address to the UN General Assembly:  “Today, let me put forward four pillars that I believe are fundamental to the future that we want for our children: non-proliferation and disarmament; the promotion of peace and security; the preservation of our planet; and a global economy that advances opportunity for all people.”

Sounds like a true visionary, and if that will become the legacy of the President, wonderful. However, he was addressing the UN, seeking its cooperation. In an ideal world, with leaders whose only motivation would be peace and the advancement of opportunity for all, the President’s four goals would be worthy of universal agreement.

However, as Steve Hayes, senior writer for “The Weekly Standard” pointed out… “ The United Nations is a broken institution. You have Muammar Qaddafi, a rogue dictator, a crazy man, speaking — supposed to speak for 15 minutes, ends up speaking for some 90 minutes…The United Nations was never able to enforce its resolutions on Iraq. It is not able to enforce its resolutions on Iran. It is not even able to keep Muammar Qaddafi from talking for more than 15 minutes.”

Hayes’ evaluation notwithstanding, Qaddafi did highlight the ineffectiveness of the UN. At one point, Qaddafi grabbed hold of the UN charter and threw it over his shoulder in obvious disdain, and chastised the international body for failing to intervene or prevent some 65 wars since the U.N. was founded in 1945.

However, back to the President’s address…as he welcomed the repeated applause of the world community, he had this to say:

“No one nation can or should try to dominate another nation. No world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will succeed. No balance of power among nations will hold. The traditional divisions between nations of the South and the North make no sense in an interconnected world; nor do alignments of nations rooted in the cleavages of a long-gone Cold War.”

I guess he was talking about NATO in his reference to “alignments of nations rooted in the cleavages  of a long-gone Cold War.” I have no idea what the “divisions of nations of the South and the North” means, other than the U.S. and Latin America…or maybe between North Korea and South Korea. The President often uses these Ciceronian metric cadences with words that one glosses over without understanding what he means…if he even knows what he means.

It is no wonder that former Speaker, Newt Gingrich, the only Ph.D. historian ever to serve in the House, turns to Charles Krauthammer for his insights into the political news of the day.

Krauthammer had this to say about that portion of the President’s speech:

“You had a president of the United States actually saying no nation can or should try to dominate another.

“I will buy the ‘should try to’ as kind of adolescent wishful thinking, but no nation can dominate another? What planet is he living on? It is the story of man. What does he think Russia is doing to Georgia?

“But the alarming part is what he said in the same paragraph where he said that it is — makes no sense anymore– quote, ‘The alignments of nations that are rooted in the cleavages of the cold war.’

“Well, NATO is rooted in the cleavage of the cold war. The European Union is rooted in the cleavage of the cold war. Our alliances with Japan and Korea and the Philippines, our guarantees to Taiwan and Eastern Europe are all rooted in the cleavage of the cold war.

“Interesting noun, incidentally. So he is saying that is all now irrelevant. What does he think our allies are going to think who hear this?

“Obama’s speech is alarming because it says the United States has no more moral right to act or to influence world history than Bangladesh or Sierra Leone.

“It diminishes the United States deliberately and wants to say that we should be one nation among others, and not defend the alliance of democracies that we have in NATO, for example, or to say as every president has said before Obama that we stand for something good and unique in the world.

“And it is not the equivalent, for example, of the alignment of Chavez with Ecuador and Bolivia and Nicaragua and Russia and Cuba and Iran.”

Rhetoric will never achieve the four lofty goals of the President. Nor will abrogating our country’s destiny to lead the world of friendly nations in its never-ending confrontation with those countries and movements which wish us harm.

Obama will have friends in the world community, but his kind of friends may ultimately turn into what they already are…our worst enemies.

First of all, as a former tart cherry grower of 35 years, I have seen the muddled attempts to stabilize markets fail again and again. This year, with a bumper crop of tarts, we have, AGAIN, a year when a large portion of the “fruit of paradise” will be left to rot on the ground. Due to a self-imposed marketing order, growers have to live with the choice they made several years ago and will have to divert 42 percent of the nation’s estimated 300 million-pound tart cherry harvest from the primary domestic market this year.

Some producers are unhappy about the dumping, and Leonard Lion made his feelings known by dumping his 72,000 pounds of diverted cherries along Old Mission Road in Grand Traverse County’s Peninsula Township.
“All I’m saying to the tourists and joggers and others in this town is that life on the farm is not always profitable, and we’re losing our producers,” he told the Traverse City Record-Eagle recently.

Well, we have some problems with tart cherries this year. Huge national crop. Recession. Cherries are not a necessary item for the grocery list. National advertising non-existent. Farmers keep over-planting new trees. Stricter regulations for fruit quality. Chemicals and fertilizers cost more and more. The list goes on and on.

Even though I own a farm market, I have never sold many tart cherries EVER. Tourists love sweet cherries. Tarts, uh, uh.

The dumbest thing I ever did was plant new orchards of tart cherries in my youth. The smartest thing I ever did was have them bulldozed out two years ago. I do not want to malign my fellow orchardists, but take it from me…you are on a bridge that leads to nowhere.

Anyway, back to the “Cash for Clunkers” program…To borrow from fellow-blogger Troy Keith:

“I have several fundamental issues with this program; the first being that increased consumer spending is a temporary band-aid for an ailing economy. Growing through a recession requires that we increase production and only one of the top six cars purchased through the CFC program (the Ford Focus) is an American model. All 10 of the top trade-ins are American autos. The subtle irony of the fact that Ford is now leading U.S. sales has not been lost on this writer (the only one of the Big Three auto makers to avoid prolonged government intervention).

“We the people are paying for this program, which amounts to little more than forced redistribution of debt. Money is being taken out of the pockets of some and given to others that will now most likely be making payments on cars they cannot afford. This sounds a bit too much like the well-intentioned Community Reinvestment Act and the events leading up to the housing collapse.

“With unemployment hovering around 10 percent and a budget deficit in the neighborhood of $2 trillion, we’re encouraging our less advantaged citizens to get rid of a perfectly good car they most likely are not making payments on, not to mention the substantially lower insurance premiums, in exchange for an additional monthly expenditure of several hundred dollars.

“Any temporary boost in current auto sales is probably due to consumers putting off purchases in May and June in anticipation of the CFC program and will most likely result in lower sales for December and January as people that would have waited until later are racing to unload their clunkers now.

“In regards to the suggested environmental benefits, trading 18 mpg for 22 mpg has a minimal effect on emissions. Some estimate the savings to be equivalent to 57 minutes of America’s total yearly carbon dioxide output. In addition, studies indicate that people will most likely drive more with a brand new car than they did before, negating any of the nominal gains anticipated in fuel economy.”

I cringed to have to dump my best cherries on the ground two years ago, with an industry verifier watching me do it.

I detest watching on TV as dealers pour liquid glass into an oil-drained engine and watch it struggle to survive, then die as the engine turns into another land-fill addition.

I abhor the thought of abortions disposing of beautiful human beings and being flushed down the toilet or dumped into a dumpster.

I hate to see waste…and I suspect our Creator does as well.

THIS president changes the focus whenever the political winds change. I have known a leader in our local community who, when he would announce a decision that was unpopular or controversial, would leave town for a week or so. By the time he returned, people had either forgotten the issue or did not think it worth the effort to revisit it. Clever and effective, but hardly  characteristic of a good leader.

Let’s see a few instances where Obama and his administration have done, or have not done, in his first seven months to change one mask for another.

After pledging during last year’s presidential campaign, and as recently as the spring, not to revisit the past, the Obama administration, in the person of Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., has named a special prosecutor to go after CIA interrogators who pried information from terrorist suspects, preventing more deadly assaults on the country.

This spring, on April 2lst after addressing about 1,000 CIA staff aimed at restoring CIA morale, Obama, who promised that CIA operatives would not be prosecuted, reiterated that he would stand by them.

If the President claims he is letting Holder do his job, well, the Prez is the chief law-enforcer in the country by reason of the Constitution, and he cannot wash his hands of this obvious reversal of his April cheerleading for the CIA.

Coincidentally, this announcement comes as Obama’s healthcare initiative apparently is in trouble.  When in trouble, Obama changes the subject. Now the focus is on the past…the Bush administration, not the present…healthcare reform.

Another switcheroo…A quick look at the Obama administration’s actual policies towards small businesses paints an entirely different picture than his pre- and post-election rhetoric. On Aug. 18^th, the President released yet another plan to supposedly include small businesses in his administration’s efforts to stimulate our nation’s struggling economy.

So far, the majority of President Obama’s stimulus plans for small businesses appear to have been created by his press office, since they obviously have not been designed to achieve any actual results for America’s 27 million small businesses.

Remember this pledge during the campaign? “No political appointees in an Obama-Biden administration will be permitted to work on regulations or contracts directly and substantially related to their prior employer for two years. And no political appointee will be able to lobby the executive branch after leaving government service during the remainder of the administration.”

Fact:  The administration has granted waivers to several former lobbyists, allowing them to serve.

Another pledge: “Will eliminate all income taxation of seniors making less than $50,000 per year. This will eliminate taxes for 7 million seniors — saving them an average of $1,400 a year– and will also mean that 27 million seniors will not need to file an income tax return at all.”

Thanks to the stimulus bill, for example, everyone who received Social Security benefits did receive a $250 check from the government in May. But the bold promise to end taxes for seniors if they make less than $50,000 seems to be forgotten.

To reduce bills rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them, Obama said he”will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.”

In his latest violation of this promise, President Barack Obama signed the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure (CARD) Act of 2009 on May 22, only two days after the bill was finalized in Congress.

The law doesn’t take effect for a full year, so it clearly is not emergency legislation.

How about this promise? “During 2009 and 2010, existing businesses will receive a $3,000 refundable tax credit for each additional full-time employee hired.”

The credit was never part of the stimulus legislation, and it was not included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, which Obama signed into law on Feb. 17, 2009. There is no indication that this idea might re-emerge.

I wake up each morning expecting to hear Press Secretary Gibbs spin one or other of Obama’s on-again, off-again, actions. Sometimes Gibbs is just plain laughable in his explanations of this or that backtracking by the White House, but it’s entertainment at its finest, because you don’t know what mask his master-illusionist boss will wear today.

However, the abortion scenario abroad is mind-boggling. The BBC reports that in China there are 13 million abortions each year, compared to 20 million births. In many cases women are restricted to just one child, although in rural areas some couples can have two children if the first is a girl. This policy, begun in the 1970s, has forced young women to seek abortions. In its front-page story, the China Daily said the high number of abortions was “cause for concern”, adding that many women who have abortions are single and aged between 20 and 29. Women are complaining that they are pressured into terminating their pregnancies.

As horrendous as China’s disposal of human life in the womb is, Russia’s abortion rate is worse. There are often more abortions annually in Russia than live births. The latest figures from the UN and the CD for one recent year show that 1.8 million abortions were performed compared to 1.5 million births.

Natural family planning, where necessary, is common sense. The massive international slaughter of innocent children in the womb is self-destructive behavior at its unthinkable worse. I wonder how much of this international tragedy can be laid at the feet of the Supreme Court justices who wrote the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade. Certainly, even today, America leads the world in influencing social policy.

What pro-abortion advocates in government do here and now in the U.S. contributes in ways unseen, in my opinion, toward an increasing international disregard for human life in its earliest stages.