Rebekah Reports

Thoughts on meals, media, momming and more

Lack of passion for the persecuted

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Kirsten Powers has done it again. She’s taken my thoughts and feelings and put them to print perfectly in this week’s article boldly entitled, “Kirsten Powers: Christians thrown overboard left to drown by Obama.”

When three North Carolina Muslims were gunned down by a virulent atheist, Obama rightly spoke out against the horrifying killings. But he just can’t seem to find any passion for the mass persecution of Middle Eastern Christians or the eradication of Christianity from its birthplace.”

This lack of response, or at best an unemotional nearly apathetic response, to Christians’ murders and torment (and other minorities like the Yazidis) in the Middle East is becoming an all-too-familiar practice for our current president and our country.

An old Christian church in Lebanon. Photo credit: n.karim, Flickr
An old Christian church in Lebanon. Photo credit: n.karim, Flickr

Don’t get too comfy on your couches with your Netflix, folks. Don’t think this persecution of Christians could come to America, the supposed “land of the free and home of the brave?” Guess again.

If a blind eye is turned to what’s happening overseas, it’ll be that much easier to grow numb to the issue and turn a blind eye to it once it’s in our own backyards. It’s time to be brave and stand up for those who are being killed for their religious beliefs. No matter your religion, you should not be murdered for it. That’s just wrong, plain and simple.

America has intervened around the globe to help the starving, the sick — those dying from AIDS and Ebola, for example — as well as the impoverished, those suffering in the aftermath of natural disasters. When do we intervene to lend a hand to the innocently hunted?

Related Story:

Go here to watch Lara Logan’s story from a March episode of “60 Minutes” on what life has been like for Iraqi Christians as of late. It’s well worth a few minutes of your time.

Google — the Wizard of America

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Photo credit: Carlos Luna, Flickr
Photo credit: Carlos Luna, Flickr

I’ve said for years, “Google is taking over the world.” I was half-kidding. Then, for a while, I thought Facebook was taking over the world. After reading this article, I’m back to thinking it’s Google.

In the article, author Kyle Smith details how far “in bed” Google and the Obama Administration are together. Let’s just say, they’re waaaay more, uh, friendly, than I’d thought they were, and Google is more powerful politically than I’d realized.

What’s scarier is what the future could potentially hold. “Google says that in the future, its determinations about what is true and what is untrue will play a role in how search-engine rankings are configured,” Smith writes.

Yikes. I don’t know about you, but no matter how much I love technology (and Google for that matter, because I am an avid user) and how “smart” it can be, I don’t think I want a company deciding what’s truth for me. That determination is supposed to happen between my ears. Worse still, Smith makes a good point that the company that could be deciding what you see/what you don’t see is the same company that “ranked second in all of corporate America in campaign donations to Obama.”  Yeaaaah, that’s not neutral.

Our country was created with governmental checks and balances for a reason. Humans, quite simply, are flawed and can’t always be trusted. We need to be put in check. So where are those checks and balances for companies (run by flawed human beings) that get so big that the president is practically their puppet?

State of the State of the Union

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This week President Obama gave his annual State of the Union address. Unfortunately for him, viewership was down — way down. Like, perhaps the lowest for the event in 15 years.

But neither a smaller audience nor a Republican-majority Congress could stop the president from laying out his plans for his final two years in office, even though several of those plans are almost guaranteed to never see the light of day because of that GOP majority in power.

Though his plans are bold — higher taxes on the wealthy, free community college tuition, and more — it seems the president may need to go back and check his facts like POLITICO did on several of the proposals he made Tuesday night.

One of the most noteworthy and controversial lines Obama uttered came near the beginning of his speech. Vox.com takes a closer look at the line.

Want to read the entire speech? Go here.

See something missing? Social Security, the Keystone XL oil pipeline, and al-Qaida are just some of the topics President Obama did NOT mention. See what else was left out of the State of the Union here.

As is custom, the GOP responded to the president’s speech. This year newly-elected Republican Senator Joni Ernst delivered the response. Her speech was at times very personal, including memories from her childhood.

You see, growing up, I had only one good pair of shoes. So on rainy school days, my mom would slip plastic bread bags over them to keep them dry. But I was never embarrassed, because the school bus would be filled with rows and rows of young Iowans with bread bags slipped over their feet,” Ernst said.
Tuesday night Ernst definitely wasn’t wearing bread bags on her feet. Instead, the Iraq war veteran and lieutenant colonel in the Iowa National Guard donned camouflage-patterned heels, which have stolen a bit of her spotlight.

And finally, for those of us who are visual learners, here’s the “short version” of the president’s State of the Union for your viewing pleasure:

Cover photo credit: NASA HQ Photo, Flickr