The ‘Town Hall’ Debate: A Prediction

We are grateful to Vice-Present Biden for showing such great restraint in his debate with Congressman Ryan. We understand how hard it was for him not to tear off his clothes, swing from the light fixtures, and throw feces at his opponent.

But that was last week, and tomorrow night’s the big “town hall” presidential debate at Hofstra University, which is not a town and doesn’t have a town hall. At the last minute they weren’t able to get Michael Moore to be the moderator, after all.

I despise the “town hall” format. We are asked to believe this event is pure Americana, a page out of a Norman Rockwell calendar, pure democracy in action. They must think we have no brains at all.

Expect to hear “ordinary citizens” who have been carefully screened and coached ask “spontaneous” questions like these:

“Governor Romney, why do you lie through your lying teeth about all those taxes you never paid while you were crushing poor little poor people into the dust?”

“Dear Mr. President Obama, your honor, it’s the highlight of my life to look upon your wonderful face! Can you tell me what you think has been your most noble and memorable achievement during the past 12 hours?”

The official and bona fide prediction of this blog: Romney will be walking into the biggest stacked deck since Shane went all alone into the bad guys’ saloon. (You really must see that movie, Shane, if you haven’t already.) I hope they go so over-the-top with this that even the TV audience will see through it.

Spiking Nasty Rumors

All sorts of nasty rumors are swirling around this presidential election season. In the interests of an informed public, I wish to refute some of the more lurid ones.

The following statements are not true. Honest.

*John Boehner is a eunuch.

*The Obama Phone lady from Cleveland will moderate the next presidential debate.

*In the wake of Hillary Clinton’s performance as Secretary of State, she will resign and be replaced by Perez Hilton.

*”E Pluribus Unum” will be removed from our currency and replaced by a new national motto: “The government is the only thing we all belong to.”

*”In God We Trust” will be replaced by “You Didn’t Build That.”

*If Madonna keeps her promise to take off all her clothes in public if Obama is re-elected, she will be the next person appointed to the Supreme Court.

*By executive order, all churches must be covered with canvas so that atheists don’t have to see them.

*To convince the Muslim world of our good will, the president will deliver the State of the Union address in Arabic.

I repeat: none of these is true. Our wonderful and glorious leaders would never even think of doing any of these things.

You have their word on it.

 

A Fallen Church… And a Prayer for America

Yesterday I drove past the church in which I was raised. I haven’t been inside the building since I heard the new pastor say, “Adultery is no big deal.”

Yesterday they had a new sign up on the front lawn, next to the old sign advertising “a welcoming and affirming congregation.” The new one reads:

“Stop persecuting them by deporting them. Let them stay.” “Them” being illegal aliens, people who break our country’s laws.

What was this sign doing in front of a church? Well, they don’t care much about God’s laws; why should they respect man’s laws?

A Prayer

This is a prayer which I pray every day now, for my country.

“Father, we as a nation are so far gone in sin and folly, so blind, so deaf, so lawless, that we cannot possibly save ourselves. Stretch forth your mighty arm, and the hand that created the heavens and the earth, and by your irresistible strength turn us off the disastrous course we have been following: turn us back to you, and make your face to shine: and then we shall be saved. Amen.”

‘Jesus for President,’ Eh?

Big-shot Presbyterian theologian Tim Keller claims he has a million ignoramuses signed up to vote for Jesus Christ for president.

So what’s wrong with that?

I don’t know about Mr. Keller, but Christ is my king, whose right it is to rule all of Creation. President would be a serious demotion.

What this exceptionally silly man is actually doing is trying to take Christians out of the electoral equation. He offers them that most tempting of all baits, a smug sense of self-righteousness. That he has strayed perilously near to blasphemy seems not to have occurred to him.

Jesus as president, eh? Does that mean He has to step down when the eight years are up? Can Congress override His vetoes? Could He be impeached? Would he have to answer questions from an inane and impious Washington press corps?

It’s really too silly for words. Nothing but a fine-sounding excuse for throwing votes away and allowing a communist community organizer to be re-elected.

Mr. Keller is a false prophet.

A Disgraceful Plea for Publicity

The Last Banquet is out in paperback now, and available via amazon.com (also in Kindle format)… and I need reader reviews!

Isn’t it shameful, what being made responsible for his own publicity will do to a man? I never used to be like this. I’d even do commercials, if I ever got the opportunity. So here I am imploring my readers to help spread the word about my books, and to post glowing reviews on Amazon. Who knows what depths I’ll finally sink to?

Meanwhile, we are editing Book #5, The Fugitive Prince, and Kirk DouPonce has been given the go-ahead to create another one of his fantastic covers for it. And my continuity editor is reading The Palace to make sure I haven’t made any glaring mistakes with it. You know–like the way Sir Thomas Malory forgot that he’d killed off Sir Carados and kept bringing him back. In between The Thunder King and Last Banquet, I managed to lose 18 of Lord Reesh’s devoted servants. But now that I have a continuity editor, I don’t have to worry about things like that happening.

Another Chance for… Who?

A big-deal columnist said this week that a lot of voters feel bad that President Obama has been such a total balls-up failure and disgrace as president, and think he ought to get another chance.

In light of his performance, wouldn’t that be like giving another chance to a bad knife-thrower?

‘The Last Banquet’ in Paperback, at Last

The fourth book of my Bell Mountain series, The Last Banquet, is now available in paperback. You can order it via amazon.com, or save a couple of bucks by ordering it directly from The Chalcedon Foundation (www.chalcedon.edu –click on “Store,” then “Books,” then “Fiction”).

Please try to buy it before they outlaw it or something.

I am typing up the last few chapters of The Palace. Soon I will have to send my baby off to college–that is, to be edited–and fuss and fret until graduation (publication).

I don’t know quite how to explain the feeling of a book passing out of my hands after such a long and intimate association with it. It’s not altogether pleasurable, I can tell you that.

But–heheheh!–wait’ll you read the climax of this thing!

Yet Another Movie in Which Everybody Buys the Farm

I’d like to take this opportunity to warn you off Quarantine (2009), starring no one in particular, which I’ve just aborted after about half of it.

Extra warning: a lot of this is shot with a hand-held camera, and it will make you ill if you’re susceptible to motion sickness. I’m not, but my wife is.

My problem with it was that I’m not entertained by the gratuitous suffering of my fellow human beings. So when the fireman had to chop up the little girl with his axe, I bailed out. Last straw, enough already…

I’m not a prude when it comes to movie violence, although this movie’s violence was inexcusably graphic. But when it’s in there for no real reason, when the characters have no way out, when I get the impression that the whole thing’s been staged to see if they can gross out an audience jaded by extremely nasty video games–well, that’s when I pull the plug.

Do yourselves a favor, and watch something else.

An Untold Tale of Narnia

I am convinced there is a book missing from C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series–a book that should have been written, but wasn’t. And I sort of believe that Lewis knew what that book was and would have gotten around to writing it someday, if only he’d lived longer.

My wife and my editor say I should get permission from Lewis’ estate and write the book myself. Well, I dunno… The Narnia books are, I should say, inimitable. There are writers who are as good as C.S. Lewis was, but I’ve never seen anyone who could do certain things as well as Lewis did them.  No one, for instance, but no one, was better than C.S. Lewis at giving you a whole character in just a few sentences, when anyone else would have needed a whole page. And who else would ever think of, and dare to do it, putting Father Christmas into the middle of a Narnia story?

Meanwhile, let me check my instincts against yours, dear readers. What do you think the unwritten Narnia book would be about?

More Progress!

I have written up the climax of The Palace. Whew! I can’t believe how much I got done, these last two days.

I dassn’t tell you much about it, for fear of undercutting my already pathetic sales; but I think I can safely say the concluding chapters of this book will knock your socks off.

I’ve been on this job since March, and I know I’m going to miss it when it’s done, and miss it badly… But that’s all the more reason to get started on the next one!