What is America's Future?.......Destruction?

[Cricket]

There has never been a year since 1776 that America wasn't said to be doomed for destruction, whether by plague or Hitler or World War III or WMD. Or just by implosion which is probably the most likely of all.

[Bostech]

So you are saying you are just fine,because on Fox News they told me "US was always threatened with something in it's history" so now when we have actual,real problem we should be fine.It will go away by itself??
Basically,same people that put you in debt and situation you are now are telling you everything will be fine,there is nothing to worry and it's all fault of some other people.
Hitler?Plague?

[BridgeTroll]

Here ya go Ock...

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/01/01/BA8V1AV589.DTL&tsp=1

Biblical scholar's date for rapture: May 21, 2011
Justin Berton, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, January 1, 2010

Harold Camping lets out a hearty chuckle when he considers the people who believe the world will end in 2012.

"That date has not one stitch of biblical authority," Camping says from the Oakland office where he runs Family Radio, an evangelical station that reaches listeners around the world. "It's like a fairy tale."

The real date for the end of times, he says, is in 2011.

The Mayans and the recent Hollywood movie "2012" have put the apocalypse in the popular mind this year, but Camping has been at this business for a long time. And while Armageddon is pop science or big-screen entertainment to many, Camping has followers from the Bay Area to China.

Camping, 88, has scrutinized the Bible for almost 70 years and says he has developed a mathematical system to interpret prophecies hidden within the Good Book. One night a few years ago, Camping, a civil engineer by trade, crunched the numbers and was stunned at what he'd found: The world will end May 21, 2011.

This is not the first time Camping has made a bold prediction about Judgment Day.

On Sept. 6, 1994, dozens of Camping's believers gathered inside Alameda's Veterans Memorial Building to await the return of Christ, an event Camping had promised for two years. Followers dressed children in their Sunday best and held Bibles open-faced toward heaven.

But the world did not end. Camping allowed that he may have made a mathematical error. He spent the next decade running new calculations, as well as overseeing a media company that has grown significantly in size and reach.

"We are now translated into 48 languages and have been transmitting into China on an AM station without getting jammed once," Camping said. "How can that happen without God's mercy?"

His office is flanked by satellite dishes in the parking lot that transmit his talk show, "Open Forum." In the Bay Area, he's heard on 610 AM, KEAR. Camping says his company owns about 55 stations in the United States alone, and that his message arrives on every continent.

'I'm looking forward to it'
Employees at the Oakland office run printing presses that publish Camping's pamphlets and books, and some wear T-shirts that read, "May 21, 2011." They're happy to talk about the day they believe their souls will be retrieved by Christ.

"I'm looking forward to it," said Ted Solomon, 60, who started listening to Camping in 1997. He's worked at Family Radio since 2004, making sure international translators properly dictate Camping's sermons.

"This world may have had an attraction to me at one time," Solomon said. "But now it's definitely lost its appeal."

Camping is a frail-looking man, and his voice is low and deep, but it can rise to dramatic peaks with a preacher's flair.

As a young man, he owned an East Bay construction business but longed to work as a servant of God. So he hit the books.

"Because I was an engineer, I was very interested in the numbers," he said. "I'd wonder, 'Why did God put this number in, or that number in?' It was not a question of unbelief, it was a question of, 'There must be a reason for it.' "

Code-breaking phenomenon
Camping is not the only man to see truths in the Bible hidden in the numbers. In the late 1990s, a code-breaking phenomenon took off, led by "The Bible Code," written by former Washington Post journalist Michael Drosnin.

Drosnin developed a technique that revealed prophecies within the Bible's text. A handful of biblical scholars have supported Drosnin's theory, lending it an air of legitimacy, and just as many scholars have decried it as farce.

One of Drosnin's more well-known findings is that a meteor will strike Earth in 2012, the same year some people believe the Mayan calendar marks the end of times, and the same year the "2012" action movie surmised the Earth's crust will destabilize and kill most humans.

Meaning in numbers
By Camping's understanding, the Bible was dictated by God and every word and number carries a spiritual significance. He noticed that particular numbers appeared in the Bible at the same time particular themes are discussed.

The number 5, Camping concluded, equals "atonement." Ten is "completeness." Seventeen means "heaven." Camping patiently explained how he reached his conclusion for May 21, 2011.

"Christ hung on the cross April 1, 33 A.D.," he began. "Now go to April 1 of 2011 A.D., and that's 1,978 years."

Camping then multiplied 1,978 by 365.2422 days - the number of days in each solar year, not to be confused with a calendar year.

Next, Camping noted that April 1 to May 21 encompasses 51 days. Add 51 to the sum of previous multiplication total, and it equals 722,500.

Camping realized that (5 x 10 x 17) x (5 x 10 x 17) = 722,500.

Or put into words: (Atonement x Completeness x Heaven), squared.

"Five times 10 times 17 is telling you a story," Camping said. "It's the story from the time Christ made payment for your sins until you're completely saved.

"I tell ya, I just about fell off my chair when I realized that," Camping said.

James Kreuger, author of "Secrets of the Apocalypse - Revealed," has been studying the end of times for 40 years and is familiar with Camping's work. While Kreuger agrees that the rapture is indeed coming, he disputes Camping's method.

"For all his learning, Camping makes a classic beginner's mistake when he sets a date for Christ's return," Kreuger wrote in an e-mail. "Jesus himself said in Matthew 24:36, 'Of that day and hour knows no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my father only.' "

'It is going to happen'
Camping's believers will have none of it.

Rick LaCasse, who attended the September 1994 service in Alameda, said that 15 years later, his faith in Camping has only strengthened.

"Evidently, he was wrong," LaCasse allowed, "but this time it is going to happen. There was some doubt last time, but we didn't have any proofs. This time we do."

Would his opinion of Camping change if May 21, 2011, ended without incident?

"I can't even think like that," LaCasse said. "Everything is too positive right now. There's too little time to think like that."

[Bostech]

I guess we should extend tax return just in case Jesus comes back on May 21st.

[Dog Walker]

Good one, Bos!  

Just in case anyone thinks that these tweety bird brains are not dangerous; remember Jim Jones and those fools who poisoned themselves so that the aliens orbiting behind the sun could come down and rescue them.

If anyone wants to take advantage of the intellectually challenged nuts, just buy their worldly goods for 10 cents on the day before "the world is going to end." After all, they won't need them, will they?

[buckethead]

This offering is based less on religion, and is by a pundit who is reviled by the left and right, alike:

Comments: A Decade of Self-Delusion
by Patrick J. Buchanan

12/29/2009


About the first decade of what was to be the Second American Century, the pessimists have been proven right.

According to the International Monetary Fund, the United States began the century producing 32 percent of the world's gross domestic product. We ended the decade producing 24 percent. No nation in modern history, save for the late Soviet Union, has seen so precipitous a decline in relative power in a single decade.

The United States began the century with a budget surplus. We ended with a deficit of 10 percent of gross domestic product, which will be repeated in 2010. Where the economy was at full employment in 2000, 10 percent of the labor force is out of work today and another 7 percent is underemployed or has given up looking for a job.


Between one-fourth and one-third of all U.S. manufacturing jobs have disappeared in 10 years, the fruits of a free-trade ideology that has proven anything but free for this country. Our future is being outsourced -- to China.

While the median income of American families was stagnant, the national debt doubled.

The dollar lost half its value against the euro. Once the most self-sufficient republic in history, which produced 96 percent of all it consumed, the U.S.A. is almost as dependent on foreign nations today for manufactured goods, and the loans to pay for them, as we were in the early years of the republic.

What the British were to us then, China is today.

Beijing holds the mortgage and grows impatient as we endlessly borrow on equity and refuse to begin paying it down. The possibility exists of an eventual run on the dollar or even a U.S. debt default.

Who did this to us? We did it to ourselves.

We sold ourselves a lot of snake oil about the Global Economy, interdependence, free trade and "it doesn't make any difference where goods are produced." The George W. Bush Republicans ran up the deficit with tax cuts, two wars and a splurge in social spending to rival the guns-and-butter of the Great Society.

Abandoning its role as the fellow who comes and takes away the punch bowl when the party's getting good, the Fed kept the money flowing fast and free, creating the tech bubble that burst in Y2K and the stock and housing bubble that burst at decade's end.

To pull us back from the cliff's edge, over which we were headed a year ago, the Fed doubled the money supply, while the administration ran up deficit spending to the highest level since World War II.

Unlike World War II, however, there is no end in sight to these deficits.

The stock market, which flat-lined over the decade, had to surge 50 percent in 2009 to retrieve the worst losses since the Depression.

Everyone, it seems, except for Washington bureaucrats and Wall Street, for whom the bonuses never seem to stop, has been hammered by the sinking home values and shrinking portfolios.

After Sept. 11, the nation was united behind a president as it had not been since Pearl Harbor. But instead of focusing on the enemies who did this to us, we took Osama bin Laden's bait and plunged into a war in Iraq that bled and divided us, alienated Europe and the Arab world, and destroyed the Republican Party's reputation as the reliable custodian of national security and foreign policy.

The party paid -- with the loss of both houses in 2006 and the presidency in 2008 -- but the nation has not stopped paying.

With nearly 200,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and another 30,000 more on the way, al-Qaida is now in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and North Africa, while the huge U.S. military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq serves as its recruiting poster.

Again, it is not a malevolent fate that has done this to us. We did it to ourselves. We believed all that hubristic blather about our being the "greatest empire since Rome," the "indispensable nation" and "unipolar power" advancing to "benevolent global hegemony" in a series of "cakewalk" wars to "end tyranny in our world."

After a decade of self-delusion and self-indulgence, we must stop deceiving ourselves. As Hurricane Katrina demonstrated, the "can-do" nation that won World War II in Europe and the Pacific in less than four years, that put a man on the moon in the same decade JFK said we would, is history.

We have a government that cannot balance its books, defend its borders or win its wars. And what is it now doing? Drafting another entitlement program as we are informed that the Social Security and Medicare trust funds have unfunded liabilities in the trillions.

At the end of the first decade of the 21st century, the question is not whether we will preside over the creation of a New World Order, but whether America's decline is irreversible.

[Cricket]

Thank you, Bucket.

I am reminded by the name of this author why we need a 3rd party in this government to, if not turn things around, at least to neutralize this insane tug-a-war between these two blockhead parties we have now.

[Bostech]

You don't need just a 3rd party,you need whole lot of parties.You need checks and balances in government otherwise nothing will change.

And things are not looking pretty.China will outpace everyone soon.

[Dog Walker]

Bos,  Finally something you and I can totally agree on.  We do indeed need multiple parties and to do so we first need to stop funding the Democrats and the Republicans with taxpayer money. 

You and I pay big bucks to hold the primaries of the Republican and Democratic parties even though we are not members of either one.  The Libertarians, Greens, States Rights, Socialists, etc. all have to pay for their own.  How come?

That is only one of the barriers erected by the dominant parties to prevent the rise of any other.  Gerrymandering of the districts is another method and just as corrupting.

We don't need less partisan politics; we need MORE!  Just look how one Independent in the Senate has confounded them.

Do either of the dominant parties represent your views about the proper role of government?  Not mine either.

Saw a sign in the window of First Coast BioFuels in Lake City; "MY USA NOT YOUR POLITICAL PARTY!"  Damn right!

[Dog Walker]

Stephen, I find NN's posts to be well written and reasoned.  I certainly don't agree with them all, but they are not rants.  Stay cool, stay civil.  YOU COMPLETE IDIOT!

[heights unknown]

Finally, we all debate, give opinions, etc. in a humorous, gleeflul, and, I don't believe it, respectful way instead of name calling, sexual inuendos, etc.  Keep up the good work troops!

"HU"

[NotNow]

I just love it when StephenDare! pats me on the head and compliments me on my "manners".  And to hear that I actually have COMPONENTS of intelligence just makes my head swim!  And I am SOOO sorry that I criticized an EXPERT OPINION. 

Main Entry: ar·ro·gant
Pronunciation: \-gənt\
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, from Latin arrogant-, arrogans, present participle of arrogare
Date: 14th century
1 : exaggerating or disposed to exaggerate one's own worth or importance often by an overbearing manner <an arrogant official>
2 : proceeding from or characterized by arrogance <an arrogant reply>

synonyms see proud

â€" ar·ro·gant·ly adverb

I will be the first to admit that I am not always right.  However, I would appreciate a reasoned argument rather than just ignoring my points and claiming all knowing preeminence.  Calling me ...stupid?  ignorant?  slow... I'm not sure what "components of intelligence" means, is not an argument, but just another fallacious tactic.  Surely you understand that, don't you StephenDare!?  I am making no "vast leaps of accusation".  Your opinions have been well documented on this forum and others.  If you have a real argument, then make it.  The name calling and claims of superior intelligence are just childish.  By the way, what are your credentials for "expert" status in anything?  FYI, "internet research" will never make you an "expert".  We have had this conversation before as well, and you continue to post on these forums and attempt to browbeat real experts about urban planning, road construction, and law.  Why do you do that?  Are you really so arrogant and self absorbed that you think you are an authority on all subjects?  If I didn't know you were a grown man I would say you sound like an obnoxious teenager.  Just try listening to the people who have actually successfully accomplished great things in life and you may just REALLY learn something StephenDare!.  Now, if you would like to go back to the thread, I am ready.  But lets stop with the personal attacks.  I will answer you in kind and you never seem to like it when I point out your shortcomings in real life as opposed to your opinion of yourself on these boards.

And I mean that in the spirit of respect and cooperation.