Christians should save not condemn

I have witnessed many Christians condemn all Muslims no matter if they are radical or not. Christians who believe it is their duty to destroy Islam by the sword. We have Christians calling themselves crusaders, soldiers for Christ yet they have strayed from what a true soldier in Christ should do, and that is spread the Gospel, to show through love, as Christ himself did, that he is the only chance for eternal life.
Christ was sent first to the chosen people of God, the Jewish people. He spread his teaching to guide people back to the ways of his father, through the True teaching. After Jesus was crucified he sent out his disciples, with the power of the Spirit, to call all his children, including gentiles, to salvation. Two of Christ’s chosen, Peter the disciple and Paul the apostle, had the most impact in spreading Christianity to the World, mainly Rome and the rest of the World. The people were the gentiles, or those not of Jewish ancestry. Today we would say gentiles of that time were pagans. Now if Islam existed at the time then Muslims would be considered Gentiles, just like the people Christ sent his chosen teacher to and bring to him. Christ did not say take a sword and force these people to come to me. He did equip his followers with a sword and that sword was his word, his teaching that the Jewish leaders of the time would resist. It was his teachings that would put one against another because some would choose to hold on to the old ways that strayed from God’s word. The war would be between Christ words, his will, and those teachings of man. Somehow, over the years, various people have used Christ’s words as an excuse to take up arms against non-believers. Today, in parts of the world, people believe that taking up the sword against anyone not sharing their faith is doing the will of God. Is it? How is killing someone spreading the Gospel and giving the person a chance to accept Christ as their savior? It does not, it denies that opportunity. Who are we to deny another of Christ’s salvation?
I am not defending Islam or saying that I agree with their interpretation of the path to God. I am not saying we should let Muslim extremists kill innocent people. What I am saying that all children of God deserve the chance of true salvation. We cannot force Christ on anyone because by trying to do so we actually seal off that person’s heart blocking out truth. We will have people calling themselves Christian for fear of the sword not from accepting Christ as their savior, the one true condition for salvation.
If we try to spread Christ’s word by the sword, we do the opposite, we spread hate and our own damnation. Christ’s word is spread by love for of all things that is what opens the heart to acceptance and change.

If you want to know why I am concerned about a president-elect having such close ties to Russia let me tell you why.

I know many law enforcement people who were upset with Hillary Clinton and her close ties to groups such as Black Lives matter. LEOs were concerned Clinton's policies would make it harder for them to do their jobs and put them at great risk. If I were a police officer I would be worried about any candidate who would put my brother and sister LEOs at risk. I know there is a strain on the relationship of the black community and law enforcement because of recent events, but I am not here to take sides on that issue only to say there needs to more dialogue and training.

 As many of you know I am a submarine veteran and I still have a love for that community even though I was medically discharged in 1997 after 11 years of service. I consider those who have served and those who currently serve as my shipmates, brethren of the silent service (add sisters too, since they now allow women to serve on submarines) just like LEOs do. The submarine force is pretty close because we have to rely on each other to keep each other alive. On a submarine we are are own fire department, medical first responders, and security force. We have to learn every system on the boat to earn the submarine warfare designation, our Dolphins. This is not just something you do for a shinny medal, you do it to show you can be counted on in an emergency to operate and save your shipmates if things go bad. You are there for each other, you have each other's back.
The greatest threat to a submarine besides fire and flooding is another submarine, especially and adversary who would love nothing more than to takeout a strategic asset like a Trident Submarine. Trident Submarines are the mainstay of America's  Nuclear Triad. A ballistic missile submarine hides below the surface and is hard to detect. Bombers are easy to track, and missile silos can be easily targeted.
Russia does not like our submarines because they are hard to detect and Trident Submarines can launch a retaliatory second strike. It is this fear that deters Russia from using a first strike.
During the Cold War Russia did everything they possibly could to detect our subs, their schedules, and patrol areas. They would have ships designed to look like trawlers but loaded with intelligence gathering equipment loiter in international waters of Submarine ports waiting to track submarines leaving port. They would use spies such as Johnny Walker to learn about submarine communications. Anytime they could they would have one of their own fast attack submarines tail one of ours, and if they thought they could get away with sinking one of our subs without getting caught, they would.
The worst thing that could happen to our Trident Submarines is for their patrol areas and schedules to fall into the hands of Russia. If this were to happen then Russia would stake out those areas and hound our Trident subs. Soon as that takes place then each of those Submarines and their 140+ crews would become targets just waiting for Putin to give the word.
A deep ocean is a good place to hide, and a even better place to cover up a crime or act of war. Every one knows about how hard it was to find the Titanic and how difficult it is to work with ROVs at that depth. Imagine a submarine minding its own business on patrol when suddenly it detects a torpedo but it is too late to avoid.
The torpedo explodes cracking the hull allowing large quantities of water to flood the boat. The Submarine loses power and starts to sink. Those still alive in unflooded compartments are desperately working in the dark trying to regain power, stop the flooding, putting out numerous fires, while at the same time trying to get the stricken sub to the surface. The damage is too great, despite hitting the "chicken switches" which are actually levers used to blow air into the ballast tanks in case of an emergency, the depth gauges show the sub going deeper. Soon everyone realizes they are doomed but they stick to their jobs all the while praying for a miracle. The external pressure on the hull increases squeezing it until and a certain depth, crush depth, the hull can take no more and is crushed like a giant beer can. All onboard are lost, debris is scattered at depth across the ocean floor. An emergency buoy fails to deploy because it was severely damaged in the initial attack. No one will know about the loss until the Trident Submarine fails to report in after its time on alert has passed. The sound of the initial torpedo explosion and the eventual collapse of the Subs hull are captured by hydrophones deployed around the oceans but no one will know they are connected to the loss of the Trident Submarine until it is declared missing and presumed loss. The Navy would then use all of the data they can find to narrow down a search area. Eventually a ROV or ship using sides scan sonar will locate the debris field at great depth. An investigation will take place. The US military will blame the Russians the Russians will say one of our own torpedoes exploded sinking the sub knowing the difficulty of the US Navy proving their argument because of the ocean depth. In the meantime families will be planning memorial services and widows and widowers will try to explain to their Children while the other parent will never return home. 140 or so submariners on eternal patrol.
This is why I am concerned about the possibility of a president-elect being compromised by a foreign power who would love nothing more than to cripple our strategic deterent force. I don't want my shipmates, members of the Silent Service, to go to sea being sitting ducks because their patrol areas were compromised. Lives are on the line.

Is America really falling apart or is it suffering from media overload?

"Killers, robbers, drug dealers, rapists are running rampant in our streets and our country is falling apart," is pretty much the claim of one presidential candidate and his supporters this year. I and many others tend to question this position because statistics provided by the FBI show the Opposite of Donald J. Trump's claim. The question is that if the crime data gathered by the FBI shows a decrease in crime over the years then why do so many people not only believe Mr. Trump, but insist he is correct based on what they have seen in real life? That is a perplexing question but one that may have a simple explanation, at least to me it is simple.
It is true that the overall murder rate has decreased nation wide there are a few places where there has been a spike in murders such as Chicago. But still, the overall rate for murders and other crimes have been dropping and yet people believe it is increasing. Why? What if I tell you that there aren't more crimes you are just hearing more about crime? Sound counter intuitive? Not really. It is that your world has increased, or rather your "information world" has increased thanks to the Internet and 24/7 365 news.
I was born in the late 1960's when the sources of news was TV, Radio, and Newspapers. When I was very young it seemed I had a strange fascination with the evening news. I mean how many toddlers would be entertained by watching David Brinkley and John Chancellor at the news desk with Tom Brokaw reporting from the field?  I was probably the only 2 year old in America to have Vietnam flashbacks all from just watching the news. Anyway, with TV, radio, and print as your only sources of news you were limited to what crime reporting was deemed worthy of making national or world news. Most crimes you would hear about were local crimes and then only the major crimes. Now unless you lived in a large city there were few major crimes to report so you would not think much about crime. When the national news would come on you would hear about a murder in a big city or some place only if it involved someone famous or was extraordinarily gruesome, then you would think "I would hate to live there!" You see your information world was limited to your local area with the occasional intrusion from the outside by network news.
During the 1970's and 80's cable and satellite TV began to expand into more and more homes. (My family never had satellite but I had friends who did. The dishes were huge! I am talking contact ET huge!). Now with these new technologies you had access to more channels and soon you had 24 hour news channels like CNN and Headline News popping up (Thank you Ted Turner). Almost over night your information world expanded to cover much, much more so you would hear more reporting on major crimes but it was still weighed to determine how news worthy it would be. Now instead of hearing about a couple murders from around the country and the odd one locally you doubled and tripled those numbers. This also applied to the other major crimes.
So as the years past and more technologies were created our information world increased but with the rise of the Internet it exploded. Our information world encompasses our whole world now. It is not just the size of the new information world it is also its "never off" availability that changes our perception of major crimes and how often they take place. Years ago you may never have heard about a robbery that happened in a small town clear across the country or a murder of some non-famous person in a major city unless you lived there or close by, now it is part of news feeds and the stories are shared via social media so your information world is ridden with crime, but is your real world? Would you be exposed to the same amount of crime stories if you shrank your information world back to your local area? Most likely you would not. You would watch your local news hear about the occasional violent crime or theft and after awhile you would change your view on the frequency of major crimes. You may even overhear someone speaking about all the crime that is going on in the world and wonder what they are talking about, especially if you live in the same area. You see, in today's world people hear of crimes that occurred in other areas of the country and mentally group them all together and then lay that across the board so they see major crime everywhere and all the time. It is like this. A murder reported in one town, the first in decades, is lumped together with murders in other places, maybe the only ones in a long time, but suddenly these murders combined imply the murder rate of the first has increased corresponding to all the murders. Why? Because of nothing more than change in perception do to the increase of one's information world. Yes the first city had a murder, but the statistics would show there would not be a considerable increase in the murder rate, if there is any at all. If there was only one murder in the previous twenty years the odds are there may not be more than one murder in the next twenty years, all things being equal. Now with an significant increase in population you will see more crimes committed but if you factor in the increased population you will see the crime rate should stay the same. If you have one robbery per 100 people over a year (1%) and over the next year you increase the population to 500 and 5 robberies take place it will still be 1%. Of course there are other factors that way in but the overall premise is the same.
I wish I had the FBI numbers that show the national decrease in crime over the years but I am writing this in bed on a tablet but you can still go to the FBI's website or search on the web to find the statistics. You will see that nationally there has been a steady decrease in crime over the last 19 years or so. What makes it seem like crime is increasing? Just the amount of reporting on the Internet that we incorporate into our information world regardless of where the crimes took place.  

America built by immigration

Written on a bronze plaque attached to the pedestal of The Statue of Liberty is a poem called "The New Colossus" written by Emma Lazarus. The poem is about immigration. It reflects that this country is made up of immigrants from all over the globe and all have one thing in common, the desire of freedom.
The poem was originally written to raise money for construction of the statues pedestal in 1883. When Emma Lazarus was first approached to write a poem to raise money for the pedestal she refused but changed her mind when told of how the Statue would be a beacon to newly arriving immigrants, and it has done exactly that through the years. The bronze plaque with Lazarus's poem was not added to the pedestal until 1901.
Everyone knows the Statue of Liberty is a symbol of our country and one of freedom. The world knows it as a symbol of America's prosperity because of the immigrants that make up the country. It is also one of the most patriotic icons of the United States and no one can deny this.
Now, in this election year, the very nature of what the Statue of Liberty represents is under attack by those who call themselves patriots. These people, the Alt-Right, have beliefs that are diametrically opposite of the calling of Lady Liberty. Yet, this is only one problem of the Alt-right, they also devalue our country by dividing it along racial and ethnic lines. It is sad to say that Emma Lazarus who wrote such beautiful moving words would be attacked because she was a Jew.
People say they want to Make America Great Again yet they speak words and take actions that only serve to undermine what does make America great among nations. If you truly want to make America great again then read these words and take them to heart for without the immigrant this country would not exist.

"The Colossus"
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

A former submariner on why Trump's take on military comms is wrong.

A day or so a go Donald Trump suggested using curriers or messengers for military communications believing to be more secure, safer. Total wrong.

I was not a ground pounder, I was a submariner. What I know of the battlefield is from studying history and talking to veterans. What I learned is stuff happens quick and the big picture changes rapidly requiring fast and accurate communications in order to adapt to a changing battlefield.

Though I am not a battlefield soldier As as Submarine sailor I did learn the importance of fast accurate communications in a fight. What battle did I fight? No military engagement because if the Subs I served on used their weapons you nor I would be hear. Our main weapon was the Trident missile whose use would mean everyone was going to have a bad day. No, the battles we trained for the most were what we referred to as casualties: fire, flooding, nuclear reactor problems, or something involving the missiles or torpedoes. These and some other incidence can be deadly on a submarine.
Take a fire for example. Of all the casualties that can happen on a submarine this is probably the most terrifying. There really is nowhere to run on a submarine and there is no fire department. The crew is the fire department, we have to fight the fire. Imagine being in your home not being able to leave with your only option to fight the fire or die trapped inside. Yes, on a submarine you can seal compartments to limit the spread of a fire, we do that, but every compartment has equipment vital to the subs operation and survival. The forward compartment is normally where control of the submarine takes place, officers quarters, galley and for Trident submarines, torpedoes. Can't just seal that off and let it burn out because we would lose control of the sub, ability to surface, ventilate the ship on the surface, our back up power and Torpedoes don't like fire.
The missile compartment can't be just sealed to let the fire to burn out because, well, missiles hate fire too not to mention we lose atmospheric processing equipment.
The engineering compartment or the reactor compartments. The names pretty much tells you why you can't just let fire burn there.

Part of the communications on a submarine is called sound powered phones. They use crystals to change sound waves into electricity then back to sound on the other end without using external power. This system is simple and reliable but can break , though it rarely does. Without the system we would have to use messengers, sometimes we still do if it is too loud. Now damage control direction takes place in control unless that is where the casualty is. So if the fire is in engineering the messenger has to go from the aft end of the ship to the forward part. Sounds simple? No because the engineering compartment would probably be filled with smoke, you will be wearing an emergency breathing apparatus you will keep having to plug into the EAB air header, get a big breath, disconnect, head forward far as you can, find an EAB connection plug in take a breath all this when visibility is zero. Luckily there are non skid pads you can feel under your feet that indicate a EAB connection is overhead or nearby. Finally you reach control, make your report, and are sent back with the reply repeating the same process all the way back. Now in that time the situation can change. The fire could be extinguished, which is good, or the fire has spread and you need more men to fight the bigger fire.
If you have sound powered phones working the person in charge at the scene will tell the phone talker the situation and what other resources maybe be required, the phone guy then uses the phones to relay the message to control who takes the information and acts accordingly the replies over the phones. Fast, more and accurate information that helps in fighting the fire and saving the ship.
Yes, messengers work but when time and accurate information is of the essence good comm systems are the way to go.
Trump wants to set us back 100 years behind our adversaries. Hell no!

Trump purposely endangering Clinton by calling her the devil

You know by Donald J Trump calling Hillary Clinton the devil he really put her life in danger. Look at a lot of his followers on Twitter, right wing extremists who think Trump is their savior. Some of his supporters will actually believe she is the devil and it is their Christian duty to destroy the devil. These nut jobs are armed with some serious fire power, we're talking about .50 cal sniper rifles like some militaries use. That has a good range and plenty of power. I hope the secret service extends the range of their protection around her.
Trump knows his true hardcore base he knows if he uses the right words he can cause one of his nut jobs to act then claim innocent saying he didn't tell anyone to take out Hillary. Right now there are probably a few hundred crazies around the country praying for an opportunity to take out the "Devil".
Calling her the devil is not just being irresponsible, no he knows what his followers are capable of and he uses them. Donald Trump gets his supporters angry at Hillary then calls her the devil. He is insane. The sad thing is this should be the plot of a very bad B movie but with Trump it could happen.

The real reason the GOP hasn't pulled their support of Trump

Ask yourself why the GOP heavies have only chastised Trump and have not pulled their support of Trump, why?
These GOP leaders are getting barraged by their supporters to pull their endorsement of Donald Trump but they aren't going to do it. No, they would like Trump to win the Presidency then they will sacrifice him to put Pence in as president with their policies. It is obvious they will use Trump then impeach him. No wall, no Muslim ban, and all other of Trump's ideas the Trump Train want are gone bye-bye. The GOP could careless about the Trump supporters and Tea Party types; the will use and dump them. It will be a way to purge the party of the radicals that would have cost them control of both houses. Yep, Trump Train the GOP has sabotaged the tracks and you're about to be derailed.