So...after years of proudly and arrogantly announcing that only Jehovah's Witnesses have "the truth," they now are embracing spiritual relativism. In essence, they are saying that is doesn't matter what you believe; what matter is that you are attached to the correct group.
Justitia Themis
JoinedPosts by Justitia Themis
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89
New CO talk: Be loyal to Org. even if you get weird instructions or can prove them wrong doctrinally!
by sir82 intheme was something about "loyalty to jehovah's visible organization".. i have neither the time nor inclination to summarize the whole thing, but a few points stood out:.
even if it causes you personal hardship.
example: joshua & caleb returned from spy trip to promised land with good report, but were "outvoted" by the other 10 spies.
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77
DC 2010 Releases and info
by JWFreak insorry i have been very busy and forgot.
as promised.
friday afternoon.
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Justitia Themis
What "4 modern presidents"?
Perhaps Carter, Clinton, Bush 1 and Bush 2? The obvious flaws is that the Presidents have term limits, yet the GB say they are appointed for rulership until the end of the 1000 year reign when Jesus hands back the Kingdom.
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2
Colonel Signs Statement That Bush Knew Guantanamo Prisoners Innocent
by Justitia Themis inplease disregard the other thread...accidentally hit "enter.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7092435.ece.
george w. bush, dick cheney and donald rumsfeld covered up that hundreds of innocent men were sent to the guantanamo bay prison camp because they feared that releasing them would harm the push for war in iraq and the broader war on terror, according to a new document obtained by the times.. the accusations were made by lawrence wilkerson, a top aide to colin powell, the former republican secretary of state, in a signed declaration to support a lawsuit filed by a guantanamo detainee.
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Justitia Themis
Please disregard the other thread...accidentally hit "enter." :)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7092435.ece
George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld covered up that hundreds of innocent men were sent to the Guantánamo Bay prison camp because they feared that releasing them would harm the push for war in Iraq and the broader War on Terror, according to a new document obtained by The Times.
The accusations were made by Lawrence Wilkerson, a top aide to Colin Powell, the former Republican Secretary of State, in a signed declaration to support a lawsuit filed by a Guantánamo detainee. It is the first time that such allegations have been made by a senior member of the Bush Administration.
Colonel Wilkerson, who was General Powell’s chief of staff when he ran the State Department, was most critical of Mr Cheney and Mr Rumsfeld. He claimed that the former Vice-President and Defence Secretary knew that the majority of the initial 742 detainees sent to Guantánamo in 2002 were innocent but believed that it was “politically impossible to release them”.
General Powell, who left the Bush Administration in 2005, angry about the misinformation that he unwittingly gave the world when he made the case for the invasion of Iraq at the UN, is understood to have backed Colonel Wilkerson’s declaration.
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</form> </form> </form></form>Colonel Wilkerson, a long-time critic of the Bush Administration’s approach to counter-terrorism and the war in Iraq, claimed that the majority of detainees — children as young as 12 and men as old as 93, he said — never saw a US soldier when they were captured. He said that many were turned over by Afghans and Pakistanis for up to $5,000. Little or no evidence was produced as to why they had been taken.
He also claimed that one reason Mr Cheney and Mr Rumsfeld did not want the innocent detainees released was because “the detention efforts would be revealed as the incredibly confused operation that they were”. This was “not acceptable to the Administration and would have been severely detrimental to the leadership at DoD [Mr Rumsfeld at the Defence Department]”.
Referring to Mr Cheney, Colonel Wilkerson, who served 31 years in the US Army, asserted: “He had absolutely no concern that the vast majority of Guantánamo detainees were innocent ... If hundreds of innocent individuals had to suffer in order to detain a handful of hardcore terrorists, so be it.”
He alleged that for Mr Cheney and Mr Rumsfeld “innocent people languishing in Guantánamo for years was justified by the broader War on Terror and the small number of terrorists who were responsible for the September 11 attacks”.
He added: “I discussed the issue of the Guantánamo detainees with Secretary Powell. I learnt that it was his view that it was not just Vice-President Cheney and Secretary Rumsfeld, but also President Bush who was involved in all of the Guantánamo decision making.”
Mr Cheney and Mr Rumsfeld, Colonel Wilkerson said, deemed the incarceration of innocent men acceptable if some genuine militants were captured, leading to a better intelligence picture of Iraq at a time when the Bush Administration was desperate to find a link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11, “thus justifying the Administration’s plans for war with that country”.
He signed the declaration in support of Adel Hassan Hamad, a Sudanese man who was held at Guantánamo Bay from March 2003 until December 2007. Mr Hamad claims that he was tortured by US agents while in custody and yesterday filed a damages action against a list of American officials.
Defenders of Guantánamo said that detainees began to be released as early as September 2002, nine months after the first prisoners were sent to the jail at the US naval base in Cuba. By the time Mr Bush left office more than 530 detainees had been freed.
A spokesman for Mr Bush said of Colonel Wilkerson’s allegations: “We are not going to have any comment on that.” A former associate to Mr Rumsfeld said that Mr Wilkerson's assertions were completely untrue.
The associate said the former Defence Secretary had worked harder than anyone to get detainees released and worked assiduously to keep the prison population as small as possible. Mr Cheney’s office did not respond.
There are currently about 180 detainees left in the facility.
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89
What Do You Think Of Israel & Obama's Relationship?
by minimus init seems that obama and netanyahu cannot work together and israel is being isolated.
the two men had a recent falling out and once again israel looks like they will have to fend for themselves in the arab world.
what i see is the usa distancing themselves from israel and becoming more pro-arab..
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Justitia Themis
…some background information posters might want to consider. Western nations helped to destroy the Middle East’s educational system. When Britain controlled Egypt, Lord Cromer drastically cut the educational budget, because he believed that education would “create a group of intellectuals imbued with nationalist ideals and a sense of frustration over their inferior status.” In other words, he wanted to keep them stupid so they wouldn’t revolt. In addition, before the British occupation in 1882, Egypt and Tunisia in particular had taken great steps towards constitutional rule…until Britain used force to stifle democracy.
From 1922 to the military revolution in 1952, Britain forcefully kept out of power the overwhelmingly popular Wafd Party that was dedicated to establishing a Western parliamentary government. French, Dutch, and Britain openly fomented hatred between ethnic groups in a short-sighted “divide and conquer” scheme. Small little Lebanon was divided into twelve distinct “ethnic” areas that never before existed. Libya had a vibrant educational system, but by 1945, they had only a handful of citizens with a modern education, because Italy destroyed the school system. That certainly worked out nicely now didn’t it? Despite that, in the inter-war period, the ME loved the US and its ideals. It naively thought that Wilson’s 14 points and talk of “self-determination” applied to them. They openly allowed US missionaries to work. A by-product of that is some of the remaining premier missionary-established schools in the area: the American University of Beirut, the American University of Cairo, and Bogazici University in Istanbul.
So a fair amount of the difficulties experienced in the Middle East is the unintended by-product of Western foreign policy. While the US has a short memory (a nice euphemism for saying we are pretty ignorant of history), a 50 year old in the M.E. has direct memories of life under imperialistic rule.
In 1917, Palestine was 90 percent Arab, and Jews and Arabs in the region had lived in peace for decades. What angered the Palestinians was the shipping in of thousands of Jews from Europe. However, regardless of how it happened, Israel is not going anywhere, and Palestinians must deal with this reality. Additionally, Palestinians too are not going anywhere, and Israel must deal with this reality. The UN needs to take a stronger role, establish an oversight committee, and must force Israel to pay the Palestinians for their land. Western countries should be forced to accept Palestinian families who choose to take their money and leave. Israel needs to respect the already established boundaries, tear down their illegal settlements (or give them to the Palestinians) and quit attempting land grabs. This is the behavior that Obama is saying is unacceptable.
The US gives a ridiculous amount of money each year to Israel for everything from weapons to donations to UN services to buy “gets” for Israeli women whose ex-husbands are jerking them around in divorce court.
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What year Did you Stop Attending Meetings - How Long were you a JW ?
by flipper ini'm trying to compare some statistics and figures on this to share later in the thread to see if more long-time witnesses are exiting- or are newer witnesses exiting after a shorter period of time.
and - are more people exiting in the last 10 to 15 years than before.
so your answers would be helpful in looking into this .
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Justitia Themis
Born in, stopped attending in 2007 after 46 years.
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When being Fiscally Conservative means Raising Taxes
by Elsewhere inmy politics boil down to two simple things:.
1. i'm fiscally conservative.
because the public wanted them, yet are not willing to pay for them through higher taxes.
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Justitia Themis
Lower Bill Gates taxes and he will spend some, but save most of it.
Where does the money go? Where does all of it go? Does Bill Gates stuff it in a mattress? Where does the money go, and what does it do when it gets there?
It doesn't matter where it goes. What matters is that most of it doesn't get put back into circulation to shift the aggregate demand curve to the right and to increase GDP.
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When being Fiscally Conservative means Raising Taxes
by Elsewhere inmy politics boil down to two simple things:.
1. i'm fiscally conservative.
because the public wanted them, yet are not willing to pay for them through higher taxes.
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Justitia Themis
Basic Economics
We are in a recession; therefore, we need to increase GDP/aggregate demand.
GDP=Income=Output= y= C(consumption) + I(nvestment) + G(overnment) + (x(ports) - m(ports)) or y=C + I + G + (x-m)
Ways to Increase AD Expenditure Changing Policy: 1) Monetary Policy, 2) Fiscal Policy Monetary Policy 1) The Federal Reserve can buy/sell bonds to increase/decrease the money supply, thereby affecting interest rates. e.g.= The Fed. buys bonds from foreign investors>the money supply increases>interest rates drop. A drop in interest rates impacts the equation as follows: ^GDP= ^C+^I+G+(x-^m) Loans are cheaper>people buy more cars/homes> C and I increase> GDP increases. The Fed. has already done this...interest rates are near zero...no more wiggle room. Fiscal Policy 1) When the government increases/decreases spending to impact demand by raising/lowering 1) taxes (T), 2) government spending (G) , or 3) transfers (TR) (SS, unemployement, etc.), and as a last resort...printing more money. Raising government spending leads to a better that dollar-for-dollar increase impact because of the "multiplier effect." Lowering taxes works best if the taxes lowered are for the middle/lower class. e.g.= Lower Bill Gates taxes and he will spend some, but save most of it. Lower an unemployed autoworkers taxes, and he will put every dime back into the economy for food/clothing/shelter. TR, such as unemployment have the same big bang effect. Raising taxes at this time would lower GDP. ^G or lowering T or increasing TR all lead to an ^C, which means ^GDP. As we can see, both Monetary and Fiscal policy options have been exhausted, but for printing more money...(I think we are doing this.:)) The government's strategies to increase C and I by lowering interest rates have worked in all past recessions because we had the housing market to lead the way out=lower interest rates, homes start selling, construction increases, more jobs/wages, more consumption (C). THIS time, we have a sluggish housing market because of the bank/lending fiasco, so it is not leading us out. We still have a long road ahead...but I don't think increasing taxes is the way out just yet. -
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Please Suggest An Answer to This Conversation Stopper
by maputo95 inplease suggest an answer to this conversation stopper: i sent the first statement and he responded with the 2nd statement:.
equivocation:.
the bible forbids "taking in" blood.
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Justitia Themis
Yes, abstain from blood PERIOD...not even parts (fractions) of it!
Quit EQUIVOCATING by saying its OK to take blood if you cut it up in little parts. Taking fractions of heroin isn't OK.
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College
by AllTimeJeff ini know i have threatened to do this before, like when i first left.
but i am thinking of going to college.
this time, i feel determined.
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Justitia Themis
maybe accounting... probably not accounting. I need to make some money with a 4 year degree.
My daughter earned her bachelor's in accounting approximately five years ago. For a little over two years, she has worked as a financial analyst for...shall we say an amazonianly large online bookstore/retailer. She earns close to six figures in salary, plus she vests next year. As part of her salary package, she receives several thousand dollars in shares every six months. Stocks alone are up to about $10,000.
...not bad for under thirty...
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World Conditions Continue to Improve
by zarco instartfragment.
as we enter into a new decade, it might make sense to look back to view the progress than mankind has made in these last days.. about 200 years ago everyone on the planet lived on the modern day equivalent of about $400 a year.
the exceptions were tiny nobilities.
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Justitia Themis
Justitia, I believe that these figures are extremly simplistic.
Upon what basis do you believe? Before making your assertion, did you read the report to ascertain the variables used?
Farkel...your response to Villabollo is directly on point.
You are trying to nullify a hypothesis with another hypothesis.
Farkel