the Centrist

Christmas Present… Christmas Past…

Here we sit on Christmas Day… Tim just called, he too alone, but not really, when we have Jesus, none of us are ever alone. Tim spent last night at midnight mass with friends… can you think of a better way to spend Christmas Eve? And yes, perhaps disease has forced us south, but those calls, from Evan last night and Christopher this morning, as well as the calls which will (and did) continue to come from siblings, sons, and grandchildren, as well as the rest of the clan, fulfill our lives. Let me tell you about our Christmas Eve. Last night (this being written between calls on Christmas Day) we took the advice of Marcel and Richard, two of our closest friends in Davenport. They recommended that we spend it at Epcot. We were reluctant because we knew how the noises and lights would negatively affect Marilyn’s disease. But she decided the worship was more important than the ensuing physical pain. So off to Epcot we ventured. We had a Moroccan dinner, reserved seats at a candlelight Christmas chorale with the age old songs, ones we used to sing in school, worshipful songs accompanied by the Orlando Philharmonic (?) and an international cast of hundreds of singers. To say it was inspirational is an understatement. I still have tears in my eyes and joy in my heart as I reflect. Then there were those fireworks, each one giving Marilyn a shock of pain, but each one food for our souls… love was the theme, and unashamedly, Disney said Christ is (not was) love, and is the Price of Peace.

As you spend your Holidays with your family, love them, but more than that appreciate them; because all too soon they grow up or are gone. Many are called away from disease, war, or accidents. As we, mourn those lost, we seem to always call those deaths premature, almost forgetting we too must walk that ‘lonesome valley’. Those of us lucky enough to remain but a few more years will have watched our families grow only to have those familiar obligations and stresses of their own.
Some of my fondest memories are from Christmas Past. They include our Timmy, always finding a way to sneak downstairs and peak at the gifts at about 4 or 5 a.m. Then, so full of excitement, blare out, not just Merry Christmas, but delineate each gift for each sibling like the town crier. The parental plan had been for all four to be surprised; after all, we had so painstakingly hidden those gifts, for each boy. At this predictable Christmas morning event, I would always pretend to be mad, but truth is I remember doing the same thing to Sal, Sandy, and Jane as a kid. What can I say; it must be in the DNA. So what was his punishment, you ask? All four had to lie in bed for another hour or so before they could open those gifts. I futilely reasoned, it would teach my Timmy not to spoil the surprise next year. But finally we would descend the stairs and see those four precious children open their gifts. Timmy, who still didn’t quite ‘get it’ would tell the other three which to open first!
But last night, after our Evan and before our Christopher called, it was my Mom and Dad and Christmas’s of the fifties which we reminisced on our ride home. Dad gone four years now and Mom eight, I still have a hard time believing their life on this side has ended. Well, perhaps it was the call and reminiscing from Skip, a lifelong dear friend, or maybe it was those wonderful songs that rekindled those memories from a simpler time, the Christmases of the fifties. Mom always made certain Sal got about the same gift as I, Sandy and Jane, well who knows, neither Sal nor I paid attention. But Dad would look on, ever so frugal with his hard earned wages, yet never realizing Mom had charged those items at the downtown stores. Those were the days before charge cards and interest, each store agreed to take $5 a week, until the bill was paid. As we grew older we realized it must have taken her years, and come to find out those bills were never really paid off until we were grown and out of their home. The gift of that community was trust and love, for without those vendors in those small businesses in downtown Jamestown, the Bellavia kids would have gone without. Here’s a deserved, albeit, belated ‘thank you’ to those of you who help build our memories.
Yet, when I think of Christmas, my mind always returns to the most precious gift ever given to me. It ranks right after the Christ child as the most important. It is my Marilyn. She is a woman, who to me has been as close to a person ‘without guile’ that I have ever known. And to have her by my side, just one more year, is more than I could have ever wished for or expected.
Finally, thank you for ‘listening’ to an old man’s musings. Understand that these are simply an example of the ‘everymans’ joys of life. And the realize I get the delight I feel in my heart from all of you who bother to read and, agree or disagree, understand that there is but one TRUTH, and that is JESUS CHRIST and HIM crucified for our sin. There can be no greater joy. This is the day we celebrate, not material goods given to our children, but the love of God the Father, allowing His Son to come to earth, not as royalty, that the poor and oppressed could not relate, but as part of the underprivileged tapestry of life, so that all can comprehend. You see of all gods worshipped, He alone arose, He alone lives, and I am unashamed to write and proclaim, He alone is my Lord and Savior. The majesty of that statement becomes clearer as I age. The closer I come to a reunion with Him, the less I fear that ‘Lonesome Valley’, because for the believer it will not be forlorn, He will accompany us to the other side and bestow the reward laid up for us from the beginning of time. Therefore, as for me, the older I get the deeper my faith grows, and the more I both appreciate and anticipate what some may call the end, but I choose to call beginning.
Merry belated Christmas, and I pray you have a Blessed and Wonderful New Year!

Be Blessed, and Be a Blessing,
Dr B

Here are some facts you must know about the Medical Bill about to be perpetrated on each and every American:
ACORN and Obamacare
A legal scholar says the Senate healthcare bill is not only stuffed full of racial quotas and preferences, but it also gives the disgraced liberal activist group ACORN opportunities to receive funding from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

Harry Reid’s (D-Nevada) “manager’s amendment” in the Senate healthcare bill requires that six federal agencies each establish an “Office of Minority Health.” Under that requirement, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is supposed to award grants and contracts to organizations that are “indigenous human resource providers in communities of color” and engage in “community outreach activities” — the type of work ACORN says it has been doing for years.

Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, says scandal-plagued ACORN — the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now — is exactly the kind of organization that will be applying for and receiving these federal funds.

“It illustrates this wrong assumption that’s all throughout this huge bill, and that is there are all these racial preferences and racial quotas everywhere in it,” he explains. “There’s this whole assumption by the left that the disparities in healthcare have to do with the racial background of doctors — something that is completely untrue — and it’s these kinds of things that in fact may worsen healthcare across the country.”

Obamacare’s Constitutional Problems Proliferating

After the Democrats cleared the second of three 60 vote hurdles last night, Republicans ceded enough debate time back to the majority so that passage of Obamacare through the Senate will take place n Christmas Eve at 8 AM. Conservatives have every right to be disappointed that Senate Republicans did not force the maximum amount of debate possible. But they can take heart in a key point of order that will be voted on later today. Sponsored by Sens. Jim DeMint (R-SC) and John Ensign (R-NV), that vote will lay the groundwork for the possible legal dismantling of Obama’s health program.
As we’ve detailed before, the very core of the Senate health plan includes an unprecedented expansion of the power of the federal government over the lives of every American. For the first time in history, every American would be forced to buy federally regulated and approved health insurance or face a $750 fine. As the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) wrote in 1994: “A mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States.” The individual mandate and other questionable measures in the bill raise serious questions as to whether Obamacare could survive a Constitutional test:

Enumerated Powers: Article I allocates to Congress “[a]ll legislative powers herein granted,” which means that some legislative powers were intended to remain beyond Congress’s reach. The Supreme Court recognized and affirmed this fundamental principle from the earliest days of the republic, as Chief Justice Marshall famously observed: “The powers of the legislature are defined and limited; and that those limits may not be mistaken, or forgotten, the constitution is written.” Nowhere in the Constitution is Congress given the power to mandate that an individual enter into a contract with a private party or purchase a good or service. Democrats have pointed to both the general welfare taxing power and the commerce clause as possible justifications for the mandate, but as a recent Heritage Legal Memorandum details, neither justification withstands scrutiny.

5th Amendment: The Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution reads in part: “No person shall … be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.” Sen. Ensign will argue today: “The Democrats’ health reform bill would require an American citizen to devote a portion of income – his or her private property – to health insurance coverage. … But, Mr. President, if a Nevadan does not want to spend his or her hard-earned income on health insurance coverage and would prefer to spend it on something else, such as rent or a car payment, this new requirement could be a “taking” of private property under the Fifth Amendment.”

Racial Discrimination: On December 10th, the United States Commission on Civil Rights sent a letter to the Senate regarding racially discriminatory provisions in Obama’s health plan. The letter reads: “No matter how well-intentioned, utilizing racial preferences with hope of alleviating health care disparities is inadvisable both as a matter of policy and as a matter of law. … Ensuring that all Americans, regardless of race, have access to quality health care requires both creativity and hard-nosed attention to data. It also requires staying within the requirements of the Constitution. The current race-based provisions of the Senate Health Care bill display none of these qualities.”

Unequal State Treatment: Speaking to Fox News, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) described Sen. Ben Nelson’s (D-NE) deal to support Obamacare in exchange for a bailout Nebraska’s Medicaid costs as “disappointing, sleazy, unconstitutional.” Graham is not the only one examining Cornhusker Kickback. The Attorneys General of Alabama, Colorado, Michigan, North Dakota, South Carolina, Texas and Washington state are jointly investigating the deal to see if special treatment for only one state in the nation at the expense of the other 49 violates the Constitution.

The leftist majority in the Senate is likely to vote down the DeMint/Ensign constitutional point of order, but the very objection itself will help build a record that courts will look at when determining whether or not Obamacare is unconstitutional. The Senate is not the final arbiter of whether or not the laws it passes are consistent with the United States Constitution. That question was settled over 200 years ago in Marbury v. Madison. Although it is always difficult for the Supreme Court to thwart what is perceived to be the popular will, polling consistently shows that this legislation faces strong popular opposition. If that remains true after enactment, the majority of the Justices who are inclined to preserve the enumerated powers scheme and adhere to the original meaning of the text will have little inclination or incentive to stretch the Constitution to reach so decidedly unpopular and far-reaching a law as this one.

Lighter Side:

The woman applying for a job in a Florida lemon grove seemed to be far too qualified for the job.
The foreman frowned and said, “I have to ask you this: “Have you had any actual experience in picking lemons?”
“Well, as a matter of fact, I have! I’ve been divorced three times, owned 2 Chryslers, and I voted for Obama

There was a Scottish painter named Smokey Macgregor who was very interested in making a penny where he could, so he often thinned down his paint to make it go a wee bit further.
As it happened, he got away with this for some time, but eventually the Baptist Church decided to do a big restoration job on the outside of one of their biggest buildings.

Smokey put in a bid, and, because his price was so low, he got the job.

So he set about erecting the scaffolding and setting up the planks, and buying the paint and, yes, I am sorry to say, thinning it down with turpentine..

Well, Smokey was up on the scaffolding, painting away, the job nearly completed, when suddenly there was a horrendous clap of thunder, the sky opened, and the rain poured down washing the thinned paint from all over the church and knocking Smokey clear off the scaffold to land on the lawn among the gravestones, surrounded by telltale puddles of the thinned and useless paint.
Smokey was no fool. He knew this was a judgment from the Almighty,
so he got down on his knees and cried:

“Oh, God, Oh God, forgive me; what should I do?”

And from the thunder, a mighty voice spoke..
(you’re going to love this)

“Repaint! Repaint! And thin no more!”

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