I Read the Headlines Today

Last updated on: August 23, 2010 at 1:30 pm by Scot McKnight

I Read the Headlines Today 2010-08-23T13:30:00-05:00 Scot McKnight

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I like to read the headlines of major newspapers from all sides of the political spectrum, and that means I poke my nob into such notables as the NYTimes, WaPo, National Review, Christian Science Monitor, Slate, and of course the Chicago Tribune.

I didn’t leave my nob in the hole long enough to get it burned, but my nose did get tweaked the other day when I perused The National Review. One would think the world was falling apart, that Mr. and Mrs. Socialist were already surrounding the Statue of Liberty, and that before the week ends we may well end up on some kibbutz plowing fields with forks and spoons and planting organic legumes.

Here’s what I saw. Which Islam will prevail? Well, I thought, that’s a good question. Maybe a good article. Obama, the next one says, is more like Carter than Reagan. Wow, I had to ask myself why in the world someone needs to say such a thing. I can’t remember the last time someone suggested Obama was like Reagan. Then came Thomas Sowell: we’re at the point of no return, folks, as our freedoms are about to disappear.

Then a piece on China doing well and how their success in free enterprising is good for all of us. Now comes a piece on how DC resembles Versailles of 1789, and I was thinking that there were lots of us who knew exactly what that meant. Since the article was about “clueless DC Democrats,” I surmise being like Versailles would be bad. Next something comparing our engagements in the Middle East give Obama a South Vietnam. (For someone my age that’s really bad news.)

Stealth Obama and his neon-green friends who are now fixed on the ocean. Followed up by how Obama’s policies are swiping things from the Cornhuskers. Well, I got a bit bored and skipped down to one on how we need a U-Turn on our road to serfdom.

Well, the headlines got me down. So I…

Opened by Prayerbook and observed that God is in charge, was in charge and always will be. No matter who is President or which Party has the louder voice. I ground some beans and made a nice up of latte, and pondered some e-mails and FB — and noticed that the news was entirely good with my friends. Everyone still has their home; no one lost a job. My kids are doing fine.

We’ve got a chipper, young, skilled craftsman at the house, named TK, and he’s hardly able to keep up with all the demands on his skills. My neighbors went back to school — one to teaching grade schoolers and the other to begin his practice teaching. My other neighbor got a job after some unemployment and is now about to return from his family vacation. Another neighbor gave up a pretty lucrative career in Sweden in physics so he could chase his passion: doing geneaologies.

The stimulus package is in front of us. Yes, that’s right. We got a new coating on our street. It’s been a bit of a mess all summer, but they delayed beginning to wait for school to get out, then the construction workers took aim at higher wages and struck — and they got what they wanted — so they resumed work. Just in time for school to begin, but they got it done. Only problem: our street didn’t really need a new coating. It was only a few years old. I contacted someone official about it and said, “Did we need this on our street?” He said, “Nope, but the Feds wanted this one to be on a busy street so citizens could see their tax dollars at work.” Then he added, “We had a number of streets that needed it more.”

I’ve come a ways since those headlines but I feel better, not because I read their stories but because realities told a different story. The best thing about headlines is that one group of them, the pro-President newspapers, tell more good stories until the other side wins.

Nothing like some apocalyptic warnings to make a Christian go out and test realities.

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