Friday, March 9, 2012

CHPP Daily Brief - Friday, March 9, 2012



•  The Daily Brief
•  The Middle East in Focus
•  Today's Legislative Focus
•  Government Gone Wild
•  Let The Vetting Begin!
•  The Netanyahu-Obama divide
•  Update: Those Mysterious Sounds
•  The Good News Corner (1)
•  The Good News Corner (2)
•  All of Israel is Crying
•  Worship With Us Today!

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The Daily Brief - Friday, March 9, 2012

Haman recounted to Zeresh his wife and all his friends everything that had happened to him. Then his wise men and Zeresh his wife said to him, "If Mordecai, before whom you have begun to fall, is of Jewish origin, you will not overcome him, but will surely fall before him." (Esther 6:13)

The Daily Brief
 
1. Senate rejects plan to hasten decision on Keystone XL
- BBC

Democrats in the US Senate have voted down a Republican plan to hasten approval of an oil pipeline project. Earlier, the White House put the plan on hold, saying it needed more time to assess the environmental impact of the $7bn (£4.4bn) Keystone XL project. Supporters say the pipeline, which would run from Canadian oil sands to refineries in Texas, would create jobs and reduce US reliance on foreign oil.

"At a moment when millions are out of work, gas prices are sky-rocketing and the Middle East is in turmoil, we've got a president who's up making phone calls trying to block a pipeline here at home. It's unbelievable," Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said.

- Father, we ask unity among our lawmakers, for the good of the people they serve. We ask that You reveal their hearts and motives as they vote, and give them wisdom in making their decisions. We bind up spirits of deception that would try to mislead the people. May we see the facts and the truth, so we may vote for Your candidates in November, we pray!

- "Your kingdom come,Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." (Matthew 6:10)

2. Govt. sets record deficit in February
- Washington Times

The federal government recorded its worst monthly deficit in history in February, according to a preliminary report Wednesday from the Congressional Budget Office that said the deficit in fiscal year 2012 is already more than half a trillion dollars.

- Abba, we ask that You make these facts known to the electorate. We know they are trying to "doctor" the financial picture to make it look like we are in a recovery - when the facts say otherwise. We ask for Truth to prevail! Amen!

- "Teach me Your way, O Lord, that I may walk and live in Your truth; direct and unite my heart [solely, reverently] to fear and honor Your name." (Psalm 86:11)

3. Gas Prices Now A Big Factor In Presidential Election
- CBS News

It might be one of the biggest issues in the upcoming presidential election. Last night, CBS News exit polls found 77 percent of those voting in seven Super Tuesday states say rising gas prices were an important factor in their vote.

- Lord, we are painfully aware that "seed time and harvest" works, whether we sow good seed or bad. We ask Your forgiveness on behalf of our nation, for the bad seed that has been planted, and call upon Your mercy on behalf of Your individual children. We look to You as our Provider - not only financially - but in every area of our lives. We ask that the people of this nation will vote and elect men and women who will sow good seed and reap an awesome harvest.

- "No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thornbushes, or grapes from briers."
(Luke 6:43,44)

4. Pat Robertson speaks out for marijuana legalization
- CNN

Televangelist Pat Robertson is raising eyebrows, and cheers from activists who are usually his opponents on political issues, by calling for the legalization of marijuana.

- Lord, we do not understand the "logic" here, because we have not won the war on banning marijuana. Lord, we ask that those individuals who look up to this man, will recognize his humanity - and that he is not speaking on Your behalf - but simply his own opinion. May we - the Church - not put any human beings on pedestals, but rather seek Your Face - and Your wisdom - submitting ourselves to You. May Your desire be accomplished, and we all submit humbly before You, and ask that Your will be done in this matter!

- "Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it." (Isaiah 30:21)

The Middle East in Focus

This week, for all the headlines cited below, please join us in proclaiming THIS DECREE:

"The earth is the LORD's, and it's fullness; the world, and they that dwell therein. For He has founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods." (Psalm 24:1,2)

1. Israelis, like United States, wary about strike on Iran - Washington Post

As Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returned from a visit to Washington this week, much of the discussion here centered on traffic-light hues. Had the Israeli leader been given a red light or a green light about attacking Iran's nuclear facilities?

2. Don't attack Iran, urges Israel's ex-spy chief - AFP

The former chief of Israel's Mossad spy agency has cautioned against an attack on Iran's nuclear sites and put his trust firmly in US President Barack Obama to intervene if and when necessary.

3. Abbas to deliver 'mother of all letters' to Israel
- Jerusalem Post

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas will deliver a "political letter" to Israel and a number of other countries next week outlining the Palestinians' conditions for resuming the peace process, Azzam al-Ahmed, a member of the Fatah central committee, said on Thursday.

4. Netanyahu: Strike on Iran's nuclear facilities possible within months - Ha'aretz

An attack on Iran could take place within a matter of months, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a series of television interviews on Thursday.

Today's Legislative Focus

From The Madison Project

www.madisonproject.com

House Republicans Deadlocked Over Budget

Members of the budget and appropriations committee met with leadership yesterday to iron out the topline spending figure for the coming fiscal year. Once again, conservatives are demanding that Republicans keep their pledge to stick with the numbers in the Ryan budget, but appropriators are not budging one inch. They want to overwrite last year's Ryan budget with a new one that reflects the levels of spending in the Budget [Out of] Control Act.
[The following is from The Hill, March 8, 29012)

House Republicans on the Budget Committee were still at odds Thursday over the shape of a 2013 budget after a long meeting with Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.).

Members had hoped Cantor would smooth a budget compromise, but they are still divided over whether to follow the August debt-ceiling deal's spending levels or to cut discretionary spending more deeply.

The debt ceiling deal set a cap of $1.047 trillion for 2013 but also imposes a $97 billion automatic cut starting in January. The debate is about whether or not to replace these added discretionary spending cuts with mandatory cuts, to reflect them in the budget, or to cut discretionary spending even deeper.

. . . The 2012 House budget would not have balanced for at least 26 years, and some conservatives were not comfortable with that. They want to see if a compromise budget based on the 2012 numbers, which had $1.028 trillion in spending in 2013, can be made to balance sooner before agreeing to it.

Meeting participants said they were confident that the impasse can be resolved by the end of March.

A budget would have to pass this month to meet the statutory April 15 deadline because Congress has a two-week recess early next month.

Read more.

PRAYER REQUEST:

Offer intercession in this impasse, asking our Lord to break down the walls that stand between these two groups of Republican congressman, so that a solution will be agreed upon regarding our national budget. Pray!

DECREE:

"And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive." (Matthew 21:22)

Government Gone Wild

Here are two stories certain to get your blood pressure up. Wednesday the Washington Times reported that the District of Columbia has received nearly $900 million in stimulus money since 2009 but can't account for a single new job. In fact, according to the Times the employment situation in the nation's capital has gotten worse! Consider this excerpt:

"In the District, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate has increased by 8 percent since 2009, as the D.C. government was receiving historic levels of federal stimulus funding via contracts, grants, loans, tax benefits and entitlements."
If that waste of your tax dollars didn't send your blood pressure through the roof, this one might. The Washington Post reported yesterday that the government awarded a $10 million grant last year for the production of a new energy efficient light bulb. According to the Post, "Energy Secretary Steven Chu said the prize would spur industry to offer the costly bulbs, known as LEDs, at prices 'affordable for American families.'"

So, what did the big government geniuses conclude was "affordable for American families"? Again, quoting from the Post: "Now the winning bulb is on the market. The price is $50."
No, that's not a typo. The article goes on, "How the expensive bulb won a $10 million government prize meant to foster energy-efficient affordability is one of the curiosities that arise as the country undergoes a massive, mandated turnover from traditional incandescent lamps to more energy-efficient ones."

Curiosities? It's an outrage! And another example of government gone wild. But, then again, this is coming from the same Energy Secretary who once said that he wants gas here to cost as much as it does in Europe. (Gary Bauer: End-of-Day; March 9, 2012)

Note:

You can sign up to receive Mr. Bauer's End-of-Day report for yourselves by going here.
Let The Vetting Begin!

days before he passed away, Andrew Breitbart announced that he was going to do the media's job and fully vet Hussein Obama's college days. This would seem to be fertile ground for any enterprising young journalist.

After all, Hussein wrote in his autobiography that "I chose my friends carefully. The more politically active black students. The foreign students. The Chicanos. The Marxist professors and structural feminists and punk-rock performance poets."

How did these "Marxist professors and structural feminists" influence young Hussein's thinking? That would have been an interesting debate to many Americans in 2008. But I suspect most journalists were uninterested in that debate, either because they counted many "Marxist professors and structural feminists" among their friends or because they were protecting Obama. Or perhaps both.

So who were these Marxist professors that Obama sought out in his college days? The first to be uncovered by Breitbart's investigation is the late Harvard Law professor Derrick Bell. In this video, you can see Obama embracing Bell and encouraging folks to "open up your hearts and your minds to the words of Professor Derrick Bell."

And what did Bell believe? Bell was a proponent of something called "critical race theory," which holds that America and its institutions are inherently racist. Bell was critical of white liberals and Jews. He embraced Louis Farrakhan.

In fact, Bell was so convinced of America's racism that he wrote a story about aliens offering to pay off America's national debt in exchange for selling all blacks into slavery. By the way, the aliens chose to represent themselves through an image of Ronald Reagan.

Just imagine if one of the Republican presidential candidates had embraced a white supremacist professor. Imagine if they had sat in the pews of a white supremacist church for twenty years. The media would be up in arms over this revelation. That candidate would be hounded out of the race and run out of the party in a matter of hours.

Yet when similar information is revealed about Obama, it is ignored and dismissed out of hand as irrelevant "old news." Is it irrelevant? Or is it one more piece in the puzzle of who Barack Obama is?

Bell fits the pattern, and helps to explain why Obama would leave Harvard and then sit in Jeremiah Wright's church for 20 years. The "Marxist professor" Bell goes a long way in explaining Obama's socialism, and why Obama's "Justice" Department would dismiss the voter intimidation case against the New Black Panthers.

Let the vetting begin!
(Gary Bauer; End-of-Day; March 9, 2012)
 
The Netanyahu-Obama divide


By Yoram Ettinger

The ideological divide between the [most Honorable] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and [Hussein] Obama is unbridgeable. It cannot be papered-over by photo-opportunities, smiles and warm hospitality.

On the other hand, the worldview expressed by Netanyahu during his recent visit to the U.S. is consistent with the majority of Americans and their representatives in the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate.

According to a February 12, 2012 Pew Research Center poll, Americans support employing military force to prevent Iran from getting nukes by a margin of 58 percent to 30%. Twelve percent are undecided. Thirty-nine percent to 5% want the U.S. to support a potential Israeli military preemption to prevent Iran from becoming nuclear, while 51% want the U.S. to remain neutral. These opinions have been consistent since October, 2009. A majority of Americans - 64% to 21% - maintain that tougher sanctions will not be effective in preventing Iran's nuclear drive. Most Democrats, Independents and Republicans concur that even tougher sanctions are ineffective.

A March 3, 2011 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll - conducted by Democrat Peter Hart and Republican Bill McInturff - documents that a 52% to 40% majority of Americans support military action to destroy Iran's capability to develop nuclear weapons. According to a February 2, 2012 Pulse Opinion Research poll, conducted for "The (Capitol) Hill" newspaper, likely voters support the use of military force - 49% to 31% - to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. A January 19, 2012 Rasmussen Report shows that 63% of likely voters believe that sanctions are unlikely to stop Iran's nuclear weapons development.

The aforementioned polls reaffirm that the U.S. is a center-right nation, consistent with polls which document that conservatives (40%) and moderates (40%) outnumber liberals (20%). [Unity Coalition for Israel] Read more.

Update: Those Mysterious Sounds

From Europe to Canada: Mysterious Sounds Coming From the Sky


"If humans had radio antennas instead of ears, we would hear a remarkable symphony of strange noises coming from our own planet." - NASA

"For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time." (Romans 8:22)

(United Kingdom)-Stash this away in your "stranger-than-fiction" file: The Daily Mail reports that mysterious sounds from the sky erupting from Europe to Canada are so loud and unsettling they are setting off car alarms.

A video taken in Germany of the phenomenon reveals that the sounds people are reporting sound like "groans and powerful horns."

Of course, such a strange manifestation has unleashed all sorts of theories, not the least of which is the return of Jesus.

Scientists, true to their field, believe otherwise. They refer to the sounds as "tweeks, whistlers, and sferics."

Jean-Pierre St. Maurice, a physics professor at the University of Saskatchewan, believes it's electromagnetic noise emitted from auroras and radiation belts.

David Deming, a geoscientist at the University of Oklahoma, calls it "The Hum"-a "mysterious and untraceable sound that is heard in certain locations around the world by two to ten percent of the population."

Do click on the link  and give it a listen yourself. Indeed, it sounds like all of creation is groaning, thus lending credence to the Biblical reality of Romans 8:22. (Source: Ted Thornhill - The Daily Mail)

Reported by: Breaking Christian News

The Good News Corner (1): How a Baby Saved the Lives of One Family During a Tornado

(Piner, KY)-Angela Praiswater gave birth to her first child, Aedan, at St. Elizabeth Hospital. That, in itself, isn't unique. What made her experience noteworthy is that she delivered her baby in the midst of an evacuation in the hospital during a tornado.

"We, along with one other person, was [sic] delivering at the time," said Praiswater. "The sirens were going off. The windows were all open at the time." [Note: windows are often opened during a tornadic storm to alleviate pressure in a building.]

According to Angela's father, Adam Praiswater, who had gone to the hospital with other family members to be at the birth, the timing was Providential. While they were at the hospital a pear tree was uprooted and impaled the trailer they lived in.

"It's God's perfect timing," he said. "He had him come on that day just to save us."

Said Debbie McIntosh, the grandmother of the new baby, "God blessed us. We all could've been home, and we could be planning funerals instead of [a] celebration. As far as I'm concerned, I'm the most blessed woman on earth." [Reported by: Breaking Christian News]

The Good News Corner (2):

Virginia Gov. Signs Bill into Law Requiring an Ultrasound before an Abortion

"I believe that we become a more compassionate society when we enact reasonable legislation to protect innocent human life." -Gov. Bob McDonnell

(Richmond, VA)-On Thursday, Governor Bob McDonnell signed into law a bill that will require a woman to first receive an abdominal ultrasound before having an abortion.

The measure was hotly contested and protested against by abortion advocates. But, in the end Gov. McDonnell signed it saying, "As difficult as an abortion decision is, the information provided by ultrasounds, along with other information given by the doctor pursuant to current law and prevailing medical practice, can help the mother make a fully informed decision. I consider it important to embrace a culture of life in our Commonwealth, and to protect the life and liberty of all of our citizens."

According to the WWBT report, the original bill had been amended removing a clause requiring "trans-vaginal ultrasounds." It was also changed to exclude victims of rape or incest.

While pro-abortion groups and even the former governor decried the signing of the bill, prolife organizations hailed Gov. McDonnell's actions.

Students for Life of America's Executive Director, Kristan Hawkins, stated, "Governor Bob McDonnell should be commended for making Virginia the eighth state to ensure that a woman have the necessary information on her unborn baby before choosing to end the life of her child. A mother should always be presented with not only an image of her child via an ultrasound but all the necessary medical and psychological information about abortion."  [Reported by: Breaking Christian News]

All of Israel is Crying

(Caution: not for children's viewing . . )

The song "All of Israel is Crying" was birthed in Jerusalem late in the evening on April 10, 2010. While in a debriefing meeting from after a week of praying through Israel, a team member with tears in his eyes said, "We have prayed throughout this nation, and everywhere we go there is a cry rising from the people: 'Help us! Pray for us!' "We began to sing the words he had just spoken, and a song was born.

When we returned to the US, the song kept growing in my heart. So here it is - the sound of our hearts married to the light released through prophetic imagery. Our hearts' cry has been that this short piece of art would touch you, release a fountain of prayer for Israel throughout the earth and for Rev. 1:7 to fully manifest in this hour:

"Look, he is coming with the clouds," and "every eye will see him, even those who pierced him"; and all peoples on earth "will mourn because of him." So shall it be! Amen.

May all of Israel be filled with the light of the glorious gospel. From our hearts to yours . . .

Bless you,
Father and Sons Music.

Worship With Us Today!

"O House of Judah, O House of Israel"

Kimberly Rogers
Thank You, Lord!