Dakota Beacon

In the CNN story, a major public university is evaluating the reading skills of its college athletes using a test (WRAT) that is considered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education to be insufficiently diagnostic in assessing the reading skills of third, fifth, and eighth grade homeschooling students.

And consider the implications of the inborn-SSA justification. After all, the same social scientists who tell us SSA is congenital also say that sociopaths are born and not made. Now, if, further, someone was born with homicidal instincts, would this give him license to commit murder?

If we want to put wood chips in the gears in the form of ordinances and court rulings against the common sense and natural law of the marketplace we will have accomplished nothing but distortion which leads to shortages, which mean higher prices and less choice and poorer quality.  Competition, on the other hand, works for abundance, reasonable prices and higher quality.  Isn’t that what we should really want?

There’s no point in Cramer bashing these watchdog organizations because they are calling him out on his votes.  As we’ve seen it’s not some rogues at Heritage Action, it’s virtually every Conservative organization that scores votes in Congress!

Kept in perspective, Christianity in general, and Christians in particular, have always faced challenges both from within and without. If Christianity is diminishing in the United States under federal auspices, it is flourishing elsewhere.

. . . These were the worst conditions I’ve ever set up in; Alberta clippers; Class B kids; the four most famous Nodaks; Welk is historically important; there is increasing evidence of large cash gifts; Sloppy dress breeds sloppy thinking; Basin retirees are scurrying out the door withe their lumps; a nitrogen fertilizer plant near Jamestown; Twin Cities have the highest disparity in the nation; knuckleheads are out in full force; Tex Hall, Chairman of the Three Affiliated Tribes; 75 percent believed ND was headed in the right direction; top must see place; DAKTOIDS . . . .

Beyond being language-focused, classical education trains the young person's mind in three parts. The mind is supplied with facts. It then proceeds to organizing those facts with logic. The mind is then prepared to express conclusions derived from logic.

. . . I never forget, it’s not my money; it’s yours; anything can have significance to a group or individual; Little Red Hen; hobbled the Little Red Hen; ND’s booming economy; oil is a fact of life in North Dakota; overwhelming the state’s usual good judgment; It is more than money and a job; It got too cold for me; oil boom produces jobs which are male-dominated; a crash program to train physician assistants and nurse practitioners; Run for it, Mr. Chief Justice! Editors of the Forum woke in a distinctly cranky mood; the most drunken metropolitan area in the nation; It was just alcohol; An arts project dubbed “Destination Corridor” is moving forward; DAKTOIDS . . . .

He concludes with an ominous warning: 'Like an ever-widening sinkhole, NSA's surveillance technology will continue to expand, quietly pulling in more and more communications and gradually eliminating more and more privacy.' Three decades later this pronouncement feels uncomfortably prescient: we were warned."

They want to be admired by the boss. They want to be his confidantes. They want to be the one he trusts to get the job done. You can get into a lot of trouble like that.

Wherever you stand on pot legalization, about legitimization there should be no debate. A nation that does not maintain stringent social prohibitions (in the least) against chemical dependency will not likely remain strong and vibrant.

The Fed is a rogue entity. As I mentioned in my article about Ben Bernanke, the Fed has arrogated to itself arbitrary powers to create however much money it wants and buy whatever financial assets—whether government, private, or even foreign—it chooses.

Cloward & Piven taught that America could only be destroyed from within. Only by overwhelming the system with debt, welfare, and entitlements could capitalism and the America (sic) economy be destroyed."

. . . c’mon folks, this is nothing new; Bubba and Bohl -- one arriving, one leaving; he also cleaned out the coaching staff; Coborn’s is a 40-store grocery chain; unprecedented construction boom; airline passenger service is subsidized; the Red River Valley is not red; the Greenway is about 2,200 acres; he lurched to an extreme recommendation; $167,000 for each of Norway’s five million residents; a big increase in heroin use; Mary Tyler Moore lives here no more; a litany of ecological horrors and decimations; DAKTOIDS . . . .

Indeed, our government is too big, and we should not expect government to be all things to all people. Unfortunately, though, our churches in America are becoming too small. Sometimes by their own personal choice, and other times by the failures of particular churches, some do not experience this sort of community strength during times of need and crisis.

True history has much to teach us, but not if we approach the subject expecting it to yield prepackaged "lessons" that are really nothing more than our own preconceptions. The past is full of surprises, often disillusioning.

A drama of survival unfolds at the feeders. How do they do it? How does something as tiny and fragile as a song bird adapt itself for cold weather survival?

. . . Grand Forks was awarded a long-sought designation; Minnesota stands to gain from North Dakota drone tests; Casselton closed out the year with a bang; Bubba is getting a late start; Bravo to Zeeland, N.D., native Kyle “Bubba” Schweigert; retiring GF Herald publisher Mike Jacobs; Case will be succeeded by Bill Marcil Jr; Enrollment has dropped 40 percent; Don’t look for ND stories in the Miami Herald; Why does a school this size need a football team; North Dakota is on a euphoric high; the ND way of death; ND traffic deaths are down sharply; pet store reported four flying squirrels were missing; the proprietor of Grosz Wrecking; DAKTOIDS . . . .

 . . . THE LUCKIEST PLACE ON EARTH; WHO’S GOT IT BETTER THAN US? IT’S BEAUTIFUL -- IT TIES TWO OF THE STATE’S PREMIER INDUSTRIES; A FARMLAND BUBBLE? WIN-AT-ALL-COSTS PROGRAM; RIDING INTO THE SUNSET; THE HOME OF THE GLOOMY; THE PEOPLE ARE FED UP; HOPE, JOBS AND BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES; TEMPEST IN A TEAPOT; I'VE GOT IT! LATE BREAKING NEWS . . . .

If you make resolutions that require a complete change in your lifestyle, it is unlikely that you will make much headway.

. . . Expect some cooling in 2014; Schmid’s Ten Biggest ND Stories of 2013; Peterson Farm Seed in Harwood; UND’s new football coach; The three counties lost electrical power; There’s nobody that’s worse off than us; Outdoor Heritage Fund; we call them Hollywood Nazis; There’s no one to chase ambulances; 25,000 counterfeit “Beats” headphones; charitable gaming; DAKTOIDS . . . .

The great gift of Christmas is that God became man and became man's atoner. This is a gift He offers to everyone, even though many choose not to accept it.

He never taught that it was legitimate to help one person by trespassing on the rights of another. He never taught that the key to heaven lay in compelling other people do good things.

Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, even secular adherents to a social gospel, fall under the spell of that momentous event so many centuries ago.

Whether a person is a believer or not, for the sake of cultural literacy everyone should read the Bible at least once during their lifetime. I've read the Bible cover to cover many times and find new meaning every time I do so. With respect to the Old and New Testaments, as the saying goes, "In the Old, the New lies concealed; in the New, the Old lies revealed."

If we subscribe to the Orange Juice philosophy, the result is that guys like Cramer will realize that there is no way he can go “too far” to the Left.  If he wants to keep his cushy Washington office all he needs to do is curry favor with the Progressives.  Only they, after all - according to tradition, anyway - will send him packing.

. . . major ramifications for future state budgets; Don’t expect to see a lot more well sites; This is the only base in the world; $155 million Dakota Spirit ethanol plant; entrepreneurs in the ND Oil Patch; Gov. Mark Dayton struck back; flowery remembrances of the deceased; more rigorous admission standards for ND public college students; the home of hard-drinking slackers; I feel like everybody has the right to get whatever they want; The Fargo Crime Report; The Grand Forks Keplin siblings; THIS AND THAT; DAKTOIDS . . . .

Of course, Mandela didn’t seek to purge whites from SA upon becoming president. What he did do, however, was take this racial minority — which had willingly relinquished political power — and initiate the process of stripping them of economic opportunity via anti-white racial quotas. The result is that poverty exploded among Afrikaners, and, with jobs often denied them, it is said that hundreds of thousands of whites now live in squatter camps. Mandela, true to form, had nothing to say about this.

Most people would never guess it, but the arrival of whites in SA dates back further than that of the ancestors of many of the nation’s blacks. The first Dutch settlers (who became known as “Boers” of “Afrikaners”) landed on Africa’s shores in 1652, while many blacks in SA arrived later. After all, since life in “racist” SA was vastly preferable to that in surrounding nations, it had long been attractive to black migrants.

Some carols dating back several hundred years still present Christ’s message unchanged. They sing of God arriving in human form. The 18th century Latin hymn “O Come All Ye Faithful” is a wonderful example.

Why would he do a thing like that? the cities are loath to see enrollment declines; administrators cut and eliminated academic departments; needs of the tribe “were pushed aside in favor of political grandstanding; problems on ND Indian reservations; hand out free cell phones; Leith has been in a state of near hysteria; Best Performing Small Cities; Work to solve its challenges but don’t suffocate it; the phenomenally successful Timbit; Campers and RVs trickle south from ND; crashes on the Red River bridge; Tough times don’t last but tough people do; leaving only two smoking concrete elevator shafts; leftover cash in their campaign funds; ND is noted for a high level of social capital; Would you enjoy a leisurely trip?