William Bruce wrote:
Hey Krause, my offer stands: Prove to the "reasonable man" standard that
(1) you have a degree from Yale, (2) your wife is a medical doctor, and (3)
that you own a lobster boat and I'll overnight a $10,000.00 check to the
charity of your choice in your name.

How 'bout it?

William


(The first step in creating a contract is identifying the parties
involved. Since nobody knows who you are, you might as well promise
$10,000,000.00. It would be equally meaningless. Making conditional
promises about things you will do "if" is ridiculous when
you cannot be held accountable)

An observation from a guy who has no interest in "defending Harry,"
(Harry can take care of himself, and does, very adequately.):

Aren't at least a few of the folks in the current pig piles on Harry
and Basskisser supposed to be getting spiritually prepared for what a
recently touted book declares the "most sacred Christian holiday" of
the year?

Will these personal attack threads continue until midnight of the 24th?
Will they stop long enough for the religious ceremony where well-to-do
people give other well-to-do people consumerist baubles and/or
expensive luxuries to emulate "God's gift of His son for our redemption
and to a lesser extent the chests of gold, frankincense and myhr
brought to the baby Jesus by the Persian astrologers"?

It is easily predicted that a chorus of wailing voices will respond,
"Gould, you hypocrite, why don't you chastise Krause for starting a lot
of this?" Harry does start a lot of it. It wouldn't be unreasonable to
say that he deserves much of what he gets in return.
Difference is, he isn't griping about the incursion of the secular
world into his Christian life, or the corruption of his sacred
religious holiday by people who would dare to say "Happy Holidays" or
"Seasons Greetings" rather than "Merry Christmas". Difference is also,
the
folks who are offended by non-Christian comments or observations of the
solstice holiday
usually claim to subscribe to a philosophy where one "turns the other
cheek" when attacked- rather than a philosophy where the one attacked
recruits a gang of people hiding behind phony names to launch a barrage
of insults for purposes of retaliation and escalation.

I guess maybe my general question is: When does this Christmas season
start? If it has started, are the pig piles and attack threads
consistent with the type of behavior one should engage in to observe
it? If it hasn't started, will the pig piles and attack threads
diminish when it does? If it hasn't started, why would anybody be upset
with references to "holiday" rather than Christmas on any given day?
Are certain non-Christian actions or statements more acceptable than
others? Does it make some sort of difference if the person engaged in
non-Christian behavior is all the while professing an overwhelming
concern for Christian behavior and expecting or demanding it from
others? It's pretty confusing. Would somebody please explain the rules?