Monday, October 17, 2016

Research Tips Using This Blog and Google, Guidestar, And Other Tools


Someone interested in the facts can learn plenty from the Net. The false teachers cannot help boasting, so there is a record - until I post it. Then they erase the evidence. That is why I copy and paste the evidence with the link.

Mordor - I mean Mequon - lists all of its graduate photos by year. The faculty's agenda will reveal some details. The classmates are also significant.  The later the graduation, the more the Mordor graduates are 100% Church Growth, UOJ, and New NIV.

LinkedIn is often an accurate resume, written by the individual using their software, but not always. If they omit significant jobs and background, there must be a reason. Paul McCain, the plagiarizing blogger and CPH bigshot, bragged about his many years at Concordia Seminary, Ft. Wayne. But now he has a profile with almost no information on it, besides working at CPH.

Guidestar.org is good for tracking incomes, such as CPH salaries (horribly out of date on that one). Guidestar is also good for seeing how Thrivent spreads money around. The synods hide most of the trail, but there are ways to pin down some of it. Hint - the apostates grab the lion's share. And by the way, the lion's share means "most of it."

A name search on Google can find newspaper articles, arrests, and other information. Something like Spokeo (which costs) can track down name, address, age, and the value of the house where they live.
Zillow (free) will show home values.

Caution - some names are common enough that one can follow the wrong trail. Defining by Lutheran, or WELS, or ELCA, or a similar tag will narrow the search. There is a Pentecostal Gregory L. Jackson who publishes religious books. I am not that person.

Humint is handy but can be deceptive. Human intelligence has to be pieced together over time. Classmates lie for each other. District Presidents play "I don't know." Clergy like Jack Cascione and James Heiser live in an illusionary world where their stooges repeat their fables.

If someone claims something, I only know that they claimed something, not that it is 100% true or even 1% true. I like hard data, which is more fun, such as quoting them. My favorite was John Lawrenz arguing with the Holy Spirit about his call - and he almost won. He wrote or said that, and it disappeared from the Net.

Reputation.com and Google will take money for making something disappear. According to my safe computer expert, Google makes a lot of money for changing the search parameters, cloaking the published photos or materials. For the longest time I could not find any good photos of Marvin Schwan or anything about his wife's death. Celebrities make their homes disappear from Google Maps.

This is funny. The photo of Ski  - as Jason from the movie - would not load. I changed its name and it loaded.  For that reason, going over material from the labels on Ichabod will yield a lot of material that otherwise does not show up well.


If a photo is subjected to reputation.com, I post it again and again with new names.

Still, searching on Google images is a great way to find the place where it was published. That can be instructive - even shocking. I did that to track down the murders committed by Tabor and Al Just (both of WELS, both covered up).

A reverse search is also possible on Google Images.

YouTube and Google will offer tutorials on these subjects.

Aderman helped found Church and Change in WELS.
He was fired for shrinking his congregation,
then forced a new vote to call him back.

 The Church and Changers work together in WELS.

Mark Jeske unites ELCA, WELS, LCMS, but seldom ELS.
Whadda guy. He is allegedly WELS,
but there is a joke about that - I cannot repeat.



To Each His Own - Divine Engineering by Season

Hostas illustrate why people wish they had more shade.
Bonus - their flowers attract Hummingbirds.

The Hosta garden is now layered with cardboard and garnished with a thick layer of pine needles. Hostas are all we need to make it complete.

The primary impulse of a gardener is to wish for more sun. In Phoenix, people work to defeat the sun. I knew the kind of house I needed to grow roses there - one that completely shaded the plants in the afternoon. We had so much sun and so little rain that a cactus forest was easy to grow. Some gardeners in Phoenix built a layer of shade fabric over their roses to spare them the burning sunlight.

In Arkansas, we did our best the change the classic umbrella shape of the maple tree to let more sunlight into the rose garden. Underneath, roses and shade plants grow with equal vigor, because each type has what it needs, plus a doting staff to water and weed them.

Today, on October 17th, the temperature will reach 90 degrees, so the leaves stay green and cling to the trees. I read about a harsh winter ahead. We do not even have a mild autumn so far.

 I'll have the Finch mocha
with two extra shots.
Don't jiggle it, barista!
By Norma Boeckler.


The needs of plants and animals should make people think more about Creation than global warming. Of course, that global warming concept is seldom mentioned now, because each global warming conference in the past coincided with a blizzard - so many times, that it became a meme - "Global Warming Conference Delayed by Snow." Instead, without a pause, we have Climate Change thrust upon us, implying that each BBQ, each flatulent cow, is leading us toward doom.

Some would like the winters warmer, but others want their winters colder and bolder. LI and I went to a camp where they bragged about being blessed by six months of winter each year. I failed to see the blessing in that.

Oddly enough, I bought suet early this year, at the first chill, thinking Starlings would be back soon. They love to swarm on the suet, and their racket brings other birds to the food. For every season there are creatures and plants, created and engineered, to take advantage of those conditions. In fact, many specialty plants and creatures only thrive in certain conditions. Skunk Cabbage must have very wet conditions.
 One of our friends harvested a plant and put it in the car.
Someone asked, "What is that foul odor?"


Wiki:
Eastern skunk cabbage is notable for its ability to generate temperatures of up to 15–35 °C (27–63 °F) above air temperature by cyanide resistant cellular respiration in order to melt its way through frozen ground,[3] placing it among a small group of plants exhibiting thermogenesis. Even though it flowers while there is still snow and ice on the ground it is successfully pollinated by early insects that also emerge at this time. Some studies suggest that beyond allowing the plant to grow in icy soil, the heat it produces may help to spread its odor in the air.[3] Carrion-feeding insects that are attracted by the scent may be doubly encouraged to enter the spathe because it is warmer than the surrounding air, fueling pollination.[4][5]
Eastern skunk cabbage has contractile roots which contract after growing into the earth. This pulls the stem of the plant deeper into the mud, so that the plant in effect grows downward, not upward. Each year, the plant grows deeper into the earth, so that older plants are practically impossible to dig up. They reproduce by hard, pea-sized seeds which fall in the mud and are carried away by animals or by floods.

I understand some insects will use Skunk Cabbage to warm up. That makes me wonder, "Who thought up a warming, stinking plant that grows down into the soil, keeps most creatures away, but provides warmth for certain insects?"

We have winter birds and summer birds, so people look forward to the changes, such as the grouping of male Cardinals, that only happens outside of the mating season. A male will peck at any mirror, especially outside rearview mirrors in cars, which are ideal for revealing a male opponent pecking back at our hero.

The winter birds take advantage of the wintering bugs, keeping the larvae population down, and larvae hatch conveniently when the mating birds need raw meat for their newborns. As Sharon Lovejoy wrote in A Blessing of Toads, a pair of Chickadees can strip a patch of wormy pests in one day. As anyone can see, the parents tirelessly feed their young until the children discover wings re-invent flight, and take off.

Nothing is easier than posing a Blue Jay
with a peanut. They know the fee and
and are happy to make a photographer's day -
working for peanuts.


We happened upon a juvenile Blue Jay on the ground, not quite flying. I seem to have a St. Francis aura with creatures - they seldom bother me at all. The parents dive-bombed anyone near their baby, but my wife and I were left alone to enjoy the exaggerated cries of terror. No one was hurt, but my ribs ached from the drama.

God created Blue Jays with great intelligence, stunning colors (except when wet), the dry feathers breaking up the light into blue tones. They are relatively large, more like the F-14s of the Air Force.
They are bossy, clever in imitating hawks to scare the competition away, and charming when they sound their happy bell tones. When I walked in Midland, being known for my bird-feeding among the avian friends, the Blue Jays would light on a branch and offer their bell tones, perhaps signaling others that I was on the good list.

The birds and squirrels study their human hosts with great discernment. Where is the food? How can we round off our diets with something from Walmart or Lowe's?

I may buy a sack of deer corn, because squirrels and birds love corn. The cost of deer corn is low, but bird corn-on-the-cob is high.

 Norma Boeckler's Bue Bird -
they love suet but also favor forested areas near grassy lawns.
They are harder to find and observe, so we really value
their delicate shape and colors.

The Difference Between Humans and Animals.
Behold the Fowls of the Air

Hurricane Matthew left behind this treasure-chest
of shells at low tide.

Sometimes we have to move from the lesser to the greater, a familiar argument in the Bible.

Matthew 6:26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?

Anyone with the slightest knowledge of Creation realizes that every single living organism in Nature, - as they often call it - has a purpose. Luther wondered about flies, but now we know that their repulsive maggots are ideal for cleaning up infections, since the little worms devour dead tissue and leave behind an antiseptic. One would think doctors prayed that God would create something that worked when powerful antibiotics failed.

But what about the Tachinid Fly, that looks like a common housefly, but works in the garden? The Tachinid Flies lay their eggs on or near pests, so their babies devour aphids or other insect pests on roses, growing up into parents who lay eggs near or on destructive insects.

Likewise, the purpose of the rose, from a beneficial insects' perspective, is to provide a place where food is available for their babies when they hatch. The adult stage of many beneficial insects will feast on nectar or pollen, so the plant also supports adults.

Adult tachinids feed on pollen, nectar, and honeydew and are important pollinators. They are very active fliers and are often seen alighting on flowers, fences, rocks, and people. All species of tachinids are parasitoids that use various insects as larval hosts. Most species use caterpillars (cabbage loopers, corn borers, gypsy moths, cutworms, fall armyworms, coddling moth larvae, leaf rollers, bollworms, and many, many others) as hosts while other species parasitize adult and larval beetles, and even various true bugs and sawfly larvae. Tachinids can be generalists that use assorted species as larval hosts or specialists relying on only one species to feed their developing young.

Walliser, Jessica. Attracting Beneficial Bugs to Your Garden: A Natural Approach to Pest Control (Kindle Locations 862-867). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

All scientists recognize the overlapping purpose of Creation and state those observations, often without acknowledging the contrast with their evolutionary philosophy. If a an insect has menacing and beastly eyes on its back  - so they will protect themselves from predators (purpose clause) - then one philosophical viewpoint must give way to the other.

Owl Eyes Butterfly (Caligo).
"The spots or ‘owl eyes’ are found on the hind wings of the caligo, and despite their eye-catching appearance, they protect the butterfly in nature by confusing would-be predators into thinking they are looking at something a bit more threatening."


The Viceroy Butterfly has taken purpose to the ultimate stage - deliberately, with malice of forethought - looking like the horrible tasting Monarch Butterfly, for the very purpose of fooling its predators into avoiding them. After all, any butterfly that develops on the toxic Milkweed plant has to taste far worse than cafeteria food at the junior high school. "Come let us reason together," said the Viceroy, "and discard our beautiful colors for the livery of the icky-tasting Monarch. Only that change can ensure our stability, growth, and prosperity."

Sure enough, a couple in Arizona spotted a Viceroy in my garden and said, "Look, a Monarch!" The plan worked.

The purpose of each appetite, camouflage, and taste is determined by the Creator, not the creature. Only man can sit and ponder his purpose in life. The animals, plants, even the fungi simply go about fulfilling their purpose.



From the Lesser to the Greater
If animals and plants have a given purpose, often an overlapping purpose and multiple dependencies, does God also give purpose to humans, the pinnacle of Creation?

Jesus teaches - we do have a purpose, no matter what we may think at a given moment, when disasters strike, when illness takes a loved one away, when jobs disappear, when physical or emotional pain dominates.

Matthew 6:26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? 27 Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?

When people see their purpose in life, the barriers and pain decrease, but may not go away. From a Christian point of view, whatever is done in faith glorifies God - and that is our purpose. 

One person I know is especially productive when a malady is at its worst. Others look at the output and say, "What a gift!" - which is true. 

I think, "Oh oh, another really bad spell." There is not an operation or pill for everything, but faith moves us to turn the ugly caterpillar of pain into a butterfly.