Re Presb Church Part-2, Did Anyone Else Challenge The Facts?

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REPORT ON THE SUCCESS OF TWO E-MAIL CAMPAIGNS

Many of the e-mail campaigns listed in Sec. 1 of this website have been successful.

Although progress on these TWO campaigns does NOT relate to this month’s topic, they occurred LAST WEEK at the 12/19/2019 Presidential Debate.

*****
Re Climate Change, Andrew Yang Championing Our Thorium-Fission Position --

Our Thorium-Fission Working Group has labored long and hard in order to, inter alia, request Presidential Candidates to support the development of thorium-fission as the only way of “Solving Global Warming 100% Without Military Action.” [Details of that effort are available at http://discussingliberally-saltlake.org ... =23&t=1781.]

At the Dec 19 debate, Andrew Yang could not have been more specific and more supportive.

[A transcript of the debate is available at https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... ic-debate/. The easiest way to find Andrew Yang’s remarks on thorium fission is to “cut and paste” the transcript into a Microsoft-Word document and then execute “Edit-Find” for “thorium.”]

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“REPRISE: Saving The Gov $86 Billion/YEAR – Medicare-For-All” and the Candidates’ Initial Reaction --

Our 7/12/2017 E-mail Campaign was entitled “SAVING THE GOV $300 BILLION/YEAR – MEDICARE FOR ALL” – details available at http://discussingliberally-saltlake.org ... =23&t=1631.

It was aimed at Sen. John McCain a mere 16 days before his iconic “thumb down” vote against “Repealing and Replacing” Obamacare, which caused it to fail by one vote.

The attendees of our 11/13/2019 meeting voted for our 12/11/2019 meeting to focus on updating this E-mail Campaign because of Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s DEFAMATION of Medicare For All by claiming that it would cost the Federal Government $52 TRILLION over 10 years – which is 41% over current Gov and non-Gov healthcare spending of only $3,683 billion/year -- which itself is DOUBLE the amount of only $1,944 billion/year if it were brought into line with the other 35 economically-developed countries in the OECD.

Our revised e-mail (“REPRSE: Saving The Gov $86 Billion/YEAR – Medicare-For-All”) is available at http://discussingliberally-saltlake.org ... =23&t=1869.

[Virtually all of the difference between $300 Billion/YEAR of SAVINGS and $86 Billion/YEAR of SAVINGS is due to the fact that, beginning in 2018, the Corporate Income Tax Rate was reduced from 35% to 21%. Which means that the COST to the government of the 55.1% of the U.S. population that obtains employer-provided health coverage (since it is deductible for the employer BUT non-taxable to the employee) was reduced to only 11.6% of the U.S. population having employer-provided health coverage provided courtesy of lost government tax revenues.]

At last Thursday’s debate, there was no mention of Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s exorbitant estimate.

The main fireworks occurred between Sen. Bernie Sanders on the one hand, and Former V.P. Joe Biden and Sen. Elizabeth Klobuchar, on the other. Which focused primarily on Sanders accusing Biden & Klobuchar of NOT being willing to fight bloated healthcare costs.

Indeed, Sanders actually paraphrased, a bit inaccurately, a point we have been making since 2017 that (quoting Sanders) “we’re spending twice as much per capita on health care as any other nation.”

Presumably by next month’s debate, there will be statements by other candidates about bringing U.S. healthcare costs into line with the other 35 economically-developed countries that are members of the OECD.
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solutions
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Re Presb Church Part-2, Did Anyone Else Challenge The Facts?

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---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: Re Presbyterian Church Part-2, Did Anyone Else Challenge The Facts?
From: Solutions
Date: Sat, December 14, 2019 11:13 am MST
To: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
Attachment:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear John,

I have just finished reading the three “original documents” for our Jan 15 meeting, plus the five “reference materials.”

The four-paragraph “intro” to each of the three parts of “The Presbyterian Church Bearing False Witness Against Israel” (the title of the 8/26/2014 “topic proposal” which is currently still the 15th posting in Sec. 3 of http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org) says that the 8/26/2014 “topic proposal” was divided into three parts for posting in our 1/15/2020 “reference materials” section because only Part-1 is required reading for our Jan 15 meeting.

Part-1 (which comprises 15.5 standard Microsoft-word pages), immediately after its four-paragraph “intro,” comprises the 8/26/2014 “topic proposal” which begins by proposing a study of “‘Steadfast Hope: The Palestinian Quest For A Just Peace’ (the 50-page glossy propaganda piece published by the National Presbyterian Church) and all of the defamation of Israel with which ‘Steadfast Hope’ is riddled” and immediately follows that with its second paragraph --

“[The reason for the proposal is that several RSVP’ers for our 9/3/2014 meeting on “Hillary Distancing Herself from President Obama Re The Islamic State” noticed that in her interview by The Atlantic, she had made some comments in support of Israel and the RSVP’ers believed that the Palestinian issue is relevant to our discussion of The Islamic State. Since the Palestinian issue itself is more than could be discussed in one session, particularly if there is no agreement beforehand on what the facts are, I promised the RSVP’ers who wanted to discuss the Palestinian issue (1) a meeting-topic proposal so that the Palestinian issue could be the sole focus of one of our meetings, and (2) an extensive recital of the facts so that anyone who disagrees with anything can try to disprove it with research before the meeting, because discussions bog down in frustration if instead of discussing principles, participants are arguing over facts. Hopefully, this proposal and its extensive recital of “facts” alleged by Yours Truly can help to preserve the major focus of our 9/3/2014 meeting on The Islamic State exclusively of the Palestinian issue.]”

Part-2 comprises an exchange of e-mails between you and Bill Lee in which Bill does indeed attempt, unsuccessfully, to challenge some of the facts set forth in Part-1 (while Part-3 comprises our post-meeting exchange of e-mails in which I asked you for citations of authority for the principle in Islamic theology that BOTH every Islamic martyr AND 70 close relatives of the Islamic martyr bypass a truly-fearsome “judgment day” and proceed immediately to Paradise).

But back to Part-2 and Bill Lee.

Did anyone else attempt to challenge any of the facts set forth in Part-1?

Your friend,

Solutions


---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: Re: Re Presbyterian Church Part-2, Did Anyone Else Challenge The Facts?
From: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
Date: Sun, December 15, 2019 4:32 am MST
To: Solutions
Attachment: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Solutions,

Thank you for your e-mail.

Please permit me to digress momentarily on the topic for our 9/3/2014 meeting which was “Hillary Distancing Herself from President Obama Re The Islamic State.”

As of 9/3/2014, The Islamic State -- which was beginning to form its “Caliphate” occupying much of Syria and Iraq -- was in its infancy and the Obama Administration was beginning to formulate its response (or lack thereof).

After all, President Obama had been famously quoted a mere 8 months BEFORE our meeting by David Remnick (Editor of The New Yorker) in an article in the 1/27/2014 issue of The New Yorker, as saying: “The analogy we use around here sometimes, and I think is accurate, is if a jayvee team puts on Lakers uniforms that doesn’t make them Kobe Bryant.”

And President Obama was quoted in The New York Times on 6/9/2015, nine months AFTER our 9/3/2014 meeting, as having admitted the previous day: “we don’t have, yet, a complete strategy” to confront the threat posed by The Islamic State.

Even though 2.5 months BEFORE our 9/3/2014 meeting, Hillary Clinton’s “Hard Choices” (Simon & Shuster 6/10/2014 – 656 pages) had been released and I had read it with great interest, particularly her criticism of President Ohama’s stance vis-à-vis The Islamic State.

Hillary had only served as Secretary of State 1/21/2009 – 2/1/2013 and now her successor, John Kerry, and President Obama were unleashing a firestorm against Hillary, especially after publication in the 8/10/2014 issue of The Atlantic an interview of Hillary by Jeffrey Goldberg entitled “Hillary Clinton: ‘Failure’ to Help Syrian Rebels Led to the Rise of ISIS.”

Indeed, Q-1 of our Short Quiz for our 9/3/2014 meeting asked: “Following the media fire storm created by the Atlantic article, does Hillary’s furious back pedaling on Aug 12-13 simply mean that the pressure to do so from the White House comprised a threat to cancel President Obama’s agreement to support her Presidential candidacy in 2016 which would mean that Hillary would be guaranteed a primary opponent from the left = Sen. Elizabeth Warren?” To which A-1 was: “Probably.”

So perhaps you can understand the paragraph you quoted from the 8/26/2014 Topic Proposal on “The Presbyterian Church Bearing False Witness Against Israel”!!!

There was no chance of doing justice to our 9/3/2014 Topic (“Hillary Distancing Herself From Pres. Obama Re The Islamic State”) in even a single two-hour meeting!!!

But several of our regular attendees noticed that in The Atlantic article, Hillary had made several comments supporting Israel and criticizing the Palestinians. So they wanted to include the Israel-Palestinian issue in our 9/3/2014 discussion!!!

[For your convenience, I have attached to this e-mail a copy of The Atlantic article with highlighted in red the portions in which Hillary comments on the Palestinian Issue.]

The 8/26/2014 Topic Proposal on the Palestinian Issue fulfilled my promise to “the RSVP’ers who wanted to discuss the Palestinian issue (1) a meeting-topic proposal so that the Palestinian issue could be the sole focus of one of our meetings, and (2) an extensive recital of the facts so that anyone who disagrees with anything can try to disprove it with research before the meeting, because discussions bog down in frustration if instead of discussing principles, participants are arguing over facts. Hopefully, this proposal and its extensive recital of ‘facts’ alleged by Yours Truly can help to preserve the major focus of our 9/3/2014 meeting on The Islamic State exclusively of the Palestinian issue.”

Our records show that of the 19 RSVP’ers for the 9/3/2014 meeting, there were only 3 who wanted to include the Palestinian Issue –

…1. Bill Lee, who had been one of the founding members of ReadingLiberally-SaltLake in the Fall of 2005; and

…2 and 3. Retired U/U Biology Prof. Ted Gurney, a long-time regular attendee, and his wife, Retired U/U Biology Prof. Tucker (aka Elizabeth) Gurney, who would become a regular attendee but for whom 9/3/2014 was only her second meeting.

So the answer to your Q???

Bill Lee was the only person to challenge any of the facts set forth in the 8/26/2014 Topic Proposal.

“Unsuccessfully” as you said.

The Gurneys apparently had no quarrel with any of the facts in the Topic Proposal since they did not challenge any of them.

And nobody else challenged any of the facts.

There was no discussion of the Palestinian Issue at our 9/3/2014 meeting on “Hillary Distancing Herself From Pres. Obama Re The Islamic State.”

And nobody voted, as the topic for the next meeting, for the 8/26/2014 Topic Proposal on the Palestinian Issue at our 9/3/2014 meeting or at any of the 5 succeeding meetings and, accordingly, it became an EXPIRED Topic Proposal.

BTW, you will have noted that the 9/26/2014 Topic Proposal was entitled “The Presbyterian Church Bearing False Witness Against Israel” and it documents, inter alia, the struggle 2007-2010 against Wasatch Presbyterian Church’s Anti-Semitism by its Senior Minister David Henry and Yours Truly.

And mentions that Rev. David Henry resigned in 2010 saying that he would like to devote the rest of his career to trying to “pour oil on troubled waters” by serving temporarily as an interim minister of severely-divided congregations for which purpose he thought he had a special gift. And that two years later, as he was serving Hilltop Methodist Church in Sandy UT as the second of many severely-divided congregations that he served, Yours Truly joined that congregation at his special invitation.

The reason for mentioning this???

When Yours Truly began attending Wasatch Presbyterian Church in 2007, he became good friends with June Taylor, then and now the University of Utah’s Research Professor of Radiology.

And June became a regular attendee of our ReadingLiberally-SaltLake meetings for more than a decade.

In all that time, June was a virtual fixture on the governing board of Wasatch Presbyterian Church and could be seen every Sunday morning singing in its choir.

ACCORDINGLY, I held my breath when the stance of Bill Lee and the Gurneys forced the 8/26/2014 Topic Proposal on the Palestinian Issue and the only way to set forth the factual issues before the 9/3/2014 meeting was to post the record of “The Presbyterian Church Bearing False Witness Against Israel.”

June never said a word about the criticism of The Presbyterian Church that was contained in the Topic Proposal!!! [Even though she attended the 9/3/2014 meeting!!!]

Not at that time, nor during the remaining 3-plus years of the decade that she was a regular attendee of our ReadingLiberally-SaltLake meetings.

From that, it would be reasonable to infer that during the 2007-2010 struggle against Wasatch Presbyterian Church’s Anti-Semitism by its Senior Minister David Henry and Yours Truly, June Taylor must have supported Rev. Henry in the meetings of the Wasatch governing board.

I’m sorry if that was more info than you really wanted.

Your friend,

John K.

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