News Weakly - 1/21/2023

Fake News
Clearly this can't be true. U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is saying the U.S. hit its legal debt limit this week. Now, hang on. I mean, sure, Trump added $7 trillion in 4 years (due largely to COVID), but Obama only doubled the national debt (from $6.3 trillion to $14.4 trillion) during his tenure and in just 2 years Biden has increased debt almost $4 trillion, so how can we possibly be so close to the end of our debt limit when our leaders have been so fiscally responsible?

And God Said ... And It Was So
Okay, this is just weird. The Independent has a story about a trend among millennials. Lots of them are pushing celibacy. "Really??" Yeah, go figure. These young people are thinking that avoiding sex, at least for a while, might improve their relationships and clarify their goals and directions in those relationships. Kind of like God saying, "No sex outside of marriage." Go figure!

Unbelievable
You will not believe this story. Apparently Arizona (think "desert") is having a water crisis. No, seriously. Thousands of Californians have streamed into the state, new housing has been feverishly constructed in the part of Arizona that has very little water resources (the desert), and some communities are having their water cut off. Who would have thought?

String Him Up
A San Francisco art gallery owner is being arrested after a video of him spraying water on a homeless woman on the sidewalk outside of his gallery went viral. "Misdemeanor battery," the district attorney calls it. "Brutal" according to the NAACP. Apparently getting someone wet against their wishes is "brutal." I'm not condoning the man's action, but I didn't know this rose to the level of assault. Oh, great, so now waterguns will be assault weapons??

Hard to Follow
Christianity Today published an article about the 50 countries where it's hardest to follow Jesus in 2023. You may not be surprised that North Korea was #1. It might be surprising that Somalia was #2. I was actually quite surprised that Mexico was #38 on the list. I get the point; these are the places that the worst persecution of Christians is occurring. I might argue, however, that one of the hardest places to follow Jesus would be somewhere that "follow Jesus" gets a nod in theory but is thoroughly opposed in practice ... like the U.S., where we are told to go ahead and believe what we want as long as we don't bring it into the public square ... where our beliefs demand it be.

Mostly Harmless
In Chicago a special needs, nonverbal 21-year-old stood waiting with his father and brother for his bus for school when three gang members came around the corner and fired 39 rounds at the trio. The young man was hit in the head and is in critical condition. Clearly the problem is guns here, because without them this group of thugs would have been kind, respectful, and mostly harmless.

And You Were Skeptical
Biden got his "Inflation Reduction Act" through and the Fed has been raising rates for a year to knock down inflation and now we see that 2022 was the slowest year for US home sales in nearly a decade. See? Prices (on homes) are dropping and fewer are buying them thanks to our vigilant federal government. And you didn't believe they could reduce inflation (by eliminating purchasing).

People Will Be Beeple
Having reached the ceiling for government spending, Congress is being urged to raise the theft ceiling again. Of course! In other news, following Stanford's recommended use of words, Harvard, citing Harvard's racist history, is banning the use of the word "Harvard". Makes sense. From the Genesius Times, there was a breaking story about them finding Hillary Clinton's email server in Joe Biden's garage. Figures.

Must be true; I read it on the Internet.