Pastoral Resources

Through the harsh design of fate, Florida was dealt the unfortunate circumstances of bearing the brunt of not one but two hurricanes, and it appears more dark clouds are poised to visit the Sunshine State.

I have noticed a marked improvement in FEMA and with the coordination of FEMA and the State agencies.

The difficulty with the present state of affairs is that there is no legislation on the sources of funding for the Polish film industry. There is no legislation concerning filmmaking. And, there is no legislation on television that would be beneficial to filmmaking.

In the first years after 1989, films were partly financed from the state's budget as well as by public television. Still, except for a few special cases, most films are made this way.

Eventually, the state's funding covered only the stages leading to presenting a film project to potential funding bodies. It was enough to produce a script, indicate casting and put together a budget to present it all, but nothing beyond that.

Even better, there were established two separate committees deciding on state film funding.

A novelty in Polish filmmaking was that it was possible to find funds for a big production. However, at the same time, the state budget committed less and less money to filmmaking.

I belong to a nation which over the past centuries has experienced many hardships and reverses. The world reacted with silence or with mere sympathy when Polish frontiers were crossed by invading armies and the sovereign state had to succumb to brutal force.

I'm in my usual state up here in the commentary box: high tension, heart beating like a trip hammer, whatever that is.

Their final objective toward which all their deceit is directed is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjection.

Martin Luther King Jr. really understood the role of the churches when he said, 'The church is not meant to be the master of the state.' We don't sort of take power and grab the levers of government and impose our agenda down people's throats.

No, we are not the master of the state, said King. We are not the servant of the state. We are the conscience of the state. The churches or the religious community should be, I think, the conscience of the state. We're not just service providers.

I believe in the separation of church and state, absolutely. But I don't believe in the separation of public life from our values, our basic values, and for many of us, our religious values.

It graduates to 'our state is better than your state,' and 'our nation is better than your nation.' And it circles all the way around to where it started: 'Our God is better than your God.'

Today the people from my State of Tennessee would listen to this debate, or even talk about a reference to God on our money or in the Halls of Congress or in our Pledge and say, please, let common sense and logic win the day and prevail versus legal mumbo jumbo.

If we pulled out of Iraq tomorrow, Islamic jihadism is on the rise. And they continue, as we see in Lebanon, to seek to destroy the State of Israel and seek to drive America back and bring us to our knees. We must stand tall and straight.

Over this August district work period, like many of my colleagues, I spent a lot of time with the men and women in uniform from my home State. The 196th Field Artillery Brigade just got back from a year in Afghanistan.

It is critical that Democratic candidates, whether they are in New Jersey, or Virginia, or anywhere, emphasize the fact that we can be trusted, and can bring fiscal integrity to our state, local, and national government.

All provisions of federal, state or local law requiring or permitting discrimination in public education must yield.

A declaration of the independence of America, and the sovereignty of the United STates was drawn by the ingenious and philosophic pen of Thomas Jefferson, Esquire, a delegate from the state of Virginia.