Fact Check Friday

Fact check Friday--it has a nice ring to it, right?

In sports:

• The Kansas City Royals continue their run to the 2015 World Series Title. Although they're on a four game losing streak, they still lead the AL Central by 3.5 games.

• Alberto Salazar, of 1982 Boston Marathon fame (winner over Minnesota's own Dick Beardsley), is in trouble. Read about it in, "Alberto Salazar allegation hints at worldwide abuse of the system" from The Telegraph. Read my commentary, "Salazar: Running Villain or Innovative Coach."

Some perspective on national and world news:

• CNN.com reports, "ISIS has executed more Christians in Libya." Belief.net and Media Matters for America have reported Muslim leaders denouncing the "so-called" Islamic State in a variety of media outlets, including the Vatican Radio (read stories here, here, and here). 

• An interesting read: The Kosovo War, an armed conflict which lead to a NATO coalition bombing, included claims of persecution both by Serbian Christians and Kosovar Muslims. The LA Times reported that the ethnicity was of greater importance in Kosovo than faith (read here).

• On same sex unions: Interesting read from the Huffington Post on Pope Francis's position on same sex marriage in "Why Gay Marriage Poses a 'Difficult' Problem for Pope Francis."  Read "The Same Sex Marriage Debate" from the office of the Archdiocese of the Greek Orthodox Church in America for a fairly nuanced view. 
• For a brief synopsis of major Christian sects' positions, read "List of Christian denominational positions on homosexuality" from Wikipedia. 
• Synopsis from all sources: 
• Grace is given through Christ apart from works of the law 
• Take the log out of your own eye before you remove the speck from your neighbor's eye
• Homosexuality in nature: Read, "Are there any homosexual animals?" from the BBC. Short answer: yes.  

• Let your kids go outside. Read, "There's never been a safer time to be a kid in America" from the Washington post. Kids are far less likely to be victims of crime or abductions than ever. They're far more likely to be taken advantage of online according to, "No Easy Answer for Protecting Kids Online" from the Wall Street Journal. 

• No commentary on national elections from me. If you're interested in affecting more immediate change in your political arena, consider reading the minutes from a city council meeting. Norfolk, Neb.'s city council information can be found here, Lincoln, Neb., here, and Eagan, Minn. here. For other cities, attempt to use a search engine such as Bing or Google.

On the lighter side of the news:

• A doctor in China claims to have removed 420 kidney stones from one patient. Unfortunately, the Chinese man fell short of the world record by over 171,00 stones. Read the the full story and other weird news at News of the Weird.

Special thanks to Paul Leckband, who allowed  me to contribute to his blog from the liberally moderate state of Minnesota.

For the record, Minnesota's conservative neighbor and arch-nemesis to the east has a worse record on job creation, education, and health care. Read about the trends in this admittedly bias source from Minnesota Public Radio. 

Personally, I prefer Nebraska's unicameral "nonpartisan" legislature where I was registered as a nonpartisan from 2001 - 2003 (really, that exists--read about it here).


COMMENTS FROM PAUL LECKBAND

Re:  the word "allowed," I would say that this is a dubious usage of this word. However, I am honored to have my son serve as co-contributor to my blog, although the views here-in do not necessarily correspond the the view's of PAUL LECKBAND. Read & follow links at your own peril!