Charlie Lehardy

By now I’m sure you’ve seen the news that terrorists have attacked various places in Bombay, India. If not, what rock have YOU been living under?

Anyway, I also read from the Times Online that terrorists “seized mobile phones and BlackBerries from their hostages and used them to contact each other and monitor world reaction.” Which reminds me of some stories I read a number of months ago about RIM and the Indian government.

In March of this year, the Indian government threatened to shut down the entire Indian Blackberry network of almost 400,000 if RIM didn’t give the government access to the security keys required to decrypt all wireless data. RIM balked, but then gave in on May 22nd of this year. However, they backtracked on that promise a bit and promised to keep things secure on the 27th of May.

Now, considering the reports that the terrorists were using Blackberries to communicate with eachother and keep an eye on the outside world, I’m a bit worried. Why? Well, I’m sure that people in the Indian government (and RIM themselves) are wondering what they might have been able to do differently if they had been able to see what the terrorists were saying to eachother.

Just watch and see, it’ll be just another week or two and the Indian government will be calling for monitoring of RIM’s Blackberry network in India and they won’t be put off so easily this time. Next it will be the English government (they’re already implementing CCTV “crime prediction” cameras) and then the rest of the governments that we the people answer to. All in the name of security.

This isn’t to say that I know exactly what I think of this. I mean, on one side, it’ll truly help in the war on terror and allow our governments to more effectively protect us, their citizens. However, it will also give a LOT more power and with that comes abuses. The movie V for Vendetta comes to mind and that rather scares me. But that’s where we’re collectively heading, you can see the writing on the walls. So, what do you think?

I need your help. Well, when I say “I”, I really mean refugees here in Tucson. THEY need your help. Here’s the short version. I just got back from visiting a few refugee families that have come into Tucson in the last 45 days and there’s a LOT of needs for them, I’ll post more about all the needs later, but the critical need right now is school registration.

You see, these families have kids that are old enough to be in school when that starts (August 11th!), but they don’t know English very well (if at all) and they certainly don’t understand the school system. So, they need someone to go with them to get their kids registered for school. That’s a very important thing for them and so I’m going to help out as much as possible.

However, there’s 7 kids and 4 adults that need to get registered and my car only seats 5. So, someone else (or two someones, even better) needs to help out in getting the kids and parents to the schools and help them get registered so they can start school on Monday! So, do you have time during the day (9am to 4pm lets say…) this week to help out? It should only take a couple hours and will mean a LOT to these refugees.

There’s a lot of other needs of course too, but this is the most critical one and the easiest to solve. So, can you help? If so, PLEASE get in touch with me via the form at the bottom of this message. I’ll post more later about how this goes and what else the families need, but for now, this should be enough

Thanks!
Charlie

I’m not sure what to say other than WOW. I mean, I suspected most of this and much of it may not be true but… the source is amazing enough! What am I talking about? Well, this article: Hezbollah or Israel, “Dooms Day” For Which One?

This really is an amazing article to read. I do wonder how much of it is true, but if even just 1/4 of it is true, then the regular news services need to get their butts in gear and start reporting this kind of stuff. Because this is the kind of thing that will show the world why we’re fighting this fight.

Then again, that’d mean they would be in effect condoning the fighting and maybe even approving of it. Which would be beyond anything I’ve EVER heard most of them speak of (even FOX News). Guess we’ll see where this all leads us!

Yep, I actually had a good Friday night! Really, it was a lot of fun. Started out with me watching “Good Night, and Good Luck” at 6:30 by myself. I’d been meaning to watch it for quite some time, just had not gotten around to it and man! I liked it a LOT. It’s one of those slower, thinking movies that has a moral to it. Plus there’s quite a bit of political things to it, but not Liberal/Conservative political (in my eyes anyway). More about the power of the press and how much good it can do if it’s used properly. Anyway, highly recommend that movie.

Then David called (I’d called him not long after I watched the movie) and we went to Fox & Hound to play some pool. I had done that a couple weeks ago with this Wednesday night Bible Study I’ve been doing (it was our monthly get-together), but I hadn’t played much pool. Man, I was just NOT doing all that well. But you know what? I didn’t care! I found a table in Yvonne’s section (one of the girls there that I used to talk to a lot) and just had a lot of fun. Chatting with David (and beating him at pool some, him beating me some), messing with Yvonne (we typically have at least once where we pretend like we’re gonna go outside and duke it out, she’s feisty and therefore a lot of fun

Overall, it was great fun. I got to unwind some, relax and not worry about ANYTHING. Just gotta hang out with people that I know and trust (IOW, David) and not worry about what anybody else thought because quite frankly, I didn’t care. It felt like old times at the Fox & Hound, which was great. Well, except that I didn’t drink anything but Coke (and Yvonne of course kept those coming… I must have had 7 or 8. Yikes!).

There WERE some guys that came over to our table during our first or second game and after watching us for a bit, asked to challenge us (I’d figured that was coming). Should have messed with THEM too (like you know, saying yes on the condition that they give me their number , but I just said no and ignored them from there. They did stay around for quite a while wanting to play, but since we were paying for the table by the hour and having our own fun, there was no way I was going to let them ruin that.

Oh yeah, I forgot the part that put me in a great mood as I was driving over to the Fox & Hound. I put a CD into my car that said Christian & Soundtracks on the front. Wasn’t sure what it was, but I thought I’d check it out anyway. Know what the first song was?? Adventures in Paradise by Ace of Base (from their Cruel Summer album). Next song? Always Have, Always Will. And then it went on from there. It was AWESOME!! I’d not listened to Ace of Base for a long time (years?) and have always liked them in moderation. But for some reason, it just made me laugh the whole way there.

And so guess what? It made me laugh the whole way back too! And so here I am now at 1:00 AM listening to Ace of Base again because I am just weird. What can I say? But I’m loving life right now so that’s all that matters

Ok, enough for this post and subject. Next!

I have a bunch of friends that are in China right now (they left on the 17th and will be getting back on the 29th (I think)). I should have probably mentioned this earlier so you could pray for them and read about what they’re up to a week ago, but I’m lazy, what can I say?

Anyway, one of the leaders has a blog at http://fromheretochina.blogspot.com/ and he’s updating it fairly frequently. There’s also posts on there for other trips he’s been on to China (they’ve been a few times) since the blog is used ONLY for the China trips.

I rather like the latest post he has… Check it out!

Hmm, that’s a song actually, but I won’t bore you by typing the words here (especially since I don’t know all of them). But it HAS been a while since I’ve last posted. This is mostly because not much has really been going on. Well, a lot has been happening, but not much that I care to talk about anyway.

Not that it’s been bad really, I just am not done with dealing with everything and so I don’t want to talk about it yet. Something along the lines of going out with my gun half-cocked or something like that. Anyway, the point is that there’s various things going on in my life. Some good, some not so good (I wouldn’t go so far as to say bad though). However, through everything God is trying to teach me to be more reliant on him. So that’s a good thing.

It’s kind of funny actually because right now as I’m writing this, two of my “problems” are fairly close to me and it’s not really an issue to me. I mean, I’m able to just ignore it and go on. So I guess it’s not really a problem, huh? Bah, enough of that crap. How about some quick updates and then we’ll call it a night (for the blog-writing anyway).

First off, I’m still in training. ALWAYS in training it seems. That’s a good thing though because I don’t have a lot of work to do still (and won’t for a bit) and so it keeps me busy (sometimes). I took the second class for MSHA (Mine Safety and Hazard Administration), so that means I just need to do 8 hours of on-the-site training at a mine and I’m legal to work in an open-pit mine for the next year (then I’ll have to do a refresher course). So I’m getting there, it’s just taking a while.

Nothing else going on in the work area really. Everything else is about the same too. Friends, Church, etc… Well, I’m getting to know some people at Casas more, so that’s a good thing (you know, more friends and such). I went to a fund-raiser for a China missions trip that the college/young adult group is going to on the um… 18th of May through the 30th. The food wasn’t all that great, but I didn’t expect much either so it was perfect. I did donate to the group though. Not something I typically do, but I’ve felt God pulling on my heart to donate to a few groups like that.

Another one is the KICY radio station up in Alaska (www.kicy.org). They’ve got a great mission up there and so I’m planning on giving a bit of support to them. They’re having a salmon dinner on Friday night for that at my Church (Grace Community Covenant Church) and are flying the salmon in fresh from Alaska just for this deal (or that’s what I’ve been told). So it should be VERY good. They’re actually charging $15 for the dinner and then doing a silent auction for donated food baskets during the thing too. Plus of course taking straight donations (I think). All of which (well, paying for the dinner up-front) was what Casas should have done for their China thing (makes for a better meal when you have money for it already instead of “borrowing” it against what you plan to get). But I guess that’s just one of those things that you’ve gotta learn the hard way. Maybe I’ll mention it to people there for the next dinner fundraiser they do

So yeah, that’s about it. Pretty boring really, which is why I didn’t write before now. Hopefully something fun and exciting will happen soon, but we’ll see. I think it’s about time for another rant though. Probably tomorrow since I’m tied up with a concert Thursday. Until then though, have a great time!

I just saw Switchfoot at the Rialto here in Tucson and I loved it! I had a great time and really heard God speaking to me through the show. But especially the first couple songs (first one was The Shadow Proves the Sunshine which is a GREAT song and a perfect start). They really put on a good show (saw them in Phx too which was very cool).

I also got to see some friends from The Xchange that I didn’t expect to see which was very cool. And some other friends of mine got to come who LOVE Switchfoot (they’re really the ones who started me on Switchfoot years ago…). So yeah, it was a great time. However, this also means that I’m REALLY tired and have to get up fairly early tomorrow to help a friend move so…

I’m outta here and going to bed! Cya!