OpinionJournal - Taste: Growing Christian Shrinks

re: Cara Marcano writes, "...At Azusa Pacific University, a Christian College northeast of Los Angeles, psychology is one of the most popular majors, and interest in the field is growing. The number of students enrolled in the psychology department has tripled in the past decade. Azusa is not alone. Psychology is one of the 10 largest majors at the more than 100 schools that are members of the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities, according to Ken Bussema, the council's vice president for student programs. /How did this happen?..."...

On the Genealogy of Morals (The Nation)

re: Samuel Moyn writes, "The enterprise of writing the history of human rights has become a widespread activity only in the past decade. Lynn Hunt's Inventing Human Rights is its most prominent result so far, identifying the Enlightenment and the age of democratic revolutions as the moment when the cause was born. Yet if human rights history is now chic, it is also confused. A few months ago the president of the main American professional association of historians announced to all students of the past--whatever the place and time and subject of their research--that they "are all historians of human rights." But what could such a claim possibly mean? /The most troubling shortcoming of the contemporary attempt to give human rights a history is that it distorts the past to suit the present..."...

WorldNetDaily: Politicians still wrong on Terri's case

re: Bobby Schindler writes, "...Romney's comments and similar remarks made by other politicians about Terri's situation have, in my opinion, been prejudiced by a media that have oversimplified what Congress did by spinning it as "meddling in a private family affair." /In reality, Congress enacted a law to afford my sister's constitutional and statutory civil rights claims to be heard in federal court. This law already exists for every convicted murderer on death row. /If monsters like Ted Bundy or Scott Peterson are afforded this right after their cases have gone through the state court system, why shouldn't an innocent disabled woman be given that same chance before she is cruelly starved and dehydrated to death? Congress was not only justified in getting involved, I believe it was their duty. /Moreover, the whole notion purported by Michael Schiavo and echoed by the media that Terri's case was a "private family matter" is ludicrous. /Starving and dehydrating someone to death is never a "private family matter," any more than abusing a child or a spouse is a "private family matter." /Laws rightly move such decisions out of the family setting and into a domain where government, if doing its job, can protect the lives of victims. Calling the right to abuse or even kill someone a "private family matter" protects only the abuser...[snip...]...Finally, it is still grossly underreported that Michael began a new "family" by living with another woman for a decade, admittedly asking her to marry him in 1994 and fathering two children with her while still married to and making life and death decisions for Terri. /The truth is Terri's real family asked Congress to get involved. Congress didn't wake up one morning and arbitrarily decide to weigh in. An enormous groundswell of support caused tens of thousands of constituents to contact their senators and congressmen, which resulted in the congressional effort to give Terri a fair hearing. This was exactly how our system of government was supposed to work. /It would behoove politicians like Romney to research the facts of Terri's case as well as the public response to it before cavalierly dismissing it as a matter for the courts. Just two days after my sister's death, a Zogby poll asked a question accurately reflecting Terri's circumstances: /If a disabled person is not terminally ill, not in a coma, and not being kept alive on life support, and they have no written directive, should or should they not be denied food and water? / Completely ignored by our "fair and balanced" media, 79 percent of respondents agreed with keeping Terri alive while only 9 percent believed she should be killed..."...

WorldNetDaily: The dehydration death of a nation

re: Bobby Schindler writes, "Saturday, March 31, will mark the two-year anniversary of my sister Terri Schiavo's death by dehydration. Not a day passes that my family does not think of my sister and relive the horrific images of her needless and brutal death at the hands of those who deliberately set out to kill her. /As hideous as it was, the truth is, long before Terri's case made headlines, the removal of basic care – food and water – was becoming commonplace. It continues to happen every day across our country oftentimes in cases, like Terri's, where the patient does not suffer from any life-threatening condition. /Much of the problem that exists stems from a blind acceptance of misinformation that has moved us from a firm belief in the sanctity of life to a "quality of life" mindset, which says that some lives are not worth living...[...snip...]...Combined with a popular media selling the notion that killing people in certain conditions is an act of compassion, one can understand why people with disabilities are in danger. /My sister's case is a perfect example. Look how the popular media presented Terri's story, abandoning any attempt at objective or ethical reporting in their rush to justify her death. In an effort to dehumanize Terri, they repeatedly reported she was in a coma, brain dead, a "vegetable" and that the autopsy proved she was in a persistent vegetative state, all of which are patently false...[...snip...]...This is why, in the years since Terri's death, we have worked, through the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation to protect the lives of the vulnerable. We are developing a nationwide network of attorneys and physicians to help families in desperate situations, whose loved ones are in danger of being killed … for the simple reason that they don't meet some arbitrary and subjective "quality of life" standard. We will continue fighting against those that threaten the lives of the disabled, until all are protected..."...

hat tip: BlogsforTerri

Audio Uplift: Close Calls

re: "Everyone wants to be "kind". But becoming a truly kind person takes effort. Actually, it's a finely cultivated art. JWR presents an English-language adaptation of the Holy Tongue bestseller, Ahavas Chesed..."...(and a three-minute audio presentation on a type of charity many people forget)...

ORTHODIXIE : INTERVIEW: Bishop Hilarion, Composer

re: "ROME, MARCH 5, 2007 - Music in church should be an avenue to deeper prayer, not a distraction, says a Russian Orthodox bishop and composer. / His Grace Hilarion Alfeyev, Bishop of Vienna and Austria, is the representative of the Russian Orthodox Church to the European Community. /His latest composition, "The Passion According to Matthew," will be premiered in Moscow on March 27 and then performed in Rome on March 29. /In an interview with ZENIT news agency, Bishop Hilarion discusses his latest composition, the central role of music in the Orthodox liturgy, Christian unity, and some thoughts on Pope Benedict XVI..."...

The Coloradoan - City studies blight status for mall

re: "Lagging sales tax revenue from Foothills Mall may be enough to spur Fort Collins City Council to declare the 34-year-old mall a "blighted area." /The council Tuesday will discuss whether it wants to establish an urban renewal plan for the 120-store mall, a move that would allow property tax increment financing to fix up infrastructure that city staff said could be hindering mall redevelopment..."...

hat tip: Face the State

Takeover by the State: Global Warming Alert From Britain by Vasko Kohlmayer - HUMAN EVENTS

re: Vasko Kohlmayer writes, "Something disturbing and ominous is happening in Great Britain as the country embarks on an all-out fight against the threat of global warming. Intent on making Britain the world’s first "green" economy, the government will soon introduce legislation designed to take SUVs and other "gas guzzling" vehicles off the road. By sharply increasing driving levies, the authorities intend to force car owners into making "more sustainable travel choices, including greater use of public transport, walking and cycling." / At the same time, homeowners will be asked to make their homes "carbon neutral" and required to draw their energy primarily from low or zero carbon sources such as wave, tide, solar or nuclear power. To ensure compliance, the government will send out inspectors to scrutinize everything from how a home is insulated to the kind of appliances it uses. Those who fail to meet the decreed standards will be fined and penalized. Just how serious the government is about enforcement can be sensed from the words of Environment Secretary David Miliband who stated -- while unveiling the program -- that it would be "painful" for home owners to continue to have an "energy inefficient home." /These sentiments were echoed by a group of cabinet ministers who said that complying with the new regulations will necessitate sweeping changes in lifestyle across the board. Everybody in Britain, they concurred, will have to "live, work and travel differently." / It is essential that we see these developments for what they really are..."...

hat tip: The Anchoress

We Protect Kids From Everything But Fear - Newsweek My Turn - MSNBC.com

re: "With hand sanitizer and long-sleeved swimsuits, we're teaching our children a dangerous lesson"... article by Paula Spencer, author of Momfidence: An Oreo Never Killed Anybody and Other Secrets of Happier Parenting...

hat tip: Rush Limbaugh

And Another Thing : I choose not to join yet another wimp-a-thon

re: Mark Levin writes, "As Senate Judiciary Committee members continue to show that emails don't comport with past statements and all the rest of it re the firing of eight U.S. attorneys, I guess I'm supposed to be outraged by all of it like some of my colleagues. I guess I'm supposed to fret about the political damage it will do to the Republican Party. Of course, the lib media are having a field day, denying their customers context and facts, as they continue to push the story. Newsbusters does a good job of busting them here. But I choose not to join yet another wimp-a-thon, where phony scandals are made to look serious and too many Republicans and conservative pundits fire shots at their own people..."...

No Left Turns : Podcast with Gordon Lloyd

re: Peter Schramm writes, "I talked with Gordon Lloyd about his new book, The Two Faces of Liberalism: How the Hoover Roosevelt Debate Shapes the 21st Century. The podcast is about thirty minutes. I hope you enjoy Gordon, one of the great teachers in our Master of American History and Government program."...

Tornado swarm kills four in three states | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

re: "HOLLY, Colo. — A massive spring storm spawned dozens of tornadoes from the Rockies to the Plains, killing at least four people in three states, including a woman who was flung into a tree by a twister as wide as two football fields. /Sixty-five tornadoes were reported late Wednesday in Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas, Colorado and Nebraska, the National Weather Service said. By early Thursday, the storm system stretched from South Dakota to Texas..."...

Townhall.com:: The Michael Medved Show: A Heart-Breaking Betrayal

re: "...disaffected young people are never drawn to watered down versions of religious faith, that lack continuity or integrity. In every faith community, the rapidly growing denominations are those that make demands on potential adherents and advance clear standards of right and wrong. That’s why Evangelical and Pentecostal Christianity has grown while “mainline” Protestant denominations have dwindled, while traditionalist Catholicism boasts far more vitality around the world than more liberal trains of the Church. Meanwhile, the Church of Jesus Christ, Latter Day Saints (the Mormons) place multiple restrictions on their members (who learn, for instance, to live without alcohol, coffee or tobacco) and yet remains one of the most rapidly growing faith communities in world. /In Judaism, the same dynamic definitely applies: with tepid and uncertain versions of the faith fighting a losing battle to maintain the affiliation of their own young people, while the unaffiliated flock to enthusiastic, traditionalist sects. No movement in Judaism has experienced anything like the explosive growth of the Hassidic organization known as Chabad with its 3,300 synagogues and community centers appearing miraculously in the most unlikely locales and transforming the face of American Judaism..."...

Townhall.com::An Amici Curiae Without Precedent::By Hugh Hewitt

re: In a "Memorandum for Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito"...[snip]..."...We lost in 1976 the full and fair and absolutely free political debate that had been the legacy of the revolution. Bureaucrats arrived to replace candidates, editors and the public as judges of what could be said and by whom. The gag order entered then on every American has grown broader with each passing year as the inevitable distortions that follow a market restraint began to build and then spread. Now George Soros and his friends –who don’t mind hiring the lawyers and gaming the rules—are in the saddle, and the spontaneous speech that has long characterized American politics begins to erupt only to be tamped down by worries about registration, incorporation, reporting and safe harbors. / You two can change that, and with a very simple stroke of the pen. Simply declare that the First Amendment meant what it said, and if the public wants a different system for campaigns, the public will have to amend it..."...

Kevin McCullough :: Entry Level Jobs, No One Else Will Do?

re: "Not if you work for Golden State Fence Co. /In December, company officials acknowledged knowingly hiring illegal immigrants and agreed the firm would pay a $4.7 million fine, one of the largest for immigration violations. Moskowitz said he was uneasy with handing down jail time because the company did not deserve to be "the poster child" for unscrupulous employers. All of Kay's workers paid Social Security taxes and received health benefits, vacation and sick time. Many earned more than $50,000 a year."...

Townhall.com::The Government's Iron Fist Is Not the Consumer's Friend::By Steve Chapman

re: "...The issue in this case is whether a manufacturer can dictate to retail stores what they can charge for its goods. You might think that if you take the risk of making a product, you should be able to contract with sellers on terms you think will enhance its chances of success. If stores don't want to go along with your preferences, they can carry someone else's products, and you can look for other retail outlets. /
But under our strange antitrust laws, that's not always how it works. For a manufacturer to make an agreement with retailers to sell only at a specified minimum price is illegal -- even when it promotes competition and offers benefits to consumers. /The practice, called resale price maintenance, is at the heart of a dispute between Leegin Creative Leather Products, which makes high-end purses and shoes for women, and Kay's Kloset, a suburban Dallas boutique that cut prices on these items below those it had agreed to. When Leegin ended its shipments, the store owners sued, claiming antitrust violations. A jury awarded them $3.6 million, in keeping with established federal law that treats resale price maintenance agreements as invariably malignant. /This view stands up under scrutiny like butter under a hot sun. The assumption is that if you let manufacturers control retail prices, they'll hose consumers for their own profit. But if they wanted to hose consumers, they could just raise the wholesale price they charge to retailers. That way, they would get the full proceeds of the rip-off, instead of sharing them with stores. So it's reasonable to assume there is some motive besides price-gouging at work..."...

» Commentary on the News - Actual Unretouched Photo

re: from March 23, "Everywhere I turned yesterday, I heard this: “The planet has a fever,” Gore said. “If your baby has a fever, you go to the doctor. If the doctor says you need to intervene here, you don’t say, ‘Well, I read a science fiction novel that told me it’s not a problem.’ If the crib’s on fire, you don’t speculate that the baby is flame retardant. You take action.” /Each time, I rolled my eyes and said (sometimes out loud), “No, you don’t. If your baby has a fever, you know that his or her little body is fighting off infection on its own. All you have to do is watch and wait.” /I’m guessing Al Gore never actually tended a baby with a fever..."...

OpinionJournal - Taste: Prayer Behind the Partition

re: Lucette Lagnado writes, "As a little girl, I was both enamored of the women's section at the back of my Orthodox synagogue and tormented by it. I lived for Saturday mornings, when my mother and I left our Brooklyn apartment and walked around the corner to sweet, friendly Young Magen David and the cozy partitioned area reserved for women only. It was its own world: intimate, charming, a place that encouraged friendship as well as prayer. Safe at last, I'd think, as I put the rough schoolweek behind me...[snip]...Fast-forward to 20th-century America, where the Reform and Conservative movements made a point of allowing families to sit together. The mehitzah all but vanished from their grand new temples sprouting in suburbia. With the rise of the women's movement, the divider became almost a symbol of female oppression--antiquated and vaguely contemptible. Even some Orthodox shuls did without a formal partition, according to Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb of the Orthodox Union in New York. /They've made an odd and tortuous comeback, these dividers, fueled in part by a resurgence of Orthodox Judaism. Some other branches of Judaism, including ones that did much to try to include women, are hurting--while Orthodox Judaism is booming. "People in this crazy world are looking to be anchored...they are looking for greater discipline," says Rabbi Marc Schneier, who runs the Hampton Synagogue in chic Westhampton Beach..."...

OpinionJournal - Taste: My Goodness! : Conspicuous virtue and the sustainable sofa

re: Joseph Rago writes, "...Conspicuous consumption stays with us today. But increasingly, it seems to me, many consumers are not seeking an outright demonstration of wealth. Instead, they consume to demonstrate their innate goodness. They spend not to suggest the deepness of their pockets but the deepness of their hearts. We inhabit, to update Veblen, an age of conspicuous virtue...[snip]...Thus we encounter the extreme specialization of virtuous consumption. Upscale boutique grocers like Whole Foods Market and Trader Joe's base their identities (and marketing strategies) on giving people a way to eat so that each of us may demonstrate where we rank in the virtue standings. The "holistic thinking" of Whole Foods Market, for instance, could not be fully expressed in a "vision statement," so the store is governed by a posted "declaration of interdependence" as well. Trader Joe's actually makes a point of advertising that it does not kill baby seals in the procurement of seafood...[snip]...To be sure, Veblen's notion of "superfluity" is bound up in this evolution of shopping. No one would go to Wal-Mart in search of conspicuous virtue. Only the reasonably affluent can afford to align their products with their beliefs. / Take Toyota's hybrid auto, the Prius..."...

Life and Liberty Medical Assistance Fund - Vision Forum Ministries

re: "...There are two defining medical ethics questions confronting the Christian community in the Twenty-First Century. The first is this: Should Christians view all life, regardless of size, age, viability, or “quality of life” as sacred and worthy of protection? The second is this: Who should be the primary caretaker for the people of God — the people of God themselves, or the state?..."...

hat tip: Absolute Truth (sidebar)

Planet Gore : Paul Driessen on the wrongs of "social responsibility"

re: Iain Murray writes, "Paul Driessen, senior policy advisor for the Congress of Racial Equality and Atlas Economic Research Foundation, author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power, Black death (www.Eco-Imperialism.com), and a featured expert in “The Great Global Warming Swindle,” sent me the following commentary on environmentalist crusades against DDT and fossil fuels, which he argues have harmed people and the planet..."...

A Letter from Bobby Schindler :: Bobby Schindler :: BlogsforTerri

re: "As you may already know, on Saturday, March 31, we will mark the two-year anniversary of Terri's death by dehydration. While this sad date brings the horror of her death into sharper focus, there is not a day that passes that we do not think of Terri and the suffering that she endured at the hands of those who deliberately set out to have her killed. /In the time since Terri's death, Terri's Foundation has been working to develop a national network of resources and support to help families whose loved ones might be in or potentially facing life-threatening situations. /Sadly, there is a steady stream of families who have contacted the Foundation on behalf of loved ones whose lives are endangered. Currently, we are involved in the case of Emilio Gonzales, a 16-month-old baby boy whose life hangs in the balance in a Texas hospital. Emilio's case is making national headlines -- you can read more about it at the links included in this newsletter. This is another tragic case of a family fighting against a hospital that ignores their wishes and doctors who have a "quality of life" attitude that rationalizes their decision to end the life of this precious baby boy..."...

Samuel Gregg: 'One more Christian, one fewer Chinese' tenet dying | Opinion | The Australian

re: "COMMUNIST regimes rarely advertise their failures. This makes all the more striking the recent report about religion's resurgence in China on the front page of the Chinese Communist Party's English-language flagship, China Daily...[...snip...]... /Even more striking are the demographics associated with China's religious growth. /First, two-thirds of those polled who considered themselves religious were aged between 16 and 39. As one survey organiser noted: "This is markedly different from the previous decade, when most religious believers were in their 40s or older." /The second variable was that the increase in religiosity was overwhelmingly in China's coastal regions; specifically, the areas opened to free trade and commerce during the past 25 years...[...snip...]...But perhaps the more immediate question concerns how the Chinese authorities will address these developments..."...

hat tip: Acton Institute

Townhall.com::Abortion: A case of missing perceptions::By Phil Harris

re: "...As one who will argue for the life choice, I have wondered how it is possible for anyone to take the other side in good conscience, yet I recognize that most people do not do so because they are evil. I have examined my own mind, to understand why I feel the way I do. There is not a particularly religious reason for my convictions; rather, I think it is more of a paternal reaction for me. More than twenty years ago, we had a little girl who died just before her fifth month. It was a horrible time for us. The grief that I experienced was difficult, and it burned for several years before time dulled the memory. /A number of years later, a young married woman, with whom we were acquainted, was conversing with my wife. For some reason the subject of losing our daughter came up. My wife and I were stunned by the young woman’s question about the loss. She asked, “Were you sad?” We were not angry that she asked the question, just surprised that she did not instinctively know. Surprised that she did not know that the word sad was insufficient to describe our suffering. She seemed to be missing a critical perception of life that was extremely relevant to us, but completely absent for her. /After considering that conversation over the years, I believe the woman’s question may be a window toward understanding the life or choice divide..."...

Władysław Bartoszewski Receives Jan Nowak-Jeziorański Public Service Award (28 March 2007) - U.S. Diplomatic Mission to Warsaw, Poland

re: "Władysław Bartoszewski is the first recipient of the Jan Nowak-Jeziorański Public Service Award sponsored by U.S. Embassy Warsaw. The award, recognizing a Pole who has made a significant difference through his or her leadership and commitment to public service, was presented to Mr. Bartoszewski at a reception hosted in his honor by U.S. Ambassador to Poland, Victor Ashe, on March 27...[...snip...]...The award to Professor Bartoszewski celebrates the life of Jan Nowak- Jeziorański, the Polish writer, journalist, and legendary resistance fighter. During World War II, Nowak served as an envoy between the commanders of the Home Army and the Polish government in exile, earning the nickname Courier from Warsaw. After the war he headed the Polish section of Radio Free Europe for a quarter of a century and served as an advisor to U.S. presidents Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter. In 1975, he moved to the United States and joined the Congress of Polish Immigration on America. He passed away on January 20, 2005. /The Nowak-Jeziorański Service Award is the second award of three annual awards the Embassy is announcing this year. In January, the embassy announced that Lech Wałęsa was the first winner of the Jan Karski Freedom Award. In June, the Embassy will announce the first winner of the Czesław Miłosz Award for Contributions to U.S-Polish Understanding. The award, named after the Polish author and Nobel Prize winner for Literature, will be presented to an individual dedicated to promoting improved cooperation and understanding between the people of the United States and Poland."...

hat tip: Power Line

Michelle Malkin on Terrorism on National Review Online

re: The John Doe Manifesto

hat tip: Power Line

The Scotsman - Business - Oil and gas industry fuels Aberdeen land rush

re: "ABERDEEN'S success as a global hub for the oil and gas industry has led to a major shortage of land and commercial property for firms looking to expand. /Ken Shaw, investment partner at property firm Rydens in Aberdeen said the city now has a severe shortage of stock. / He said: "To say the market is busy is an understatement. The take-up of office space has been significant over the past 18 months and, as a result, there is virtually no Grade A accommodation available in the city centre or west end of Aberdeen..."...

Touchstone Magazine - Mere Comments: A Good Education

re: Geoffrey R. Battersby writes, "In the Jan/Feb 2007 issue of Touchstone, columnist Phillip E. Johnson suggested that there may be better education models than the likes of Harvard. He recommended schools like the Torrey Honors Institute at Biola University or Thomas Aquinas College. Please join the discussion on our Treaders website of schools that educate students to be good people."...

Touchstone Magazine - Mere Comments: Where Nietzsche was Right

re: S. M. Hutchens writes, "I have been troubled in recent days by the shade of Nietzsche. When years ago I read Der Antichrist, it struck me that what he said about the shameful and unnatural weakness of Christians had a great deal of truth in it, truth with which I would someday have to come to grips. I have lived my life in a religious milieu where the scorn the philosopher heaps upon us is to a significant degree justified. There has been something very wrong about the way the gospel is so often interpreted among us—wrong because it is not the will of God that we be the weak and passive things, the welcomers of shame and of death and of inferiority and imperfection that we so frequently are, the excuse being that we are put into this world to decrease and die. For while it is true that we are here to die, we are put here first to live..."...

At A Hen's Pace: Why I Homeschool

re: another homeschooling Mom lists why she likes homeschooling...

FIRST THINGS: Schooling at Home

re: Sally Thomas writes, "...The night before, we had gone to dinner with old friends, and in the course of the evening the conversation turned to our homeschooling. Our hosts didn’t want to argue with the decision my husband and I had made to homeschool; in truth, people do that a lot less often than we had steeled ourselves to expect early on. I suppose they didn’t ask how we expected our children to be “socialized” because there the children were, in front of everyone, doing their best impersonations of socialized people. The nine-year-old talked to the grownups about Star Wars, the four-year-old helped to carry dishes to the table, the three-year-old played nicely on the floor with our friends’ baby granddaughter. The twelve-year-old, away at a ballet rehearsal, proclaimed her socialization by her absence. /In fact, our friends’ questions had nothing to do with the welfare of our children, because they could see for themselves that the children were fine. But they were curious, and what they wanted to know was simply this: What do you do all day long?..."...

FIRST THINGS: On the Square » It’s Not All Relative

re: Robert T. Miller writes, "As I wrote in this space last week (see here and here), many Catholic thinkers tend to dismiss as “relativists” anyone who disagrees radically with them on some moral or political matter. This, I argued, is a mistake, for there very many ways of disagreeing with Catholic moral teaching, each importantly different from the others, and of these very few amount to relativism in any plausible sense of that term. In particular, almost none amount, in Bishop Crepaldi’s words, to a “dogma [that] a priori rejects rational argumentation” on normative questions. /My correspondence has since been voluminous and (except for that from professional philosophers, who have largely agreed with me) usually furious. I want therefore to address some of the more common points my correspondents raise...[snip]...No one is a relativist in morals just because he’s uninformed about material facts or untrained in logic. Indeed, the very fact that someone is prepared to make arguments—even bad arguments—shows that he does not reject rational argumentation but rather embraces it. Whatever the intellectual faults of people guilty of shoddy reasoning, they do not include a wholesale rejection of rational argumentation. Notice, incidentally, how my correspondents who raised this point are falling into the very error I was inveighing against on the blog: By confusing people who reason badly with people who reject reasoning completely, they are mistaking a non-relativist position for a relativist one..."...

les Davey de France: The robe - an emblem of working cross-culturally

re: "...Here in France évangélique (evangelical) is a very scary word. That's those weird Americans who jump around and fall over, no? Baptiste? Scary! That's what George Bush is isn't he? No? Well I am sure one of them was. Réformée? That's not scary. That's French, OK, but aren't they basically about Kierkegaard and hospitals and youth clubs and stuff? Protestante? Oh yes - those are the people who stood up for what they believed even if it cost their lives. And after all many of the reformers who had most influence on us were Frenchmen. Chrétien? Well I suspect that most French ears will hear that word as Roman Catholic, but Christian is what we are after all, and the Christian message is what we are about. / OK - that's a caricature, but in a predominantly RC country the denominational variety of Britain and the USA looks really weird! Five churches in one street? What's that all about? And we can talk till we are blue in the face about gospel unity and dividing over secondary issues, but the French ear will hear sectes. / In Britain a new church, well it wouldn't be scary and you may even go and check it out. And cults and sects? Our instinctive reaction is "nutters". Not scary. Here in France there is a genuine fear of psychological manipulation and of new groups because they are sectes, aren't they. Obviously.So you have to remember that you are not in Britain. And adapt..."...

My Part of Nairobi: This would not fly in the land of its origin

re: "The Belgian government has sent a copy of An Inconvenient Truth to all of the 7th grade classes in the country and is asking for teachers to initiate projects around climate change/control... / And I must remind you that Mr. Gore's personal home uses 20 times more energy than the average US home uses. But I guess the good changes he might start in Belgium could make up for his personal sins. (Politician = televangelist?)"...

The Corner : re: Die Kinder

re: Kathryn Jean Lopez, following this Mark Steyn post, writes : "Since that first dump-here box — not for pay, mind you — showed up in Germany (hospitals, train stations...). I've felt mildly guilty as fellow pro-lifers complained to me, don't you want to save the life of the child? Well, of course I do. But it's not that simple. Kids aren't library books or Blockbuster rentals. And there are other, more constructive and long-term-beneficial ways to help a desperate mom. Because guess what? She may not have to change diapers for the kid after she dumps the child, but she'll still have given birth and though drugs or alcohol may dull the pain of regret for a while she can never can't fully dump that reality. / Yes, we need to save the kids — every last one we can save, every day. But we need to save our civilization too."

The Corner : The German Babies

re: "...When I read that story about "dump your unwanted baby here," I knew that picture. It's an old story. Lots of Neapolitan churches had a feature on the front door, a sort of revolving bassinette so that women could take their unwanted newborns, put them in the container, and then revolve it so that the [babies] went inside. /Those babies were called "esposti," exposed, as in "left outside," and as they grew up they were given the last name "esposito." We all know some Espositos, my personal favorite was a hockey star for Boston and then the Rangers. Many of them come from Naples, and at one point or another one of their ancestors was put in that revolving bassinette and rotated inside a church. /So I will, for once, mildly disagree with Mark, who is right about the phenomenon and right to be contemptuous of a wealthy German culture that has adopted a custom born out of the desperation and poverty of the Neapolitan underclass, combined with the generosity and love of the churches that saved these children. But I think he is wrong to call it post-human. It's been there all along. But its meaning is different today. Back then it was the best they could do. Today it's a disgusting form of narcissism..."...

Discovery Channel :: News - Space :: Sun Burp Blasted Ozone Layer in 1859

re: "...The huge September 1859 solar flare appears to have gushed 6.5 times the protons of the largest flare seen by modern science — which was in 1989. By modeling the space storm using nitrate data from the ice — compared with the modern event also detectable in the ice — the researchers estimate that more than three times as much ozone was destroyed by the 1859 event than in the 1989 blast. / The discovery is a hint at just how nasty the solar weather can get. Ozone is the gas that blocks ultraviolet-B (UV-B) light, which is particularly lethal to many life forms. / "The flare itself was observed directly," said researcher Brian Thomas of Washburn University in Kansas of the event. The flare was followed by a historic aurora light show and a geomagnetic storm that caused telegraph lines to spark and start fires. /In some places power surges created by the storm of charged solar particles blasting Earth’s magnetic field made it possible to operate telegraph systems without any added power, explains space weather forecaster Ron Zwickl, deputy director of NOAA’s Space Environment Center in Colorado..."...

hat tip: Brothers Judd

Press Briefing by Dana Perino (re: Tony Snow)

re: "MS. PERINO: Good afternoon. As I was able to tell you this morning, you know that Tony Snow went into surgery yesterday. He told everyone last Friday that he was going to have this surgery. You remember that he said that the doctors had found a small growth, that they had seen over a series of CAT scans and MRIs, that had been identified on his abdomen. It was in the area where his previous cancer had been located. Tony called us this morning and informed us that despite all of our best hopes and expectations, that his doctors, unfortunately, learned that the growth was cancerous and there has been some metastases, including to the liver..."...

miss_o_hara :It's 1938 All Over Again: French Jews Seeking Asylum in America

re: "Since about August [Glenn Beck's] been saying, "It's 1938 all over again!" So has Bibi Netanyahu, Rick Santorum, myself, and anybody else who is actually paying attention to what is going on in the world. As if we needed more proof (some do), here is a heart-stopping, truly chilling report via Pamela: / More than 7,000 French Jews have signed a petition asking for political asylum in the United States because of anti-Semitism in France. / "Following the barbarous murder of a young Jew because he was Jewish, in the context of the rise in anti-Semitic acts committed by Islamic fundamentalists, numerous members of the community no longer feel safe in France," reads the petition, which was sent to the U.S. Congress. The reference was to Ilan Halimi, a 23-year-old Parisian Jew who was kidnapped and tortured to death last year by an anti-Semitic gang. / The petition asks Congress to enact a law according refugee status to French Jews. "We believe that the United States, known for its traditional welcome to those under threat in their native lands, must open its doors to us," the petition says..."...

Kathryn Jean Lopez on Conservatism on National Review Online

re: a tribute to Jennifer Gratz (and a suggestion to book her instead of Ann Coulter)...

Considerettes - Abstinence Considered Offensive, University Surrenders

re: "Welcome to the age where encouraging abstinence until marriage is considered offensive. OK, truth be told, we’ve been in this age for quite some time now, except that the sentiment wasn’t quite as outspoken. Now that abstinence groups are being formed in places like Harvard and MIT, however, the ridicule is boiling over. /This article talks about the new group at Harvard, secular in nature, that is trying to promote abstinence on campus. Seniors Sarah Kinsella and Justin Murray started “True Love Revolution” in response to all the other overt encouragment of sex on campus, and to the white flag waved by the administration. In response, those oh-so-tolerant folks on the Left are outraged..."...

Betsy's Page: Enjoying Anger

re: A George Will column "Anger Is All The Rage," and Peter Wood's book A Bee in the Mouth...

It's All About You? The Truth About "The Secret"

re: "...According to press accounts, Rhonda Byrne was given Wattles' book at a breaking point in her life. Transformed by Wattles' philosophy, Byrne got to work updating the "Law of Attraction" for a new generation. She turned the idea into an Internet-based movie and a book entitled The Secret. Now, the book is a runaway best-seller, ranking number one on The New York Times listing. /We should be very concerned to live in a country in which so many citizens evidently want to be told that they, individually, are the very center of the universe. The Secret is just the latest form of American esoteric positive thinking run amok. The nation seems to endure periodic waves of positive-thinking nonsense, and every generation seems primed to believe that it can have all it wants and more. Can anyone actually believe this stuff? /Evidently so. Oprah is a big fan, as are other Hollywood and entertainment types. Byrne has attracted publicity, books sales, and attention, if nothing else..."...

Allthings2all: Living in Community: Getting Past the Church Criticism Fad

re: "I received some unsolicited email in my inbox yesterday, from some-one I don't know, which made me think. The email was promoting a website which is designed to create a network of Christians who help each other practically. The basic idea was that people sign up to give and receive practical help. For example, if you have clothes you don't wear anymore you offer them to some-one in the network who needs clothes. If you have skills in a particular area you offer to mentor some-one needing asistance in that area. It sounded like a good idea when I first looked at it, and I'm sure some people will get involved. / But something struck me, something I've been thinking about. Shouldn't these things be happening in our Christian communities - our churches? If some-one in a church has clothes they know they never wear anymore, and some-one else needs clothes - wouldn't it be obvious that person A would offer the clothes to person B? And should there be no-one in the church in need of the clothes, surely there would be a local op shop (thrift shop) or mission which could easily pass them on to some-one. As much as I can appreciate the initiative to want to create practical solutions, it seems to me that the Christian community we live in would be where these things take place. What does it say about a Christian community if members have to go to a website to obtain help with clothing, transport, or practical advice?..."...

hat tip: Shannon

Rocks In My Dryer: Looking For a Few Good Reads?

re: several links to follow up...

Cafe Hayek: Richard Lindzen, Skeptic

re: "Here's a ten minute podcast from Tom Keene at Bloomberg with Richard Lindzen of MIT, one of the more prominent scientific skeptics of global warming..."...

Joust The Facts: Skeptics Debate Alarmists - And Win

re: "A debate was held in New York City featuring scientists from the alarmist and skeptic sides of the anthropogenic global warming argument. And, lo and behold, an audience which was in favor of that theory before the debate moved noticeably and significantly away from that belief when polled after the debate..."...

Civilization Watch - March 4, 2007 - All in a Good Cause - The Ornery American

re: "...The Hockey Stick Hoax should be a scandal as big as the discovery of the Piltdown Man Hoax. Bigger, really, since so much more is at stake..."...

hat tip: Thursday Night Gumbo

The Review Revolution: Improving Culture through Kvetching: What Are You Giving Up for Lent?

re: another look at different ways of observing Lent. Also a mention of the book Fasting: Spiritual Freedom Beyond Our Appetites by Lynne Baab...

The Point: Think about it

re: "Jana Riess at The Review Revolution has an insightful review up on latest book phenom The Secret (which Martha discussed previously here). /Riess points out, "The logical reverse of extreme positive thinking -- which asserts your responsibility for every good thing that happens in your life -- is that every nasty thing that ever happens to you is, correspondingly, entirely your fault." How is it your fault? Because you thought negative thoughts. /As an example, The Secret's author asserts that obesity isn't rooted in genetics or bad eating habits, but rather focusing on fatness. The solution: Don't even look at someone who is fat, lest it cause you to think fat thoughts. Riess very aptly applies the ridiculousness of this mindset to our every day experience..."...

Sayet Right - EvanSayet.com: Just Your Typical Conversation with a Liberal

re: "...I just had another one of those typical conversations with a Liberal. She was responding to something I said in a recent article in which I argued that hatred of Christianity comes from the Modern Liberals' fear of that which is good, right and successful. / Specifically my evidence that Bill Maher's attack on religion as "the antithesis of science" is nothing but mindless hatred, debunked every time someone drives past Cedar Sinai Hospital, Long Island Jewish Medical Center and the Presbyterian Hospital at Columbia University. / The first "point" she made was that these were just the names of buildings and proved nothing. She then went on to argue that all religions are the same and that good Christians would also make good Moslems, etc because they're good. / She then went on to argue that it is not religion that is important but "spirituality."..."...

The scary nihilism of the Left « Bookworm Room

re: "...And that, according to Evan Sayet, an ex-liberal deep in Hollywood’s heart, is the Left’s ultimate goal: nihilism. Carve out 47 minutes for yourself and listen to what he has to say (below). Part of me wants to say “It’s a good speech, but he’s just exaggerating to make a point.” And part of me, having drifted to my neo-con position from the liberal side of life knows that that meaninglessness was where my life was going and that he’s described the belief systems from which I escaped..."...

Addition: Here's the speech as recorded at The Heritage Foundation.

Power Line: A Man Who Deserves to be Heard

re: "We've been reporting on developments relating to the Traveling Imams' lawsuit against U.S. Airways and, potentially, the "John Doe" passengers who expressed concerns about their activities to the flight crew. One very bright spot in the story comes from an Arizona group called the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, which says that it will raise a defense fund for any passengers who are sued by the imams and their Manhattan lawyer, who is the chairman of CAIR-New York. /The group's spokesman is Zuhdi Jasser, a doctor from Phoenix. This morning he was on Bill Bennett's radio show. He was great, and Bill's show has graciously shared the interview with us..."...

This isn’t writing, it’s typing.: Is blogging a crime?

re: "...The editor of the St. Augustine, FL, Record seems to think so. /At least when it's done anonymously...[snip]...Following Glenn's link to Cadenhead's Workbench blog, I found this almost-unbelievable story: /Newspaper Asks Public to Identify Local Blogger /A Florida newspaper appears to have hit an all-time low in the relationship between bloggers and the media. The St. Augustine Record is asking the public to help expose the identity of a local blogger who recently started a site critical of county politicians. This evening, the paper's home page has a grainy surveillance photo of a man accompanied by this text: /Who is this man? /Believed to be connected to a politically charged but anonymously-run Web site targeting the character of members of the St. Johns County Commission. Help us determine his identity. Start by watching these four movies featuring footage from surveillance cameras. /The Record published video taken inside and outside its offices March 1 that show a man dropping something off at the front desk. There's no explanation of what he's doing, making it look like some kind of threat was delivered, but I found the details on the paper's message board. He was at the newspaper buying an ad..."...

This isn’t writing, it’s typing.: Animal rights activists to baby polar bear: Drop dead!

re: "...Not "species-appropriate"? /Has anyone told Herr Albrecht & Co. that compassion is (at least occasionally) species-appropriate behavior in humans?..."

FOXNews.com - Rat Poison Found in Killer Pet Food That Sparked Nationwide Recall

re: "ALBANY, N.Y. — Rat poison was found in pet food blamed for the deaths of at least 16 cats and dogs, but scientists said Friday they still don't know how it got there and predicted more animal deaths would be linked to it. /Also Friday, the company that produced the food expanded its recall to include all 95 brands of the "cuts and gravy" style food, regardless of when they were produced. / The substance in the food was identified as aminopterin, a cancer drug that once was used to induce abortions in the United States and is still used to kill rats in some other countries, state Agriculture Commissioner Patrick Hooker said. /The federal government prohibits using aminopterin for killing rodents in the U.S. State officials would not speculate on how the poison got into the pet food..."...

Was Reagan a Liberal?, A Review by Katherine Ernst

re: a thumbs-down review of Ronald Reagan: Fate, Freedom, and the Making of History, by John Patrick Diggins...

Planet Gore on National Review Online: Little Green Book

re: Chris Horner writes: "Russell Roberts notes how Al Gore wants to do for US energy production what Mao did for Chinese steel production...[...snip...] ...It is worth noting that BP, which donated $100 fuel cards to attendees of Gore’s pre-Oscar party, is pushing this peasant-production idea hard, particularly in the form of a mandate in the UK that every home be a net contributor to “the grid” through microwind and the like. As I note in my book, although hailed by academia and the media for its “soft” persuasion, BP is no stranger to larding out money for its massive lobbying, er, public affairs efforts. /One of BP’s in-house PR gurus in London was kind enough to enthusiastically walk me through this a couple of years ago, responding to my disbelief with patient explanation about the need for a mandate to overcome societal stigma on microwind turbines, traceable to their association with government housing where it is mandated (frankly I've never personally witnessed the product of such mandates and this growing obsession in the UK, though my visits are generally to urban London where such turbines would be even more futile). Eyesores to be sure, he told me, but that’s a temporary reaction; after all, people were up in arms over the blight of satellite dishes, only to then get used to them, and once they're made to get used to this the same comfort will accrue. /And if they don’t? Well, Mao had answers for that, too."...

Steven F. Hayward on Global Warming & Al Gore on National Review Online

re: From March 21, 2007, "As international celebrity and film star Al Gore prepared to testify about global warming on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, it was already apparent that the hot air may be leaking out of the global-warming balloon..."...

Catholic World Report - The Young, the Fertile, and the Ambitious

re: "Author Philip Jenkins discusses the demographic trends and religious movements that the elite don't notice...Philip Jenkins is a professor of history and religious studies at Pennsylvania State University...[snip]...A reviewer for the Baltimore Sun called Jenkins's The New Anti-Catholicism "a book of powerfully convincing fairness, of impressive scholarship, and of extraordinary courage." He's written over 20 books since 1983. The latest, God's Continent: Christianity, Islam, and Europe's Religious Crisis, will be released this May by Oxford University Press. Jenkins talked with CWR in January about demographic trends, American exceptionalism, and the future of the Catholic Church..."...

hat tip: The Alliance Alert

DenverPost.com - N.M. linguist wrote Navajo dictionaries

re: "Albuquerque - Linguist Robert Young, whose work with a Navajo linguist resulted in dictionaries of the native language, died Feb. 20. He was 94. /He became an adjunct linguistics professor at the University of New Mexico when he retired from the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1971. He taught Navajo language classes and was co-director of the Navajo Reading Study. /Young is known for his Navajo dictionary and lexicon work, including "The Navajo Language: A Grammar and Colloquial Dictionary," published in 1980; "Analytical Lexicon of Navajo," 1990; and "The Navajo Verb System - An Overview," 2000. /Young's dictionary work came from a long collaboration with William Morgan, a Navajo linguist with whom he began working in the 1930s..."...

DenverPost.com - Grizzly protection lifted in Yellowstone

re: "Grizzly bears have recovered so well in Yellowstone they no longer need protection under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, said Deputy Interior Secretary Lynn Scarlett today. /The U.S. Government officially announced it was removing the bear from the threatened list. /Grizzly bear numbers in the Yellowstone ecosystem have increased from roughly 312 when they were listed in 1975 to more than 500 today, said Dale Hall, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in a press conference Thursday. /The official action of removing the bear from the list will take place on March 29 and will be official 30 days later, Hall said. /"It is an occasion to celebrate the success of the Endangered Species Act," said Doug Inkley, senior science advisor to the National Wildlife Federation. "This delisting today shows and demonstrates the Endangerd Species Act has been very successful." /Louisa Wilcox of the Natural Resources Defense Council disagreed with the decision, saying grizzlies are being threatened by the effects of global warming..."...

Elsie Dinsmore: Bad Christian Books are Bad or Morality is More than One Thing | Scriptorium Daily

re: "There is a strange twist to interest in Victorian and early twentieth century children’s literature in the many home school and Christian school groups in America. While able to see much that is wrong in modern children’s literature, they have replaced bad new lit with bad old lit. The worst case of this is the Elsie Dinsmore series for young girls . . . a recent subject for discussion inside of Torrey containing important lessons for Christians trying to renew American culture about how not to do it..."...

There and Back Again - Robin Hood: Hero Or Thief?

re: "I read Howard Pyle’s version of Robin some years ago and fell in love with it right away. I have read it a couple times since then and have always considered it to be a very well-written book and purposeful book. I was quite astonished, when, a few weeks ago, I heard that some people were afraid to read this book to their children as they feared it would teach them to murder and steal. I feel as though this is an injustice done to my beloved Robin Hood and, in case I have any readers with the same doubts concerning this outlaw, I have decided to give a little evalution of his character and tell briefly why I believe him to be a hero instead of a villian. (Please remember throughout this discussion that all references to Robin Hood and any other characters refer to Howard Pyle’s version of the book as I have not read many other versions and cannot vouch for them.)..."...

OpinionJournal - Leisure & Arts: Inside ROTC

re: the book Army 101, by David Axe...

OpinionJournal - John Fund on the Trail: Whose Ox Is Gored?

re: "...Last Tuesday, the Times reported that several eminent scientists "argue that some of Mr. Gore's central points [on global warming] are exaggerated and erroneous." The Tenessean reported yesterday that Mr. Gore received $570,000 in royalties from the owners of zinc mines who held mineral leases on his farm. The mines, which closed in 2003 but are scheduled to reopen under a new operator later this year, "emitted thousands of pounds of toxic substances and several times, the water discharged from the mines into nearby rivers had levels of toxins above what was legal."..."...

OpinionJournal - Featured Article: Television Takeover

re: "U.S.-financed Al-Hurra is becoming a platform for terrorists...[snip]...The airing of the Nasrallah speech is a sign of the network's new direction since it was taken over by a longtime CNN producer, Larry Register, last November. Launched in February 2004, Al-Hurra broadcasts three separate feeds: to Europe, Arab nations and one for Iraq. The network is supposed to be a key component of our public diplomacy to the Arab world. Its mission statement calls for it to showcase the American political process, and just as important, report on things that get little attention on other Arabic networks, such as human-rights abuses and government corruption. / Within weeks of becoming news director, Mr. Register put his own stamp on the network. Producers and on-air talent quickly understood that change was underway. Investigations into Arab government wrongdoing or oppression were no longer in vogue, and the ban on turning the airwaves over to terrorists was lifted. For those who had chafed under Mr. Register's predecessor--who curbed the desire of many on staff to make Al-Hurra more like al-Jazeera--the new era was welcomed warmly..."...

Heldref Publications: CLUES: A Journal of Detection

re: "From Braddon to Busman's Honeymoon and Block to Burke, the academic essays and nonfiction book reviews in Clues cover all aspects of mystery and detective material in print, television, and movies. As the only U.S. scholarly journal on mystery fiction, Clues is essential reading for literature and film students and researchers; popular culture aficionados; librarians; and mystery authors, fans, and critics around the globe."...

Includes call for papers on The Girl Sleuth, for the Fall 2008 edition. Submission deadline Oct. 31, 2007. "The whole range of technical and thematic critical approaches is welcomed, including feminist, Marxist, and cultural studies perspectives. Articles might include the following topics and concerns..."

Dr. Sanity: WHEN KARL MET SIGMUND--Second Time Around

re: "Many have observed that the fields of psychology seems to attract those on the political left. As far as I can tell, there is no really good explanations about why this should be, but I have a theory. / It is a theory that goes back to when Marx met Freud--not literally, but intellectually. For Marx's followers, it was love at first sight. But for poor Sigmund, the relationship was toxic--at once popularizing his thoughts among the intelligentsia, but at the same time distorting them out of all recognition..."...

Brandywine Books: Tar Baby: An Unusable Term?

re: "...In this AP story, two presidential hopefuls have said of a difficult--dare we say 'sticky'--situation that it is or would be a 'tar baby' for those involved. Both men apologized for using the term, but I don't get it. Are the Uncle Remus stories anathema in our sensitive age? Or is this a return of the idiocy that cried out a few years ago when a politician who labeled someone as 'niggardly' was rebuked for his racist remark? That's about as smart as trying to take the 'hell' out of 'hello' by saying 'heaveno.'..."...

Zondervan - Zach Hunter

re: "Teenager Zach Hunter believes in empowering people his age and helping them find a greater purpose in life by fighting slavery. / Through his book, Be the Change, and speaking, Hunter hopes to inspire young people to to ignite their passion and bring about amazing changes in our world..."...

hat tip: Phil at Brandywine Books

FrontPage magazine.com :: Politically Correct Death Threats at Georgia Tech by Peter Collier

re: "...Already a controversial figure on campus, [Ruth] Malhotra, now chief plaintiff in the suit filed with fellow student leader Orit Sklar, became Public Enemy number one for the Georgia Tech left. An ad hoc group called CLAM (Conservatives and Liberals Against Malhotra) formed on campus with the sole raison d’etre of harassing her. An anti Malhotra website appeared calling her "christo-fascist" and showing an unflattering shot of her face stippled with digitized swastikas. Flyers were posted throughout the campus denouncing her as a "Twinkie"—an Asian who was "yellow on the outside and white on the inside." /The charge of ethnic treason was almost laughable: Malhotra’s Indian descent had given her a dark complexion and she wasn’t Asian according to the racial taxonomy propounded by campus victim groups, although she knew that if she had been on the left she would have been accorded "protected status" as a presumptive minority. Far more disturbing that the mundane slanders she faced as she completed her course work for her degree were the messages that now began to appear on her campus email. In one of them, the writer threatened to throw acid in her face at the upcoming graduations ceremonies..."... and that was just the beginning...

hat tip: The Alliance Alert

Some Inconvenient Truths - Prison Fellowship

re: "In the film, Mr. Gore insists that the experts are agreed, the science is in—global warming is fact and anthropogenic (man-made) sources are the cause. From there, he builds the case that nearly every malady in recent history from hurricane Katrina to the spread of malaria is due to the rapid rate of warming; and things are only going to get worse—it’s not if, but when and how much. /Notwithstanding, Canada’s National Post has been running a multi-part series (the last I checked, it’s at fourteen installments) profiling prominent climate scientists who refute anthropogenic warming and its effects. Recently, the New York Times reported a backlash from rank-and-file scientists who consider Gore’s film alarmist with conclusions that are “exaggerated and erroneous.” And last year, at the National Review Online, Iain Murray listed twenty-five inconvenient truths about the companion book to the documentary./...Having sat through An Inconvenient Truth, I have a few observations of my own. First off, I was surprised to learn that Mr. Gore “got religion” about global warming in the early 70’s. As I seem to recall, that was the era in which global cooling was all the rage...[snip]...I came away with the clear impression that, in Mr. Gore’s opinion, had the presidential election turned out differently, we would be well on our way to a solution. Yet, if my memory serves me, Mr. Gore had eight years as vice president to effect his political will. Funny, the only thing I remember during that administration was a bipartisan Senate resolution opposing the Kyoto Treaty by 95-0. Then again..."...

Outlawing Conscience - Prison Fellowship

re: "You may think the day would never come when preaching the Gospel would be illegal in a Western country—when governments would restrict what Christians can teach. /You would be wrong. The persecution against the Church has taken a decisive turn in the cradle of civil liberty—the United Kingdom (UK). And it will happen in America, also, if we do not wake up to the danger..."...

Alice Walker - Rebecca Walker - Feminist - Feminist Movement - Children - New York Times

re: the book “Baby Love: Choosing Motherhood After a Lifetime of Ambivalence” by Rebecca Walker...

hat tip: Bookworm Room

Media Blog on National Review Online: Cavuto Defies MS

re: "He memorizes each show's script in case an occasional loss of vision renders him unable to read the teleprompter: / Ten years later, [Fox News anchor Neil] Cavuto both accepts his MS and defies it. Doctors marvel at his MRI scans because they indicate a man unable to walk or talk. Yet while he sometimes has difficulty doing both, the Fox News anchor is remarkably fit, exercising on a stationary bike and treadmill to stave off muscle atrophy of the legs, a common problem in MS patients. Cavuto, 48, has the secondary progressive form of the disease, meaning it steadily worsens over time. /He has fatigue, headaches, trouble walking, some vision loss, and — occasionally — hoarseness. "Having difficulty talking isn't good in my profession, but my wife welcomes it," jokes the anchor, who memorizes scripts for his program, Your World With Neil Cavuto, in case he can't read the teleprompter during taping..."...

The Corner on National Review Online

re: from Mark Krikorian: "After the Swift meatpacking raids in Greeley. Colo., Americans lined up out the door of the hiring office seeking the newly freed-up positions. Then, after the Crider chicken plant in Stillmore, Ga., was cleared of its illegal aliens, "For the first time in years, local officials say, Crider aggressively sought workers from the area's state-funded employment office." And now, after the raid on a New Bedford, Mass., military contractor (that has caused such hyperventilation from the party apparat in the people's republic), guess what? Yup. Americans in that high-unemployment city are actually getting hired. (see cable news video here) /So, can we finally retire "jobs Americans won't do"?..."...

PCCEF - Articles: Emotional and Psychological Effects of Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia on Participating Physicians

re: "...When new treatments or procedures in medicine are developed, they are scrutinized to determine if there are adverse or harmful effects associated with them. In the same way, physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia deserve to be evaluated to determine if they have adverse or harmful effects. Instead of focusing on the involved patients, this investigation focuses on the reported effects on the doctors who are involved in assisted suicide and euthanasia..."...

Doctors Group Laments Record Oregon Assisted Suicide Figures

re: "Ottawa, Canada (LifeNews.com) -- A doctors group says it's dismayed by new figures from the Oregon health department showing the number of assisted suicides on the rise. The numbers also show that, in 2006, more patients died after killing themselves in assisted suicides than in any previous year since the state become the only one to allow the practice. /According to the data, 46 Oregonians, most of them suffering from cancer, killed themselves after getting a prescription for a lethal amount of drugs from their physician. /The Physicians for Compassionate Care Education Foundation sent LifeNews.com a statement in response to the new numbers. / The group is disappointed that the Oregon Department of Human Services prepared a very brief report on assisted suicide compared with more comprehensive reporting in the past. /It says the report "is amazingly brief and incomplete, and much of the past narrative-type information is not present in this year’s report." For example, the doctors group says the new survey doesn't include information about the number of prescriptions written by doctors that prior reports contained. /But when analyzing the information the report does contain, the physicians group is worried about the status of assisted suicide in Oregon. /"Only two of the 46 patients dying from assisted suicide in 2006 were referred for psychiatric evaluation, yet depression is the most common cause of suicidal ideation," the group said. /The organization was also worried about the lack of a true doctor-patient relationship. / "The prescribing physician was present when medication was ingested for only 15 of the 46 deaths; knowledge of complications for the other 31 patients is obtained second or third-hand," the group added. "Emergency medical services were called for a patient who had fallen, yet that fall was not listed as a complication." / "The median duration of the patient-physician relationship was only 15 weeks, with a range from one to 767 weeks," which the group says undermines the premise of physician-assisted suicide. "We know that many of these patients are receiving prescriptions for lethal medications from doctors that are new to them, rather than from their usual doctor." /Physicians for Compassionate Care is also troubled that the time between the first request for the assisted suicide and the actual death ranged from 15 to 747 days. /"As we have previously noted, many non-terminal patients are dying from assisted suicide," it said of the longer durations. /Finally, the physicians want to see more emphasis placed on adequate pain control for patients and pointed to information in the report showing that patients are concerned about it as well. /The new report showed that...

Wittingshire: Human Traces

re: "...When I followed Paul's advice and got hold of Sebastian Faulks' Human Traces, I didn't realize what I was letting myself in for. Human Traces has its lyrical moments and its profound ones (and its uncomfortably crude ones). Mostly, however, it is a long (550 pages), detailed, and historically accurate description--albeit in novel form--of the birth of modern neuroscience and psychoanalysis..."...

Wittingshire: Global Warming Swindle?

re: links for the documentary...

Dappled Things: Mediaeval Solution to Italy's Abandoned Babies

re: "Italy's Health Minister wants the country's hospitals to follow the pioneering example of a few that have gone back to the mediaeval rota. Originally used by monasteries and convents, the rotas became anonymous drop-off points for abandoned babies. In the modern-day version, they are integrated into the outside wall of hospitals. (Blog post in Portuguese.)..."

ATTORNEY GENERAL SEEKS RESIGNATIONS FROM PROSECUTORS

re: from 1993, New York Times: "WASHINGTON, March 23 -- Attorney General Janet Reno today demanded the prompt resignation of all United States Attorneys, leading the Federal prosecutor in the District of Columbia to suggest that the order could be tied to his long-running investigation of Representative Dan Rostenkowski, a crucial ally of President Clinton. / Jay B. Stephens, the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, who is a Bush Administration holdover, said he had advised the Justice Department that he was within 30 days of making a "critical decision" in the Rostenkowski case when Ms. Reno directed him and other United States Attorneys to submit their resignations, effective in a matter of days. / While prosecutors are routinely replaced after a change in Administration, Ms. Reno's order accelerated what had been expected to be a leisurely changeover..."...

From Farm to FME

re: Vernon L. Smith, awarded the 2002 Nobel Prize in Economics, writes: "Growing up on a farm in Kansas provided an invigorating child-hood—learning about crops and animals, befriending pet chickens, and shooting rabbits for dinner with an 1890 vintage lever action 12-gauge Winchester. My early interaction with the “environment,” coupled with the ideas associated with free market environmentalism (FME), which were so eloquently put forth in Terry Anderson and Don Leal’s book, helped shape my thinking about natural resource policy. / Life on the farm provided ample opportunity for lessons in “how things work”—an interest I have carried throughout my life. My family had a direct incentive to tend to our gardens, grain crops, and well pumps if we wanted to eat and drink. I quickly learned that one cannot ignore the important role of incentives in guiding human behavior. Similarly, Anderson and Leal pointed out that the famed conservationist Aldo Leopold learned through first-hand knowledge from working his Sand County farm in Wisconsin that incentives or rewards for private landowners lead to the best environmental outcomes..."...

hat tip: Don Boudreaux

Riehl World View: Gore Funding Plan For "A New World Order"

re: "If your employer began paying you 80 cents on the dollar, but, not to worry, the other 20 cents was going to support "good causes", thereby giving you value instead of capital, would you be pleased? /If not, you won't like what Al Gore has been quietly planning along with his Global Warming initiative. He and others are working to achieve that very thing and to bring it about in a manner which doesn't give you a vote in which values your dollars end up supporting. /Gore is quietly funding an assault on Capitalism as we know it, one that begins but doesn't end with Global Warming. That's only the model for what's coming next. /Sans news conferences and Oscar nods, it's a well-funded, grand design to re-shape, not just America, but the global economy in such a manner so as to inculcate Liberal values into the world's system of finance. /Defeated at the ballot box, it seems Gore has figured out that if he can follow, or perhaps even lead the money, he and other liberals can bring about the social and economic change they want, whether the middle class likes it, or not..."...

hat tip: lgf

Miracles in the Womb from Channel4.com

re: "Twins appearing to embrace in the womb, siblings engaged in early game-playing and never-before-seen footage of 'vanishing twin syndrome'. The team behind Animals in the Womb turns its attention to the incredible story of multiple foetal development in Miracles in the Womb. /Combining revolutionary 4D ultrasound footage (three dimensions plus real time) with state-of-the art graphics and life-like modelling, Miracles in the Womb offers a stunning window on the often fraught world of multiple pregnancy – from conception to birth. /The film follows real-life rare pregnancies, including identical quadruplets conceived by chance (estimated as a 1 in 64 million occurrence) and triplets, theoretically the result of a rare phenomenon called Superfecundation, where one of the foetuses was conceived at a separate time to the other two..."...

SerandEz: A song, A movie, A drasha.

re: "...So, I'm not going mention the P-word but you all know what's coming up in just a few weeks. The time of year when easygoing mothers are turned into maniacal cleaning Nazis, barking out orders like a drill sergeant and snatching cookies from the hands of innocent toddlers. We all know the drill; all leaven products (and their crumbly remnants) must be swept, vacuumed, sponjad, emptied, washed, scrubbed, or otherwise disposed of. Owning chametz on the 14th of Nissan is strictly prohibited by the Torah. / Many of us are familiar with the age-old rebuke that in addition to reaching into the recesses of our closets and drawers in search of chametz, we must also take a good look at ourselves and see if there are any Middos (character traits) in need of a thorough cleaning job. It's while we're elbow deep in soapy water or piles of outgrown t-shirts that we need to stop for a moment and do a brief "Cheshbon HaNefesh" (personal accounting). As we bleach our countertops in the hopes of covering up that stubborn stain, let us also try to scrub out any imperfection in our personalities or behavior which is detracting from the shine of our Neshamos (souls)..."...

WorldNetDaily: Could the tide be turning?

re: Pat Boone commentary: "In this space, over the last year or so, I've found myself complaining about a lot of things. Things that indicate America is losing its bearings, or that the majority of good old-fashioned citizens – who still hold to the traditions and priorities that have defined us for 200-plus years – are letting those traditions and priorities be wrenched from us by a militant leftist minority. It's very troubling, it's wrong, it's undemocratic and actually destructive to the American vision, and I've felt I had to speak out about it. /Well, whaddya know? I've got something good, something very hopeful to comment on this weekend. In fact, I've got a couple of good somethings. Maybe not all is lost, after all. At least, not yet./ First, there's the case of young Poway High School student Tyler Chase Harper...

hat tip: The Alliance Alert

The Point: Dawkins Hit by Friendly Fire

re: Regis Nicoll writes: "When you're being peppered with “incoming” from your own camp, it's a clue that sumpin's gotta give. Despite its long run on the New York Times bestseller list, The God Delusion and its author, provocateur extraordinaire Richard Dawkins, are getting pelted by some unlikely critics. /One book reviewer began, “Imagine someone holding forth on biology whose only knowledge of the subject is the Book of British Birds and you have a rough idea of what it feels like to read Richard Dawkins on theology.” That was from Marxist scholar Terry Eagleton. /Then there’s evolutionary biologist H. Allen Orr..."...

The Point: Are We or Aren't We?

re: Anne Morse writes: "Last week I quoted a piece posted in The Catholic Register titled "No Deal, Rudy," in which Mark O'Malley says Catholics voters should not support a pro-abortion presidential candidate even if he does promise to appoint conservative judges to the Supreme Court. O'Malley also said the U.S. has "built the first abortion businesses in Afghanistan and Iraq, ever. Shamefully, our taxes paid to build and operate a Baghdad abortion clinic...And that happened under a pro-life president. What would a pro-abortion president do?" /O'Malley may have seen this bogus Washington Post piece (scroll all the way down) claiming that the U.S. is building abortion clinics in Iraq because so many U.S. servicemen rape Iraqi women in their spare time, with the approval of their superior officers...[snip]...The Catholic Register has, since last week, cut out the lines about the U.S. funding and building abortion clinics...[snip]... but the piece continues to claim the U.S. "brought the first abortion business to Afghanistan ever." (The original version of the story is reprinted here.) If this is true--and I wish the Register would provide documentation--it is, as I noted before, disturbing news..."...

Worth Wedding For - Prison Fellowship

re: "The Washington Post ran a story last weekend announcing that “Numbers Drop for the Married With Children,” in which staff writer Blaine Harden quotes demographers who “peg the rise of a class-based marriage gap to the erosion since 1970 of the broad-based economic prosperity that followed World War II.” Marriage with children has become an exception rather than the norm, she writes. /The piece bothered me for a number of reasons. First, as my colleague Roberto Rivera frequently notes, correlation does not equal causation; and as Harden acknowledges later on in her piece (and in her blog posts), factors other than economics hugely influence the marriage decision..."...

westbankblog: Life in the Wild West...Bank

re: "This past week there was an announcement from the municipality, saying "Yes, we KNOW the streetlights are on, even during the day, please stop calling!" It seems that some *ahem* local individuals have been vandalizing and stealing parts from the streetlights. I know, I know - what can you do with streetlights? (Perhaps sell them to disreputable contractors who will buy them cheap, then sell them to others at a high price?) In order to deal with the situation, the municipality decided to leave the lights on 24 hours a day, presumably because the fear of being electrocuted would be a deterrant to would-be vandals. / Of course, it means that all of us will have to foot the bill for the higher electricity usage- by paying higher arnona (municipal taxes). And, if someone does get electrocuted (future Darwin award winner?), then the rumors will start circulating that the settlers are electrocuting the local Arabs....

Seraphic Secret: The Democrats Blacklist Fox

re: "So let me get this straight. According to the Democrats, Israel is supposed to sit down and chat with Hamas, a terrorist gang dedicated to Israel's annihilation. /According to the Democrats Israel is also supposed to sit down and "dialogue with Iran," a country that denies the Holocaust, even as it promises a new Holocaust. /Also, according to the Democrats, America is supposed to shmooze with the North Koreans, a country that has systematically murdered over 3 million of its own citizens. /Why? Well, because you "talk to your enemies." /But the Democrats refuse to take part in a debate sponsored by Fox Cable Network because, y'know, Fox is too right wing..."...

Planet Gore on National Review Online: The Great Global Warming Swindle

re: Jay Richards notes: "The documentary entitled The Great Global Warming Swindle aired last week on Channel 4 in the UK. It presents the side of the debate that's not supposed to exist. It focuses on the evidence that the Sun is the primary driver of climate change. The entire documentary is now up on Google Video..."...

No Left Turns Archive: Novak on Bush as conservative, part 2

re: "Michael Novak has more to say after his debate with Joseph Bottum, noted here. Here’s his conclusion/ President Bush has defined a new kind of conservatism. It is legitimate to criticize it, even to oppose it vigorously. But to do so honestly and accurately, one must note the change in method that President Bush has quietly and successfully been enacting. As often as possible, in as many ways as possible, he is using as the dynamo of personal choice and the methods of the market, not direct state-management, in order to make government programs more effective and more efficient. That is why Democrats, both of the old New Deal-type and of the new Clinton-type, oppose him so fiercely. They seem to see what he is up to better than many uneasy conservatives do. /Try to imagine the conservative future as Bush is trying to...[snip]...Note that these new pension, medical, and school mechanisms deeply affect families, not simply individuals. This greater reliance on familial choice re-introduces a reliance on family, rather than on the state, as the chief agent of health, education, and welfare..."...

Terrorists Proving Harder to Profile - washingtonpost.com

re: "...terrorism suspects from atypical backgrounds are becoming increasingly common in Western Europe. With new plots surfacing every month, police across Europe are arresting significant numbers of women, teenagers, white-skinned suspects and people baptized as Christians -- groups that in the past were considered among the least likely to embrace Islamic radicalism. /The demographics of those being arrested are so diverse that many European counterterrorism officials and analysts say they have given up trying to predict what sorts of people are most likely to become terrorists. Age, sex, ethnicity, education and economic status have become more and more irrelevant...[snip]...Bakker and other analysts said more attention should be devoted to understanding the personal experiences that motivate people to become radicals. For example, Dutch researchers said they suspect one reason why more young women are becoming involved in radical networks in the Netherlands is that they come under the influence of "Moroccan lover boys." Authorities use the phrase to describe charismatic Romeos who manipulate emotionally needy women into committing criminal acts. "These are really down-to-earth things that we should not underestimate," Bakker said. /Indeed, there are clear signs that al-Qaeda cells and affiliates are intentionally recruiting supporters from nontraditional backgrounds as a way to avoid detection, according to European intelligence officials and analysts..."...

Russia's patience wearing thin with ally Iran - washingtonpost.com

re: "MOSCOW (Reuters) - Iran's isolation over its nuclear ambitions deepened on Monday as Russia, its closest big power ally, announced indefinite delays to a joint nuclear power project and accused Tehran of abusing its goodwill..."...

French PM Villepin Backs Rival Sarkozy - washingtonpost.com

re: "PARIS -- French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin endorsed the presidential bid of fellow conservative but longtime rival Nicolas Sarkozy on Monday, a day after Jacques Chirac announced he would not seek a third term... [snip]...The first of two rounds of voting is scheduled for April 22. In his address, Chirac said he would let the nation know within days whom he might back. /Chirac's blessing is important for Sarkozy as the margins narrow between him and Socialist rival Segolene Royal and a surprise third candidate, centrist leader Francois Bayrou..."...

Rhubarb: First Fruits of Spring - Allrecipes

re: growing, harvesting, storing, cooking rhubarb...

Robert Kagan - The 'Surge' Is Succeeding - washingtonpost.com

re: "A front-page story in The Post last week suggested that the Bush administration has no backup plan in case the surge in Iraq doesn't work. I wonder if The Post and other newspapers have a backup plan in case it does...[snip]...A greater sense of confidence produces many benefits. The number of security tips about insurgents that Iraqi civilians provide has jumped sharply. Stores and marketplaces are reopening in Baghdad, increasing the sense of community. People dislocated by sectarian violence are returning to their homes. As a result, "many Baghdadis feel hopeful again about the future, and the fear of civil war is slowly being replaced by optimism that peace might one day return to this city," the Fadhils report. "This change in mood is something huge by itself." /Apparently some American journalists see the difference. NBC's Brian Williams recently reported a dramatic change in Ramadi since his previous visit. The city was safer; the airport more secure. The new American strategy of "getting out, decentralizing, going into the neighborhoods, grabbing a toehold, telling the enemy we're here, start talking to the locals -- that is having an obvious and palpable effect." U.S. soldiers forged agreements with local religious leaders and pushed al-Qaeda back -- a trend other observers have noted in some Sunni-dominated areas. The result, Williams said, is that "the war has changed."..."...

hat tip: Ed Morrissey

Cherokee Nation votes out former slaves' descendants - CNN.com

re: From March 4, 2007: "OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- The Cherokee Nation's vote this weekend to revoke the citizenship of the descendants of people the Cherokee once owned as slaves was a blow to people who have relied on tribal benefits. /Charlene White, a descendant of freed Cherokee slaves who were adopted into the tribe in 1866 under a treaty with the U.S. government, wondered Sunday where she would now go for the glaucoma treatment she has received at a tribal hospital...[snip]...In Saturday's special election, more than 76 percent of voters decided to amend the Cherokee Nation's constitution to remove the estimated 2,800 freedmen descendants from the tribal rolls, according to results posted Sunday on the tribe's Web site. Now the tribe is defending itself against accusations of racism. /Marilyn Vann, president of the Descendants of Freedmen of the Five Civilized Tribes, said the election results undoubtedly will be challenged. /"We will pursue the legal remedies that are available to us to stop people from not only losing their voting rights, but to receiving medical care and other services to which they are entitled under law," Vann said Sunday. /"This is a fight for justice to stop these crimes against humanity."...[snip]...In a statement late Saturday, Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chad Smith said he was pleased with the turnout and election result. /"Their voice is clear as to who should be citizens of the Cherokee Nation," Smith said. "No one else has the right to make that determination. It was a right of self-government, affirmed in 23 treaties with Great Britain and the United States and paid dearly with 4,000 lives on the Trail of Tears." /The petition drive for the ballot measure followed a March 2006 ruling by the Cherokee Nation Supreme Court that said an 1866 treaty assured freedmen descendants of tribal citizenship. /A similar situation occurred in 2000 when the Seminole Nation voted to cast freedmen descendants out of its tribe, said attorney Jon Velie of Norman, an expert on Indian law who has represented freedmen descendants in previous cases..."...

hat tip: La Shawn Barber

The Scotsman - Business - Why the fallen stock scheme is legislative madness

re: "...The scientists pronounced that scrapie could be masking the fact that the bovine disease BSE was being carried by the UK's national flock of almost 40 million sheep. Scrapie would have to be eliminated as quickly as possible. /This would be accomplished by genotyping pedigree rams. /There are five distinct genotypes and the theory was that by keeping only groups one and two and slaughtering the rest, the country would soon be rid of scrapie. /Cynical farmers and shepherds thought this was a load of nonsense, but they had no choice in the matter if they were to continue selling pedigree livestock. /
Breeders of hill sheep, particularly Blackfaces, were adamant that the process of selecting only top rated rams was diluting the inherent hardiness of their flocks. There is no scientific proof of that, but I am willing to accept the word of those who have spent lifetimes in the hills. /But towards the end of last year the government's own spongiform encephalopathy advisory committee (SEAC) ever so quietly admitted that the chances of BSE being present in the sheep flock were as close to zero as one could possibly wish. On a UK basis the implementation of the NSP has cost taxpayers at least £100 million, with the government picking up most of the bill for the testing process. /Incredible as it may seem, the agricultural press were called to a briefing in Edinburgh's Pentland House, the headquarters of the Scottish Executive's Environment and Rural Affairs Department, in 2000 to be told there was a contingency plan to slaughter every sheep in the UK...[snip]...Over the past ten years many valuable bloodlines have been lost..."...

Diurnata » New Kind of Christian Blog Ring

re: "This is the home page for the New Kind of Christian Blog Ring. This blog ring is for people like me who’ve been inspired by reading “A New Kind of Christian” by Brian McLaren... [snip]...A New Kind of Christian’s conversation between a pastor and his daughter’s high school science teacher reveals that wisdom for life’s most pressing spiritual questions can come from the most unlikely sources. This stirring fable captures a new spirit of Christianity–where personal, daily interaction with God is more important than institutional church structures, where faith is more about a way of life than a system of belief, where being authentically good is more important than being doctrinally “right,” and where one’s direction is more important than one’s present location. Brian McLaren’s delightful account offers a wise and wondrous approach for revitalizing Christian spiritual life and Christian congregations..."...

hat tip: kpjara's sidebar, via the Christian Women Online Blog Ring

Painted Rainbows and Chamomile Tea: Preparing Our Bird Study

re: includes recommendations for children's books about birds...

hat tip: Semicolon

...the girl with a 'fro

re: another blog found at random on the Christian Women Online blog ring...

The Flourishing Mother: Make it do

re: another blogger applying the "Use it up/ Wear it out/ Make it do/ Do without" attitude; simplifying, being content with less, doing more with what's at hand...

Continuous Media "Snacking" -- Bite Size Entertainment for an Attention-Deficit Age

re: from an article in WIRED: "Music, television, games, movies, fashion: We now devour our pop culture the same way we enjoy candy and chips - in conveniently packaged bite-size nuggets made to be munched easily with increased frequency and maximum speed. This is snack culture - and boy, is it tasty (not to mention addictive)..."...

open book: Where your literary and spiritual worlds meet:

re: novelist Ron Hansen...

Betsy's Page: The French ponder mandating naps at work

re: From a story in The Telegraph: "...In a country renowned for its long lunches and 35-hour working week, establishing the legal right to a siesta might not appear an overriding priority./But yesterday, in an apparent attempt to bolster the nation's morale, France's health minister Xavier Bertrand suggested that a short afternoon nap might become government policy..."...

A new spin on the old Constitution « Bookworm Room

re: "...On March 7, 2006, the Federal District Court issued a 75 page long opinion holding that the Washington, D.C. law violates the Second Amendment (that bit about not infringing the People’s right to keep and bear arms). /And here’s how the New York Times characterized the court’s ruling: /Interpreting the Second Amendment broadly, a federal appeals court in Washington yesterday struck down a gun control law in the District of Columbia that bars residents from keeping handguns in their homes. (Emphasis mine.) /Now, much as it always pained me to admit when I was a card-carrying, gun-control liberal, there’s no “broad” reading necessary to conclude that a law making gun ownership entirely ineffectual does, in fact “infringe” upon “the right of the People to keep and bear arms.” The only way to get around this language is to change the language, not to try to nitpick it and narrow it to death. /And before those of you start making the old argument that guns are only allowed for a “militia,” and that the National Guard is our militia, hold your breath. The only way to harmonize “militia” and “People” in the Second Amendment is to envision a situation in which people have the ability, because they are armed, instantly to form citizen’s brigade separate from the United States Military. Nor is this careless drafting. (As if the Founders were ever careless about these things.) That the Founders viewed these citizens’ militias as entirely separate from forces under Government aegis (including the National Guard) they would not have drafted the Fifth Amendment as they did...

FIRST THINGS: On the Square » Blog Archive » For the Sake of Civil Argument

re: Richard John Neuhaus takes on “criminalizing political differences” and the tendency of some people to declare an issue decided already rather than discuss it...

BREITBART.COM - Appeals Court Overturns D.C. Gun Ban

re: "WASHINGTON (AP) -- A federal appeals court overturned the District of Columbia's long- standing handgun ban Friday, rejecting the city's argument that the Second Amendment right to bear arms applied only to militias. /In a 2-1 decision, the judges held that the activities protected by the Second Amendment "are not limited to militia service, nor is an individual's enjoyment of the right contingent" on enrollment in a militia. /The ban on owning handguns went into effect in 1976. /The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit also threw out the district's requirement that registered firearms be kept unloaded, disassembled and under trigger lock. /In 2004, a lower-court judge told six city residents that they did not have a constitutional right to own handguns. The plaintiffs include residents of high-crime neighborhoods who wanted the guns for protection. /"The district's definition of the militia is just too narrow," Judge Laurence Silberman wrote for the majority Friday. "There are too many instances of 'bear arms' indicating private use to conclude that the drafters intended only a military sense."..."...

hat tip: Rush Limbaugh

OpinionJournal - Taste: Only Moonlight for Vermont

re: Geoffrey Norman: "...The Green Mountain State is seriously green. It is also seriously small. Its population of some 600,000 is about equal to that of Charlotte, N.C. Its signature export is maple syrup. None would mistake it for a player on the world stage. Still, the Vermont Legislature has lately been engaged--to the exclusion of just about all other matters--in a discussion of how it might lead the world in the mortally serious fight against global warming. The president pro tem of the state Senate, Peter Shumlin, was emphatic on this point. "Historically, when we do bold things in Vermont, others follow," Mr. Shumlin was quoted as saying in January. "It is our moral imperative to lead again . . . and if we succeed in being part of the solution, we can help regain America's moral leadership and trust in the eyes of the rest of the world." A charming vision. Millions and millions of people in China and India, waiting on orders from little Vermont before they fall in and march. Las Vegas turning off unnecessary lights to conserve electricity and reduce greenhouse gases because Vermont has shown the way. Movie stars flying coach because they crave approval from the citizens of Bethel, Brattleboro and Bennington..."...

The Hillary Spot on National Review Online: A Fascinating, and Very Long, Look at Obama's Early Career

re: "Ryan Lizza has a gargantuan profile of Barack Obama in the new redesigned New Republic. Lots of interesting stuff, generally a positive profile but by no means the typical gushing about the "Obamessiah", focusing on Barack Obama’s learning experiences as a community organizer and early political career. A few sections that stood out..."...

ARMAVIRUMQUE: THE NEW CRITERION'S WEBLOG: 'It's the curriculum stupid'

re: Emily Ghods: "Yesterday, I had the pleasure of joining The New Criterion’s James Panero and Roger Kimball for a luncheon sponsored by the Center for the American University under the Manhattan Institute. Held at the Harvard Club, the purpose of the luncheon was to discuss ways in which intellectually monochromatic college campuses can achieve intellectual color. The luncheon featured Brown University’s Professor of Political Science, John Tomasi, who has spear-headed an effort at Brown to achieve what he calls “the specter of intellectual pluralism.” (Professor Tomasi wryly noted that “coming from Brown, I can’t help but beginning by quoting Marx”—with these asides, he won his conservative audience instantly). /The Manhattan Institute—through its new VERITAS fund—is establishing a way to support professors who seek to establish intellectual centers of traditional political, philosophical, and economic thought on their campuses. For instance, at Princeton University, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence Robert George directs the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions, and at Brown, Professor Tomasi runs the Political Theory Project—these centers not only organize speakers and debates on campus, but are able to hire highly qualified post-doctorate professors to teach small seminars grounded in Western thought or American civics. Professor Tomasi stressed that permanent intellectual change on college campuses is achieved only through the curriculum, which he calls the “pulse of a college campus.”..."...

hat tip: Anthony Paletta at Phi Beta Cons