Maggie's Farm

An old southern Baptist country preacher had a teenage son, and it was getting time the boy should give some thought to choosing a profession.

Like many young men, the boy didn't really know what he wanted to do, and he didn't seem too concerned about it.

One day, while the boy was away at school, his father decided to try an experiment. He went into the boy's room and placed on his study table four objects:

A Bible
A silver dollar
A bottle of whisky
A Playboy magazine

"I'll just hide behind the door," the old preacher said to himself, "and when he comes home from school this afternoon, I'll see which object he picks up.  If it's the Bible, he's going to be a preacher like me, and what a blessing that would be!  If he picks up the dollar, he's going to be a businessman, and that would be okay, too.  But if he picks up the bottle, he's going to be a no-good drunkard, and, Lord, what a shame that would be!  And worst of all, if he picks up that magazine he's gonna be a skirt-chasin' bum."

The old man waited anxiously, and soon heard his son's footsteps as he entered the house whistling and headed for his room. The boy tossed his books on the bed, and as he turned to leave the room he spotted the objects on the table.

With curiosity in his eye, he walked over to inspect them.  Finally, he picked up the Bible and placed it under his arm. He picked up the silver dollar and dropped it into his pocket. He uncorked the bottle and took a big drink while he admired this month's Centerfold.

"Lord have mercy," the old preacher muttered in disgust, "he's gonna be a Congressman."

(h/t, Alpha Patriot)

"Tolerance" is a one-way street. How about plain good manners? Michelle on the chocolate Jesus

Evita sending Bill out to raise money. A sign that she is worried. Who is running? And one rhetorical question: How come Rudy gets all sorts of attacks this week for answering a question by saying that perhaps his wife might attend a Cabinet meeting on a topic of special interest to her - while Bill Clinton ran as "two presidents for the price of one"? Hillary attended meetings whenever she wanted.

Breaking into houses at night and killing women and children. The US Army pays a visit to Omar's Baghdad home.

Nice example of justice in Texas. Ace. A bad day for the little Mrs.

Image: Photo of the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival (thanks, reader)

Talked with a friend last night who had just returned from Africa, and who spent ten days at Singita's Ebony Lodge in South Africa's huge Kruger National Park.

It sounds like a trip of a lifetime, and Singita's lodges (each with a small number of guest suites) sound like the most comfortable places in Africa with service which silently anticipated their every want. They even had his favorite cigars in a humidor waiting for him on arrival.

They got to the lodge by chartering a plane from Johannesberg, which he described as becoming a lawless, white-hating and frightening city. The famous Saxon Hotel is surrounded by walls, barbed wire, with dogs on patrol and armed guards.

We may be fated to watch this amazing country deteriorate into a third world country.

You can fantasize about, or plan, your trip to Singita here. The lodges here. Conde Nast Traveller named Singita the 2004 Best Hotel in the World.

If you didn't take the time to listen to this short speech by Evan Kayet, do it. He is smart. He gets it.

I have promised to buy dinner for all of my lib friends who will listen to it.

With Roger McGuinn, Chris Hillman, David Crosby, and Bob. YouTube

The Byrds, I'll feel a whole lot better when you're gone. YouTube

Love's Usury

FOR every hour that thou wilt spare me now,
            I will allow,
Usurious god of love, twenty to thee,
When with my brown my gray hairs equal be.
Till then, Love, let my body range, and let
Me travel, sojourn, snatch, plot, have, forget,
Resume my last year's relict; think that yet
            We'd never met.

Let me think any rival's letter mine,
            And at next nine
Keep midnight's promise; mistake by the way
The maid, and tell the lady of that delay;
Only let me love none; no, not the sport
From country grass to confitures of court,
Or city's quelque-choses; let not report
            My mind transport.

This bargain's good; if when I'm old, I be
            Inflamed by thee,
If thine own honour, or my shame and pain,
Thou covet most, at that age thou shalt gain.
Do thy will then; then subject and degree
And fruit of love, Love, I submit to thee.
Spare me till then; I'll bear it, though she be
            One that love me.

Why is the overfishing of sharks leading to a serious decrease in scallops on the East coast? Explained here.

I think shark fishing is stupid anyway. What's the point? People chum for them, catch them, kill them, take a photo, and throw the thing overboard. Not sporting, not manly. People - not the government - should decide to quit it.

Image: A Sea Scallop, the source of those big "scallops" at the fish market.

20 I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the state, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party, generally.

21 This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.

22 The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries, which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of Public Liberty.

23 Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind, (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight,) the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.

From his Farewell Address

From a piece by Fred Sanders on George Washington Carver:

Carver developed a homespun religious philosophy and told little stories that catch the imagination. One story has him crying out to God, “Oh, Mr. Creator, why did You make the universe?” to which God replied, “You want to know too much for that little mind of yours. Ask me something more your size.” So he tried “Dear Mr. Creator, tell me what man was made for.” Still too big. Finally: “Mr. Creator, why did You make the peanut?”

"Thats better!" the Lord said, and He gave me a handful of peanuts and went with me back to the laboratory and, together, we got down to work.

It might be homespun but it works for me.

I still cannot believe that a military Brit prisoner would speak these words:

"Obviously we trespassed into their waters," Turney said. "They were very friendly and very hospitable, very thoughtful, nice people. They explained to us why we've been arrested. There was no harm, no aggression."

Meanwhile, incomprehensibly, Pelosi refuses to support the Brits.

"If you can't annoy somebody, there's little point in writing." 

Kingsley Amis

One more photo of our friend fishing the Upper Malleo River in Patagonia this past January.

Long-time readers know that Maggie's Farm doesn't do ads. I suppose we'd consider it if the money were big enough, though. Anyway, we sort-of linked up with the Pajamas Media team (without taking their ads) and have added their button to our sidebar.

Thanks to Roger Simon for expediting. 

Auster says what many people think silently. A quote from his latest on the dangers of uncontrolled immigration:

Indeed, if someone as smart and as critical of left-wing nuttiness as Badillo could sound the racial-socialist note at this stage of the game, after so many disasters have already resulted in the past from the same egalitarian assumptions, and the lessons had presumably been learned, then we have a bitter taste of the future. America is filling up with a vast population of people who, let us be frank, have no interest in education, no interest in reading, and an average IQ of 90, and, residing as cultural outsiders in a country with a still dominant and successful though ebbing white majority, and also fueled by their own ethnic chauvinism, those people will naturally and increasingly blame their inferiority of accomplishment and income on the whites and seek to appropriate as much from them in the form of government transfers as they can. As their numbers increase, their political power and their will to express their resentments politically will also increase, as will the perverted anti-white passions of the white left.

The whole thing here.

Brits don't want to upset Iran. WTF? Shouldn't it be the other way around? Can't they see that they are being toyed with?  Meanwhile, a show of force.  

Update: Andrew Sullivan (who we no longer read) proposes the theory that the prisoner-taking is the fault of the US. Gay Patriot hits him hard with sarcasm.

Update: This production via MEMRI, via Iran TV - a quote:

"Creating a fuss in order to pressure the Iranian people in this [nuclear] issue, using the U.N. Security Council as a tool, will only harm the forces confronting the Iranian people. I must say this. If they want to use the Security Council as a tool, thus ignoring this indisputable right... So far, we have done everything in accordance with international law, but if they want to violate these laws, we too can and will violate these laws."

Crowd chanting: "Allah Akbar Allah Akbar. Allah Akbar. Khamenei is the leader. Death to America. Oh noble leader, we are prepared. Oh noble leader, we are prepared. Oh noble leader, we are prepared. Oh noble leader, we are prepared."

From a global warming hysteric (with a large, very comfortable home): "How could my wood stove be adding to global warming? It's not oil. It's natural. What would we do without it? It's our pleasure and comfort."

She thinks that as long as it isn't oil, it's good. Wrong. Oil and coal are simply old wood.

From Tom Shales' review of the "Planet Earth" series on the Discovery Channel:

“Youth is easily deceived because it is quick to hope.” 

Aristotle

"Hope is not a plan."

Bird Dog

You cannot be culturally literate - or an educated person - in Western Civilization without knowing the Bible. It's our culture's taproot. It's therefore interesting to see that public school courses in the Bible are growing in popularity.

David van Biema has a very fine piece in the usually-disappointing Time Magazine discussing this new trend, and the issues around it.

It begins thus:

Miss Kendrick came ready, with props. The day's topic was the Gospel of Matthew. "You can divide all the Beatitudes into two parts," Jennifer Kendrick explained to her teenage audience. "The 'Blessed are the whatevers,' like 'the meek,' and then the reward they will get. So I've made some puzzle pieces here." She passed out construction-paper sheets, each bearing either the name of a virtuous group or its reward, in black marker. "And you've got to find the person who has the other half. What's the first one in the Bible?"

"The poor in spirit," mumbled a crew-cut boy.

"O.K. What goes with the poor in spirit?"

A girl in the front of the room replied, reading from her sheet, "For they will see God."

"Nope," chirped Kendrick. "O.K., find the person that matches yours. I'll take the roll."

Read the whole thing (4 pages).

Superb piece by Munchkin Wrangler, found by Mr. Free Market. It begins thus:

Human beings only have two ways to deal with one another: reason and force. If you want me to do something for you, you have a choice of either convincing me via argument, or force me to do your bidding under threat of force. Every human interaction falls into one of those two categories, without exception. Reason or force, that's it.

In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively interact through persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social interaction, and the only thing that removes force from the menu is the personal firearm, as paradoxical as it may sound to some.

When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to use reason and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your threat or employment of force. The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound woman on equal footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal footing with a 19-year old gangbanger, and a single gay guy on equal footing with a carload of drunk guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the disparity in physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker and a defender.

Read the whole thing. BTW, can you name that handgun?