Thursday, December 26. 2013
I think it's a government weasel-word, usually meaning government-subsidized. Prof. Gregory Mankiw wonders.
Wednesday, December 25. 2013
 Christians believe, as I understand it, that Jesus was the "son" of God, "son" being used figuratively to describe a human-like incarnation of the deity which was made manifest by the resurrection and other remarkable phenomena.
Don't ask me to explain the Trinity - it's a mystery to me.
To non-believers, it sounds like science fiction, but even non-believers and Doubting Thomases have no doubt that Jesus (the Latinized version of Yeshua, Joshua) was an inspired and spiritually revolutionary rabbi who has been rocking the world since he lived.
For Christmas, the Beatitudes (beginning with Matthew 5), the beginning of The Sermon on the Mount.
"And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
"Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
"Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you....
"You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?"
Tuesday, December 24. 2013
Fish is required on Christmas Eve. Instead of the usual poached salmon, for after church tonight with in-laws, the kids, and friends, we are doing a big mess o' Marcella's Baked Filet of Sole with Tomato and Capers.
Great stuff, zingy. Easy, too, and only 15 minutes in the oven. Plus potatoes roasted in butter and olive oil, and steamed asparagus splashed with olive oil.
Wine, beer, Martinelli's, Champagne, and Eggnog.
Then Christmas cookies. Then a long winter's nap.
...a general problem with much of Western theology in my view is that the God portrayed is too small. It is a god of a tiny world and not a god of a galaxy, much less of a universe.
Carl Sagan on God, via this post
A better secular name for Christmastime than Festivus would be Frenzius. You could barely get in the door of my neighborhood bookstore or wine shop today. Still, everybody was cheerful and mannerly. Tonight, people won't be able to fit into church to light the candles, to hear that same old eternal Christmas story, and to sing the carols.
Yet it's a positive sort of madness. This, from Hinderaker, is not: We Are Living In a World Gone Mad
 "Science-based conversation hacks" that will get people to like you
It does work.
Spike in Harm to Liver Is Tied to Dietary Aids
Piers Morgan: First Amendment 'Shouldn't Protect Vile Bigots' Like Phil Robertson
Let's switch it: First Amendment shouldn't protect vile foreign twits like Piers Morgan
Kalashnikov is dead at 94:
“I would prefer to have invented a machine that people could use and
that would help farmers with their work – for example a lawnmower.”
Catholic Schools Remove Common Core Books for First-Graders Celebrating Same-Sex Parents
I can’t explain why we shouldn’t murder disabled children
Obamacare: Now Officially a Hardship
Scott Brown: New Hampshire Move Is ‘Strictly Personal’
Warmist fundamentalists ban dissent
Lessons from Dutch Welfare Reform
UCLA Professor Says Jesus Supports Obamacare
But on the other hand, Jesus Denounced as Symbol of White Supremacy on CNN
Beware of ideology masquerading as science: The Man Who Hated Men
The Pope gets some things right and some things wrong.
Never claimed economic infallibility
Steyn: The Age of Intolerance - The forces of “tolerance” are intolerant of anything less than full-blown celebratory approval.
Think Progress Offers Its Climate Grinches Of 2013 Who Are “Stealing Christmas Warmth”
Top US academic association decries
Israel boycott - Association of American Universities
releases statement saying measure ‘clearly violates’ academic freedom
Government Isn’t Santa
Mazel Tov, Christians! Most Jews wish you a Merry Christmas.
Last year:
Monday, December 23. 2013
This was written by a former POW in Hanoi, Mike Benge. To know more of his astonishing survival, read his POW bio.
Every one of our servicemembers must know that we will never forget nor abandon them. The punks in the Obama administration are the only ones who deserve to be abandoned. Their cowardly perfidy will not be forgotten.
Christmas Lights over Hanoi
The lighting of the Christmas trees in Washington, DC and New York are beautiful sights. And the Christmas lights in Denver and other cities are outstanding. However, the most beautiful Christmas lights of all were those of the Christmas bombing of Hanoi in '72. The flash of the Sam missiles, the flares dropped from the plane, the arclights hitting the city, and yes, even when a Sam hit a plane, it was all spectacular, for this gave us all hope and we knew we were soon going home.
Bless that noon time reccie who flew up the train tracks blowing past our camp for the past year with a sonic boom while gaining altitude and turning across the Red River heading for home. It gave us hope, and we knew that when the bombs started falling, we wouldn't get hit, for Uncle Sam knew where we were.
When the bombs started falling, we all cheered, and for a minute the guards threatened to shoot us if we didn't shut up, but they soon were crouching in their hidey-holes and shitting in their mess kits as the bombs started falling and they were too scared to say anything more.
European Union’s fracking pronouncement: Full speed ahead, Britain.
But do they really need to ask permission?
The rules of multicultural tolerance are difficult to understand. Would it be better if Phil converted to Islam?
More on this amusing meme: This latest bloody clash in the national Kulturkampf pits dick-hunters versus duck-hunters.
One more: Gay activists get another case of the vapors. A pretend case of the vapors, in my opinion.
Also this:
For many years now, the drill has become familiar. Someone speaks out in favor of maintaining the traditions of marriage, and instantly the gay rights organizations are up in arms, making threats, filing lawsuits, and mobilizing protests. Then, instead of Christians putting up a serious resistance, there is apathy, apology, and defeat. The script was repeated over and again, time after time. This time was different.
We have nothing against gays here at Maggie's. We just hate thought police, thuggishness, and speech codes..
This via Bookworm:
 Well, we finally took the family Christmas card photo on Saturday afternoon, after brunch, so I doubt the card made from it will arrive by Christmas Eve. We forgot to take the photo at Thanksgiving and it's difficult to get everybody together in one place at one time. You do the best you can. Christmastime is hectic, too much packed into a short while.
Charlie Daniels: Piers Morgan you woudn’t last five minutes in the swamps Phil Robertson hangs out in. Want to try it?
A&E really wanted to tell you a story ’bout a man named Jed
Juan Williams: Forget the War on Christmas …
The People Who Don't Want to Have Sex With Anybody Ever
Stossel on the enemies of innovation
Witch-hunt du jour
Is It Safe Yet to Have an Honest Conversation About Secondhand Smoke and Lung Cancer?
The 'Labor-Electoral Complex' - Bloomberg coins a phrase that deserves national currency.
Krauthammer: Nation Finally Sees ObamaCare's True Colors
Lowry: ObamaCare ad reveals infantile assumptions
May I mention that there is no such thing as "health insurance"? There is "medical insurance."
Supreme Court strikes down Canada's prostitution laws
Man with gun robs passengers on a Seattle bus, until…
EPA on the Renewable Fuel Standard: Uhm, we’re totally just now realizing that this is unrealistic and inadvisable
We share the same climate as … the Romans?
No. It was much warmer then. Vineyards in the north of England. Farms in Greenland.
...why do we continue to put up with our tax dollars being funneled through
Washington? How about letting the states make -- and pay for -- their
own social policy decisions without the (ahem) assistance of those federal experts?
Moral Intelligence and Public School Bullying
What's more selective than Harvard? A WalMart job
Who occupies American jails?
Sunday, December 22. 2013
Here
Here's one of the 30:
I was a liberal once. I knew that liberal policy was wrong — but I also knew that conservatives were evil. Racist, sexist, uncaring, one step from Nazis. This was a religious truth to me. Well, of course it was. All leftists are taught this. That’s how the left keeps you in the fold despite the evidence of your own eyes. Leftists do to their followers what the townspeople did to Jim Carrey’s character in that movie The Truman Show. They teach them to fear and hate the unknown so much that they won’t test alternative ideas no matter how bad things get. “Life in Liberal World may be a mess, Truman,” they tell you, “but oh the horrors that wait for you out there in Conservative Land!”
Andrew Klavan
 Matthew 1:18-25
Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. All this took place to fulfil what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,
which means, God is with us. When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife, but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus.
Botticelli's Mystic Nativity (1501). Sandro became more devout as he grew older.
Saturday, December 21. 2013
The study of how gene expression can contribute to adaptation is a hot topic in biology these days.
Asperger's Syndrome has been removed from the DSM and folded into Autism Spectrum. I'm not convinced that people with Asperger's-like symptoms have anything in common with what was traditionally termed Autism, and my suspicion is that Asperger's is just a normal human variation which, a while ago, might have been termed "slightly eccentric."
The comments here are interesting: Convergence in the meaning of "autism"
 My favorite Christmas cookies are either Ginger cookies, or those plain Christmas cookie-cutter cookies with some sprinkled colored sugar on top, and maybe red-hots for the eyes in the reindeer.
Here's a good basic Ginger cookie recipe.
Here's the plain basic Christmas rolled cookie recipe. They should be thin, I think, and not very sweet. Not soft - crunchy.
How come it's OK for Muslims to hang gays and to hate them, to endorse bestiality, child marriage/sex and rape, but not ok for some Christians to opine that homosexual behavior goes against Biblical teaching while still loving them as God's children?
Multiculturalism gets quite complex. Above my pay grade, as Obama would say. Or is everybody just scared of Muslims? Nobody is askeered of Christians, and rightly so. Christianity teaches that we are all fallen, all sinners, all in need of redemption through Christ. I believe that, and I do not dislike gays at all although I do find all of the LGBT stuff very weird and distasteful.
A Happy Solstice and a Merry Christmas to you, Gerard. One Moment in Time: The Solstice Seen from Newgrange
Your Tax Dollars at Work… Gay Christmas Videos Pushing Obamacare
I do not want these images in my head.
Friday, December 20. 2013
Sheesh. You just have to laugh: Obama Repeals Obamacare.
Does this mean we can keep our old medical insurance? What the heck are these geniuses doing to us? SNAFU.
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Hotel Ducks Gone Wild 
Bloomberg’s ultimate victory: NYC bans e-cigarettes in indoor public