We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
Women know about Argan Oil. It is made from the nut (seed) of the Argan fruit. It is in many beauty and hair products nowadays, often termed "Moroccan Oil."
In pure form, it is quite expensive and desirable (we brought some of the pure stuff home for the family gals). In Morocco, it is used like olive oil too. Nice, nutty flavor. The tree seems to be the main tree in dry southern Morocco. From our November hike in the Atlas Mountain foothills, these are all Argan trees (except the donkeys).
Are you feeling terrorized by ISIS? I am not. In some ways, I empathize with Obama's practical and political dilemma. Let me explain.
Jihadists pose no threat to the US as a nation. To some unfortunate randomly-selected innocent people, yes. That is evil at work in this dangerous world. I have little doubt that their efforts are designed to produce hysterical overreactions to add fuel to their bluster and threats and to magnify their importance in the name of Allah. This is neither WW 2 or WW 3. Jihadists, whether Taliban. Al Quaida, ISIS - they are all basically the same thing and their only significant threat is to their fellow Middle Easterners, and perhaps secondarily to Europe to some extent. Israel, rightly, fears no one.
In their delusions, they are at war with everybody, but I do not see them as America's problem. Beating war drums and ginning up popular emotion is cheap politics, but perhaps effective politics.
I've left a lot out to keep it short. My final point is that the Middle East is a tar baby, and takes up far more American bandwidth than it deserves. There are no real nations there, just tribal and religious warfare. It is a pre-national, semi-civilized part of the world. There will be no end to that in our lifetimes. And it's not our job. The dissolution of the Ottoman Empire was a disaster.
and re Trump's idea re Muslims, I am in favor of a moratorium on all immigration to the US, legal or illegal, until the nation as a whole can debate and decide what makes sense in today's world.
As a seasoned Psychiatrist, he ought to know the signs but few can doctor themselves. Listen to the tone of this post: And Death Shall Have Its Dominion
Maybe he should not have retired, but that's what Brits do. It's their culture, to be pensioners. His post-retirement career, as commenter and thinker, has been a fine contribution to the world.
I know what he needs, and it's not pills. He needs to get to the gym and to begin working out hard. Rage, rage....One hour of intense physical effort daily is good for attitude and mental health, and fends off the feeling of aging along with some of its physical effects.
Pic is the gym at our hotel last month in Puerto de la Cruz after we disembarked: the comfortable Hotel Botanico. After we hiked all over town for four hours, I spent a "relaxing" hour and a half in there before dinner. Nice gym. No gym music.
This year’s calendar offers a way to think about two important dates in Judaism, the birth of today’s Israel and Chanukah. The two dates represent the importance of struggle to accomplish a Jewish state as well as the struggle to deserve a Jewish state.
Four days after I was born, the modern state of Israel was ratified by the United Nations partition vote on November 29, 1947. Here’s a video recollection.
In the video, a commenter says that with the UN resolution Jews were no longer the object of history, acted upon by others, but the subject, taking control over their own fate. Divine intervention may have helped but it was the struggles of man that fulfilled the two-millennia of prayers.
A humorous take is that at the beginning of a year G-d tells a pious man he will be rewarded by winning the lottery before year end. Months pass and come late December the pious man asks of G-d why he hasn’t won yet. The response: “Meet me halfway, buy a ticket.”
The creation of modern Israel is when Jews got the message.Similarly, the two books of Macabbees on the origin of Chanukah offer contrasts between struggles of man and divine intervention. The first book is a fairly straight-forward reputable history. The second book contains more of the divine. (Here’s an analysis of the books of Maccabees, and theories of why they are not included in the Jewish bible.)
Maccabees (left); Hasmonean Kingdom 140-37 BC (right)
The most accepted theory of why the books of Maccabees are not included in the Jewish bible is that the Maccabee Hasmonean dynasty was not of the house of David and that it was itself later corrupted by Hellenism, due to its failure to live up to its nationalistic founding, and because the Jewish bible’s canonizers avoided provoking the Romans after their destruction of Israel, murder of as many Jews as they could and the dispersal of Jews to relative refuge elsewhere.
With the creation of modern Israel, as well as Jews promoting Chanukah as a counter to the lures upon their young of Christmas festivities, Chanukah has risen from a minor to a major Jewish holiday and the books of Maccabees are read more often.
The same tensions exist for modern Israel as for the Hasmonean and succeeding Herodian and diaspora era Jews.
To what extent is the influence or antipathy of other powerful states to be accommodated or resisted? To what extent can the core nature of the Jewish state be compromised? To what extent are the survival of the state of Israel and the fate of Jews in their own hands?
History and current events are why the original Maccabees are today’s models. Those, within or outside, who counsel surrender of vital interests or defeatism would bring upon Israel and Jews another diaspora, at best, and another likely slaughter.
Naturally, he blames the guns. I know that Bird Dog and his friends had good fun with firearms this weekend, and not one of their firearms went postal. Also, Gopnick neglected to mention that they had bombs too. Everything they did and had was illegal and had evil intent.
On our sailing ship in November, there was an Open Bridge policy. You could go there any time -24 hrs/day - and hang out and ask questions about the sail-handling, ship-handling, collision-avoidance, and general navigation. Always one mate and one watchman on duty, along with the 15-minute buzzer-button to prevent on-watch sleep.
Aren't they sposta be our moral and intellectual superiors?
Today is the first day of Hannukah, and of course we are well into Advent now. These times have a large secular component (and Christmas, of course, a large pagan component), and can be enjoyed by everybody regardless of religion or lack thereof. Even atheists tend to love Christmastime.
Thus perhaps the great Cornell University is worried about the hypersensitivities and potential postal rages of the Hindu, Buddhist, atheist, Ba'hai, Confucian, Zoroastrian, Wikkan, and Muslim students and faculty, but naturally nobody has heard those hypersensitivities expressed because who could be or would want to be that much of a negative, obnoxious a-hole?
This is all to be laughed about without wasting any mental bandwidth on angry indignation: It's Holiday Season for all, so cheer up and lighten up, you university sillies and you university pantywaists.
My message to university administrators: Chill out, have an eggnog, and and go look for a pretty girl (or boy) under the pagan mistletoe. You will feel better.
3:1 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene,
3:2 during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.
3:3 He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,
3:4 as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, "The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
3:5 Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth;
3:6 and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.'"
Yesterday was a bluebird day in Yankeeland. A couple of pals and I spent the morning fly-fishing with great results - a beautiful few hours that turned out to be practicing casting rather than catching fish. It matters little. Fly-fishing and catching are not the same thing. We know there are big trout there, but they weren't interested. It ain't shopping - it's outdoor life.
After take-out ham, brie, and honey mustard sammiches and Cokes, with some Cape Cod tater chips, we pursued pheasants for three hours with my buddy's 2 hunting Labs (barely seen in my photo). That pursuit was more productive in the meat department, and hanging out and hiking with hunt dogs in fields and brush is one of the finer things in life. Basically, joyful.
At least one reader is interested in the topic, so I'll tell you what I had to do Friday morning at 5 am for my Friday Fun heavy calisthenics day.
After my usual 3-minute elliptical warm-up, my master strapped a 20# weight vest on me (I call it the jihad suicide vest because it might kill me). With that on, I went through cycles of these, repeated until an hour was up, approx 1-2 minutes of each with minimal (30-40 second) but necessary breath-catching time, thus about 6 cycles:
Jumping step-ups Squat-presses Kettle-ball swings Heavy ball smashes Complex agility ladder games Rope smashes Planks
Like Crossfit. I was drenched and incapacitated. But not dead yet. Feeling strong now? Nope. Feeling like a wreck. As you can see, this sequence is more about endurance, explosive effort, and intense cardio than strength-building. It would burn fat too, but I don't have much left to burn. I could not have completed this hour's sequence 5 months ago.
Noonan: The First Amendment Needs Your Prayers - Jumping on anyone who publicly expressed a religious feeling after the San Bernardino massacre. Where are we heading?
Indignation is always selective, it cannot be otherwise; but because it is so pleasant and self-satisfying an emotion there is always the temptation to simulate it. It can be a genuinely generous emotion where it is in response to the outright injustice, cruelty, or neglect of others, but it can also be used to justify one’s own bad behavior (throwing bottles in the Place de la République) and to exile the locus of one’s moral concern from one’s own conduct to that of matters far beyond one’s personal control. In other words, purity in the world, libertinism in one’s life.
Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rage at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right, Because their words had forked no lightning they Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay, Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight, And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way, Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay, Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height, Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray. Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
At this time of year, we either join with our families or yearn for our families. That's one kind of home. But, there's another home that is always there, available and welcoming. "Lift yourself up higher and you'll find your way back home." The song is multi-denominational, open for all.
Freud did not discover the unconscious territory of the mind, but he was a pioneer in making a methodical study of it and in proposing theories about how it worked.
I am not sure why this is a "crisis." It is unwise to ever borrow - or lend - money if there is a reasonable concern about repayment. Nonetheless, people often do it.
Now that politicians have defined it as a crisis, they want to pander and to throw OPM at it and to do all the things pols do.
As Reynolds and many others have been explaining for years, there is a bubble in the pricing of higher ed. There will never be enough money to satisfy them, and loans and grants perpetuate the situation. It is a scandal, really, between the pricing and the little return from so many schools which are little more than diploma mills for recreating youth.
I would propose two simple solutions: eliminate federal loan guarantees, and permit student loans to be discharged in bankruptcy. This would normalize the debt and lending mess in higher ed, and would force pricing downwards.
Have you ever pored over the balance sheet of an institution of higher ed? If you get the chance, prepare to be shocked.
Why is college so expensive? Three main reasons. First, because colleges, with enthusiastic support from politicians of all stripes, have convinced Americans that higher education is the ticket to success. While a college degree is no longer a badge of the upper class, it is still viewed as a luxury good and is priced accordingly. Second, colleges have joyfully suffered from what Andy Rosen, CEO of the testing and online-education company Kaplan, has called “an edifice complex.” Colleges, including lots of state schools, continue to build luxury dorms, gourmet dining rooms, and lavish athletic centers to attract students—almost as if academics were an afterthought. Staffs have become bloated, too, not with more professors, but with administrators. Third, colleges have been playing with other people’s money. Washington has pumped trillions into financial aid programs. Low-income families get outright grants; everyone else qualifies for easy-to-obtain loans.
Below is the letter I received today from my good friend, fellow USMC Vietnam veteran, Del Vecchio. The contribution can be made at the website of the Vietnam Healing Foundation (www.thevhf.org ) :
Well, here it is, December again, Thanksgiving behind us and Christmas coming up fast. This is the time I send out my end of year appeal for support for the charity that brings badly needed help to the crippled old South Vietnamese veterans still eking out their lives in Viet Nam.
We are now supporting directly 100 vets and their families, and also providing partial support to 30 others who have come to us with desperate requests for some help. Our work has become more difficult because of the police taking an ever worse view of us. In February on my last visit, I was "busted" in Hue for the crime of giving money to people the top cop of that region doesn't like, and told to leave and never come back. So my days of visiting the old vets to give them some real recognition from a former comrade and raise their spirits have come to an end. This is a bitter thing for me, it was such an important thing to them to have someone come from the US to see them, and I was so deeply honored to be able to give that service.
But our work goes on, the men get older and sicker and need more medicines, and now every month or so another one passes on. But we have a long list of those waiting for help, so we go on running events to raise some funds, and of course depending heavily on donations from others who understand the plight of these men and wish to help. Please consider if you can contribute anything this year. Our overhead remains under 5%, so you know the money you give will end up right in the hands of those who need it. You can send checks or use PayPal, and all contributions are tax deductible. (If there are others you know who might have any interest in this cause, please feel free to pass this on.) Thanks again, and best wishes for a very Merry Christmas.
Del Chairman, Vietnam Healing Foundation
Here I am on my last trip, with some of the new candidates for help from us. Eight men with three operating legs between them. (Faces are blocked out for their safety, since we know too well that all our activities are watched.)
I get 
The creation of modern Israel is when Jews got the message.
At least one reader is interested in the topic, so I'll tell you what I had to do Friday morning at 5 am for my Friday Fun heavy calisthenics day.
Heart disease 
Researchers: 