Friday, May 26. 2006
 It ain't what you don't know that gets you in trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.
Mark Twain, with a slick hair-do
Thursday, May 25. 2006
 She told me we couldn't afford beer anymore and I'd have to quit. Then I learned she had spent $175.00 on make-up. And I asked how come I had to give up stuff and she didn't. She said she needed the make-up to look pretty for me. I told her that was what the beer was for.
Wednesday, May 24. 2006
 Pinkerton has written at TCS today about nationalism vs. universalism. His piece, which is excellent, left out the one bit that is most important to me: in a no-border, one world universalist dream, who runs it?
Isn't "universalism" a giant empire, in effect? Who runs it, and what do I have to say about how they run it? What is right for me in CT just might not be right for Mohammed in Somalia, or Moishe in Israel, or Swen in Sweden. Already, in the mini- and already-failed experiment of the EU, distant bureaucrats put out edicts faster than Democrats hand out street money in Newark. The leftist universalist dream is a totalitarian nightmare. Any one-world dream would be a nightmare of oppression, and then a nightmare of local rebellion - Star Wars. People are tribal and the best governments are the most local, where people have some control over their destiny according to their own ideas, for better or worse. I'm a State's Rights person, too. Give me flawed, messy, non-utopian ideas, any time. Pinkerton points out that Einstein was famous for deriding nationalism, but, without nationalism, where would he have fled from the Nazis? From the beginning of Pinkerton's piece: Here's a question: Why do Roger Cardinal Mahony of Los Angeles, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and The Wall Street Journal editorial page have such similar views on immigration? The answer is that all four of the above -- Mahony, CAIR, the ACLU, and the Journal -- have chosen universalism over nationalism.
Yeah, read the whole thing. Good stuff.
From WTFV: MEXICO CITY - A Varig airlines cargo plane from Brazil sits parked at the Mexico City airport with its nose up in the air after the cargo was unevenly distributed. Brazil's troubled flagship airline, Varig, is reeling under an estimated US$3.3 billion (euro2.7 billion) in debt and is currently in the restructuring phase of bankruptcy proceedings and, last April 12, some 300 Varig employees boarded a chartered jet to Brasilia, the nation's capital, to call on the federal government to bail out the company, which employs 11,000 people. Rest of story: (04/17/06 AP photo) 
 From a fine piece in The New York Sun:
By the early 1950s, Mr. Domino had perfected the basic beat of New Orleans rock 'n' roll: repetitious 16th notes in an insistent triplet pattern.Virtually everything he played, fast or slow, conformed to that motif, which made ballads and rockers alike irresistibly danceable. It was the big beat. Mr. Domino's best music was harmonically simple too. "My Girl Josephine," for example, essentially consists of three chords (B flat, D sharp, and F) over and over in the I-IV-V pattern of the blues.
Read the whole thing.
 I yam what I yam.
Popeye
Tuesday, May 23. 2006
Ford Foundation supports anti-Israel causes and organizations. I still do not quite get why the Left does things like this. More on Bill Cosby's "Call-outs." This man is speaking truth to power. USA Today. The professor's critique at the end is revealing of a certain kind of condescending and un-American mind-set. Dr. Thomas McGlashan's career of treating schizophrenia. He's done it all. Science Times Is Bush losing Hispanic support? Probably, but for no good reason. Calif. Yank Birth of a nation: Montenegro. Get out your atlases and coloring pencils.
Roger Sandall became curious about the domesti cation of the horse, but he found out that modern prehistorians have no interest in such grand topics, but instead are interested in guinea pigs and mammoth droppings. A wonderful piece, including rodeos and Vergil. Image: Alexander on Bucephalus, from the piece.
To love means loving the unlovable. To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable. Faith means believing the unbelievable. Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless. G.K. Chesterton
Monday, May 22. 2006
When the state is most corrupt, then the laws are most multiplied. Tacitus
Sunday, May 21. 2006
 Lab rescues child from drowning. Not hysterical enviros: Can the world's marine fishery be saved? Sisu tells us about Garlic Mustard - yes, I have that weed all over the place. Fortunately, it is easy to yank out. Will show you my invasive weed soon - much more evil than Garlic Mustard. Another good one from our friend Sisu: Time Magazine admits its "advocacy." Is journalism dead? Going home: Mexico has the world's 9th largest economy, and it is a tropical paradise. Why not go home, asks VDARE "If Cheney were a Dem, he'd be a folk hero to gays and lesbians." That's what Gay Patriot says, and he is right. Republophobia is a disease. Evangelical Christians: numbers at Harvard on the increase. Probably everywhere else, too. It's about time - and Harvard did have its beginnings as a Congregational divinity school, after all. Moslem gang rape growing rapidly in Europe. They like white girls, for this purpose. If they tried it on Moslem girls, they'd be killed by the families the next day. But, with white girls, they know they can get away with it. If you don't wear a burkha, you're a ho, in multicultural Euristan. At Atlas. DaVinci Code Again: Michael Novak quote, from here: I think I have never for two-and-a-half hours felt so surrounded by decadence and hostility toward Christ. Yet I must admit that the film was glitzy with the art of the makers of thrillers. One could never be sure when one scene, then another, then another, then another, would be cut short by a murderous lunge, a shot ricocheting around a closed space, a door slamming, a car screeching. From one shock to another, one's stomach absorbed punch after punch.
Afterwards, I sure felt like a strong double bourbon. And I felt eager to forget as soon as I can the sheer malicious hatred that swirls up from this film.
I am thinking "Do I need this stuff in my head?" Which is how I felt after ten minutes of "Goodfellas." The wrold provides so much ugliness, we always have to wonder, and decide, how much we chose to add to the net ugliness stored in our brains. I guess I tend towards the "truth and beauty" end of the spectrum, but like everyone I am not immune to the siren call of ugliness, evil, and depravity. I decided to take a pass: the rest of the family can go today - they love movies and they love Ron Howard. Image: The family church in Alford, MA
 Psalm 33
1Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous. Praise befits the upright.
2Praise the Lord with the lyre; make melody to him with the harp of ten strings.
3Sing to him a new song; play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts.
4For the word of the Lord is upright, and all his work is done in faithfulness.
5He loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of the steadfast love of the Lord.
6By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all their host by the breath of his mouth.
7He gathered the waters of the sea as in a bottle; he put the deeps in storehouses.
8Let all the earth fear the Lord; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
9For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm.
10The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing; he frustrates the plans of the peoples.
11The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations.
12Happy is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people whom he has chosen as his heritage.
13The Lord looks down from heaven; he sees all humankind.
14From where he sits enthroned he watches all the inhabitants of the earth—
15he who fashions the hearts of them all, and observes all their deeds.
16A king is not saved by his great army; a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.
17The war horse is a vain hope for victory, and by its great might it cannot save.
18Truly the eye of the Lord is on those who fear him, on those who hope in his steadfast love,
19to deliver their soul from death, and to keep them alive in famine.
20Our soul waits for the Lord; he is our help and shield.
21Our heart is glad in him, because we trust in his holy name.
22Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you.
Saturday, May 20. 2006
May 1 2006: Yom Ha Zikaron/Atzma’ut “Where is he wounded? You don’t know if the aim is a place on his body or a place on this Land. A bullet sometimes passes through the man’s body and wounds his Land’s earth.” ---- Yehuda Amichai A Jewish way to “celebrate” Independence: start with a day of mourning. Jewish holidays start with darkness, start the night before, to remind us that “in the beginning was darkness and waste.” But Independence Day here starts with a double darkness: not only the darkness of the night before, but also the darker entire night and day before to remember all those fallen since the State’s founding. I was encouraged, or perhaps warned unintentionally, not to miss the Yom Ha Zikaron (Day of Memory) ceremony in Ra’anana. Tel Aviv’s is more impressive perhaps: in Rabin Square every major singer, artist, alights the stage, sings one song and leaves. There is respect for the day: no protest speeches, no signs waving. But, little Ra’anana a town of some 60, 000, fills its Yad Le Banim square (Hand/Memory of the Sons’) with some 15, 000. On television, starting at 8 p.m. and for the next twenty-four hours precisely, runs the name of every person killed in the State. I had been asked to stay in the States a few days longer to work as an expert witness for the Court. I said, impossible. I did not say, that I would not miss my first Independence Day, as I had missed my first elections. I just said, impossible, and the Court backed down, worked out a schedule so that I could finish work late last week.
For me, Independence Day is the most important Jewish Holiday: holier than Yom Kippur, with only less food and ceremony than Pesach. I could not miss this.
I had not understand the weight of the preceding Yom Ha Zikaron. Precise was the timing. A very unJewish precision. The ceremony starts precisely at eight. I, a bit stunned with jet lag, get phone calls from Michelle Green, most of which I do not hear, until I call and she says that Ira is also returning from the states, will take Ben and Avital, two of their teen children, to the ceremony; Michelle is staying home with eight-year old Mayan. their oldest, Ben, will be recognizing the ceremony with his army unit. Thoughtless as I am, I bring my laptop, figuring that I will arrive a few minutes early, work in the wireless cafe across the street, then join. Streets are blocked off. The main street is blocked for some distance. The Kfar Saba fire engine parked across the square. Police direct traffic; soldiers abound, even those seen only in shadows. Ira phones me as I am approaching, around 745, to say that they have saved a seat for me on the side, near the stage, but obscuredc by a video screen. He comments that the previous mayor left much of the seats facing the stage open for the public; reserved only a few for the elite; this mayor seems to have more people demanding reserve seating, so we are relegated to the wings. Wings are enough for me, as I find tears pressing through much of the ceremony. The cafe is dark. All cafes, restaurants are closed. It is like Yom Kippur here in Ra’anana: main street empty of traffic, filled with people; stores dark, shuttered. And at eight, precisely at eight, all stand, air raid sirens begin simultaneously. They halt serially, as if distant echoes of each other. I sit between Ben --who has just received notice that he is being recruited for the air force, whose brother is in Nachshon -- and bleary-eyed Ira. I think during this ceremony, how, when Ira arrived to Israel, on his first Yom Ha Zikaron, a boy from Ra’anana is killed -- Daniel Greener, a name too close to his eldest son’s. I think during the ceremony of how war reverses the natural course of mankind: instead of sons and daughters burying parents, the opposite occurs. I can’t recollect if this is Heroditus who made this observation. I don’t know if I should congratulate Ben on his news, or admonish him never to be listed in this ceremony. I want to tell Ira that Daniel should always return home safely. I think how this country is guarded by such very young and prematurely aged soldiers .
Continue reading "Guest Author: Aliyah Diary #16"
Try it. Bressingham Gardens. All of our places should look like this, but Maggie's Farm sure does not: 
Friday, May 19. 2006
 North America's Northern Harrier, aka Harrier, aka Marsh Hawk, is one of my favorite birds, because he dwells in my favorite sorts of places. I am happy wherever the Harrier is happy.
He likes vast marshes and fields, where he tilts around very low, hunting small birds and rodents. He is never in the woods. Many a duck hunter has had one silently swing over their duck blind, six feet over your head, and reflexively raised the gun before making the ID. Never shoot one: forget illegal - it's plain wrong. For fun, you can draw them in by making a squeaking sound - like owls, they can hear well. And while you are busy fooling with the Marsh Hawk, no doubt a flock of Bluebills will pass over your decoys while you are distracted - it never fails. The males and females are very different in coloration, but the white rump, and the behavior, are the easy diagnostic points. With draining of marshes, and the reduction of farmlands in the East, their numbers are down. But in Britain, the essentially identical bird was almost extinct, but now happily making a comeback. More about the Northern Harrier here at CLO. I still call them Marsh Hawks. Photo courtesy of P. LaTourette.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, are of imagination all compact. William Shakespeare
Thursday, May 18. 2006
Canada is de-registering long guns and shotguns. Good for them. Isn't sanity a fine thing? Those of us who like to hunt in Canada will appreciate that, but I bet Canadian shooters will appreciate it even more. I have no doubt that their billion-dollar attempted gun registration system was designed to lead to total disarmament eventually, because it wouldn't help much with the bad guys - what bad guy would commit a crime with a legal gun? Cap'n Ed has more on the subject. And more at Canada's Small Dead Animals. Image: A favorite Maggie's Farm hunting location, in central Manitoba, last O ctober.
Quote from a piece on Britain from Atlas: There has been over the past 20 to 30 years an evisceration of British National identity and values which has created a cultural and moral vaccum being exploited by Radical Islamism which has come to fill that vacuum.
Life can't be all bad when for ten dollars you can buy all the Beethoven sonatas and listen to them for ten years. William F. Buckley, Jr.
Wednesday, May 17. 2006
Who's afraid of economic growth? Daniel Ben-Ami has written what I believe is a very important essay on Spiked on the anti-growth and limited-growth movement which is so much in evidence amongs environmentalists, the intelligentsia, and the leftist-minded these days. My own main problem with the anti-growth movement is that it contains, I believe, a latent fascism. There is an assumption that someone other than me ought to determine how I chose to live my life, and that they (the anti-growth folks) are the ones to do it. From his intro: The aim of this essay is to examine how cynicism about growth has become a central element of contemporary anti-humanism. It will examine the indirect forms that growth scepticism takes while pointing out its link to environmentalism. It will then consider how anti-growth thinking has moved from being an elite middle-class phenomenon to an idea widely held throughout society. A key factor in this shift was the capitulation of the left to environmentalist and anti-growth thinking from the 1970s onwards. The slowdown in economic growth over the same period, which in turn helped undermine the legitimacy of the market, was also important.
another: ...mainstream politicians and thinkers have maintained a formal attachment to economic growth despite any reservations they may express. A direct attack on growth would be almost unthinkable. If they argued explicitly for a levelling off of living standards, let alone their decline, it is hard to see how they could maintain popular support. This tension - between formal support for growth while expressing doubts about its benefits - is particularly worth exploring. It provides an opening for a restatement of the need for economic growth as part of a broader development of a new humanism.
Please read the whole thing. It is excellent brain food.
They say that when you owe a bank $100,000, the banker controls you, but when you owe a bank $100,000,000, you control the bankers. That's my analogy for illegal immigration: The government does fine with the acceptable trickle of welcome legal immigrants, but the hurricane of illegals makes them collapse.
We should sign up for the Day by Day cartoon strip, but so many other folks have it...here's today's: 
Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions. G.K. Chesterton
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