1227 All the good stories are from Hollywood

Ex-Liberal in Hollywood has an interesting account of his move from wide eyed trusting liberal to pragmatic conservative. Probably most interesting for Californians, but since we see so many of these LAPD folk on our TVs, you might learn from this one.

1226 What's the worst decision you've ever made?

That was a topic on a talk show this morning, but the phone rang and I didn't hear what the guest said to do to get out of it. However, at 65 I've got to admit that even the awful decisions, or the ones I agonized about, smooth out over time. Bad ones lead to changes or modifications which evolve into good ones, which maybe wouldn't have come along if you'd done it right the first time.

I remember about 20 years ago we bought a lot on a lake in Indiana on a whim. We'd been out on a moonlit boat ride on a lovely summer night, and for some stupid reason offered the people $10,000 for a lot for which they were asking $25,000. We continued on to Illinois and didn't give it another thought until we got a phone call that our offer had been accepted. I was stunned, and almost physically ill. We kept it about a year, paying the assessment and real estate tax and mowing costs (it was waterfront with improvements, including trees). We listed it and sold it for $25,000. With expenses, realtor's fee and capital gains taxes, we still came out ahead. But I don't dabble in real estate anymore.

Deciding to be a foreign language major in college was a terrible decision at the time. I loved the cultures and the people, but really had no talent for language. Eventually, however, it lead me to Library Science, a field I loved after I was in it, but which definitely was a second choice--one I wouldn't have pursued if it hadn't been right under my nose in 1965.

A Bible promise I hold dear is Joel 2:25: "I will restore to you the years which the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent among you. You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people shall never again be put to shame."

1225 There is no plan B; only A-b-o-r-t-i-o-n

Although I understand the reasoning the media calls Plan B "emergency contraception," it isn't; it is a very early abortion. Let's be more honest than we were with all the coat hanger statistics back in the 1960s. If you believe abortion is a woman's right to choose, and not the death of a human being, then be very clear about what you promote. There is NO morning after solution to tragedy, be it rape, long term promiscuity or one night stand.

"The American Medical Association voted Monday to put its weight behind legislative initiatives around the United States that would require pharmacies to fill legally valid prescriptions in the wake of recently publicized refusals by pharmacists opposed to dispensing the morning-after contraceptive." Chicago Tribune

And this:

"A bipartisan bill introduced last week by Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY), Jon Corzine (D-NJ), and Olympia Snowe (R-ME) would require hospitals receiving federal funds to provide rape survivors with information about and access to emergency contraception. The legislation, known as the Compassionate Assistance for Rape Emergencies (CARE) Act, comes at a time when other proposals to ensure availability of contraception are the subjects of intense political debate -- proposals such as making Plan B (a form of emergency contraception) available over the counter and a bill ensuring that all pharmacies fill prescriptions for contraception." ACSH

1224 If you die in Cleveland

You'll need to check out the verb policy for the PD.


At home with the Lord. Hope to see you there, if you're from Cleveland.

1223 Another test for you

I took the MIT Weblog survey which is collecting information on how people use their logs. Here's the site:

1222 Mao, the unknown story

Have you ever picked up an old notebook or pad of paper and read through the notes? We keep a small notebook here at the Lakehouse for writing messages, only a few notes are written each summer, so we forget what they are about. My husband was flipping through it puzzling at the cryptic messages, some clear, some not:

Chicks, turn on radio, Studs.
We’re at art center. Back by 12.
Video tapes for print machine 421-7591
Buns chips brats burgers chips salad strawberry
Gone to library to return book. Keep cat out of bedrooms so she can’t hide.

And finally

Wild Swans. Est. 30,000,000 died in famine 1958-1962. Peasants pulled off land to work in steel.

What’s that one all about, he asked. I had to stop and think a minute, then remembered that Wild Swans was a book I was reading here at the lake maybe in the mid-1990s about China. My summer reading never seems to be light. It’s definitely one that should be on Senator Durbin’s short list. The author Jung Chang grew up in China and Wild Swans is about her life. In her new book, Mao, the unknown story, she writes:

“I decided to write about Mao because I was fascinated by this man, who dominated my life in China, and who devastated the lives of my fellow countrymen. He was as evil as Hitler or Stalin, and did as much damage to mankind as they did. Yet the world knows astonishingly little about him.” (Publisher’s note)

The issue of Far Eastern Economic Review June 2005 which contains the book review by Jonathan Mirsky of Mao: The Unknown Story by Jung Chang, Jon Halliday and Jonathan Cape has been banned in China, where a dead Mao is still ruling from the grave. Wall Street Journal article comments on this ban.

1221 The President's Accomplishments

Dana has a long list. Your mileage will vary.

1220 July Fourth 2005 at the Lake

Did you see the feature on Lakeside on yesterday's CBS Morning show (9-10:30 EDT)? It was the last 5 minutes. We rushed home after communion to turn on the TV and of course, sat through all the other summer time clips on skateboarding, hot dogs, and hunting for relatives in the islands off of Italy. I think the Lakeside story was cut to make room for the Luther Vandross bio (died last week). Even though it showed almost none of the lovely sights, it did get the ambiance right, featuring the friendliness and trust of the community.

My husband then craved hot dogs all morning, so he took off on his bike and went to the little grocery store right outside the gates and fixed himself a hot dog for lunch. One. He is the most disciplined person I know.


This morning is the parade. Every little kid decorates a bike, and grandparents decorate their golf carts. A neighboring school district will probably send in a band, and there will be a few clowns. The Guys Club will march--that's a group of men who do nothing and I think their motto is something like "can it wait." This morning I saw someone flying a kite off the dock with a tiny US flag appended.

When I was walking through the park this morning with my coffee on the way to the lake, I saw a grandpa shooting baskets with his two little grandsons (at least I hope they were not sons), one about 2, the other maybe 4. Grandpa didn't give them any breaks either. Also, I don't think he made any points, but it was the cutest thing to watch.

Changing the Template

Fiddle. Fiddle. Faddle. Re-fiddle. I've deleted the comments window (I think) and moved my e-mail to the top, so if you have something to say, speak up! But you better note which entry you're referring to, otherwise, I won't know what you're talking about. Your inciteful comments haven't been deleted, blogger.com tells me, and can be retrieved anytime. Nasty comments, of course, were deleted as we went along. No blogger abuse allowed here.

1219 Cat Fanciers

Usually, I don't make fun of other people's pets, love like beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but check out this link, and then scroll down to ninth place. The copy function has been disabled, otherwise I'd just drop the photo in here. Truly, the most frightening cat I've ever seen.

1218 Daniel's Gift for the Fourth

My friend Daniel, a documents librarian and a proud American, offers this selection for your holiday reading. I was just browsing the Federalist Papers. Hamilton was awesome. One can't imagine the USA being what it is without his input.

Declaration of Independence
Articles of Confederation
Federalist Papers
Constitution of the United States
Bill of Rights
Other Primary Documents of American History from the Library of Congress

1217 War of the Worlds

Barbara Nicolosi at Church of the Masses has a long list of Whys in her review, beginning with why are there only 5 people in a theater that seats 500? But this Why was my favorite:

"Why doesn't the ACLU arrest Speilberg for being blatantly pro-Christian? (I mean, nobody in the WHOLE movie breathes the smallest prayer while the human race is being systematically exterminated. So, I figured, the filmmakers must be saying that all the Christians must NOT be getting exterminated. That is, the aliens are only killing the unbelievers who don't pray -- the Christians must have put lamb blood or something on their lintels off screen. Anyway, I think that must be pretty offensive to the ungodly...)"

My own Why, Why were we seeing Tom Cruise every time the TV is on? is now answered. It was a full court press--a trumped up controversy between him and Brooke, the Lauer interview, and probably a fake engagement, all to keep his name in the news to hype this movie.

1216 This is old news, or was it buried?

In the late 1970s I was hired on soft money (USAID funds) to be the agricultural economics bibliographer at the Ohio State University Libraries. It was a fabulous job for reentry into the work world: my children were in school from 8:15 to 3 p.m., and this job was half time, so I worked about 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. I contributed to the retirement plan, and got full credit instead of half for my time there (which became critical in 2000 when adding everything up). I had complete freedom and great funding to build the collection on agricultural credit--mostly about third world countries. I went to a lot of the graduate student meetings and lunches, attended some college functions like the Farm Science Review, was included in most of the library faculty functions without being appointed to committees (temps don't need the professional credit), attended state and local professional meetings and the department supported my research and publication. I also got to co-teach a bibliographic instruction unit with one of the professors. Truly, a dream job for a librarian who needed to work part time and relearn the ropes after a decade out of service.

However, I'm quite sure I knew then from all the reading I did to stay current in agriculture what I've just seen on a blog--that the inputs for alternative fuel cost more and required more energy than the resulting product. Renewable crops eat up a huge amount of inputs. Midwestern farmers and the schools of agriculture really wanted crop fuels to make it, and so I was shocked to read this when I know the writing was on the blackboard even 30 years ago:

"Ethanol, touted as an alternative fuel of the future, may eat up far more energy during its creation than it winds up giving back, according to research by a UC Berkeley scientist that raises questions about the nation's move toward its widespread use.

A clean-burning fuel produced from renewable crops like corn and sugarcane, ethanol has long been a cornerstone of some national lawmakers' efforts to clear the air and curb dependence on foreign oil. California residents use close to a billion gallons of the alcohol-based fuel per year."

Hat tip to Considerettes who links to SFGate. The research is not without controversy apparently.

1215 The journey of a conservative librarian

Susan, aka Mustang Mama, has written an outstanding post about being a conservative in the field of librarianship. You might think it doesn't concern you because librarians just do after school crowd control and direct people to the rest room, but I learned things I didn't know (I never worked professionally in a public library, although I've noticed the bias in the book selection). Particularly read this if you have children who use the library.

1214 In my humble opinion

This is a phrase I see frequently in blogs. It means the opposite of what it says--the person is not claiming to be humble at all, but has a very strong opinion on something. Father John has a not so humble opinion on the "right" to marriage.

"All of the arguments being advanced today to "change society's morality" to gain acceptance of same-sex marriages -- fairness; equality; acceptance of minority (that is, non-mainstream) points of view and practices, and so on -- can be made in favor of the "polys"; polygamy (one husband, many wives), and polyandry (one woman, many husbands). Indeed, here in the "wild, wild west," we have a group with significant money, power, and influence, whose central tenets at one time required its adherents to practice polygamy as the best way to salvation. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (known to many as the "Mormons") only rescinded this as a principle of belief when required to do so by the federal government as a condition for admitting the territory of Utah as a state. Why would they not return to this practice if the mood of the nation is to change the "traditional" understanding of marriage as the union of a man and a woman to allow same-sex marriages? After all, the proponents of polygamy have Biblical precedent on their side (at least, in the Old Testament), where many of the patriarchs had multiple wives. The practitioners of the Islamic faith also are permitted as many as four wives. Why should either of these groups refrain from entering the fray, and extend the definition of marriage to allow their religious beliefs to be practiced? Granted, part of the problem is that the practice has often been abused, with men marrying girls under the usual state-established age of consent -- girls young enough to be their daughters. But the abuse doesn't abrogate the right; and there's no reason why, with proper documentation, women of legal age to marry should be denied entry into a polygamous marriage if they choose to do so of their own will.

Nor should the legalization be limited to polygamy. After all, that would be unfair to that part of the female population who would prefer instead to have several husbands providing for their care, comfort, and pleasure. Again, as long as everyone is at or above the age of consent, and enters knowingly into such a union, registered with the state, why should anyone object? And, while there isn't (so far as I know) a "poly" for more complex relationships, there's no need to limit the establishment of some sort of "multiple marriages," where, say, three men and two women, or three men and four women (or "a" men and "b" women) desire to be joined in marriage and be recognized as each other's spouses. With everyone at the age of consent, and all open and above-board, why not? After all, we can't use Christian morality as an argument against any of the "polys"; that argument is out-of-bounds in the dialogue today. And, after all, just because only a few people, comparatively speaking, will actually want to enter into these forms of union doesn't make them wrong." Father John (scroll down until blogger gets it gap together)

And he hasn't even mentioned why adults shouldn't have the right to marry children (if you can change the gender, why not the consent) or their siblings or first degree relatives. Or why the marriage shouldn't take place if only one person wants it. Sort of a Kelo-Marriage. Follow the money. Follow the power. Just my humble opinion, of course.

1213 Are the media liberal or conservative or balanced?

Ask someone who earns his living there. Callimachus, a journalist whose "co-workers sit at their desks talking about how much they hate Bush, how important it is to defeat him, how many people they saw at the anti-war rally they marched in, how criminal the Iraq war is, how "evil" the U.S. administration is, how brilliant and important Michael Moore is, how stupid Republicans are" writes:

"I find it amazing that people consider the media to have a "conservative" bias. If by that you mean, "Peter Jennings is not actively promoting Maoist revolutionary rhetoric," then yes, that's true. But according to a Pew Research Center survey reported in "Editor & Publisher," the official publication of the U.S. news media, the proportion of self-defined "liberals" in newsrooms is increasing much faster than that of self-defined "conservatives," and the ratio is well out of proportion to the nation as a whole.

At national organizations (which includes print, TV and radio), the numbers break down like this: 34% liberal, 7% conservative. At local outlets: 23% liberal, 12% conservative. At Web sites: 27% call themselves liberals, 13% conservatives.

This contrasts with the self-assessment of the general public: 20% liberal, 33% conservative.

Pew found that, over time, not only is the media more polarized, but the liberal voices are more numerous. Since 1995, at national outlets, the liberal segment has climbed from 22% to 34% while conservatives have inched up from 5% to 7%."

Done with Mirrors

1212 Live Aid

There are few people more entrepreneurial or price gouging than the entertainment/rock musician club. So if they really want to help the poor in Africa, they need to encourage capitalism. Marxism and socialism didn't get them on stage raking in the dough. Somehow, I don't think we'll hear that message. They also need to sing loud enough to encourage African ex-pats to leave Europe, Canada and the US and return home to put their education and skills to work for the homeland. Yeah, I know that won't happen either.

1211 A Perfect Summer Day

When we arrived last Saturday the temps were in the high 90s and we could barely see the islands. A storm blew through on Thursday and cleared everything out. Last night we finally saw a sunset. Today has been coolish and windy. While walking along the lakefront today we could practically see people grilling out on Kelley's Island. Lake Erie is like a saucer of water, and with a little wind you get white caps.

I'd stopped in a new gift shop and heard a rumor that a house on the lake listed for $695,000 was in a bidding war, and had gone up into the $800s. So we were walking along trying to figure out which one it was. We did see one in contract which still had most of the porch protection in place. Like many of the older houses, some of its porches had been filled in. A lakefront house can get pretty chilly. Location really is everything. In Columbus, this house might go for $65 or $70,000.

Someone flagged down my husband today on his bike ride to ask if he'd retired. Their kids had just bought a house on our street and wanted to remodel. He won't take the job, but did stop and look at it and explained to them the complex set-backs and footprint rules. We do ponder what some of these young families do to be able to afford a second home--when we were their age, the groceries were spread awfully thin at the end of the month, and we'd hold our breath that nothing went wrong with the car.

Also on our street, the only "fixer-upper" left in town has changed hands. I stopped in yesterday to say hello. The floors and walls were straighter than I expected, judging from the outside. This family group owns about 6 other cottages that we know of, and I know they'll do a good job. It was an incredible mess. The former owner's family had been here on Monday to take out what they wanted. Then the next day a dumpster was in the yard, and virtually everything in the house went into it. I heard the young owner say, "Here's another typewriter," as he threw it in. The final frosting on the cake made of trash was 4 double bed mattresses. The roof is completely covered with a tarp--it's been that way for two years. The two story garage, which looks like a former stable, leans dramatically to the east. We'll enjoy watching the transformation.

1210 On activist judges

Jane Galt recalls:

"Most people seem to think of the constitution as a guarantee of everything they believe sacred and good--whatever that may be. I think of it rather as a process for finding what is sacred and good; the operating manual for a classically liberal society. The rights it guarantees are mostly the rights that allow people to meet and debate ideas. We have freedom of speech, assembly, and religion so that we can meet and debate about the truth, including the truth about God. We have the right to bear arms, freedom from unreasonable searches, and the various criminal justice rights to prevent the government from curtailing those rights through the backdoor of intimidation. We have a mechanism for electing a federal government to be our proxies for the enacting of the truths we discover into law.

This is a model, of course, and it's imperfect; the founding fathers had many things in mind (and I'm neither a historian nor a legal scholar). But as a model, I think it works pretty well. And I think there's an important idea here: the constitution doesn't tell us what those truths are.

It doesn't tell us that the right to sexual privacy is fundamental to human liberty, nor that we may not hear prayers in our classrooms or see nativity scenes on the town square, nor any of the other multitude of "rights" we've discovered since the Warren court. If we discover such things, it gives us a perfectly good mechanism for enacting those truths into law: the legislature."

1209 Mom Writers

While browsing through my site meter by referrals who had also mentioned Mt. Morris, IL, I came across the Mom Writers, "a community of professional and new writers . . . who face the unique challenges of writing with children underfoot." A very interesting site for female writers and wannabees. They've got their own t-shirts and hats. If you are a beginner, they offer encouragement and help.