Thirteen Things about NORMA in the last 5 days 1. Served communion on Sunday. 2. Entertained house guests for the New Year celebration. 3. Played with my new grandpuppy, a Chihuahua named Abbie. 4. Read "Beyond the River" by Ann Hagedorn. 5. Wrote 23 blog entries, including this one. 6. Cleaned out 2 drawers and one file box. 7. Sorted through all the bills and invoices for 2005. 8. Wrote 6 notes (real handwritten notes with stamps) to friends and relatives. 9. Delivered magazines to a library sale. 10. Attended book club. 11. Met a friend for breakfast. 12. Took a walk on a mild day. 13. Did some financial research. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. Jane 2. I heart Peanut Butter 3. Straddling the line 4. Colleen 5. Grumpy 6. Busy Mom 7. Dariana 8. Jane, Cozy Reader

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1983 The press has done it again

The West Virginia mine bad reporting incident reminded me of the press fiasco of Katrina, but Achoress has said it better than I could:

"So, yes, one could could excuse the press their mistake, and forgive the torturous turnabout which came after, if only they had not - just a few months ago - done precisely the same thing while covering Hurricane Katrina. Recall that back in New Orleans - just as last night - unknown people ran about, shouting unverifiable “news” and the journalists, particularly the always-voracious cable news outlets, latched on to the “news” and emotionally redelivered it, without checking it out, without doing the basic job of journalism which is: if your parents say you’re not adopted, and you look just like your brother, confirm, confirm, confirm."

1982 Maureen Dowd vs. Ann Coulter

Both of these women journalists are vitriolic, sarcastic, bombastic and often angry. The difference is Coulter's columns actually contain information and facts. I tried, I really did, to read Maureen Dowd's column today about Abramoff, but it wasn't about him. His crime didn't appear until paragraph five where she gets to "the Abramoff plea bargain." On the way there she manages to smear only Republicans, as though there are no Democrats involved. Then she moves on to bashing Bush, then Cheney, then she's on to quoting the WaPo that Bush has used something (legal) 108 times. Then moves on to smearing Bush for a joke he cracked at a medical center, completing her tirade about Abramoff (I think) with Nixon. That's a lot of column inches to point out that Abramoff has a plea bargain.

She might spend a bit more time on the whole smelly process of tribal casinos. Today's WSJ reports "Indian gaming is a $19 billion industry involving 228 tribes operating 405 gambling operations in 30 states." "Lobbyists, legislators and inside-the-beltway lawyers are the real stakeholders in Indian gambling," according to Alexis Johnson, Arizona lawyer, and Abramoff is the tip of the ice berg.

I think Dowd knows that, and her column is smoke and mirrors. She'll want to check into some of the Democrats' favorite causes when she's finished bashing Bush and Cheney (yeah, that'll happen) because these tribes getting wealthy on gambling are exempt from local taxes, state labor laws, municipal ordinances, zoning restrictions and environmental reviews.

For well-paced, factual vitriol, here's Ann Coulter. You can find Maureen Dowd on your own.

1981 Nibbled to death

by fees, taxes, surcharges and related components. I've been going over the year's expenses. My, isn't it a treat to look closely at the phone bill, electric bill and gas bill? Where do they get this stuff? If they divy it up into enough small pots do they think we won't notice? Well, we don't, for the most part. Were the taxes for WWII ever removed? This is just the phone company (SBC) and Verizon has a different set.

• federal access charge
  
• federal universal service fee
  
• federal tax 3%
  
• federal long distance tax
  
• federal universal service fund
  
• regulatory surcharge
  
• 911 system fee
  
• sales tax 6.75%
  
• state tax
  
• municipal tax

Our electric bill from Ohio Edison (Lakeside) is just as confusing. First they alerted us that there will be a 3% increase in a "transmission related component" approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or about $1.50. I'm left to ponder how transmission differs from delivery. That new charge is not to be confused with the

• transition charge
  
• generation related component or the
  
• delivery charge

Our electric company in Columbus is AEP, and it has transmission charges, distribution surcharges, customer charges and transition charges, that don't look anything like the Ohio Edison hen scratches. If we're getting a 3% increase approved by the FERC, I missed the ferkin announcement.

1980 National Education Association supports left causes and candidates

with members dues. About a third of the members' dues goes for political lobbying, gifts and grants. Unions now have to disclose how they use their members dues, and it isn't pretty, according to this editorial in yesterday's WSJ. The Union gave away $65 million last year to Jesse Jackson's Rainbow PUSH Coalition, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, Amnesty International, AIDS Walk Washington and dozens of other such advocacy groups. I'm not sure how that helps teachers (certainly doesn't help children, but that isn't what the organization is about).

"Reg Weaver, the union's president, makes $439,000 a year. The NEA has a $58 million payroll for just over 600 employees, more than half of whom draw six-figure salaries. Last year the average teacher made only $48,000."

". . .last year the NEA gave $45,000 to the Economic Policy Institute, which regularly issues reports that claim education is underfunded and teachers are underpaid. The partisans at People for the American Way got a $51,000 NEA contribution; PFAW happens to be vehemently anti-voucher. . . Protect Our Public Schools, an anti-charter-school group backed by the NEA's Washington state affiliate, received $500,000 toward its efforts to block school choice for underprivileged children. . . the Floridians for All Committee, which focuses on "the construction of a permanent progressive infrastructure that will help redirect Florida politics in a more progressive, Democratic direction," received a $249,000 donation from NEA headquarters."

This one really surprised me. The Fund to Protect Social Security got $400,000, presumably to defeat personal investment accounts. I have a teacher's pension (STRS, university faculty) and we're not eligible for Social Security--not our own and not our spouse's--so just what is NEA protecting? Are they afraid that if their members also had personal accounts when they did work under SS, they'd be less dependent on the union?

Librarians don't have a union; they have the American Library Association, ALA. It looks out for libraries, not librarians, with campaigns against censorship, the Patriot Act, and the Bush administration. I guess that's a good thing to keep their eye off the ball after seeing what NEA does to schools. The NEA may be an arm of the DNC, but ALA is far too liberal to be anybody's patsy.

Public disclosure page.

National Education Association
Unions

1979 The Index of Economic Freedom

For 12 years the Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal have cooperated on the Index of Economic Freedom, and today's article in the WSJ compared the freedom outcomes of two small countries, Estonia, which has moved quickly with reforms and Chile which has moved slowly. Estonia is 7th and Chile is 14th.

"The Index measures 161 countries against a list of 50 independent variables divided into 10 broad factors of economic freedom. Low scores are more desirable; the higher the score on a factor, the greater the level of government interference in the economy, and the less economic freedom a country enjoys. . . A systematic analysis of these factors continues to demonstrate that countries with the highest levels of economic freedom also have the highest living standards."

The nice thing about using the website is that you can select the variables and see how different countries compare within their regions. Canada and the U.S. are almost always neck and neck whether it is wages, or trade policies; except for fiscal burden, and there Canadians have us beat (lower score is better). Here's the executive summary--note particularly what is happening in Latin America where Chile is the poster child for economic freedom and all the rest are marginal or repressed. Three countries in Latin America made the 10 most worsened list.

1978 Mom! I'm famished. What's to eat?

There's a lot of media coverage of overweight children. Given the success of the anti-smoking campaigns (which I support), I'm guessing we'll see the lawyers and do-gooders checking our lunch boxes and dinner tables before too long--after they get the pop and snack contracts with the food companies out of the schools (which I support).

So here's a tag for you and the rules: you can only tag a blogger over 50 and you copy the question and let the person know he or she's been tagged.

What snack items did your mother allow in your home and put out for you when you were growing up--either home made or store bought? And what item was absolutely not allowed? Here's mine:

1. Buttered slice of bread with sugar-cinnamon sprinkles.
2. Egg nog--milk, egg, sugar and vanilla.
3. Raw potato slices.
4. Kool-aid if it was really a hot day (made with sugar).
5. Peanut butter toast or sandwich.

We NEVER had soda pop in our house.

I'm tagging Mr. Cloud, Octogenarian, Bonita, Jane, and Cuppa.

BTW, Mr. Cloud and Cuppa are married, and both have fabulous winter photos on their sites--check it out.

1977 Blooger burps

What else would you call it when your blogger template goes all crazy? The writing window for "create" was all messed up this morning, but I know a little code and remember life from a kinder, gentler software, so I kept going. It was a little like driving at night in the rain with no headlights. Then when I posted my last entry about Canada, Blogger.com somehow scooped up the NLM page from the previous entry, and used its bold green heading style to morph into my title and face! It was scary, I tell ya. So I quickly exited before it tried to become part of my blog family (I have six, you know). Leaving it alone in the closet for awhile, I came back, and everything was just peachy.

1976 Building boom in Canada for the Arts

Although there's more to be done, Canadians will be happy about this:

"The arts are experiencing a construction boom in Canada unlike any other in modern memory, as museums and galleries scramble to open the biggest, best, and most recognizable buildings they can afford."

Story here.

1975 Sorry, no more room for tools!

PubMed has a new tool bar to install, but now that I've got the lower level of the condo clean and neat and all our tools in a nice arrangement, I don't think I'll clutter up my computer screen with one more tool bar. I love my Google tool bar, though.

Check out the NLM Technical Bulletin for details.

1974 Journalist gives up job to become a Marine

A 32 year old Wall Street Journal reporter in poor physical condition decided to go for it and become a Marine officer after living in China for 7 years and reporting on the tsunami last December. He'd been disgusted and sicked by the murder of a colleague and the beheading of Americans. He wanted to become part of something bigger than himself and so he trained and disciplined himself until he could pass the requirements. What made him give up what some would see as a wonderful career? On December 15 he wrote his story in the WSJ:

"It's a cliché that you appreciate your own country more when you live abroad, but it happens to be true. Living in China for the last seven years, I've seen that country take a giant leap from a struggling Third World country into a true world power. For many people it still comes as a surprise to learn that China is chasing Japan as the second-largest economy on the globe and could soon own a trillion dollars of American debt.

But living in China also shows you what a nondemocratic country can do to its citizens. I've seen protesters tackled and beaten by plainclothes police in Tiananmen Square, and I've been videotaped by government agents while I was talking to a source. I've been arrested and forced to flush my notes down a toilet to keep the police from getting them, and I've been punched in the face in a Beijing Starbucks by a government goon who was trying to keep me from investigating a Chinese company's sale of nuclear fuel to other countries."

HT to our Blue Star Mom, Beth.

1973 When Bess Myerson became Miss America

You'll enjoy this story of how Bess Myerson made the day for a young Jewish soldier stationed in India, a long way from home--the Bronx. He's a very experienced writer and editor, but a little new to blogging.

1972 And that's no bull

Speaking of the New Year, maybe it's time for a new screen saver? How about something really cute, like some Angus art work by a famous animal artist, Frank C. Murphy. You can get left leaning bull, or right leaning bull, it's entirely up to you. Aren't these heifers just too cute?

Check here for more Angus clip art

1971 Tag for the New Year

The Soul Sings has tagged me, and here are the rules.

Rules: “The first player of this game starts with the topic “five weird habits of yourself,” and people who get tagged need to write an entry about their five weird habits as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose the next five people to be tagged and link to their web journals. Don’t forget to leave a comment in their blog or journal that says “You are tagged” (assuming they take comments) and tell them to read yours.”

1. I add up the purchases in my head (rounding to the nearest dollar) as I place items on the conveyor belt at the grocery store. I'm almost always within 50 cents of the correct total, but I've never been able to balance my check book.

2. I collect first issues of journals and write about them, but mostly I look at them in a pile under the small couch in my office, and do nothing with them.

3. I leave my home very early in the morning to buy a cup of coffee. I'm not on my way anywhere except the coffee shop, and I've done this for the last 50 years or so. Wasn't so bad when coffee was a quarter. Now it probably amounts to a mortgage payment in a year's time. I write about what I see and hear at coffee shops.

4. I analyze library databases as I use them, and usually e-mail the contact person about the screwed up mess in the numbering of series or complain about the terrible printing options. I was just looking at Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science at OSUL and OhioLINK and almost had a meltdown. Sometimes I write about that too.

5. I have 5 or 6 places for loose change, but have forgotten where most of them are. It's like found money (actually it IS found money) when I come across the receptacle. Most recently I cleaned out a pink mitten that had no mate, but did have $3.00. Although it's not exactly a New Year's resolution, I'm planning to do some drawer cleaning to go along with our big December clean out, so I expect to claim some lost funds.

And now I'll tag Pat in NC, who is pretty in pink, and Beth, a proud military mom, and Cathy, who is incredibly crafty, and Joan, who is Beth's sister, and Eric, who needs a little encouragement (he took my blogging class).

If I had 6 habits, I'd mention that I shamelessly promote my blogs.

1970 Don’t ask don’t tell--Christians in U.S. history.

This is a paragraph from an Ohio history teachers’ website. I was looking through it after reading about John Bennington Mahan whose story is told in our January book club choice, “Beyond the River” by Ann Hagedorn. Virtually all the abolitionists were devout Christians, and often they were battling Christian slave holders. The abolitionists' homes and businesses were destroyed, their lives and families were threatened, they were whipped, imprisoned and "egged." Both sides used the Bible to defend their own morality. The slaveholders were motivated by economics, but why leave out what motivated the abolitionists? They believed in the common humanity of blacks and whites; that Jesus had died also for the black slave, that they were their brothers and sisters, and that slavery was an abomination in the eyes of the Lord, a insult to a holy God. Their commitment and beliefs are reduced to “conscious choice to break the law” in this passage--sort of a "values clarification" exercise. Mahan died a few years later, probably as a result of his imprisonment.

“Rev. John Mahan, Rev. John Rankin, and others in Brown County, Ohio were not just making a choice to help slaves to freedom; they were making a conscious choice to break the law. The case of abolitionist John Mahan illustrates the fine line between —doing the right thing“ (his conscience) and —breaking the law,“ his capture, arrest, trial, and the results that followed. People involved with the Underground Railroad broke the law every time they helped a runaway. This not only put them in danger of going to jail but also their family (some were left destitute).” Case histories, Underground Railroad

Ohio history
slavery
abolitionists
Presbyterians

1969 What's private is also political

How many times have we heard or read that abortion should be private and not political? That's because the unborn in the minds of many are either property of the mother (but not the father), or a parasite living off the good graces of another.

Liberals are outraged by Alito's ruling that it was not an undue burden for a married woman to notify her husband that she was having an abortion. Now that notification didn't save the child's life, did it?

So the story of the antislavery saints of Ohio, "Beyond the River," reminds me a lot of the current "private vs. political" struggle.

"Their response was to tighten restraints, to raise the walls of confinement higher, to argue for laws to protect their human property, and eventually blame anti-slavery crusaders for fomenting revolt."

Anti-abortionists are painted as the personification of evil woman haters by the pro-abortionist camp--and nothing Alito has done or stands for will ever be more important in their minds than abortion--not civil liberties, or the death penalty, or the 2nd amendment, or the 10 commandments in schools or Christmas trees in the public square. Just as in the early 19th century when slavery threatened the union, it has come down to one issue again in the early 21st century. And Christians are complicit now as then.

"Even though members of the church agreed with him [John Rankin, a Presbyterian minister] that the Bible was opposed to slavery, to say it publicly was a radical move, . . .never [to be] discussed from the pulpit." p. 31

Advent Carol Service

Although Advent season is over, I'm listening to the Advent Carol Service from the Chapel of St John's College, Cambridge on the BBC radio player which was originally broadcast November 27. I can't give you a link or I'll lose my station. It is really quite lovely, and may perhaps be more welcome now than before. I think I started here, after reading Tom Roper's site.

Nine Ten Planets

This story of the discovery of the 10th planet in our solar system is not new, but was one of the top stories of 2005. There's just a lot I learned in school or from my doctors or in graduate school or from politicians that just isn't true or factual, but we used to believe it. Wonder what's next? Evolution?

1966 Parting company

We accidentally received a copy of YouthWorker Journal yesterday and I blogged about that at Church of the Acronym.

Wishing you a safe and happy New Year

Our friends Tom and Pat are coming over from Indianapolis. The guys have been friends since their teen years, and Tom was the best man in our wedding. Our children are about the same age, and some day I hope to see their son Mike's name on the title page of a novel. Their daughter Rachel teaches in an urban school in Indianapolis.

We'll either go to a movie or a jazz concert--it's their call, then either to Old Bag of Nails or Rusty Bucket--our call--for something to eat, and then downtown to look at the lights, which so far, we've managed to miss. I think there is a Ferris wheel at Skate on State something set up to draw people downtown during the holidays. Hope we aren't too late.

I hope you have a wonderful, healthy, prosperous 2006.

May your investments do well,
your medical visits few,
May your friends be many
and love always surround you.

At least, that's what matters when you're my age!