2600 Why I don't RSS you

Sure, it's easy, they say. But do I want more things to read? I just click on my favorite links which are right here to my left, recommended by me and occasionally updated. As it is, I subscribe to way too many newsletters, a method I prefer to RSS feeds. I hear from James Carville and some lady (Nikki?) at the LATimes for news from the left; I get Nathan Bierma who writes for the Tribune about language; Michael Yon for news from Iraq; Boogie Jack tells me web page code secrets; George Barna keeps me informed about surveys of Christians; I get a genealogy newsletter, and a film maker newsletter, and an adoption newsletter from Capital U.; James Taranto of the WSJ and Christianity Today alert me when they have something new to say; and I have on-line subscriptions to WaPo and NYT. Medscape tells me when one of you have commented, so I can go back and find it. Really, I don't want your RSS feed. I have enough to do feeding my own eight blogs. And then there's all that Viagra and ink cartridge and mortgage spam.

2599 Let's all go down to Mexico

and protest their immigration policies.

• Immigrants and foreign visitors are banned from public political discourse.
• Immigrants and foreigners are denied certain basic property rights.
• Immigrants are denied equal employment rights.
• Immigrants and naturalized citizens will never be treated as real Mexican citizens.
• Immigrants and naturalized citizens are not to be trusted in public service.
• Immigrants and naturalized citizens may never become members of the clergy.
• Private citizens may make citizens arrests of lawbreakers (i.e., illegal immigrants) and hand them to the authorities.
• Immigrants may be expelled from Mexico for any reason and without due process.

Full story here at "Mexico's Glass House" which pretty much confirms an article I found in Lexis Nexis about the classism in Mexico's citizenship.


No wonder their citizens try so hard to stay here, and not go home.

2598 Can 500 experts be wrong?

Today's WSJ editorializes that 500 prominent economists claim that "immigration has been a net gain for American citizens."

Guess what? In the 1830s and 1840s, U.S. economists and egg-heads believed that about slavery too! Yes indeedy. Slavery was absolutely an economic necessity in the rural South (they said then) and besides, white people were doing those poor pagans a big favor by bringing them to an enlightened country (while decimating their own culture and families).

I'm not worried about the 950,000 legal immigrants. We need them. But the illegals flooding in from Mexico? Is that good for the Mexican economy and culture to export their poor so they never have to address the inequalities in their system. And how about that drug trade that is part and parcel of the illegal immigration, and the one in 10 who are not Mexican, but come across that border into the U.S. Do you know how hard it is to immigrate to Mexico? Did you know you can't be President of Mexico if your mother was born in Spain even if you were born in Mexico? Did you know there are at least 4 classes of citizenship in Mexico, and guess who is at the bottom--the poorest and brownest (that's not the correct way to say it, but I like the alliteration). Well, no, the naturalized Mexican citizen would be at the bottom--especially if brown--not allowed to do many things.

But hey. Could 500 economists be wrong? Yes, about something other than the economy.

2597 Acceptable risk

Would you get on an airplane, eat an egg, or take an aspirin with these safety figures? The U.S. government regulations for acceptable quality for condoms is 4 per 1,000 with discernable holes. Thirty two percent of normal, intact condoms leaked in FDA tests. Add to that depressing figure, they must must be used from the beginning (during foreplay), until the end to work as intended. Among couples where one partner had AIDS, over an 18 month period the HIV virus was transmitted to the uninfected partner in 17% of the couples who used condoms. The "in theory" rate of failure in birth control for condoms is 2%; the reality rate is 14%, just slightly less than the reality rate for the rhythm method (16%). "How to talk confidently with your child about sex," by Lenore Buth.

Aren't you glad you stopped by to read my blog today?

condoms
HIV-AIDS
birth control

Clarifying Clinton's Kyoto

Amy Ridenour of National Center for Public Policy Research takes apart Media Matters claim that Clinton's Kyoto plans (U.N. global warming treaty) were dead on arrival because of key Republicans, concluding . . .

"It seems to me that Chris Horner [on Neil Cavuto's show] is right and Media Matters is wrong to criticize him. Senate Republicans may well have told Clinton Kyoto couldn't be ratified, but Senate Democrats -- indeed, 95 out of 95 Senators present at voting in July 1997 -- told Clinton the very same thing. And, if Clinton disagreed, he didn't do much to fight them."

Calling all B-team Catholics

I saw this at Vox Lauri's blog. It's for blogging Catholics (which I'm not), but I thought it was a cute idea, because blogging is definitely being taken over by the "real" journalists, and in Catholicism I guess the little guys are feeling crowded out.


Here's a typical B-Team member:

"I am the poster child for the Amateur Catholic. I am not a theologian, I am not a bioethicist, I don't have a Ph.D. and I have to beg my parish to let me speak on stem cells and cloning. (In fact, when I told my Bishop about my website, I got a polite response that passed me off to my parish priest, who I am sure was instructed to discourage me at all cost!)

My only credentials are that I go to Mass on Sunday, I have a degree in Biochemistry and have a high speed Internet connection. It doesn't get more amateur than that." Mary

"I'm part of the 20-something crowd that has decided to stake our claim on Catholicism and rebel against the evil effects of the 70's and 80's, or what we like to call "the birthing years". I'm a graduate student in Theology but don't let that fool you. I'm part of the school of thought that firmly believes; 'the more ya know, the more you realize you don't know anything' and boy do I know a lot, or...something like that. I've just recently started a new blog about my adventures through the Lenten season. How long will it take me to break all of my Lenten promises? Not long at all, in fact, I probably already have. I'm broken, I'm inarticulate and in spite of the number of comments on my blog remaining firmly at 0, I still think I'm wildly interesting." Amy

I discovered the Catholic blogosphere when I was trying to ignore that pesky call to become a Sister. I kept going to Google and typing in "Should Susan become a Sister" or "What should Susan do with her life" or "Does anyone become a nun anymore?" to no avail. I was however lucky enough to happen upon the real life stories of amateur Catholics who were struggling to make sense of this thing called life. I was inspired by their honesty and integrity, and it helped me to decide that I too could trust in my loving God and walk down this path to see where it leads. I must say I've been pleasantly surprised! Susan

Others call themselves amateur Catholics because they are converts as well as bloggers.

Monday Memories

Cousin Kirby, seated on floor, album cover, The Lincolns* Kirby and I at a family reunion in 1993 Kirby Johnson and I were first cousins and about the same age (I think my grandparents had 24 grandchildren). Our families would gather at my grandmother's home in Mt. Morris on Sunday afternoons, and the little house would be full of cousins. I remember he had terrible asthma and I think he took up trumpet to help his breathing. We both attended the University of Illinois, where we graduated in 1961--he in music and I in Education. He was a member of the concert band and was in a music fraternity, so our paths rarely crossed on campus. While at Illinois he and some friends formed a folk singing group called "The Continentals," and then changed the name to "The Lincolns." I was only vaguely aware of what they were doing, but I have one of their records (cover photo above). After college they headed for California and the "big time," touring the country with Donald O'Connor in 1962-63. Kirby by this time was playing many instruments and singing. Their album was the commercially viable pop/folk tunes so popular in the early 60s, with a number of the songs written by Rich Dehr, Frank Miller and Terry Gilkyson, of "Marianne" and "Memories are made of this" fame. Kirby stopped to see me in Champaign in 1963 after the death of my son, but I didn't see him again for thirty years. His home was in California and after 1967 mine was in Ohio, and when we returned to Illinois to visit family, our paths didn't cross. I knew the group performed on TV and changed its name to The Wellingtons. So through the magic of Google and the internet I looked him up this week. I discovered that he and his group (by then a trio) recorded the original Gilligan's Island Ballad. Rick Jarrard had left the group to become a producer. It was a rush job and no studios were open so it was actually recorded in someone's garage (according to one message board). Many sites still list them in the credits, but another said it was re-recorded the next season by a different group. According to Rick and Darva's Gossip page, the Wellingtons appeared on one of the episodes of Gilligan's Island as a band called "The Mosquitos," a take off on the Beatles, having added Les Brown, Jr. to the group. Kirby performed regularly with The Wellingtons on Hollywood Palace, a popular, long-running Saturday night variety show of the mid-to-late 1960's often hosted by Bing Crosby. They also performed 64 times on Shindig! according to a fan site. I found Kirby's name as a performer, conductor and arranger on the albums of some big name performers like Carly Simon [No Secrets, 1972; Another Passenger, 1976], Harry Nilsson and Bonnie Raitt. I think he probably had a fairly strong career in concert touring, TV and as a studio musician at least through the mid-1980s**. I never heard much after that, and didn't find many Google entries for later dates. I did find a 1986 film (music arranging) credit. It is difficult to tell, since many recordings are reissued and the credits run very long. We got together at a family reunion in 1993--in some ways he seemed the same sweet boy I knew as a child, but he was also world-weary. He died in 1999. Most of the pop music web sites and bulletin boards say that Kirby became an attorney, but if he did, no one in our family ever knew about it. And some web sites say a group called the Wellingtons recorded Disney's "Ballad of Davy Crockett," but if so it wasn't for the TV series (Mellomen one of whom was the voice of Tony the Tiger)--the guys in the Wellingtons wouldn't even have been out of high school in Illinois. Some sites say Wade became a producer, but I think it was Jarrard--but maybe they both did. The internet is fabulous, but there's a lot of misinformation too. And it's not much cleaner in the Wiki's. *Members of The Lincolns were Kirby Johnson, Rick Jarrard, Ed Wade and George Patterson **There is another musician also named Kirby Johnson, so more recent entries most likely belong to that person. 1. Ma 2. Natalie 3. The Shrone 4. Libragirl 5. Reverberate58 6. Shelli 7. Lazy Daisy 8. Old Lady of the Hills 9. Chelle If you'd like to join in on Monday Memories, leave a comment and I'll link back to you. Click here for the Monday Memories code Trackbacks, pings, and comment links are accepted and encouraged! View More Monday Memories Participants The Wellingtons Hollywood Palace Shindig! Kirby Johnson

2593 The cocoon where I live

If there was ever a statement that shows me my cocoon it's this one: "There is little difference between the amounts that Christians and non-Christians earn, spend, save, charge, or donate to charities." (John W. Kennedy)

Almost all my friends are Christians. They are married (or widowed), well-educated, prosperous and most tithe or at least are close. They are also very generous with their time, serving the larger community in many ways from boards of education to committees and races for the cure, city government, food pantries, hospitals, prisons, mental health agencies, Habitat for Humanity and inner city schools. Friends at Vineyard fan out and pick up the Homeless from the streets and bring them to church. There's a group of my friends who are doing an arts camp all summer "on the Hilltop" which includes meals for the children and neighborhood volunteers. Men I know are using business skills to reclaim a decaying neighborhood, house by house, for the poor. This month alone I know Christians coming home from rebuilding in Biloxi, distributing medicine in rural China, and Latin America, or going to Haiti to work in a school.

And probably because of our age, we know many people who are debt free and living well, after an early adult life of struggle and building. So I'll have to take a second look at that quote (forgot to write down the source, forgive me) and see why my life experience is so different.

2592 Front end or back end?

According to JAMA (285,no.16) Democrats are holding up the approval of Andrew von Eschenbach to be the Food and Drug Administration commissioner.

"Andrew C. von Eschenbach, M.D., was appointed Acting Commissioner of Food and Drugs in September 2005. He holds that appointment concurrently with his position as Director of the National Cancer Institute, to which he was named in January 2002. Dr. von Eschenbach is a nationally recognized urologic surgeon, medical educator, and cancer advocate. He also is a cancer survivor.

Prior to his appointment as Director of NCI, Dr. von Eschenbach spent 25 years at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, ultimately serving as Executive Vice President and Chief Academic Officer. In that position, he led a faculty of nearly 1,000 cancer researchers and clinicians." Full bio here.

If you read about him in the MSM (I checked WaPo), you'll first hear all about his friendship with the Bush family. That, in my guess, is what's really holding this up. No possible good could come of person with ties to the Bush family. It's apparently OK for him to fight cancer, but his views on over-the-counter sales of "emergency contraceptive pill" are not liked by Dems, who would rather catch potential cancer victims in the womb and eliminate them then, rather than treat them 50 or 60 years down the road.

2591 Out of the word closet

Every time I see JAMA or some other medical journal struggle to euphemistically describe men who transmit diseased results of homosexual behavior to women, I wonder if they need a committee working on a new term. Here's my suggestion.

The current term has three parts--the perp, the act and the victim. "Non-gay-identified men-who-have-sex-with-men who-have-female-partners could be shorted to prom-him-aids. That would mean a promiscuous bi-sexual moving very serious diseases back and forth (promenade).

2590 Are we drowning in red tape?

A clock repairman in South Charleston, Ohio refused a job with Lake County (Painesville, OH) to fix its 128 year old court house clock. The bid process was 20 pages long.
Phil Wright who is one of a handful of craftsmen who does this says he's used to doing work on a handshake, and it was just too much red tape. I can see having a contract, especially if you are a county or state agency, but 20 pages?

2589 My husband's new camera

He bought a Sony Cybershot H5. That means nothing to me since I don't know anything about cameras, but we thought we needed something before going to Europe in July. A neighbor who teaches camera classes at the Senior Center helped him pick one out, then sold him his brand new one when the source was out of that model, and he'll order a new one for himself. That way we'll have a little time to learn how to use this one. It tells me my computer doesn't have a hi-speed USB port. Will that matter? These are some practice shots:

Grilling burgers for Father's Day

Ready for burgers and bean salad

2588 Have you ever noticed

that if you do something well and are proud of it, someone else will second guess your decisions, outcomes or motives? Robert Fulghum (the guy who learned about life in kindergarten), a terrifically successful author, was recently asked:

"Why did I not address the political issues of our time, especially the actions of the present American government administration? Why did I not address the humanitarian issues of our day? Why was I not outraged as an American with the evil done on my behalf? Did I agree that might makes right, that the end justifies the means, and that God is on our side? How can I support the fundamental position of Zionist Israel? Did I really believe the American Way was the only Way? Did I have any real understanding of how America is perceived in the world now? How much hatred and contempt is felt? Why was I silent on these burning issues? Why did I not run for office and do something?"

He adequately answers, I think. But I did all this or addressed all these questions in the past 3 years except the last sentence (I wouldn't run for office of anything), and trust me, no one is beating down the door to my blog. The problem with people who ask these questions is usually that they don't like your answers and they'll still have a tantrum and flood you with "Yes, buts."

His response is beautifully appropriate for his style, beliefs and skill set:

"When people ask why don’t I do this and this and this instead of that and that and that, I can only say that I am a man who has found his league and scale, who goes about trying to be awake to the news of the immediate ordinary world; to make sense of what I see; to pass it on with the implied question: have you seen what I see? Look! Don’t miss the good stuff – that is my message."

Thank you, Mr. Fulghum, for being the best you.

2587 Which one would you believe?

I'm with the Starbucks folks on this one. I've yet to see a tattooed coffee clerk who would raise a studded eyebrow or flare a nose ring and bust some one (no pun intended) for breast feeding. But changing diapers? Yeah, that should get them tossed. Go to the rest room and use the one with the Braille instructions if you're too dense to know why other customers eating and drinking coffee don't want you near by. Someone's just a little too anxious for the lime light.

"Though the South Beach, Florida store in question was closed for renovations this past Sunday, some mothers gathered at a Starbucks and held a "nurse-in" to protest the expulsion of a woman named Nicole Coombs from the store. Coombs claims that she was asked to leave for breast-feeding her 4-month old son. The Starbucks manager, however, maintains that Coombs was asked to leave for changing her baby's diaper on one of the tables in the cafe." . . .

"Management and employees of that Starbucks store have never had any problems with nursing mothers in the past and have many women with infants as regular customers. This tends to support the store's side of the story, though the protesting mothers clearly support Coombs. They believe that Starbucks may have broken a Florida law that allows mothers to breastfeed anywhere they are legally allowed to be." Full story here.

Happy Father's Day

Usually I post my coffee shop stuff over at my other, other blog, but this one was just too good to allow it to languish in blog basement.

My regular Sunday coffee shop had a newbie on duty, and at 6:35 a.m., the coffee still wasn't made, so I hopped back in the car and went to another one about a mile away. While sitting by the window I overheard the two guys behind the counter who were making the coffee and waiting on customers:

Clerk #1: "There was a guy in here yesterday--had four kids and his wife is pregnant with the fifth. All girls."

Clerk #2: "Oh God. I'd have to shoot myself."

2585 Kroger battles Wal-Mart for food shoppers

according to a story in last week’s paper. I used to be a loyal Kroger shopper--I knew where everything was, I knew the staff, and I knew the specials--then they asked me to start playing games with a little plastic card, Kroger Plus. Well named, because it sure did up the price on everything. Jack it up, then give a special lowered price for using the silly card. They are not rewarding you for shopping there; they are penalizing you with data mining which is very expensive.

The worst thing about the loyalty cards isn’t just the cost increase in every day non-special items (about 49% higher than non-card stores), but the snooping they do on your shopping habits, which in turn “dumbs down” the choices to please the 20% of the customers they figure are making 80% of the purchases. Selling your information instead of food is also now part of the business. And in case you think you’ll just lie on the address and personal information, or borrow a friend's or the card of the person in line with you, some are going to finger scanning. With all the news about data being stolen recently (VA, AIG, Ohio University), you’d better know that a “privacy policy” is your own personal surrender flag.

So now I shop at Meijer’s or a neighborhood non-chain, neither of which use loyalty cards.

Loyalty cards

2584 Sadness mixed with joy and relief

My daughter called about 2 hours ago to tell me that her mother-in-law died early this morning. She had a rare form of dementia and had been in a nursing home for about 18 months. We last visited her in August, and although she was weak, she knew us and could carry on brief conversations. Each time they thought they were losing her, she would rally and return to the world of the living. She had physical problems too which the wonderful staff at the Lutheran Home (I've forgotten the name) controlled completely with proper diet and good nursing care--nothing extraordinary. My son-in-law had gone up Friday night, not because she was any worse, but just because he's such a super sweet guy who was helping out his parents. They were called after midnight because she was "in distress" so his father and brother were with her when she quietly slipped away. Her other three children are making arrangements to come home to Cleveland.

Yet, when a Christian dies, we are comforted by knowing there is more, much more. Mixed with relief because her illness is over, there will be sadness that now there is a hole in the family, among friends and in the church family. She directed a children's choir for many years at her Missouri Synod Lutheran church. She lost both her parents at a very young age, and I know a reunion will be on the agenda.

2583 The importance of a father

Ruth has a lovely message about the importance of fathers, and our heavenly Father. She lost her father at a very young age. She is the mother of several of the bloggers to whom I link. Check here, you will be blessed by her full message.

"The influence of a father cannot be over emphasized. Studies have shown that when a father is missing, absent from the home, there is a hole in the child, especially in a son, that cannot quite be filled

Fortunately, the Bible teaches there is a remedy. Many of the great leaders of past generations have filled this space, this hole left by an absent father with the Heavenly Father. The Psalmist David tells us even if my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will take me up. God is able to take all kinds of tragedy and bring about good when we commit our live to him."

2582 Episcopalian sound bites

About 1500 Episcopalians have been in Columbus this week, but you'd think there was only one, the gay Bishop Eugene Robinson. If I heard sound bites from him once, I'll bet I heard ten on our local radio and TV, admonishing others to believe the Bible, not about gender or marriage or judgement for sin, but about love and relationships. Most Anglicans (77 million worldwide) outside the U.S. take the Biblical view that homosexuality is an abomination, but he and a few hundred others have another agenda for their church. Did no one else but Robinson have anything to say?

Because ELCA (Lutheran synod to which I belong) cooperates with the Anglicans on things like disaster relief and social issues, a few years back it was proposed that Lutheran pastors be a part of the "historic episcopate" through the Episcopal hierarchy in order to be ordained. I've checked a few web sites to see if I could figure out where this stands today (it was a late 90s issue), but if there is anything more obfuscating than a federal government document, it is one done by the church where the elephant is just putting his trunk inside the door to see if he'll be invited to sit down.

2581 Environmental issues I believe in

Al Gore is just trying to rebuild his political base. The real action has to take place locally and by American business, not globally by government fiat. My goodness, in 2004 the airborne particulates in Beijing were more than 6 times as high as in New York City. And Ohio used to be under a glacier. So here's what I support, in no particular order:

1. Cleaner burning coal and safer mines.
2. Drilling for oil in Alaska, which is what Alaskans want.
3. Don't allow western and southern states to drain the Great Lakes so they can farm non-agricultural land.
4. Rebuild the barrier islands while restricting coast-line communities--even for the rich. Or the poor.
5. Don't allow mega-Casinos by Indians or Cajuns or Hispanics or the Mafia or people of any special interest in coastal-tourist areas. Work on developing "real" jobs that produce something.
6. Restore the fence rows in the Midwest so the birds can eat the bugs and less pesticide will be needed, plus it is just prettier and more colorful. Encourage living snow fences to protect soil from erosion in winter.
7. Get rid of welfare for farmers (price supports) which encourages mismanagement and misuse of the land and creates ever larger farms.
8. Strict enforcement of keeping out agricultural and waterway pests. (Actually we do a better job of restricting harmful bugs that hurt our economy than we do illegal people who do it by stealth.)
9. More solar power; forget wind turbines--looks ridiculous, kills birds and changes air currents which will have long term bad effects on agriculture.
10. More bicycle paths and set asides for parks. More sidewalks for walking. Discourage culs-de-sac to reduce congestion on feeder roads.
11. Give small, efficient cars a tax break instead of trucks, or eliminate it all together.
12. Reduce the government's dependence on oil by cutting gasoline taxes at the pump.
13. Have Hollywood's falling stars let squatters use their land for gardens for the poor.

I'm sure you have ideas from your industry.