That’s the Lakeside greeting for the first meeting of the summer whether it is Memorial Day week-end or the first week of the season 4 weeks from now. I just heard it at the Coffee and Cream shop, and last night we had Marion and Jim over, so we heard it then, and when our neighbors Scott and Carol rolled in, we heard it. Margie from Delaware said it as did Jan from Virginia. Of course, those of us in Ohio had a very mild winter with little snow--although certainly more around Lakeside than Columbus since it gets the Lake affect snow.
I’ve had 2 wonderful morning walks along the Lakefront enjoying the iris, roses, poppies and the annuals that many people have already planted. I bought 2 flats of impatiens on Thursday which my husband planted yesterday. We are hoping we can keep them alive on a limited watering schedule until we’re able to be here on a daily basis at the end of June.
The Heritage Society is having its sale at South Auditorium, and many cottage owners have set up tables in front of their homes, too. One I stopped at this morning seemed to have all manner of furniture of various eras and designed painted in the same 4 colors--white, soft green, light yellow and cream, plus many attractive home décor items. Sort of “shabby chic” but not quite. So I asked the owner, who was putting them out. He said every thing had come from the dump or dumpster or put out for pick up. He repairs them, paints them and then has a sale. Not sure if the sale is for one of the local organizations, or his own purse. There was a lovely wicker 2 seater, with a slightly damage leg--better condition than ours--for $19, but I passed on that. The next one, if I replace this, will have to be sturdier. So often they come in sets, and we have 2 good chairs.
The deck has been scrubbed down, the porch roof swept, the grass mowed, the flowers planted, the weeds pulled, and the bushes were trimmed a week ago. Last October we planned to replace the toilet with a taller (old folks) more efficient model, but when it came up, a leak was found which damaged the floor, so that all had to be replaced, and then we decided to also raise the sink 3 inches to a more comfortable height, so the plumbing had to be extended. We also had the basement cleaned out and painted white. It looks very nice, but all this is to say that a cottage isn’t a boat with a hole in it where you throw money, but it sure is close!
Saturday, May 26, 2012
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Getting to know you, getting to know all about you . . .
“According to hagiography, Barack Obama was born to a hippy girl from an insignificant family and raised in poor circumstances, out of which he rose through brilliance. Yet his haughty demeanor, his stilted language when off the teleprompter, his cultural likes and dislikes, bespeak an upbringing in an environment at once so upscale and so leftist that it makes him almost a foreigner to ordinary Americans. No one raised in ordinary American circumstances, much less straitened ones, would cite with a straight face, as Obama did, the price of arugula at Whole Foods, the yuppie boutique, as an example of the cost of living. No one at home in American culture could refer to a U.S. Marine medical corpsman as a "corpse-man." Nor do ordinary folk talk about (or even understand) the need to "change the rules of power" in America. "Rules of power" belongs to the argot of doctrinaire nouveau socialists. How many American college kids would describe, as did Obama, his studying with Marxist professors as an attempt not to look like a "sell out"? No. Obama's official story is counterintuitive.
Consistent with the Barack Obama we know, however, are his real family, his real upbringing, and his real choices of profession and associates. His mother's parents, who raised him, seem to have been cogs in the U.S. government's well-heeled, well-connected machine for influencing the world, whether openly ("gray influence") or covertly ("black operations"). His mother spent her life and marriages, and birthed her children, working in that machine. For paradigms of young Barack's demeanor, proclivities, opinions, language, and attitudes one need look no further than the persons who ran the institutions that his mother and grandparents served—e.g., the Ford Foundation, the United States Information Agency, and the Central Intelligence Agency—as well as his chosen mentors and colleagues. It is here, with these people and institutions, that one should begin to unravel the unknowns surrounding him.”
“. . . In sum, though the only evidence available is circumstantial, Barack Obama, Jr.'s mother, father, stepfather, grandmother, and grandfather seem to have been well connected, body and soul, with the U.S. government's then extensive and well-financed trans-public-private influence operations.”
http://www.claremont.org/publications/crb/id.1852/article_detail.asp
Pow Wow Chow
“Elizabeth Warren was touting her claim of Cherokee heritage as early as 1984, according to a cookbook titled “Pow Wow Chow” edited by her cousin that includes Warren’s recipes for a savory crab omelet and spicy barbecued beans.
The cookbook, edited by Warren’s cousin Candy Rowsey, is a compilation of “special recipes passed down through the Five Tribes families,” according to the introduction in a copy obtained by the Herald.
Warren, who has been under fire for claiming Indian lineage despite a lack of documentation, is identified as “Elizabeth Warren, Cherokee” under each of five recipes she contributes in the cookbook, published in 1984 by the Five Civilized Tribes Museum located in Muskogee. Warren is not listed as an official member of the Cherokee tribe and she has been unable thus far to document her claim of any Native American heritage.”
Grandpa, tell me ‘bout the good old days
Grandpa, everything is changing fast
We call it progress
But I just don't know
And Grandpa, let's wander back into the past
And paint me the picture
Of long ago
The New Left of the 60s and 70s is the parent and grandparent of today's Occupiers making a mess in Chicago, Boston and New York. Instead of Vietnam, they are protesting NATO, or anything else that isn’t nailed down. What they have in common is the belief that evil is outside man, somewhere out there in society, and if they scream and yell and march enough, they might be able to come up with a plan. It seemed to work for Bill Ayers, who bombed some buildings in his youth as a member of the Weather Underground, and then after obtaining a cushy tenured position at the U. of Ill. helped groom a president.
Jay Carney has developed the Obama stutter
“Wendell Goler: The President has voiced support for the Occupy folks in the past, or at least their goals, did their actions in Chicago sour his support?
Jay Carney: Well I think you’re making broad comparisons between . . . uh . . . uh . . . different groups, what the President has said in the past is . . . uh . . . he has understood . . . uh . . . the frustrations Americans have about (pause) the (pause) failure in particular of Wall Street in some cases to . . . uh . . . uh, (pause) well obviously Wall Street’s role in the financial crisis that precipitated the worst recession since the Great Depression.”
Disco—it’s not just about Donna Summer
Wonder why race relations don't improve? While browsing a news story about Ohio State I found a piece of it: Faculty of Color Caucus of the Department of History; the Race, Ethnicity, and Nation Constellation of the Department of History; and DISCO, Diversity and Identity Studies Collective at OSU. Great for expanding opportunities for bureaucracies and listings on resumes, but do they benefit students or just expand grievances and victimhood? What can you do with a degree in victimology? Become a community organizer?
When job opportunities expand, neighborhoods are integrated, black and white children play together, the need for "leadership" drops as people do what comes naturally--friendships, collegiality, neighborliness--the definition needs to be expanded to keep the race baiters employed and receiving their block grants and research money.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
If both sides are reasonable. . .
The left and right can discuss political issues--when it's Glenn Beck and his guest Canadian Muslim Marxist Tarek Fatah ("The Jew is not my enemy" is the title of his latest book) tonight on GBTV. So why not friends, neighbors, fellow church members and families? I personally believe it’s because “liberals aren’t.” Views different than their own are threatening because they are rarely outside their bubble protected by the media. Beck, however, wants his listeners to hear more than one viewpoint even when he disagrees with it.
Tarek Fatah actually has respect for the rights and traditions of Western civilization. Born in Pakistan and a Canadian citizen, Fatah was very candid about the hatred many Muslims, including his own relatives, have for blacks and how they sat out the civil rights movement. He considers the Muslim Brotherhood fascists, racists, homophobes and haters of women. He also believes the Saudis are funding programs in many American liberal universities. He said Arabic for "my slave" is the same word for "black man." I know of no country that has espoused Marxism that has been tolerant of blacks, so I’m still puzzled that he claims Marxism as his political choice.
Arab Spring brings in Sharia Law
What a shocker. The Right was right again! The Arab Spring so touted by liberals, including the President and Pelosi, a year ago is turning out exactly the way the crazy conspiracy talkers said--imposition of Sharia Law. Liberals just don't learn.
" . .women’s rights activists are particularly worried that the well-organized Muslim Brotherhood will use its religious and charitable groups to encourage uneducated and poor women to vote for its candidate, Mohammed Morsi. Morsi opposes women being allowed to serve in the presidency. He has called for the implementation of Islamic law and, at campaign rallies, referred to Islam’s holy book, the Koran, as the constitution."
Snorkeling, surfing and Zumba?
Yes, that’s on the Judges’ agenda at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals judicial conference on the beautiful island of Maui, HI (tax payer funded). They have the tastes of the 1%. And probably the income. Schedule from The Kitchen Cabinet, a political site.
Saturday, August 11
1...2:00 p.m. – Conference Registration desk opens
Sunday, August 12
5:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. – Sport Fishing
12:00 p.m. – Golf Tournament
Monday, August 13
9:00 a.m. – Yoga
9:00 a.m. – Surfing Lessons
9:00 a.m. – Stand-up Paddle Board Lessons
12:00 p.m. – Welcome Luncheon & Book Review for Spouses & Guests
2:00 p.m. – Zumba
4:30 p.m. – Opening Program
6:00 p.m. – No-host Cocktail Reception
7:00 p.m. – Maui Dine Around
Tuesday, August 14
9:00 a.m. – Yoga
9:00 a.m. – Surfing Lessons
9:00 a.m. – Stand-up Paddle Board Lessons
1:00 p.m. – Tennis Tournament
2:00 p.m. – Floral Design Workshop (includes flowers & supplies)
7:00 p.m. – District Dinners
Wednesday, August 15
9:00 a.m. – Yoga
9:00 a.m. – Surfing Lessons
9:00 a.m. – Stand-up Paddle Board Lessons
9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. – Day Trip and Tour of Upcountry Maui
11:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. – Gemini Catamaran Snorkel Trip (includes gear & lunch)
2:45 p.m. – A special treat! Ice Cream Social
6:00 p.m. – The Aloha Experience
Thursday, August 16
9:00 a.m. – Yoga
9:00 a.m. – Stand-up Paddle Board Lessons
A few book suggestions for your conservative dad for Father’s Day
** means I checked it in the UAPL library and it has been ordered or purchased. In the past (aka Bush years) there was a very poor selection of conservative titles. This has changed.
On President Obama
The Amateur: Barack Obama in the White House by Edward Klein, Regnery Publishing, 2012. **
Blacklash: How Obama and the Left Are Driving Americans to the Government Plantation by Daneen Borelli, Threshold editions, 2012. **
Fast and Furious: Barack Obama's Bloodiest Scandal and the Shameless Cover-Up by Katie Pavlich, Regnery Publishing, 2012 **
Masters of Audacity and Deceit, by William E. Been, Tate Publishing, 2011.
Democracy Denied: How Obama is Ignoring You and Bypassing Congress to Radically Transform America - and How to Stop Him, by Phil Kerpen, BenBella Books, 2011.
We've Been Had: How Obama and the Radicals Conned Middle Class America, by James R. Keena, Twin Creek Books, 2010.
Breaking the System: The Obama Team’s Strategy for Changing America, by David Horowitz and Liz Blaine, David Horowitz Freedom Center, 2010.
The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War on America, by Pamela Geller with Robert Spencer, Threshold Editions, 2010. **
To Save America: Stopping Obama’s Secular-Socialist Machine, by Newt Gingrich and Joe DeSantis, Regnery Press, 2010, 2011 **
The Manchurian President: Barack Obama’s Ties to Communists, Socialists and Other Anti-American Extremists, by Aaron Klein with Brenda J. Elliott, WND Books, 2010. Rev. updated ed. pb **
Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Cronies, by Michelle Malkin, Regnery Press, first edition, 2009, 2010 reprint edition in paperback. **
The Audacity of Deceit: Barack Obama's War on American Values, by Brad O'Leary, WND Books, 2008.
The Case Against Barack Obama: The Unlikely Rise and Unexamined Agenda of the Media's Favorite Candidate, by David Freddoso, Regnery Publishing, 2008. **
On other issues
The Voting Wars: From Florida 2000 to the Next Election Meltdown, by Richard L. Hasen, Yale University Press, forthcoming: expected publication summer 2012 **
The New Leviathan: How the Left-Wing Money-Machine Shapes American Politics and Threatens America's Future, by David Horowitz and Jacob Laksin, Crown Forum, 2012. **
The Compromising of America: An American Tragedy, by Richard McKenzie Neal, AuthorHouse, 2011.
Resurgent: How Constitutional Conservatism Can Save America, by Ken Blackwell and Ken Klukowski, Threshold Editions, 2011.
The New Reagan Revolution: How Ronald Reagan's Principles Can Restore America's Greatness Today, by Michael Reagan with Jim Denney, Thomas Dunne Books, 2011. **
Death by Liberalism: The Fatal Outcome of Well-Meaning Liberal Policies, by J.R. Dunn, Harper, 2011.
Global Governance, Poverty and Inequality, by Rorden Wilkinson and Jennifer Clapp (editors), Routledge, 2010.
Dissed Trust: America's Crisis of Truth, Faith, and Freedom, by William DeMersseman, WestBow Press, 2010.
Wake Up, America! We're Headed in the Wrong Direction, by Suzanne Vergotte, iUniverse.com, 2010.
Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America, by Christopher C. Horner, Regnery Press, 2010.
The Blueprint: How the Democrats Won Colorado (and Why Republicans Everywhere Should Care), by Rob Witwer and Adam Schrager, Speaker's Corner, 2010.
Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How Barack Obama is Inviting the Next Attack, by Marc Thiessen, Regnery Press, 2010. **
Candidate Obama vs. Author Obama
In 2008, Candidate Barack Obama said some very different things than the autobiographical Barack Obama (listed as Kenyan born by his agent for 20 years) wrote in 1995, Dreams from my father. Some people caught on, like Michael Gledhill of NRO—but most people ignored the warnings. As we’ve discovered in these past 3+ years, he doesn’t tell the truth, lives in a fantasy world, and is a huge narcissist, even to the extent of inserting his name and alleged accomplishments into all the biographies of the presidents since Coolidge except Gerald Ford at the White House web site. Was he telling us his true feelings in his book, or on the campaign trail, or in the self-absorbed behavior of his presidency? I think the book was closer to his real feelings—he disliked the United States then, and hates us now.
Candidate Obama claims that “throughout my life, I have always taken my deep and abiding love for this country as a given.” He tells us his “heart swells with pride at the sight of our flag.”
In Dreams, his heart swells at many things but the sight of the flag certainly isn’t one of them. There he presents a warts-only history of the U.S., a story of evil and suffering. U.S. society is a “racial caste system” where “color and money” determine where you end up in life. He tells us of white children’s stoning black children, Jim Crow, and heatless Harlem housing projects. He describes “Japanese families interned behind barbed wire; young Russian Jews cutting patterns in Lower East Side sweatshops; dust-bowl farmers loading up their trucks with the remains of shattered lives.”
Obama says the Hawaiian islands, where he grew up, are beautiful, but quickly reminds us that behind the beauty lurks the “ugly conquest of the native Hawaiians . . . crippling disease brought by missionaries . . . the indenturing system that kept Japanese, Chinese, and Filipino immigrants stooped sunup to sunset in [the fields].”
Candidate Obama proudly tells audiences that his white grandparents were raised in the American heartland. But in Dreams he describes this heartland as the “landlocked center of the country, a place where decency and endurance and the pioneer spirit were joined at the hip with conformity and suspicion and the potential for unblinking cruelty.”
Candidate Obama fondly tells audiences that one of his earliest memories is of sitting on his grandfather’s shoulders proudly watching the Apollo astronauts return to Hawaii after their splashdown in the Pacific. But in Dreams, even this event is an occasion for outrage, as Obama asks: “How could America send men into space and still keep its black citizens in bondage?”
American affluence offends Obama. The vast upper-middle class lives in a land of isolation and sterility. As a teenager, he envies the white homes in the suburbs but senses that the big pretty houses contain “quiet depression” and “loneliness,” represented by “a mother sneaking a tumbler of gin in the afternoon.” American consumer culture is comforting but mentally and spiritually numbing, yielding a “long hibernation.”
Studying U.S. law at Harvard, Obama concludes it is mainly about “expediency or greed.” Working in a large modern corporation, he sees himself as a “spy behind enemy lines.” Even science and technology draw his disdain as he warns of “technology that spits out goods from its robot mouth.”
Finishing Dreams, I could not recall a single positive sentence about the United States or European society.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Why 43 Catholic institutions are suing the government
“Effectively, the mandate prohibits us from asking what we’ve asked for more than 200 years, “Are you hungry?” Now we also have to ask, “Are you Catholic?” To qualify for the exemption, and so to be permitted to follow their beliefs, Catholic institutions may have to stop providing educational opportunities to as many non-Catholics as they currently educate, stop serving as many non-Catholics in need as they currently serve, and stop employing some of the non-Catholic employees they currently employ. But this kind of withdrawal from the world violates our religious commitment to serve all in need without regard to religion.
The exemption also involves an invasive federal government inquiry into an organization’s religious beliefs and practices, conferring powers on government forbidden by the Constitution. Specifically, for an institution to know whether it meets the government’s definition, it must submit to a governmental investigation whereby federal employees determine the religion of those employed and served by the entity, whether their beliefs are the same as the institution, and whether the institution hires and serves “primarily” those of in agreement.”
Christians on the left
The Religious Left consists of three groups – the evangelical Left, the mainline Protestant Left, and the Roman Catholic Left. The Religious Left parallels the Political Left. Through their own organizations (all tax exempt) they advocate for “distributive justice,” not God’s justice. They receive money from the government and from their own denominations and members to achieve their goals—feeding the poor, training the unemployed, rehabbing houses, and offering a variety of shelters for the illegal, the battered woman—everyone but the unborn. The Good News of Jesus written in the Gospels and in the Epistles is a reflection of the values and ethics of the Old Testament, but leftist Christians have distorted the Biblical view of justice with the idea that government needs to redistribute goods and services through taxation to achieve justice. This can only be done through coercion and force, but for Christians it should be through charity and tithe. These Christians fail to see that they are enslaving people to the state, both the “donors” and the beneficiaries and muzzling their own pastors in the pulpit with “tax breaks.”
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Obama pandering to women
So college grads don’t have their dream job and are mooching off or having bills for tech toys and vacations paid for by mom and dad? Bigger government can give you "unemployment benefits," but not necessarily "employment benefits." They need to re-read the history of the Great Depression—how FDR extended it for a decade while convincing the voters more government was the answer.
Look, Obama chose this route when he went after healthcare in 2009, further shaking up the economy and pressing it down. If you're unemployed, or your kids are, think about who you're voting for in November.
This writer gets it right, but still is an Obama supporter. I don’t get it!
The women I know who are struggling in this economy couldn’t be further from the fictional character of Julia, presented in Mr. Obama’s Web ad, “The Life of Julia,” a silly and embarrassing caricature based on the assumption that women look to government at every meaningful phase of their lives for help.
My cousin in Louisiana started a small company with a little savings, renovating houses. A single mom, she saved enough to buy a home and provide child care for her son. When the economy went belly up, so did her company. She was forced to sell her home and move in with her parents. She has found another job, but doesn’t make enough to move out. Family, not government, has been everything to her at this time of crisis. She, and they, wouldn’t have it any other way.
Saturday, May 19, 2012
The Democrat who launched the War on Poverty
"The personal experiences that [Lyndon B.] Johnson and Robert Kennedy had with race in the sixties were completely different. Kennedy began visiting the ghettos early in his brother's presidency and continued to do so for the rest of his life, but Johnson had relatively little contact with blacks. His favorite story about his own experience with the horrors of segregation had to do with the time his servants, Helen and Gene Williams, transported his dog by car from Washington to Texas and were unable to stay in motels or eat in restaurants. He felt uneasy with civil-rights leaders to the left of Roy Wilkins, of the NAACP, and Whitney Young, of the Urban League- including Martin Luther King, Jr., whom Johnson considered to be vain, preachy, Communist-influenced, and, when King began to oppose the Vietnam War, a man who cared more about posturing than helping his own people. (Robert Kennedy didn't especially like King either.) Up close, Johnson had a hard time treating the many civil-rights landmarks of his administration with the dignity they deserved. He summoned Louis Martin, his closest black political adviser, to the White House for the announcement of the appointment of the first black Cabinet member by saying, "I was sitting in the toilet here and I got to thinking about you." Johnson never completely shed the racial language of his youth: he occasionally used the word "nigger" in private."
Atlantic, "The unfinished war," January 1989
Atlantic, "The unfinished war," January 1989
The life of Julia
I haven’t seen the campaign cartoon by the Obama camp called “The Life of Julia,” only reviews and parodies. Is it appearing on YouTube? I think it would be too long for TV attention. It’s about Obama sucking up to the women’s vote, although why women want to be portrayed as such helpless, hopeless victims in constant need of a man like Uncle Sam, I have no idea.
Breaking the spiral of silence
I would love to host a “Spiral of Silence” group, but when I go to the website, the first thing I see is not information, but BUY http://breakingthespiralofsilence.com/ Websites that sell rather than tell are a big gripe of mine.
Does my butt make these jeans look tight?
At Panera’s this morning there was a woman and a teen-age athlete (knew this from the school name and sport on his jacket) waiting for their take-out orders. An attractive blonde came in whose jeans were so tight, they could have been painted on her skin. How she got in and out of the car without bursting a seam, I don’t know. How she breathed. . . you get the idea. The waiting woman took a long, hard look at her back side, then looked away. The teen was trying to look any where butt there; I think he’d just signed a chastity pledge.
Friday, May 18, 2012
Who’s fault is it?
[snark] I know who ordered that pizza, who bought that bag of chips and forced open my mouth. Yes, someone in the 1% who needs to be taxed more so I'll eat more fruits and vegetables which I grew in my backyard.
Have you ever looked at photographs of the over 50 crowd in 1910 or 1950—before the days of fast food restaurants, or 32 oz. bottles of coke? Yup. They are fat. What’s different today is how heavy the young people are. For that I think we can give thanks to the women’s movement of the 1970s, and less time playing outdoors. Women in the 1970s didn’t really calculate how much of their income was being taxed at a confiscatory rate [tacked onto their husband’s rate], and they were tired after working and driving, so they began taking the kids out to eat. The restaurant industry and the processed food industry responded to the market, and so the next generation barely knew how to make a white sauce or hard cook an egg. That gave rise to cooking shows and gourmet clubs and more food advertising, which lent itself to more and more government regulation.
See how neatly this all fits together? Instead of blaming an industry or an agency, just eat less and move more.
Thursday, May 17, 2012
From the fabulous fifties
One of the most popular TV shows in the 1950s was Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, a handsome Catholic priest. I'm not sure how I knew about him because my parents didn't have a TV, but I knew. Everyone knew who he was. He was drawing 30,000,000 viewers a week when our population was only about 172 million and 42 million households had a TV.
The other day I heard a story about him. A man sat down next to him on a plane, and noticing his collar, began to unload on him all his gripes about the church. Just a bunch of hypocrites, liars, losers, pettiness, etc. So Bishop Sheen looked at him and said, "How much did you steal?" Turns out he was an usher at his church and had been dipping into the collection plate (which he confessed to Sheen probably in shock). By then I was in the garage and turned off the radio, but it was probably the end of the story. Might be why he was so popular--he really knew people.
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