Our son got tickets for the 2012 Memorial Tournament, May 31, in Dublin, Ohio, north and west of where we live. The weather was gorgeous, the greens fast, and the spot we chose to put our folding chairs was very close to the second hole right on the water, near a grove of trees for shade to flee to when we needed it, close to the restroom, and close to a food tent, was fabulous. We left after we saw Phil Mickelson play in a group with Rickie Fowler and Bubba Watson, a favorite of my guys, and were home by about 2:30. It was my first experience of any length with golf, other than walking through the living room saying, “Isn’t there anything interesting on TV?”
Friday, June 01, 2012
Thursday, May 31, 2012
"Shrewd as serpents and simple as doves"
Christians who take their faith seriously — unless called to a monastic lifestyle — are not supposed to withdraw from such a world, but to transform it; their influence, example, and prayers are intended to demonstrate God's love for the world — a love so great that He sent His only Son for its salvation (cf. Jn. 3:16). Fulfilling this mission, however, requires an awareness of the challenges we face — challenges which, while they can only be overcome through divine grace, require us for our part to be as "shrewd as serpents and simple as doves" (Mt. 10:16).
Fr. Joseph M. Esper, “Spiritual Dangers of the 21st century,” 2010, introduction
Contraception won’t end abortions—it encourages abortions
The following appeared at Renew America: http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/abbott/100325
Responding to a March 15 story on EmaxHealth.com titled "Free Contraception Can Cut Abortion Rate in Half," Brian Clowes, Ph.D., director of research for Human Life International, said in an e-mail (slightly edited):
- 'After 40 years of widespread contraceptive use in the United States, we should have learned that more and more contraception is not the answer to less abortion. This is because two things are imperfect: the contraceptive methods and the people themselves.
- 'According to the Guttmacher Institute, the research arm of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, there are more than two million contraceptive failures in the U.S. each year. Two-thirds of women seeking abortions were using contraception when they got pregnant.
- Contraceptive Technology, the 'Family Planner's Bible,' states that condoms, perhaps the worst offender, break, tear or slip off one time out of twelve, which means that the average condom user experiences eight failures every year.
'Contraception is obviously not the answer to ending abortion, as history has shown us. And it is certainly not the answer to ending sexually transmitted diseases. The only answer to ending these [evils] is living by nature's plan — abstinence before marriage and fidelity after. Those who sneer at this solution are both unscientific and tend to select the easier wrong over the harder right, claiming the former is 'impractical.' What is truly impractical is doing the same thing for decade after decade and expecting a different result.
- 'The Norwegian study purporting to show that women use the pill more when it is free flies in the face of human experience. In general, people tend to use and maintain products better if they have to invest in them. The Norwegian study must have missed one or more factors that impacted the behavior of these women.'
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Four more years, suggests WSJ
“The most significant policy change during President Obama's first term was his health-care "reform," the movement of 17% of our economy from the marketplace of ideas and physician-patient decision-making to control and management by the federal government. The Supreme Court is now considering whether ObamaCare is constitutional, and is expected to decide by the end of June.
ObamaCare is a huge governmental mandate, the impact of which we are just beginning to feel. If the Supreme Court upholds the law, full government control of health care will start next year, with the new ObamaCare taxes on investment income. The individual mandates and other rules and regulations will begin in 2014. If the court upholds ObamaCare and Mr. Obama is re-elected in November, the scope and size of our government's control over health care will increase dramatically.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304707604577425232476213016.html
What's it all about, Al "race hustler" Sharpton?
The Democrats came up with Jim Crow and the KKK, they undid all the Civil Rights laws passed by Republicans after the Civil War, then took credit for the Civil Rights laws of the 20th century. The Democrats are pushing abortions, 40% of which are for black babies. So just what is he saying about Republicans? Just who is wiping out whom? Who is the only president ever endorsed by Planned Parenthood which systematically kills minorities?
"It seems like [Republicans] act as though, some wiping out of people, some of the right-wing, is all right. It's not all right to do to any innocent people. If you had war and people that's one thing, but to wipe out innocent people just because of who they are like what was done in Hitler's Germany or what was done to Native Americans is not justifiable."
http://nation.foxnews.com/al-sharpton/2012/05/29/sharpton-compares-republicans-hitler
Eric Holder is possibly the worst Attorney General ever!
Eric Holder is correct when he says the right to vote is under attack. But he’s saying it to increase racial tensions, not to quash voting threats. Or he’s saying it fearful that blacks will be leaving the plantation as Obama continues to lead against their best interests on abortion, marriage and religious freedom.
When we Americans accept fraud, double and triple registrations, no ID, dead people voting, and voter intimidation by special interest groups and unions, they are in fact stealing our valid vote. Holder is trying to scare blacks that the old timey Democrat Jim Crow is back, but in fact, it is he who won't do anything about fraud. No one will dislodge the black vote from Obama. So why is he playing the race card? He may be the biggest racist in government.
http://www.chron.com/default/article/Tea-partiers-confer-in-Houston-to-fight-vote-fraud-3518567.php
Obama and the Polish death camps
To the prime minister of Poland: Sir, we have been dealing with "ignorance, lack of knowledge, bad intentions" since January 2009, also from our more experienced vice president, and we so sincerely apologize that our leader made such a horrible mistake in referring to Polish death camps. He wasn't around in 1939, and God knows no one taught him (or his speech writers) history. His parents and grandparents were socialists and statists as are his mentors and friends. Some children do grow up to live out their parents' expectations. http://catholicglasses.com/2012/05/30/obama-nazi-death-camp-gaffe-hurt-all-poles-prime-minister-said-yahoo-news/
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Most of us know Romney isn’t a Conservative, but Obama, doesn’t—he’s too far to the left
“RUSH: The Obama campaign intends to portray Romney as, quote, "the most conservative nominee Republicans have had going back to Goldwater." I hope they do. This is Romney's big problem. He's not conservative enough for many on the Republican side of the aisle. So if Obama tries to tag this guy as Goldwater or Reagan, bring it on, that would be the best possible endorsement Romney could get. People don't fear Barry Goldwater anymore. People are not afraid of Barry Goldwater. They fear Obama.”
No, they aren’t afraid of Barry Goldwater, but they are afraid of Barry Obama (his name before he ran for political office).
Support Governor Walker
Also, there was a segment of Glenn interviewing Ari Horowitz who has a new movie called U.N. me about the corruption and ineffectiveness of the United Nations, now 60 years old and still doing nothing except sopping up our money. The United Nations doesn't answer to anyone
Dana also interviewed Madeleine Mcauley, a 16 year old who is the newest face on the War against Women. She made a video and posted it on YouTube in support of traditional marriage. She didn't say anything hateful or mean, but she sure is getting the hate mail. Brave young woman. She says marriage is a covenant with God. She also points out the hypocrisy of the left.
John Fund of the Wall Street Journal (plugging his new book "Who's counting" due in August) and President and Founder of True the Vote, Catherine Engelbrecht, were also on the show. Catherine says, "If our elections are not fair, we are not free." So why are Democrats and leftists so against this organization? Thirty-two states now have True the Vote organizations. It's like exposing mold to sunshine. It was started by a few women in 2009 who decided to be observers at the polls, thinking it would be a one time thing, and were shocked by what they found. For instance, 1200 felons voted in Minnesota who shouldn't have. Al Franken won in a recount. Obamacare passed by one vote. Every vote counts--and unfortunately fraudulent and illegal votes count even more--they cancel out your legal vote. In Ohio, we have only two cases of voter fraud--2 counties that is where there are thousands more registered voters than people over 18 in those counties. Our President used to represent one of the most crooked organizations in the country--ACORN. He is the organizer in chief.
Nearly all of the concern over voter fraud [in 2008] has focused on one group, the Association Community Organizers for Reform Now (ACORN), which is under investigation or facing serious allegations of fraud in 13 states over how it has conducted voter-registration drives. ACORN insists, incredibly, that its voter-registration drives are nonpartisan activities. However, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has endorsed the group’s activities in the past and taught at their seminars. His campaign has paid them $800,000 for get-out-the-vote efforts, and ACORN’s political action committee has endorsed Obama. http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/225997/community-organizer-chief/mark-hemingway
Elevating Chris Hayes
Chris Hayes has a little watched program on MSNBC called Up with Chris Hayes. He’s come under fire (the only type he gets since he's never been in battle) for what he said about the meaning of the word "hero" in connection with Memorial Day. It was sort of his his Sandra Fluke moment. Now, the MSNBC political pundit has had to apologize. But was it an apology? He apologized for not living up to his own standards of rigor for political speech. Huh? Then the 300+ comments are people arguing over Limbaugh, Fox, who is Chris Hayes, MSNBC ratings, etc. Just read the apology. It wasn't.
http://upwithchrishayes.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/28/11924150-statement-from-chris-hayes#comments
I’ve never heard of him. Now he’s famous for saying something really dumb and hurting a lot of people. My uncle was killed in WWII in an exploding airplane due to the negligence of his commanding officer. Perhaps this is the type of war death that Hayes doesn’t want to call heroic. Has he ever looked at the accident statistics for WWII or Vietnam?
Adele—Make you feel my love
This young lady from Britain, Adele Adkins, now known by her first name, has had an amazing career in just a few short years. I think this one is lovely – nice to know beautiful love songs are still enjoyed. Many artists have covered this since 1997. She has won a Best Songwriter Award, but this one was written by Bob Dylan. She says criticism of her first album, 19, was that her songs weren’t as good as her voice. She took it to heart, and now with her album, 21, she’s won songwriting awards.
When the rain is blowing in your face,
and the whole world is on your case,
I could offer you a warm embrace
to make you feel my love.
When the evening shadows and the stars appear,
and there is no one there to dry your tears,
I could hold you for a million years
to make you feel my love.
I know you haven't made your mind up yet,
but I would never do you wrong.
I've known it from the moment that we met,
no doubt in my mind where you belong.
I'd go hungry; I'd go black and blue,
I'd go crawling down the avenue.
No, there's nothing that I wouldn't do
to make you feel my love.
The storms are raging on the rolling sea
and on the highway of regret.
Though winds of change are throwing wild and free,
you ain't seen nothing like me yet.
I could make you happy, make your dreams come true.
Nothing that I wouldn't do.
Go to the ends of the Earth for you,
to make you feel my love.
Monday, May 28, 2012
Gaydar is more accurate than you might think
From the press release about the Public Library of Science article, “The Roles of Featural and Configural Face Processing in Snap Judgments of Sexual Orientation.”
“After seeing faces for less than a blink of an eye, college students have accuracy greater than mere chance in judging others' sexual orientation. Their "gaydar" persisted even when they saw the photos upside-down, and gay versus straight judgments were more accurate for women's faces than for men's.
The findings, published May 16 in the open-access online journal PLoS ONE, suggest that we unconsciously make gay and straight distinctions.
"It may be similar to how we don't have to think about whether someone is a man or a woman or black or white," said lead author Joshua Tabak, a psychology graduate student at the University of Washington. "This information confronts us in everyday life."
Tabak says that our ability to spontaneously assess sexual orientation based on observation or instinct conflicts with the assertion that if people just kept their sexual orientation to themselves then no one else would know and discrimination wouldn't exist, an argument frequently used by opponents of anti-discrimination policies for lesbian, gay and bisexual people.” . . .
“It's unclear why some have better gaydar than others, since studies have only tested this aptitude in college students. Tabak speculates that "people from older generations or different cultures who may not have grown up knowing they were interacting with gay people" may be less accurate in making gay versus straight judgments. “
For this article.
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0036671
Why I stopped blogging about libraries
When I first started blogging about 9 years ago, I actually still wrote occasionally about libraries. I retired in 2000 and for awhile kept up with library news and information by participating in discussion groups. Five years out, and it was pretty much hopeless. Today I came across some “library humor” (funny to no one except librarians) called Award for the Worst Title Change of the Year, or something like that, except it seems to have self-destructed around 2005. So while back tracking I came across this paragraph, which reminded why I don’t write about libraries any more.
RDF and microdata both use the same fundamental triple data model. Please note that schema.org is just a specific set of vocabularies that can be used with HTML5 microdata, HTML5 microdata goes beyond this. schema.org is a pretty good microdata tutorial though, if you remember you don’t have to use it’s vocabularies. Here’s the actual microdata spec. Here’s a good microdata tutorial that pre-dates schema.org and is not schema.org-specific.
Abortion laws in DC need to be changed
In our nation's capital, abortion can be performed right up to the final day of gestation, and for any reason. Is it any wonder our country has sunk so low?
"The toughest part of a D&E abortion is extracting the baby’s head. The head of a baby that age is about the size of a large plum and is now free floating inside the uterine cavity. You can be pretty sure you have hold of it if the Sopher clamp is spread about as far as your fingers will allow. You know you have it right when you crush down on the clamp and see white gelatinous material coming through the cervix. That was the baby’s brains. You can then extract the skull pieces. Many times a little face may come out and stare back at you. Congratulations! You have just successfully performed a second-trimester Suction D&E abortion.”http://www.lifenews.com/2012/05/28/doctor-who-once-did-late-abortions-now-says-ban-them/
Did Romney and Bain Capital create jobs?
Many, many thousands at Staples, Sports Authority, Gartner Group, Steel Dynamics, and save others by creating turn arounds. Now let’s compare those tens of thousands of jobs created with how many Barack Obama’s administration has created by frivolously throwing tax dollars at campaign contributors and union buddies.
“There are two ways to look at job creation. The first is to look at jobs created and lost in Bain Capital’s companies at the time Romney left Bain Capital at the beginning of 1999. The second is to look at jobs created and lost in those same companies today. This gives Romney and Bain Capital credit for having invested in those companies when they were young. It is inappropriate to include companies that Bain Capital invested in after Romney left because he did not have any impact on those investments.” . . .
“Among Bain Capital’s investments under Romney, the large job creators are clearly Staples and Sports Authority. Both of these were small, young companies when Bain Capital invested in them. Bain invested in Staples when it had only one store, so there were likely fewer than 200 employees at the time. Bain appears to have invested in the Sports Authority when it had fewer than ten stores. Unfortunately, there are no public data to say how many people were employed at that time. At the end of 1998, Staples had more than 42,000 employees, Sports Authority had almost 14,000, Gartner Group had almost 3,000, and Steel Dynamics had over 500. So at the beginning of 1999, when Romney left Bain Capital, these four companies alone employed almost 60,000 total employees. While some of the job growth at Sports Authority came from acquisitions, there is no doubt that these four companies created tens of thousands of jobs over the period.
Fast forward to today. By the end of 2011, Staples had about 89,000 employees. Sports Authority is now a private company. The last time it reported employee numbers, in 2006, it had 14,300 employees. In addition, Gartner Group had over 4,400 and Steel Dynamics had over 6,000 employees. Using the most recently available data, these four companies alone employed almost 125,000 total employees.
Bain Capital also successfully turned around several existing businesses during Romney’s tenure. For example, Bain Capital bought Wesley Jessen Vision Care for $6 million in 1994. It had been a division of Schering Plough and was not profitable. Bain Capital and a new CEO turned it around and sold it to Ciba Geigy for over $300 million in 2001. When it was sold, it appears to have had 2,600 employees. Today, the company is part of Ciba Vision.
Overall, then, the companies Bain Capital funded under Romney have created tens of thousands of jobs using any measure.”
http://www.american.com/archive/2012/january/how-many-jobs-did-romney-create-at-bain
Sunday, May 27, 2012
It's about relgious freedom--The First Amendment!
You'll hear the current administration refer to "freedom of worship" rather than "freedom of religion." They are not the same--even the constitution of the USSR guaranteed "feedom of worship." Our Constitution guarantees us that the government will not interfer with religion--that is the "separation" we are to have, not the other way around. Our founders came from Europe where the King was often also the head of the church. It looks like that is happening again, with the President deciding what is worship and what is religion.
Saturday, May 26, 2012
How was your Winter?
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!
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.