Be pro-life

Be pro-life. A blessing by St. Francis of Assisi. "Blessed is the servant who loves his brother as much when he is sick and useless as when he is well and can be of service to him. And blessed is he who loves his brother as well when he is afar off as when he is by his side, and who would say nothing behind his back he might not, in love, say before his face." [A brother I am assuming in this context is a friar, but it works for us, too.]

Until I was looking for this quote, I didn't know Columbus, Ohio has a St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church. Looks like an architectural wonder and is located in Victorian Village. Could use a little help with some restoration. I think we'll have to go visit. It has a nice newsletter and a Facebook page.

 




Blessing the animals in October

The Grammys I didn't watch

No, I would never watch the Grammys, but I'm trying to watch the national news.  And even Fox has to show clips about every two minutes. I'm hitting the mute every chance I get. An industry that is built on merit, talent, fighting tooth and nail to win and entrepreneurial energy (from the eyebrow creator--like our niece Kimberly--to the theater designer to the pearls sewn on the designer dress to the lunch ladies) wants to destroy capitalism? 

The Gramophone was invented in 1877--and that's about how useful and up to date the Progressives are. Someone needs to read about the show trials in the USSR in the 1930s.

I hope everyone in northern California is safe--there is some news between the Grammy clips.  A dam is eroding. Huge hole that needs to be filled before people drown while trying to escape.  But it's more important to show a rap group insulting the president.

I'm biased and so are you, but Washington Post really is biased

Everyone has a bias--and more than one  I have them.  You have them.  But Washington Post has gone waaaay beyond bias to insane, hysterical hatred.  Since it was bought by Jeff Bezos (Amazon gay gazillionaire) it’s worth swearing off, but I do still look through the headlines to see if any of the 8-9 “news” or opinion stories in the digital version will be about anything other than Trump hatism. Nope. But one story on the 11th made me wonder if it is eating its own toxic entrails.  The “journalists” opined that perhaps all this rioting and activism about Trump’s election could possibly be good for the Democrat party--sort of like the Tea Party was good for Republicans.

1) The authors ignore that not only did President Obama’s policies, particularly the misnamed Affordable Care Act, lose the federal government for the Democrats, but he lost most state legislatures for them, too. He left the country leaderless abroad, although he personally enjoyed great popularity at home. There is no Donald J. Trump in a governor’s seat; there is no State Senator Trump in a state where Obama helped Democrats lose.  But 68% in flyover country are controlled by Republicans.

2)  And what Starbucks did the Tea Party burn down? When did the Tea Party mob bankers and businesses wearing black masks and screaming obscenities?  What March in Washington did the Tea Party ever threaten the police or leave enough trash to sink the climate change movement or dress like their own genitals? And did the entrenched Republicans in Congress ever listen to the Tea Party?

Looking back on Alan Bloom looking back

In Alan Bloom’s book, "The Closing of the American Mind” (1987)--a book that began as an essay and became a best seller--he discusses how the meaning and acts of sex and sexuality changed between the 50s and 60s and the 80s, and that the college students he knew saw a sexual arrangement as convenient, but not lasting or a commitment. “They are roommates with sex and utilities included in the rent.” (p. 106). 

With the looming strike of women (they are angry about the election of Trump and mad at the Electoral College) and the January 21 Women’s March in DC, I think he missed his mark in thinking the “rights” push was over.  It’s not over because it's never over for the Left which needs a victim, and over 50% of the population are women and 57% of the college graduates since the 90s are women.  For the Left  no matter what progress women, homosexuals or transsexuals make, there’s always a new victim to be found which can be folded into the original goal.  The push to normalize sex with children is the most recent one, as polygamy or polyandry will just be too boring and acceptable since sex with adults has lost all meaning. Relativism, Bloom said, makes students conformist and incurious. Their supposed open-mindedness closes their actual minds. And that continues as the students of the 80s are the parents and professors of today's college students.

Bloom writes about relationships in the mid-80s: “Men and women are now used to living in exactly the same way and studying exactly the same things and having exactly the same career expectations.  No man would think of ridiculing a female premed or prelaw student, or believe that these are fields not proper for women, or assert that a woman should put family before career.  The law schools and medical schools are full of women, and their numbers are beginning to approach their proportion in the general population.  . . The battle here has been won. . . They do not need the protection of NOW (p. 107)  And he goes on to note that not only do his students have nothing to learn about sex from their parents, but also believe they have nothing to learn from old literature or history  [and I would add the Bible, but he doesn’t] so when they have problems with relationships, they have nothing to go back to.

Although Bloom's book was a best seller, other academics became alarmed--he was called a racist, sexist, homophobe (although he was probably gay said a close friend after Bloom died), a Nazi--well, you know the routine.  He was practically Trump!  After 200 reviews of the book, the academics began having conferences about it!  Which makes me think, maybe I should put it back on the shelf and choose another title to withdraw.  Since I've blogged about this a year ago (at my book blog) I'm not making much progress reducing the crowded bookshelves.

Fake history as well as fake news

Shocking isn’t it how most of us were taught fake history, for me beginning in 5th grade in Forreston, Illinois?  There was no Dark Ages after Rome fell to the barbarians. In fact, those barbarians were Roman citizens enjoying a  fairly high level of culture and more likely assimilated Rome. There was no Enlightenment where suddenly the world of learning exploded.  There was no scientific revolution, only a group of secularists who denied the truths the church had taught all along. And what about that awful Spanish Inquisition? More people died from the death penalty in the first 70 years of the 20th century in the U.S. than in 350 years of the Inquisition.  To bring us up to today’s headlines, there is also no HIV Pandemic, just very risky behavior by a small segment of the population in multiple countries, mostly young, gay and bisexual males, which spreads disease and death around the world.

There were incredible advancements in technology, science, agriculture, literature and art all through the era I was taught to call “the Dark Ages.”  And without an era that had gone  “dark,” how could there be an era when the lights suddenly came on--the Enlightenment--a time when Europeans looked back and copied what the Greeks and Romans did.  How could scientists of the 18th century pat themselves on the back if they had to be standing on the shoulders of the giants of science of the middle ages? They needed the myth of a Scientific Revolution. There was slavery in ancient Rome, but it had virtually disappeared in Europe by the time of the so-called Enlightenment.  So where did it go?  Changes in technology, agriculture, war and economics made it useless.

But who can we blame for all this misinformation about darkness and slow progress? Why were we taught this? Christianity, of course, say the atheist academics, and specifically the Roman Catholic Church say the non-Catholic academics. The United States arose from the English Reformation view of world and European history, so that’s what we were taught; most of our colonies excluded Catholics owning land or building churches. That’s why the religious history books on my office shelves begin around 1517 for Lutherans and Reformed or 1600 for Baptists, or 1850 for Restorationists and 1900 for Pentecostals and Charismatics, and 10 years ago for the Rock City Church, the fastest growing Christian church in Columbus, Ohio.  That’s why we could watch five seasons of Downton Abbey without asking why aristocratic Anglicans in the 20th century were making their home in an abbey built by Catholic monks who lost their home, life’s work and probably their lives for Jesus in the 16th century.

The other day I looked through the introduction of a book of evangelical Christian literature, “Valiant for the truth,” by David Otis Fuller (c. 1961). Let me quote, “It has been said that after the close of the Apostolic Age theology fell over a cliff until restored by the great formulated creeds of the church. . . “ And that’s pretty much the mother’s milk we were all nourished with whether mother was a Lutheran, Calvinist, Mormon, Congregationalist, secularist or atheist.

Local channels promote fake news

Let your local news channels hear from you when they repeat the fake news script "Muslim ban" or "immigration ban." It's 7 countries out of 50 (and that number should raise some questions--most used to be Christian countries). It dates to 2015 when President Obama recognized the danger of trying to vet people from governments with terrorist ties (and he would have NEVER used the word Muslim). I've written to Channel 10, WBNS. They not only misuse this term, they misuse their audience with anti-administration stories.

The big boys that bring in super smart and well educated workers on legal visas are getting nervous. They must make us think the worst. Google. Amazon. AMA. Academe. They are bringing in foreign workers in every imaginable category--while American graduates struggle to pay off their college loans working as secretaries and copy editors. I'd be shocked if Google is bringing in any Somalis or Yemenis except to work in the kitchen to feed their millennial staffers organic, vegan salads. I think large universities like Ohio State would close tomorrow if their supply of foreign students all getting a full ride from their governments back home, would have their visas questioned.  This is BIG money.

http://fortune.com/2017/02/09/h1-b-silicon-valley-tech

These companies don't import steel or light bulbs or bicycles to compete with American factories, they import workers to compete with American workers. So what happens when a labor field is flooded? Wages stay flat--STEM workers' wages haven't progressed much since 2000, according to Fortune Magazine. But it probably looks pretty good to someone from India. So how is an American college grad to pay off that $30,000 debt if Silicon Valley is filled with workers from Asia and India here on H1-B visas? The college slots are also filled with foreign workers. I don't think these guys at Google and FB worry about Muslim terrorists, but they probably stay awake at night thinking about a level playing field for American IT workers. So let's call it an "immigration ban."

Comments on the "Muslim Ban" from Medpage

Don Lynch:  "I guess first I would like to say it is not a Muslim ban. If it was there are countries with a higher number of Muslims that would have been on the list. It was an attempt to get a better hold on people with ill intent for America. It has happened before. And I would be negligent if I didn't mention that The President of the United States may have better information on the currant security risk and where they are coming from then us mere mortals. ( And NO he wouldn't tell the people as it would just tip our hand on just how must information we have on the bad guys operation.) That being said, he also mentioned this was just for two months, any questionable entries would be handled on a case by case basis. Like someone coming here for emergency surgery. During this short two months he was hoping to have a handle on things after meeting with security around the globe, and his own cabinet. But that might be delayed while politics are delaying The Presidents Cabinet. This is all being done at the risk of Americans. He didn't want to act globally until he had the necessary information in hand. And now we have judges making up law the way they think it should be. So we'll all wait (with our pants down around our ankles leaning across the table) until we get in front of a judge that reacts to The Constitution of the United States, and not one that dispatches law the way he wants it to be."

I saw this response in a comment about 12 medical organizations at MedPage objecting to the travel restrictions from seven terrorist countries.  I do wonder why the U.S. is either 1) borrowing their doctors when they need them so much, or 2) training their doctors to be sent back into the meat grinder.  Of course, we can be pretty sure they won't go back.

Obama's plan to help poor children (there wasn't one)

“Among all children under 18 years in the U.S., 43 percent live in low-income families and 21 percent—approximately one in five—lives in a poor family." How did Obama let this happen? I thought everything was great! He said so! Our pension investments did fine most of his 8 years--and I know the wealthy did extremely well. How many articles did you see the last 8 years on a gap?  Do you suppose this could be why President Trump won and the rent-a-mobs now rage? And did you know that being raised in a married family reduced a child’s probability of living in poverty by about 82 percent? Nothing like a job to get Dad out of poverty. We have 123 income transfer programs to help the poor; it seems it does help--them stay poor.

Basic facts about low income children    Jiang, Y., Granja, M.R., & Koball, H. (2017). Basic Facts about Low-Income Children: Children under 3 Years, 2015. New York: National Center for Children in Poverty, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health

 
 Obama's economic, social and foreign policies not only lost the Democrats control of the federal government, but he pretty much destroyed their chances in the state governments--Republicans are now in control of a record 67 (68 percent) of the 98 partisan state legislative chambers in the nation, more than twice the number (31) in which Democrats have a majority, according to the bipartisan National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). Instead of doing some soul searching, kicking a few has-beens to the curb and reorganizing, Democrats continue to rage about Trump's tweets and hire rent a mobs, like trying to stop Betsy DeVos from visiting schools today.

Fair Trade Coffee

This morning I saw an ad for a coffee brand on TV that prominently promoted the "Fair Trade" label. That label now appears on a number of products from developing countries and originally was intended to get the little guy a better price for his labor. There's no evidence that has actually happened, but it has become a huge marketing campaign, and makes people (you and me and especially churches) feel better. It's a product produced in the poorest countries consumed by the richest countries--22% by the U.S. and 67% by EU. Because it's intended to help the small farmer, large corporate producers don't qualify for the label, even it they pay their farmers more, provide schools and hospitals for the community and use sustainable/organic agriculture. 

"Fair Trade USA is a nonprofit, but an unusually sustainable one. It gets most of its revenues from service fees from retailers. For every pound of Fair Trade coffee sold in the United States, retailers must pay 10 cents to Fair Trade USA. That 10 cents helps the organization promote its brand, which has led some in the coffee business to say that Fair Trade USA is primarily a marketing organization. In 2009, the nonprofit had a budget of $10 million, 70 percent of which was funded by fees. The remaining 30 percent came from philanthropic contributions, mostly from foundation grants and private donors.

People in the coffee industry find it hard to criticize FLO and Fair Trade USA, because of its mission “to empower family farmers and workers around the world, while enriching the lives of those struggling in poverty” and to create wider conditions for sustainable development, equity, and environmental responsibility.⁶ “I’m hook, line, and sinker for the Fair Trade mission,” says Shirin Moayyad, director of coffee purchasing for Peet’s Coffee & Tea Inc. “When I read [the statement], I thought, there’s nothing I disagree with here. Everything here I believe in.” Yet Moayyad has concerns about the effectiveness of the model, mostly because she does not see FLO making progress toward those goals." 

https://ssir.org/articles/entry/the_problem_with_fair_trade_coffee

 http://www.foodrepublic.com/2014/02/19/what-does-fair-trade-coffee-really-mean/

 https://www.organicconsumers.org/sites/default/files/What%20is%20Fair%20Trade%20Certification.pdf

 http://www.nature.org/greenliving/gogreen/everydayenvironmentalist/buy-sustainable-coffee.xml

Lincoln on slavery

In March 1860 Abraham Lincoln spoke at Yale on the campaign trail to the White House. Yale's student body was divided on the issue of slavery, an important plank in the Democrats' platform. "If Slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and Constitutions against it, are themselves wrong, and should be silenced, and swept away. If it is right, we cannot justly object to its nationality—its universality; if it is wrong they [the Democrats] cannot justly insist upon its extension—its enlargement."

That's how I feel about legal abortion, both the federal and state laws; if Roe v. Wade is ever overturned, the issue just goes back to the states where it is still immoral even if legal. If abortion is right, then all acts and laws are wrong and have no meaning. 

However, this statement by Lincoln was a paraphrase of a writer who influenced him and many abolitionists, Leonard Bacon, a Congregational preacher and writer who wrote it in 1846. The Congregationalists are now blended into United Church of Christ which has been supporting abortion since 1971. President Obama was a UCC member, but so was Harriet Beecher Stowe (Congregationalist).

Looking forward to the defunding of Planned Parenthood

When they get around to defunding Planned Parenthood you'll hear so many lies--all of course about poor women being denied "health care." You won't hear that it is awash in money. Planned Parenthood is in the abortion business--it doesn't provide pre-natal care, it doesn't see poor woman through their pregnancies (if she escapes plan A), it doesn't provide adoption assistance, no counseling or material aid for new mothers, it doesn't do mammograms--it just collects money from poor people, pro-abortion donors and we tax payers. There are 13,540 women's clinics receiving federal support who actually do provide health care; there are 665 Planned Parenthood abortion mills. Don't panic--you can still support abortion if that is your calling.

Shape up Self

We've never been able to figure it out, but for about 3 years we've been receiving "Self" and "Shape" magazines published for the under 25 body obsessed, narcissistic female. When my husband was still teaching an exercise class (all female) he would pull out the (impossible) routines and add a few moves. Women's magazines whether Godey's in the 19th c. or Prairie Farmer in the 20th, have always been dependent on advertising, not subscriptions, so how we fell into the demographic interested in make-up, exercise, dieting, and sweaty sex really baffles me. http://wwd.com/…/conde-nast-closes-self-magazine-10715645-…/ But the marketing didn't work, and it looks like the print editions will go belly up (but a toned belly).

Presidents defend their daughters

Harry Truman didn't tweet, but he certainly knew how to defend critics of his daughter. 

"I've just read your lousy review of Margaret's concert. I've come to the conclusion that you are an 'eight ulcer man on four ulcer pay.' It seems to me that you are a frustrated old man who wishes he could have been successful. When you write such poppy-cock as was in the back section of the paper you work for it shows conclusively that you're off the beam and at least four of your ulcers are at work. Some day I hope to meet you. When that happens you'll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter below! Pegler, a gutter snipe, is a gentleman alongside you. I hope you'll accept that statement as a worse insult than a reflection on your ancestry."

Ivanka Trump is obviously being blackballed. Not sure how this "justice" figures with Christians who don't want to participate in a gay wedding, except nothing on the left is logical, fair, or practical.

The power of fake news

This is the power of fake news. Democrats are more familiar with Steven Bannon than life long, powerful legislator, Chuck Schumer. Bannon was the editor of Breitbart, the on-line news source, flip side of Huffington Post. He was demonized by the left for NOT deleting the trolls and idiots who posted in comments. Now he's advising Trump and they are convinced he has more power than Schumer who's on TV beating a dead horse every day and whom they elected.

Washington Post 

 

There are 7,000 diseases on the rare disease list

 February 28 is Rare Disease day. Choose one of 7,000 and become informed or support the research. Last year the FDA allotted $23 million over 4 years, choosing 21 projects. As you can see, $23 million doesn't go far. We are supporting MPS III A (San Filippo Syndrome) because we know a sweet girl who has this. While the internet rages with politics and fake news, there are families quietly suffering and battling along. Let's help.

"The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today [Oct. 17, 2016] announced that it has awarded 21 new clinical trial research grants totaling more than $23 million over the next four years to boost the development of products for patients with rare diseases. These new grants were awarded to principal investigators from academia and industry with research spanning domestic and international clinical sites."

 https://rarediseases.info.nih.gov/diseases/browse-by-first-letter

Rare disease day in the U.S. is February 28, 2017.  http://rarediseaseday.us/

"Rare diseases are not so rare:  there are 7,000 rare diseases disorders that combined affect 30 million Americans–1 in 10 of us–and more than half are children.

People with rare diseases have tremendous unmet needs, including misdiagnosis, a long time to finally receive a correct diagnosis, and when they do, 95% have no treatment with ZERO CURES."