Bookworm Room

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under Heaven — or so the Bible tells us.  In nature, the Mama bird has to push that baby bird out of the nest, so that it can function on its own.  Usually, though, once having done that, the Mama bird doesn’t send [...]

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Melissa Clouthier has a nice post about the tax freedom tea parties planned all over America for this coming Wednesday.  After addressing (and pretty much dismissing) some concern from those on the Right about the motivations behind the tea parties, she has this lovely paragraph about the worry from the Left: I’m smelling more than [...]

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Another week, another vote — and this time I’m very honored that my fellow Watcher’s bestowed the honor on me.  Be sure to visit the Watcher’s site and read the Watcher’s comments about the common threads running through some of the results. Council Submissions First place with 2 points! – Bookworm Room – Can it [...]

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Picture this:  You’re a believing Christian, and you work for a Christian charity that is under the patronage of your country’s major Christian organization.  One of your colleagues, in a private conversation, asks for yours views about your faith. You say that you’re opposed as a doctrinal matter, but that you don’t personally have a [...]

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Good news: An American ship captain was freed unharmed Sunday in a U.S. Navy operation that killed three of the four Somali pirates who had been holding him for days in a lifeboat off the coast of Africa, a senior U.S. intelligence official said. One of the pirates was wounded and in custody after a [...]

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From Britain’s Got Talent:

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Have a very Happy Easter!

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Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano: “I referred to “man-caused” disasters. That is perhaps only a nuance, but it demonstrates that we want to move away from the politics of fear toward a policy of being prepared for all risks that can occur.” The Pentagon:  “This administration prefers to avoid using the term ‘Long War’ or [...]

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The Way We Get By is a movie that is starting a limited (very limited) run in theaters now and will be on PBS (!) at the end of the year.  Even the two minute trailer is uplifting: Hat tip:  Don Surber

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I caught Taco on satellite radio, performing his own weird version of Irving Berlin’s Puttin’ on the Ritz.  I thought I’d do a little collection of videos showing that song playing out over the decades. Here’s Harry Richman, for whom Berlin wrote the song, performing it in 1930, in one of the earliest musical films.  [...]

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Already back in the 70s, when the “natural” movement began, my Mom was cautious.  As she liked to say, “hemlock is also a natural substance.”  Her point was that nature can be cruel, and that people who assumed that things untouched by human hands were automatically better were foolish and potentially dangerous.  The bee in [...]

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My son came home from public school the other day complaining that one of his teachers used a history lesson as an opportunity to launch into a short speech about how Obama was going to bring peace to the world.  (Which is true, if you accept that, as Charles Krauthammar points out, Obama is going [...]

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During this week, a holy one for both Christians and Jews, here’s a story to remind you about true faith, something that provide comfort and strength in the face of even the worst adversity.

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From Eric Hoffer’s The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (at pp. 36-37), written in 1950: The attitude of rising mass movements toward the family is of considerable interest.  Almost all of our contemporary movements showed in their early stages a hostile attitude toward the family, and did all they could to [...]

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Right now, I’m reading the following fascinating material, nominated over at the Watcher of Weasels: Council Submissions The Glittering Eye – Risking It Mere Rhetoric – New J-Street Poll Is Rigged In Particularly Stupid, Obnoxious Ways Bookworm Room – Can it happen here? The Colossus of Rhodey – Just … crazy Right Truth – This [...]

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My nephew is autistic.  While his body sometimes resists his efforts at control, he is blessed, not only with acute intelligence, but with the type of analytical insight that many adults never attain.  Every year, he puts in writing his thoughts about the meaning of Passover.  This year, he had this to say: “Moses couldn’t [...]

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Very long story short, we don’t celebrate Passover in my home.  So I forgot that tonight was the first night, until I was reminded by emails and blogs, both Christian and Jewish. To all my Jewish readers, a belated (since they’ve already signed off) Happy Passover!

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In the lead-up to the election, I wrote about Obama’s lies — these are lies that are exposed by hard contemporaneous evidence (videos, photos, documents), but that Obama boldly told anyway, bolstered both by his own narcissistic approach to truth (“the truth is what I say it is”) and by a media anxious to see [...]

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Daniel Hannan explains the problems with nationalized health care: (Sorry about all the videos today, but good stuff is coming through and I just want to make sure you have the option to view it all.)

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A moderate Muslim, a doctor living in America, is dedicating himself to rescuing Islam in America from the radicals — and in making us alive to the threat those radicals present. This is a powerful video. I urge you to watch it and to send it friends and family:

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Over at Small Dead Animals, you can take a quick, enjoyable poll on one of today’s news stories.

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Got two jokes out of a 1945 joke book.  This is the first: The teacher was classifying a new pupil.  “Who gave us this beautiful school?” she asked. “President Roosevelt,” he replied. “Who gave us our wonderful transcontinental railroads?” “President Roosevelt.” “Who makes the trees grow and the flowers blossom?” “God,” answered the pupil. At [...]

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Am I the only one to be a bit surprised by Tony Blair’s chutzpah?  He’s been Catholic for about a year, and he is already presuming to tell the Pope that the Church’s doctrine is wrong and should be changed. Perhaps, ex-PM Blair, you should have converted to a different faith.  After all, it’s not [...]

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Hat tip:  Danny Lemieux

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