Just for laughs

The Book Den: Tech Support in the 15th Century links to a family-friendly comedy sketch, acted in Norwegian, with English and Danish subtitles.

No, really.

"Six Simple Strategies for Achieving Misery"

Sol Herzog offers succinct advice on how to produce misery in your life. If that's what you want, of course. ;)

For instance, did you know that "Too often people cheat themselves out of misery by maintaining perspective..."?

Heh.

Addressing supposed Republican rifts

At Backbone America » Introducing Jerome Noirot, a Fulbright scholar completing his political science doctorate on modern conservatism in the United States shares some of what he's found in his research. He also draws on voices from the past to explain some of the foundations of conservative thought.

hat tip for leading me to Backbone America via a mention of Backbone Radio: Hugh Hewitt

Don Ho has died

Hawaiian performer Don Ho has died of heart failure. He was 76. Sadly, some reports are omitting something very important in articles about him.

For instance, this article states:

Ho had suffered with heart problems for the past several years, and had a pacemaker installed last fall. In 2005, he underwent an experimental stem cell procedure on his ailing heart in Thailand.

But it never gets around to explaining that Don Ho emphatically had nothing to do with embryonic stem cell treatment, as I noted in December 2005 (Don Ho Recovering From Adult Stem Cell Procedure). From an article by Associated Press writer Jaymes Song (which was well-done as filed, but was stripped of its balance by most editors, as far as I could see), there was this:

The "VesCell" technology Ho underwent was developed by TheraVitae Co., which has offices in Thailand and laboratories in Israel, where Ho's stem cells were sent to be multiplied.

Dr. Robb MacLellan, associate professor of cardiology at UCLA, said a similar stem cell procedure has been used in Europe for a couple years and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved studies are currently being conducted.

"The difficulty with any new therapy, no matter how promising it looks in animal models and even in small controlled human studies, we're never really sure if it's really safe or effective until rigorous controlled studies are done," he said.

Dr. Ralph Shohet, a molecular cardiologist at the University of Hawaii medical school, said there's a lot of excitement in the medical community surrounding stem cell therapy but the risks are not yet known.

"It's entirely an experimental procedure at present," he said.

Brown noted that Ho was not participating in controversial procedures involving embryonic stem cells.

"Don did not take stem cells from a fetus. He doesn't believe in that," he said. "He took blood from his own body and re-injected that into his heart."

From today's article (first link above), there is this:

In the final years of his life, Ho's heart problems couldn't keep him away from the stage. He was back performing at the Waikiki Beachcomber Hotel on a limited schedule less than two months after his heart procedure in Thailand. His final performance was Thursday, Jung said.

Ho is survived by his wife, Haumea, and 10 children, including Hoku, who sometimes performed with her father.

Now, that's a trouper.

My condolences to his family and friends.

This, that, and the other thing

At The Paragraph Farmer: Unrecognized beauty and its implications, Patrick O'Hannigan takes on beauty, art, music, film, worldviews, novelist Terry Pratchett's Discworld, and more - and ties it all together wonderfully. (I really enjoy Mr. O'Hannigan's essays when he cuts loose like this. And he has quite a few links for further reading, too. :)

Daniel Henninger, writing at OpinionJournal, notes that more people seem to be latching onto the idea that a rebirth of civility would be a very good thing. (To which I say Hear! Hear!)

From Bertie Wooster to Don Imus by Gina Dalfonzo is related. I don't often see Bertie Wooster held up as a role model of sorts, but she has a point. Or two. The world would be nicer if more men refused to be ungallant, and objected when other men were. (Is ungallant a word? I'm not sure it is, but you know what I mean, I hope.)

A dip in the use of fraud and deceit to gin up support for federal legislation would also be nice. Matt Barber has some background on that. (I'm issuing a parental warning on this one.) Be sure and read the part that comes after "Now, here's where it gets hysterical..." (Ninth paragraph onward.) Admittedly, Mr. Barber isn't as civil as he might be (was a Michael Nifong jab really necessary, I ask you?), but under the circumstances I think he's showing admirable restraint, don't you?

While we're on the subject of despicable behavior, did you know that several popular teen sites have been targeted by people daring kids to make and post blasphemous videos on the Internet? And offering rewards for doing so? Catherine Claire has info on that, and on a response being mounted by some Christians.

Apparently it's Holocaust Remembrance Day. Growing up, I remember being led to think that the Holocaust was a fluke, something that happened because the Germans had something in their make-up and society that made them go bad now and then, or at least more susceptible than the rest of us to really bad, sweeping ideas imposed ruthlessly. Bookworm claims that idea is all wrong - that it's significant the Holocaust was spawned in Germany because, she says, at the time Germans had come to be considered the world's most civilized nation.

And, finally, some original content. This week, at the laundromat, I met an old man who had driven across the country to visit his son. The laundromat I frequent has recently had some sprucing up. The walls have been painted, broken equipment has been removed, a new wheeled cart has made an appearance to make it easier to move wet clothes from washer to dryer, reading material has appeared on a new table, potted plants have made an appearance - and a bit of humor and perspective have entered the picture, in the form of some old photographs of washerwomen dealing with tubs and washboards; some of the pictures have captions added, others just drive home the point that laundry used to be more of a chore than it generally is today.

The old man, not ancient by any means but definitely retirement age, walking with a limp, looked at one of the washerwomen pictures and laughed. 'Oh, I remember those days!' he said, and with a little encouragement from me he was off on tales of growing up in coal country, soot on everything, and wash days in those days. His job was to get the wood for the fires used to heat the water. 'I was pretty little for that job, but that's what I did' he said, trying not to look too pleased with himself for having pulled it off despite having been awfully young for such a responsibility.

He talked about how poor the people were around there, and about cracks in the floors and the walls of most of the houses; how you had to keep fires burning in the winter just to survive. But, he said, beaming, people had come a long way since then. I should just see the town now, nice houses all over the place. Sound houses. People had brought themselves up.

I stuck my oar in with one of my favorite what-I-learned-working-at-a-newspaper stories. Back before Owyhee Dam was built in southeast Oregon, the land around was semi-desert, not farmable. But people, upon hearing that a dam was going in, smelled opportunity down the road and converged on the area, many of them so poor they couldn't afford even a tar shack. So some of them built dugouts in the hills, and lived in those until they got work, perhaps helping to build the dam, or until the irrigation system was operational and they could farm the land they'd staked out.

I forget what the main assignment was, but during the course of researching the article I wound up talking to some folks who had lived in dugouts as kids, and then moved up to tar paper shacks, and now proudly showed me their brick houses in a nice part of town. 'Only two generations, and look!' they said.

What set me back on my heels was that these folks were so proud of their parents. You never saw such open, honest pride in your life. 'They didn't have anything, but they knew opportunity when they saw it. And they worked. Only two generations, and look at our family now!' These people beamed with love and appreciation; they had profound respect for their parents. After having spent part of their childhood living in a hole dug into a hillside, mind you.

Well, that makes sense to me now (having learned more about the relative importance of things), but it was a shocker then, I tell you.

So, I told the old man at the laundry about those people and he knew, really knew, what I was saying. We just looked each other in the eye and he had a look of understanding and joy on his face: hey, someone else who gets it, yay might serve as a translation.

But then he got a troubled look and told me that his son could never seem to understand about stuff like that. That he couldn't seem to get it through his head about people who had to struggle. That he looked down on them. 'We don't see eye to eye on that. No, sir. We don't see eye to eye on that. But...' the old man faltered, 'he's always had somebody looking out for him, you see?'

I didn't know what to say. I'm more or less in his son's generation and I know how perilously close I came to turning out like that myself.

We talked of other things. I told him of an older lady who grew up in the Midwest and talked about how they didn't have roads that were passable in the winter until they got RFD (rural free delivery mail service). He laughed, and said when they got RFD it didn't change the road situation any because their mail came on horseback. He shook his head, and marveled about the postman and his wife, who more or less dedicated their lives to getting the mail delivered. 'But of course we didn't have all those ads and other junk then, you know,' he added.

He talked about surviving the Depression, of the family killing a hog every year and canning sausages, and how good the sausages were, and how fantastic meals cooked in pork fat were. Of tossing every bit of unused flour back into the bin, which was all right except for the lumps that got into it that way. Of how it was much better to live in the country in the Depression, because then you could grow food. How hard it was on city folks.

When he ventured into stories about neighbors and relatives who made moonshine and I didn't cut him off I was treated to some wild tales. Family feuds. Gunfire in churches. I mean really wild tales, told with chuckles and tears in the eyes, probably the sort of tales he gets shushed at if he tries to tell them back home. At a guess. ;)

But a couple/three more times he came back to his son, and how he couldn't or wouldn't understand people who had less than he did. Each time the old man faltered. Each time he explained, 'But he's always had someone look out for him, you see.' The son never, in other words, had to really struggle himself. I don't think this man was trying to excuse his son. I think he was embarrassed. I think he was trying to understand him. And couldn't. Not on this one thing. It was unfathomable to him, I think, how a man could grow up in a family that had overcome steep odds, and end up looking down on people facing steep odds.

I never did figure out what to say in reply.

Addition: In case you were wondering, the Owyhee name (which shows up here and there in the Oregon-Idaho border region: a county, a river, towns...) sprung up in pioneer days in memory of some men native to Hawaii, and is pronounced like Hawaii without the 'h'.

I'm back, sort of...

Well, just my luck. I'm finally well enough to attempt a bit of blogging, and it's Friday the 13th. In my culture, a Friday falling on the 13th of the month is supposed to mean bad luck. In reality what it means is that you get conditioned to place inordinate weight on anything that goes wrong on a Friday the 13th, so that you can join in the fun of jumping up and down and saying see, see, see, it is bad luck after all. Besides, knocking wood (aka touching wood) several times a day is also fun, if you're doing it in the spirit of play and don't really take it seriously. If you do take Friday the 13th seriously, my condolences. There's nothing like being sure your day is going to be miserable to take the zest out of living.

Changing subjects, I'm feeling a bit like Rip Van Winkle here. Not only was I not well enough to work, but I wasn't up to following the news, either. And since I have more than a week's worth of work (real work -- the sort that either keeps the house livable or helps put food on the table) to catch up on, it might be a while before I'm up to speed around here. My thanks for your patience.

In the meantime, let's clear up some unfinished business. Laurie nominated me for a Thinking Blogger Award, which means I'm supposed to turn around and hand the award to five more blogs, the hosts of which are then supposed to hand out the award to five more blogs, etc., etc., etc. It's something of a glorified meme or linkfest, really, but since it concentrates on content and provides a wonderful excuse to plug some blogs that have made me reconsider what I thought I knew, I'm game. On the other hand, I tend to take these things too seriously, and being confined to five nominees made me feel rather like I was back in grade school and only allowed to invite a handful of kids to a birthday party (but Mom, that means I can't invite everyone I like, and the kids who don't get invited will be hurt and maybe they'll hate me...), so...

So, this list has been different every time I've tried drawing it up, but in its current state it features a good variety of blogs, each of which has introduced me to new ideas, information, and perspectives, and has persuaded me to change my mind about something. That, to me, makes it a reasonably good list, considering that it leaves off a dozen or so blogs I'd like to include.

So, if your blog is on this list, you are now the proud recipient of a Thinking Blogger Award. Rules and buttons here.

Brandywine Books
Cafe Hayek
Joust the Facts
Mere Comments
Neo-Neocon

Noted in passing

It snowed today. Of course it did. I listened to my impatience instead of my experience and just got rid of pretty much all the winterizing we still had around here.

That is, between naps I did that. I came down with a bug last week. That's on top of seasonal allergies. And since my old allergy medications were discontinued, I'm trying a new one... which...zzzz....has....zzzzz....some side effects, I'm finding. (She types as she tries to not nod off...)

I'm doing much better than a couple/three days ago, so with any luck I should be back to full blogging sometime this week.

How math is taught (more or less)

Via an email from Terri Leo here's a video on how math is being presented to many school students these days. You might be surprised at the contortions and extra steps kids are being asked to go through to multiply and divide. (When, of course, they aren't just told to go ahead and use a calculator...)

This is related to what is covered in this article from last December: Leo: Connected Math an Example of Why SBOE Needs More Authority (Lone Star Report, Texas Insider).

In today's email, Leo states:

Why do students learn Math more slowly in Texas today? Because the Texas Education Code (TEC) ties the hands of the State Board of Education (SBOE) from rejecting textbooks and math programs that use poor teaching methods. Poor teaching methods = slower learning. The legislature by law prohibits the SBOE from designating methodologies in Math instruction. It would be counter productive for the SBOE to try to accelerate learning in Math standards (TEKS) before the legislature removes this prohibition in the TEC. The faster you try to teach with poor teaching methods, the less students learn. Below is a link to a brief but superb video on K-12 math education that every parent and policy maker needs to see.

State Representative Bill Zedler's HB 3557 would fix this problem. Please thank Representative Zedler for carrying this bill in the House, and ask your own state representative to sign on to it as a co-author. I am still needing a Senate sponsor.

Nominated

Laurie's nominated me for a Thinking Blogger Award.

My thanks to Laurie for the honor. I don't feel like I've lived up to it lately, but I'll do my best not to embarrass her in future. How's that?

I'll be back with my nominees, today if I can swing it, but more likely next week sometime.

Favorite children’s picture books

In A Gracious Home » Favorite children’s picture books, Sallie lists some of the books that have been hits around her place.

“Little Emilio” in trouble in Texas

From an April 5, 2007, press release from The Alliance Defense Fund:

Federal judge refuses to grant temporary restraining order to save life of “Little Emilio” in Texas

Hospital plans to cease boy’s treatments on April 10; federal judge to take matter under advisement, state court judge to hear case Tuesday

AUSTIN, Texas — A federal judge decided Wednesday not to grant a temporary restraining order filed by an Alliance Defense Fund allied attorney which would have allowed a toddler to continue to receive medical treatment while his case moves forward in court. The judge did, however, say he will take the matter under advisement pending the outcome of the state court hearing set for Tuesday. In March, an “ethics” committee at the Children’s Hospital of Austin deemed the child’s life “futile” and voted to end his treatments. Without the treatments, the boy, named Emilio, will likely die in a matter of hours.

“The Children’s Hospital of Austin should do the right thing, and that is to make sure little Emilio gets the treatment he needs to live,” said Joshua Carden, the ADF-allied attorney working on the case, Gonzales v. Children’s Hospital of Austin, along with lead counsel Jerri Ward. “Instead, the hospital has betrayed this little boy by subjecting him to ‘death by vote.’ We are very disappointed that the court today refused to stop this insanity.”

Though doctors are not certain in their diagnosis, they believe Emilio has Leigh’s Disease, a condition that is treated primarily through vitamin therapy. But on March 12, a hospital ethics committee voted behind closed doors to end Emilio’s treatment, deeming his life “futile.”

Under Texas law, a hospital is required to wait only 10 days before discontinuing treatment, to allow for a transfer to another hospital willing to admit the patient. Due to litigation, the 10-day window in Emilio’s case was extended until April 10; however, because of hospital bureaucracy and extensive paperwork, a successful transfer to another hospital is unlikely to occur in time to save Emilio’s life. A state probate hearing on this case is scheduled to take place at the Travis County Courthouse on Tuesday--the same day the hospital plans to cease giving Emilio his treatments.

An outside nurse reviewing Emilio’s records noticed that the hospital had removed the boy’s vitamin treatments during the initial 10-day period, bringing up concerns among some that the hospital could be rushing to end the toddler’s life to avoid discovery of malpractice in the boy’s treatment.

“People who could profit from an innocent person’s death should not get to decide when it occurs. Whatever the hospital’s motives are for pushing to end Emilio’s treatment, a child’s life outweighs all other concerns--whether it’s to cut costs, or for convenience, or something else,” said Carden. “And furthermore, the twisted state law that allows hospitals to exterminate disabled children over their parents’ wishes needs to be changed.”

A story of two wolves

Received, unattributed, in an e-mail titled Cherokee Wisdom:

Two Wolves

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people.

He said, "My son, the battle is between two "wolves" inside us all.

One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.

The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather:"Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."

Families United for our Troops and their Mission seeks petition signatures

Gateway Pundit: Gold Star Families Launch Petition to Support Iraq Mission! has info on a drive to gather a million signatures in support of the troops. The sponsors would like to present the petition to Congress sometime around September 11.

Hot Wheels: History and memories

Ron Enderland was eight years old when Hot Wheels toy cars came out...

Author note: Jeanne Marie Laskas

The blogger at At A Hen's Pace recommends books by Jeanne Marie Laskas.

The Network of enlightened Women (aka NeW)

This is interesting, and encouraging. Conservative women on college campuses are organizing NeW Chapters, which sound much more civilized than NOW Chapters. Much. The movement (there are enough chapters already for me to feel justified in calling it a movement, albeit a small one yet), started as a book club at at the University of Virginia in 2004. Book discussions are still part of the program.

hat tip: Is Feminism Finished?, by Jennifer Roback Morse, Townhall.com, April 2, 2007 (via Lightweight Feminists Never More Apparent, by Julie Ponzi, No Left Turns, April 2, 2007).

Hostage drill prepares school for attacks (from rabid Christians)

I wonder who thought this was a brilliant idea?

In the March 23, 2007, David Levinsky article Hostage drill prepares school for crisis (phillyBurbs.com) Burlington County Times, we find that Burlington Township High School recently had a disaster drill in which a scenario of gunmen taking hostages was played out. OK, so in this day and age to have the cops come in for practice runs under controlled circumstances probably isn't such a bad idea. People without a properly-maintained inner compass will sometimes target schools, unfortunately.

What strikes me as odd, and not too bright, not to mention rather unhelpful, is that the fictional maniacs in this set-up were cast as:

...members of a right-wing fundamentalist group called the “New Crusaders” who don't believe in separation of church and state. The mock gunmen went to the school seeking justice because the daughter of one had been expelled for praying before class...

Words fail me. (But please keep reading, because I'm going to give it a shot anyway, at least from a tangent or two.)

It could be worse, I suppose. The school might have been one of those where history teachers have given up teaching about the Holocaust and/or where talking about Crusaders is, in effect, taboo. Not that Crusaders was used appropriately above, but at least it hasn't been erased from their vocabulary yet. Maybe kids at this school district will now be curious about what a Crusader is, and get their hands on non-PC sources, and not be too poisoned to give those non-PC sources a fair read? (Yes, I know, that's really, really stretching for a silver lining. But I'm a silver lining type of person. Live with it.)

I had a relative who, when I went to visit her, spent her days being afraid someone might use a garage door opener while she was around and thus expose her to what she thought would be unhealthy radio waves -- but who had a fridge crawling with mold, contaminating what she ate. What can I say? Some people are like that, ignoring real threats because they don't have time left over from worrying about stuff that's never likely to hurt them. But at least she doesn't work in law enforcement or school administration.

Now, I'm still holding out hope that I've totally misread what happened at Burlington Township High School. I come from a part of the world with a strange, lively, and imaginative sense of humor that often displays itself when people are talking about disasters (it's a variety of gallows humor, I expect). It's barely conceivable to me that they might have thought this was soooo outrageous that it was funny, providing a much-needed aspect of comic relief to an otherwise dreadful duty. (Face it, sometimes really, really outrageous things are funny, simply because they are so absurd.) If anyone finds any evidence for that sort of thing in this case, I'm all ears.

......

Oh, wait, a brilliant thought has struck me. Let's see if the district has anything to say that might clear this up (...pause while your hostess googles...). Ah, yes. Here's the district's statement in its entirety (no direct page link available):

STATEMENT REGARDING MARCH 22, 2007 EMERGENCY EXERCISE

Burlington Township, NJ - Concerns have been shared regarding the emergency management exercise conducted at Burlington Township High School on March 22, 2007, in conjunction with the Burlington Township Police and Fire departments. The main goal of the exercise was to practice our lockdown and evacuation procedures, and test our abilities to respond to an emergency situation.

Any perceived insensitivities to our religious community as a result of the emergency exercise are regrettable. It was certainly not the intent to portray any group in a negative manner. We cherish, respect, and celebrate the diversity of cultures and faith that exist within our community.

Our schools have respected and supported staff members’ and students’ right to pray. Students and staff have held morning prayer vigils. There are various prayer groups within the High School as well as an established Bible club.

Oh, good. They don't hate Christians after all, or consider them alien beings, or try to make them leave their faith at home. I feel better.

It was still a very odd choice of bad guys, though. Wasn't it? And straight out of a secular-leftist playbook of the most irrational sort, too.

Notice to my local school district: Let's not try this here, shall we? And (looking at another aspect of all this) really, it's OK by me if you portray groups that have declared war on humanity in a negative manner. Sanity trumps mindless suicidal niceness any day, in my book.

hat tip: for the Burlington County Times article, I started at the second-to-last link at Bookworm Room: The Islamist War on children continues, and kept following links back to the source.

"We are what we read..."

There's a discussion on "We are what we read more than we know" over at the Albert Mohler blog, starting with quotes from a 2003 David McCullough speech and building on them.

As if my to-read list isn't long enough, McCullough's mention of books read when he was younger has me reaching for the list to add a few.

Mohler suggests that parents of boys might want to take a look at what type of reading lit a fire under McCullough when he was young.

I think there is a lot to what both men say.

"Tradition" in Newspeak

The New York Times and Mark Mossa have different ideas about the proper use of the word tradition. I'm with Mark.

Another large tsunami

The Solomon Islands, near Australia, suffered an 8-magnitude undersea earthquake followed by a tsunami. Details are still confused and sketchy, but there's no question that huge waves hit some inhabited areas. BBC coverage here.

The USGS earthquake animation map shows that the area has been hit by many very large aftershocks. (This map is updated constantly, showing activity over the last seven days.)