Right As Usual

I wish I had had this information before my mother suffered the stroke that ended her life a week later.   http://www.stroke.org/site/DocServer/FAST_walletCard_2011.pdf?docID=8342   It's a link to a site with a pdf of a wallet-sized card reminder of the things to look for if you suspect a stroke.   In all fairness, Mom was also resistant to the idea of going to the ER.  She'd called her regular doctor, and he said he'd see her Tuesday in the office (this was Sunday).  She refused to go to the hospital, as her doctor was aware of the stroke, and wasn't concerned.   He should have been.  Before she could see him, on Monday, she had another stroke, this one more severe.   The argument I should have made was for Dad to realize that she wasn't competent to make the decision.  And, I should have called 911, and let the techs persuade her.   I will be carrying this card in my wallet from now on, and I urge anyone with a history of cardiovascular problems in their ...

Are you For - or Against Blacklists?   What do I mean?  How can anyone be FOR Blacklists?  Aren't they the McCarthyite (Spit!  Spit!  on his grave) tactic that all proper, good-hearted people are appalled by?  That NO person should EVER employ?  Or Support?   Well, not exactly.   In this article, Jeffrey Lord makes the case that The Tactic has returned - in fact, never left.   Warning - this is LONG (but surprisingly readable).  It may ruffle your feathers, and cause you to stutter, "but, but...".   Just approach it with an open mind.   Then, ask yourself, what if this tactic were employed against ME?  Or someone whom I support?   Would I still think it fair?

Are some people just destined to be poor?   I don't think so.  I think wealth has more to do with the actions of  individuals, than how "lucky" they are.   Dennis Prager agrees.  People who make less than $20,000 a year . . . told Kahneman and his colleagues that they spend more than a third of their time in passive leisure — watching television, for example. Those making more than $100,000 spent less than one-fifth of their time in this way — putting their legs up and relaxing. Rich people spent much more time commuting and engaging in activities that were required as opposed to optional. Hmmm.  Maybe there's a reason that network marketers are told "turn off the TV".

First, and most importantly, it's critical to be respectful of the family.  It has to be devastating to lose a loved one so young, no matter what the circumstances.  To have the shock of the death followed by criticism of that child seems especially cruel.   However, few violent deaths happen in a vacuum.  Mr. Martin's death is no exception.   Was the shooting a deliberate targeting of a Black youth?  At this point, that is unknown.  The initial reports of racial slurs being recorded seem to be in error - enhancements support the belief that the words used were "f---ing punk" - not nice, but not a racial comment.   Was he just walking home (well, not HOME, but to his father's girlfriend's house, where his father was at the time)? CORRECTION - his father and girlfriend were out.  When they returned, they thought Trayvon had gone out with the nephew of the girlfriend. At this point, his actions have been called into question.  He was NOT a model A-B student - he...

This week, I'm going to start a major re-organization project.  You may see some evidence of the process (if you see a Page Under Construction sign, take that as a temporary thing).  My goal is to group similar posts under a topic division - it may be links in a sidebar, it may be tabs on the heading bar - I'm not sure how it will turn out.   In the meantime, here's a cogent and insightful piece on Capital Punishment.  I think it refutes the idea that those who favor the Death Penalty for egregious crimes are knuckleheads - one of those arguments against continued imprisonment of murderers is that they so often visit their violent nature on the people around them - guards, prison staff, and even other prisoners.  Does being locked up for a crime mean that you have lost your right to life?

Probably more so, than any time in the last century.  We are awakening to the dangers of falling under the spell of a Liberal Philosophy, and thereby weakening our specific, Catholic  traditions.   Catholicism is NOT a liberal institution.  It is profoundly conservative, in the old-fashioned sense of "conserving" its message from Our Lord.  There is a reason that translators try, as far as possible, to adhere to the exact words of the original Bible - they try to conserve the meaning of the stories.  To that end, at times, the Biblical translations have to preserve old parables, then footnote the underlying meaning.  It's a delicate balance, and one that showed up recently with the revised mass liturgy.   That revision attempts to restore the spoken words to be the same as the original (for example, the prior words "and also with you" return to "and with your spirit" - an exact translation of "et cum spiritu tuo").   The new battle with the O...

I just found this article about marriage (it's from 2008, but still timely).  The information that caught my attention: In the six centuries up through Austen’s lifetime, Clark found, English women didn’t marry on average until age 24 to 26, with poor women often having to wait until their 30s to wed. And 10 to 20 percent never married. Judging from the high fertility of married couples, contraceptive practices appear to have been almost unknown in England in this time, but merely three or four percent of all births were illegitimate, demonstrating that rigid premarital self-discipline was the norm. OMG!  (I really should change that, as it's disrespectful to God.  Maybe Oh, My Zeus! would be better?) OMZ!!!! No!  Couples using abstinence to prevent children? I thought that simply wasn't possible!  That it was a physical and psychological impossibility for humans to abstain from sex for an extended length of time! Apparently, the levels of marriage in different areas of th...

He had said that "One of my predecessors, President Rutherford B. Hayes, reportedly said about the telephone: 'It's a great invention but who would ever want to use one?'" Obama said. "That's why he's not on Mt. Rushmore." "He's looking backwards, he's not looking forward. He's explaining why we can't do something instead of why we can do something," Obama said. "The point is there will always be cynics and naysayers." Citation:  Politico Obama was incorrect. According to the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center: Hayes was not only the first president to have a telephone in the White House, but he was also the first to use the typewriter, and he had Thomas Edison come to the White House to demonstrate the phonograph. Courtesy of The American Thinker.  

Of color/ethnic group?   Of religion?   Of background?   Of THOUGHT?   Thomas Sowell thinks that last may be the most lacking in academia and other Liberal bastions.   If you haven't read Dr. Sowell, you're missing a treat.  He's an economist, author, and commentator, who is also Black.  Unlike many economists, he can explain his field without either: Confusing me Boring me Causing me to say "Huh?

Well, it's certainly possible that the soldier-shooter in Afghanistan was named John B. Smith, or some other Caucasian-type variant.   But, I'm beginning to doubt it.  The continued refusal of the government to release his name makes me wonder...   Could any part of it be "Ali" "Abed" or "Mohammed"?   That is beginning to seem like a real possibility.