Religious discrimination against the US military chapians

URGING CONGRESS TO DEFEND THE CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT OF MILITARY CHAPLAINS -- (House of Representatives - December 07, 2005)

We are disappointed and gravely concerned to learn that the Christian military chaplains are under direct attack and that their right to pray according to their faith is in jeopardy. As you may know, the Air Force leadership recently released proposed guidelines that will restrict how Air Force chaplains can pray, and if approved, those guidelines may well be implemented throughout the entire DoD. We believe that the Air Force's suppression of religious freedom is a pervasive problem throughout our nation's Armed Forces, and it has come to our attention that in all branches of the military it is becoming increasingly difficult for Christian chaplains to use the name of Jesus when praying. There are currently no laws or regulations that prohibit chaplains from praying according to their respective denominations or different faiths, and we are deeply concerned that chaplains are now being instructed on what to say when they pray.

Throughout our nation's history, chaplains not only have remained an integral part of our military, but they also have always prayed according to their faith tradition; and Christian chaplains have always been able to pray using the name of Jesus . We believe that if Christian chaplains are chosen to pray before a professional setting, then they--as with the chaplain of any other faith--have a constitutional right to adhere to the religious expressions of their faith. Praying in the name of Jesus is a fundamental part of Christian belief and to suppress this form of expression would be a violation of religious freedom.

The current demand in the guidelines for so-called "no-sectarian'' prayers is merely a euphemism declaring that prayers will be acceptable only so long as they censor Christian beliefs. Current surveys in the military indicate that upwards of 80 percent of soldiers identify themselves as Christians, and such censorship of Christian beliefs is a disservice not only to Christian chaplains, but also to the hundreds of thousands of Christian soldiers in the military who look to their chaplains for comfort, inspiration, and support, just as our military soldiers of other faiths look to the chaplains of their faith.

While some military members may find certain prayers to be offensive and wrongly claim that they are not non-pluralistic, we believe these restrictions raise constitutional issues involving the Establishment. Free Exercise and Free Speech Clauses of the First Amendment (There are numerous other offensive provisions throughout the proposed guidelines. including the onerous provision that chaplains can only speak of their faith with officers--the "peer to peer'' provision). Officially inhibiting or defining what chaplains can and cannot say in effect establishes an official religion and burdens our military's chaplains' right of free speech.

For 4 years I have heard from chaplains around this Nation in letter, meeting with them in person, by telephone, and they have told me just how concerned and disappointed they are that they do not have the freedom. Let me at this time read a letter from a marine major written to me in May of this year, getting ready to go to Iraq. He is in Iraq tonight, and I hope and pray that all of our men and women in uniform are safe. He said:

"Dear Congressman Jones, I am a member of the military, and there is something that I think you should know. Before my last change of command, my chaplain came to me and asked if I minded if he mentioned Jesus in his prayer given at the start of the ceremony. I was surprised by the question since the prayer was for me and my family and we are Christian and we specifically desired he do so. He alluded to the fact that he and other chaplains have been asked not to mention Jesus Christ. This startles and frightens me that one's faith is being infringed upon even within our own military. I strongly believe in religious freedom, and I hope you understand my grave concerns about forces that would try to limit it. I hope you can find support to stop this intolerance that is creeping into all walks of life. Sincerely.''

This is a marine major who is in Iraq fighting for freedom for the Iraqis and for those in Afghanistan. The last letter I want to make reference to is from a chaplain in the United States Army, and he wrote:

"Thank you for your interest in ending the religious persecution that exists in our military today. I am a chaplain in the United States Army, and I can tell you in all honesty that religious persecution is taking place in the Army on a daily basis. The persecution centers on Christian chaplains praying in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Additionally, I have personally been subject to heavy-handed intimidation by a senior chaplain.''

Invoking the name of Jesus doesn't violate the so-called separation of church and state. Congress has been starting it's day with prayer since before the 1st amendment was written. Here is a prayer I picked at random:
PRAYER -- (House of Representatives - June 15, 2005)

Dr. Edward D. Johnson, Senior Pastor, First Baptist Church of Ocala, Ocala, FL, offered the following prayer :
Dear Father, I thank You for each Member of the House of Representatives. I thank You for the sacrifice they give in order to represent our communities; time spent away from their families, time spent here in Washington and time spent in serving others. I am aware of the enormity of their responsibility in making decisions about issues that not only affect our incomes, but also affect our national security, our moral well-being and our precious freedoms as a nation.

I pray that You would bless these men and women with physical health, mental acuity, moral toughness and spiritual peace. You have established us as a "nation under God.'' You have reminded us that in Your Word, "Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.'' Heavenly Father, we ask for Your continued blessing on our Nation and for peace and prosperity to abound through our land.

As a Christian, while I make this prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, I know that many others approach prayer in a different manner. We all ask for Your blessings and for Your grace for our lives. Amen.

If Congress can invoke the name of Jesus, why can't our military chapians invoke the name of Jesus?

Note: Here is a good place to read the daily prayers said on the floor of the House and Senate. It is also a good place to check for what Congress did that day.

Bush Was Right to Reject Kyoto 'Fiasco'

"After many years of European chatter about the monstrous evil perpetrated by George W. Bush in rejecting Kyoto,” Forbes magazine concludes, "it is of possible interest that the increase in carbon emissions in the U.S. during those years was slightly lower (4.7 percent).”

Ironically, even western Europe is not reducing emissions. According to the protocol, western European nations must reduce their emissions to levels 8 percent lower than those of 1990. But in the years since the treaty was negotiated, carbon dioxide levels increased by 7 percent in France, 11 percent in Italy and 29 percent in Spain. Overall, the increase for western Europe was 5.4 percent.

From the New York Times:

Why should India and China make major sacrifices while the United States, in effect, gets a free ride? The battle against global warming will never be won unless America joins it, urgently and enthusiastically. Our grandchildren will look back with anger and astonishment if we fail to do so.

It doesn’t look like Europe is following the Kyoto protocol either.



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Was deadly force necessary?

From USAToday:

On the day after Christmas, at least a dozen officers surrounded a 38-year-old man. As a civilian videotaped the scene from a window above the avenue, the man walked about slowly, waving both hands at his sides. In one hand, he held a 6-inch "Army-type" knife with a 3-inch blade, Adams said. "They ordered him to drop the knife, and he just kept backpedaling," Adams said. "Then he lunged at an officer, who had to step back to avoid being stabbed in the chest." That's when police fired. The man suffered multiple wounds, and 10 shell casings were recovered at the scene, Adams said. Adams said police tried to subdue the man with pepper spray, but it had no effect. A watchdog group questioned the officers could have avoided the shooting. "A lot of police departments use non-lethal Taser guns or bean-bag guns," Goyeneche said. "And this city's SWAT team has bean-bag guns. Could they have secured the perimeter and called in the SWAT team?" The incident "happened too quick" to call in the SWAT team, Adams said. "In a matter of minutes, it was over."

While I was still working in downtown Chicago, two young black men tried to sneak in the back door of a bus. The bus driver saw them and ordered them off. One left. One refused to get off so the bus driver called the police. When a police officer arrived, he and the young man went back and forth between the back and front doors of the bus. When a couple more police arrived, the young man burst out of the back door and tried to escape. He was swarmed by 6 to 8 police officers and after 5 minutes struggling, the man was handcuffed and led off. Was it excess force for someone who was just trying to “steal” a 90-cent bus ride?

While it might have been okay to let a man go free for trying to steal a bus ride but do you let a knife wielding man go free? Unfortunately when you don’t obey police orders, you may end up dead.



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Santa says Bah Humbug to global warming

REINDEER-drawn sleds have been slammed as environmentally unfriendly, because the carrot-munching animals produce the greenhouse gas methane in their wind. Now Santa has been urged to ditch his sleigh team and start travelling on public transport to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions.

It has been calculated that Santa's team of nine reindeer would emit methane with a global warming impact equivalent to more than 40,600 tonnes of greenhouse gases on the 122 million mile Christmas Eve dash to deliver presents around the world. That would make his marathon sleigh ride almost as environmentally damaging as an aircraft, which would produce approximately 41,500 tonnes of on the Christmas Eve trip. But Santa, making a personal appearance at the Glasgow branch of John Lewis, in the Buchanan Galleries, hit back at the untimely attack on his traditional Christmas means of transport. He said: "I am very conscious about the environment and conserve energy wherever possible. "However, it would be very difficult for me to get round all the children in the world on Christmas Eve on a bus due to the fact that, as far as I am aware, there isn't a route that goes past every house in the world." The methane calculations were made by Liberal Democrat transport spokesman Tom Brake. He said the best Christmas present for the environment would be if Santa took the bus, which would keep his total emissions output down to just 10,980 tonnes of - although he admitted the annual trip might take a bit longer than usual. Mr Brake said: "Boys and girls up and down the country will be eagerly waiting for Father Christmas to arrive with their presents on Christmas morning. What they may not realise however is that Santa would be better off taking public transport." But he conceded: "At least he isn't taking the plane, which would be worse than the reindeer." He added: "We realise that it might be a bit late to change things for this year, but hope that Santa will take this research into account when he plans next year's trip."

Scientists warned earlier this year that the wind of large mammals like cows and reindeer was a major contributor to global warming. is by far the biggest contributor to climate change, but methane has 23 times its warming potential, so reducing methane emissions is also considered important by environmentalists. There are 1.4 billion cows worldwide, each producing 500 litres of methane a day and accounting for 14 per cent of all emissions of the gas.

Source: London Times and the Scotsman

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UK Gun Control Failures: week of Dec 19-24, 2005

While England has some of the strictest national gun control laws, here is this week's list of UK violence that the laws didn't stop:

From the Home Office:

Gun-related crime kills, maims and intimidates, and is frequently linked to gang activity and the illegal drugs trade in the UK. We are committed to tackling gun crime to ensure the safety and security of all British citizens. .......The number of overall offences involving firearms has been increasing each year since 1997/98. And crime involving imitation weapons was up 55% in 2004-05 compared to the previous year. (Source: Crime in England and Wales 2004/2005) Also of concern is a rise in the number of young people carrying real or imitation firearms in an attempt to boost their image or from a mistaken idea about self-protection.

A turkey farmer has been questioned by police after he fired a shotgun at burglars as they tried to run him down.

A PLUMBER appeared at the Old Bailey today charged with terrorism and firearms offences. Rahman was charged with having entered into or become concerned in an arrangement to make weapons available for terrorist purposes, and with having an Uzi sub-machine gun for terrorism.

POLICE are today questioning a 28-year-old east London man suspected of buying weapons for international terrorism.

A MAN was shot dead in Meir, Stoke-on-Trent, early today after apparently brandishing a gun at armed police. "I'm told they challenged him on the stairs. He had every opportunity to put the gun down, but in the end they had no alternative but to shoot him dead." The man also was apparently seen by a neighbour wielding a sword.

HUNDREDS of pupils were locked in their classrooms yesterday after a man with a gun threatened to commit suicide in a house opposite their school in South Queensferry, near Edinburgh.

A MAN who beat a grandmother to death over an unpaid garage bill was found guilty of murder yesterday.

ARMED robbers made off with a five-figure sum yesterday after raiding a branch of Boots in the west end of Glasgow.

A SCHIZOPHRENIC sneaked up behind a pensioner like a "pantomime villain" in broad daylight, before calmly raising an axe to the man's head and hacking him to death, a court heard yesterday.

Five members of a "family from hell" are facing life in prison for murdering a mother-of-two who had married into the family.

Two drug addicts who killed an elderly disabled man and set his body alight were jailed for life yesterday.

As bemused residents were allowed back into their homes yesterday, detectives continued to question Joe Buckley, 17, an “A-star student”, to discover just how far his fascination for explosives had led him towards making his own home-made bomb.

A TEENAGE gang member who stabbed a rival to death on the day he was given automatic early release from a sentence for possessing a knife was ordered yesterday to serve a minimum of 15 years in jail.

A 40-YEAR-old woman was arrested yesterday in connection with the shooting death of a man and the wounding of his brother in a Greenock street.

THE colourful, gay lifestyle of the great-grandson of Alfred, Lord Tennyson was being investigated by police last night, after he was found stabbed to death in his bed.

Phillip Wooton, 18, from Fatfield, Washington, who admitted setting fire to an 82-year-old woman’s hair on a train, has been sentenced to two years’ detention.

A supermarket worker who has a “morbid fascination with fire” was jailed for life after killing a woman by setting a house ablaze

UK gun control laws made for a nice peaceful week before Christmas

Source: London Times and the Scotsman

If the reason for gun control laws is to reduce violence and crime, the laws don't work. How about treating the problems and not the symptom (guns)?



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What are liberals trying to hide??

Tony Snow (TownHall.com)

"No wonder they call us the Stupid Party," said a disgusted Republican operative in Washington. "You've got to wonder what these guys were thinking." At issue was the publication of a report by David Barrett, an independent counsel who has spent the better part of a decade looking into some of the most hair-raising allegations of presidential malfeasance in American history. Like most independent counsels, Barrett didn't set out on such a mission. He was assigned the duty of looking into whether former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros committed tax fraud in trying to cover up payments to a former mistress. Yet, as published reports have indicated, he soon discovered that he was onto something much bigger. He found unsettling evidence that Justice Department officials were actively interfering with the probe and even conducting surveillance of Barrett and his office. Worse, there were indications that Team Clinton was using key players at the IRS and Justice to harass, frighten and threaten people who somehow got in the former president's way.

By all accounts, the 400-page Barrett report is a bombshell, capable possibly of wiping out Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential prospects. At the very least, it would bring to public attention a scandal that would make the Valerie Plame affair vanish into comical insignificance. Democrats know this. Using provisions in the independent-counsel statute that permit people named in a report to review the allegations against them and file rebuttals, attorneys close to the Clintons have spent the better part of five years reviewing every jot and title of the charges arrayed against their clients and friends. This careful and continuous monitoring of the report explains why Sens. Byron Dorgan, Dick Durbin and John Kerry took the highly unusual step earlier this year of trying to slip into an Iraq-war spending bill an amendment to suppress every word of the Barrett report. (Every other independent counsel finding has been printed in its entirety, with the exception of small sections containing classified material.)

If you want President Bush investigated for allowing both sides of terrorist phone calls to be monitored, you should want to know what is in the Barrett Report. Contact your senators and demand the Barrett report be made public!!

PETA kills animals

I watched a news story about PETA. A vet at animal control center showed a picture of a stray mother and three kittens. One kitten was adopted into a loving family. A couple of PETA volunteers took the mother and other two kittens and said homes would be found for them. They were later caught dumping animal bodies in a dumpster. The stray mother and two kittens were among them.

Fron PETA.org:
PETA seeks to solve the animal overpopulation problem in North Carolina by subsidizing spay/neuter services, but we do not and will not hesitate to roll up our sleeves and do the dirty work at our own expense. They execute them and throw them in a dumpster.

From PETAKids.org:
Always look out for our animal friends, and never turn your back on lost, stray, or injured animals! If you find an animal, quickly ask Mom and Dad for help, and call your local animal control office right away so that they can come and get the animal off the street. So our volunteers can grab them and euthanize them and throw away as so much garbage.

Read my post on PETP – People for the Ethical Treatment of Plants

RFK Jr: Fight Global Warming but not in my back yard

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (New York Times op-ed)

AS an environmentalist, I support wind power, including wind power on the high seas....... Many environmental groups support the Cape Wind project, and that's unfortunate because making enemies of fishermen and marina owners is bad environmental strategy in the long run. Cape Cod's traditional-gear commercial fishing families and its recreational anglers and marina owners have all been important allies for environmentalists in our battles for clean water.......There are those who argue that unlike our great Western national parks, Cape Cod is far from pristine, and that Cape Wind's turbines won't be a significant blot.There are many alternatives that would achieve the same benefits as Cape Wind without destroying this national treasure. Deep water technology is rapidly evolving, promising huge bounties of wind energy with fewer environmental and economic consequences. Scotland is preparing to build wind turbines in the Moray Firth more than 12 miles offshore. Germany is considering placing turbines as far as 27 miles off its northern shores. If Cape Wind were to place its project further offshore, it could build not just 130, but thousands of windmills - where they can make a real difference in the battle against global warming without endangering the birds or impoverishing the experience of millions of tourists and residents and fishing families who rely on the sound's unspoiled bounties.

The environmental lawyer and professor at Pace University Law School complains that the turbines will pollute the views from places like "Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket" - some of the Kennedy family's favorite haunts. And that's not all. Kennedy gripes that if the wind farm plan goes through, "hundreds of flashing lights to warn airplanes away from the turbines will steal the stars and nighttime views." And if that weren't bad enough, "the noise of the turbines will be audible onshore," he warns.

Do “solutions” to global warming cause worse problems?



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Aliraqi forum shows Iraqis giving the finger to the terrorists

Iraqi soldiers celebrating voting in their national election.

Here are more pictures where the Iraqi people are showing the purple finger of freedom.

For other blogs on "purple fingers of freedom", check out Aaron's "It's Clobberin Time".

The Constituion is not a living breathing document

Heritage Guide to the Constitution

*Stressing the original intent of the Framers as the authoritative standard of constitutional interpretation, and never straying from the Constitution and the definitive writings of the Framers—especially the invaluable notes taken at the Constitutional Convention by James Madison, the widely-recognized analysis in The Federalist Papers, Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story’s 1833 classic, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States—this volume is unique, comprehensive and authoritative.

This constitution is not a living breathing document. If you go to the American Memory section of the Library of Congress you can read the words for yourself like I have. In discussing the 1st amendment, the members of the 1st Congress state they are concerned that future generation will interpret their words differently than they intended. The writers of the constitution knew that future generations might want to do things differently. That is why there is the amendment process.

Reading this book is important because the views of SCOTUS nominees on stuff like abortion doesn’t matter. What matters is “Will they review laws to see if those laws violate the original intent of the constitution”? If they do, they should be struck down. If they don’t even if it is something like legalized infanticide, the laws must be upheld.

Brrr! I want to move now!

My sister, brother and I are having a little townhouse built near the Parris Island Marine Corps base in South Carolina. I want to retire there now.

You may have seen the plane that skidded off the runway at Midway Airport most likely because of a slippery runway. While I spent three hours commuting home from work, I had jerks riding my bumper all the way. No matter how I braked I couldn't get them to back off. Commuting home sometimes can only take 20-25 minutes.

And it has been cold the last week or two (so much for global warming.). I see that Beaufort is 61 degrees versus 20 degrees here in Chicago,

It will be nice to have a place where I can escape the cold weather for a couple of days. And it will be nice to meet some of the marines that have been putting their lives on the line fighting to protect our freedoms. Thanks guys and gals.

Teddy Roosevelt describes a true American

Excerpts from Theodore Roosevelt’s acticle “TRUE AMERICANISM” (April 1894, The Forum Magazine)

We Americans have many grave problems to solve, many threatening evils to fight, and many deeds to do, if, as we hope and believe, we have the wisdom, the strength, the courage, and the virtue to do them. But we must face facts as they are. We must neither surrender ourselves to a foolish optimism, nor succumb to a timid and ignoble pessimism. Our nation is that one among all the nations of the earth which holds in its hands the fate of the coming years. We enjoy exceptional advantages, and are menaced by exceptional dangers; and all signs indicate that we shall either fail greatly or succeed greatly. I firmly believe that we shall succeed; but we must not foolishly blink the dangers by which we are threatened, for that is the way to fail. On the contrary, we must soberly set to work to find out all we can about the existence and extent of every evil, must acknowledge it to be such, and must then attack it with unyielding resolution. There are many such evils, and each must be fought after a fashion; yet there is one quality which we must bring to the solution of every problem,- that is, an intense and fervid Americanism. We shall never be successful over the dangers that confront us; we shall never achieve true greatness, nor reach the lofty ideal which the founders and preservers of our mighty Federal Republic have set before us, unless we are Americans in heart and soul, in spirit and purpose, keenly alive to the responsibility implied in the very name of American, and proud beyond measure of the glorious privilege of bearing it. There are two or three sides to the question of Americanism, and two or three senses in which the word “Americanism” can be used to express the antithesis of what is unwholesome and undesirable. In the first place we wish to be broadly American and national, as opposed to being local or sectional. We do not wish, in politics, in literature, or in art, to develop that unwholesome parochial spirit, that over-exaltation of the little community at the expense of the great nation, which produces what has been described as the patriotism of the village, the patriotism of the belfry. Politically, the indulgence of this spirit was the chief cause of the calamities which befell the ancient republics of Greece, the medieval republics of Italy, and the petty States of Germany as it was in the last century. It is this spirit of provincial patriotism, this inability to take a view of broad adhesion to the whole nation that has been the chief among the causes that have produced such anarchy in the South American States, and which have resulted in presenting to us not one great Spanish-American federal nation stretching from the Rio Grande to Cape Horn, but a squabbling multitude of revolution-ridden States, not one of which stands even in the second rank as a power. However, politically this question of American nationality has been settled once for all. ….

One may fall very far short of treason and yet be an undesirable citizen in the community. The man who becomes Europeanized, who loses his power of doing good work on this side of the water, and who loses his love for his native land, is not a traitor; but he is a silly and undesirable citizen. He is as emphatically a noxious element in our body politic as is the man who comes here from abroad and remains a foreigner. Nothing will more quickly or more surely disqualify a man from doing good work in the world than the acquirement of that flaccid habit of mind which its possessors style cosmopolitanism. It is not only necessary to Americanize the immigrants of foreign birth who settle among us, but it is even more necessary for those among us who are by birth and descent already Americans not to throw away our birthright, and, with incredible and contemptible folly, wander back to bow down before the alien gods whom our forefathers forsook. It is hard to believe that there is any necessity to warn Americans that, when they seek to model themselves on the lines of other civilizations, they make themselves the butts of all right-thinking men; and yet the necessity certainly exists to give this warning to many of our citizens who pride themselves on their standing in the world of art and letters, or, perchance, on what they would style their social leadership in the community. It is always better to be an original than an imitation, even when the imitation is of something better than the original; but what shall we say of the fool who is content to be an imitation of something worse?. Even if the weaklings who seek to be other than Americans were right in deeming other nations to be better than their own, the fact yet remains that to be a first-class American is fifty-fold better than to be a second-class imitation of a Frenchman or Englishman. As a matter of fact, however, those of our countrymen who do believe in American inferiority are always individuals who, however cultivated, have some organic weakness in their moral or mental make-up; and the great mass of our people, who are robustly patriotic, and who have sound, healthy minds, are justified in regarding these feeble renegades with a half-impatient and half-amused scorn.

We believe in waging relentless war on rank-growing evils of all kinds, and it makes no difference to us if they happen to be of purely native growth. We grasp at any good, no matter whence it comes. We do not accept the evil attendant upon another system of government as an adequate excuse for that attendant upon our own; the fact that the courtier is a scamp does not render the demagogue any the less a scoundrel. But it remains true that, in spite of all our faults and shortcomings, no other land offers such glorious possibilities to the man able to take advantage of them, as does ours; it remains true that no one of our people can do any work really worth doing unless he does it primarily as an American. It is because certain classes of our people still retain their spirit of colonial dependence on, and exaggerated deference to, European opinion, that they fail to accomplish what they ought to.

It is precisely along the lines where we have worked most independently that we have accomplished the greatest results; and it is in those professions where there has been no servility to, but merely a wise profiting by foreign experience, that we have produced our greatest men. Our soldiers and statesmen and orators; our explorers, our wilderness-winners, and commonwealth-builders; the men who have made our laws and seen that they were executed; and the other men whose energy and ingenuity have created our marvellous material prosperity - all these have been men who have drawn wisdom from the experience of every age and nation, but who have nevertheless thought, and worked, and conquered, and lived, and died, purely as Americans; and on the whole they have done better work than has been done in any other country during the short period of our national life.

On the other hand, it is in those professions where our people have striven hardest to mold themselves in conventional European forms that they have succeeded least; and this holds true to the present day, the failure being of course most conspicuous where the man takes up his abode in Europe; where he becomes a second-rate European, because he is over-civilized, over-sensitive, over-refined, and has lost the hardihood and manly courage by which alone he can conquer in the keen struggle of our national life. Be it remembered, too, that this same being does not really become a European; he only ceases being an American, and becomes nothing. He throws away a great prize for the sake of a lesser one, and does not even get the lesser one. The painter who goes to Paris, not merely to get two or three years' thorough training in his art, but with the deliberate purpose of taking up his abode there, and with the intention of following in the ruts worn deep by ten thousand earlier travelers, instead of striking off to rise or fall on a new line, thereby forfeits all chance of doing the best work. He must content himself with aiming at that kind of mediocrity which consists in doing fairly well what has already been done better; and he usually never even sees the grandeur and picturesqueness lying open before the eyes of every man who can read the book of America's past and the book of America's present. Thus it is with the undersized man of letters, who flees his country because he, with his delicate, effeminate sensitiveness, finds the conditions of life on this side of the water crude and raw; in other words, because he finds that he cannot play a man's part among men, and so goes where he will be sheltered from the winds that harden stouter souls. This emigre may write graceful and pretty verses, essays, novels; but he will never do work to compare with that of his brother, who is strong enough to stand on his own feet, and do his work as an American. Thus it is with the scientist who spends his youth in a German university, and can thenceforth work only in the fields already fifty times furrowed by the German ploughs. Thus it is with that most foolish of parents who sends his children to be educated abroad, not knowing - what every clear-sighted man from Washington and Jay down has known - that the American who is to make his way in America should be brought up among his fellow Americans. It is among the people who like to consider themselves, and, indeed, to a large extent are, the leaders of the so-called social world, especially in some of the northeastern cities, that this colonial habit of thought, this thoroughly provincial spirit of admiration for things foreign, and inability to stand on one's own feet, becomes most evident and most despicable. We believe in every kind of honest and lawful pleasure, so long as the getting it is not made man's chief business; and we believe heartily in the good that can be done by men of leisure who work hard in their leisure, whether at politics or philanthropy, literature or art. But a leisure class whose leisure simply means idleness is a curse to the community, and in so far as its members distinguish themselves chiefly by aping the worst - not the best - traits of similar people across the water, they become both comic and noxious elements of the body politic. …..

The mighty tide of immigration to our shores has brought in its train much of good and much of evil; and whether the good or the evil shall predominate depends mainly on whether these newcomers do or do not throw themselves heartily into our national life, cease to be Europeans, and become Americans like the rest of us. More than a third of the people of the Northern States are of foreign birth or parentage. An immense number of them have become completely Americanized, and these stand on exactly the same plane as the descendants of any … among us, and do their full and honorable share of the nation's work. But where immigrants, or the sons of immigrants, do not heartily and in good faith throw in their lot with us, but cling to the speech, the customs, the ways of life, and the habits of thought of the Old World which they have left, they thereby harm both themselves and us. If they remain alien elements, unassimilated, and with interests separate from ours, they are mere obstructions to the current of our national life, and, moreover, can get no good from it themselves. In fact, though we ourselves also suffer from their perversity, it is they who really suffer most. It is an immense benefit to the European immigrant to change him into an American citizen. To bear the name of American is to bear the most honorable titles; and whoever does not so believe has no business to bear the name at all, and, if he comes from Europe, the sooner he goes back there the better. Besides, the man who does not become Americanized nevertheless fails to remain a European, and becomes nothing at all. The immigrant cannot possibly remain what he was, or continue to be a member of the Old-World society. If he tries to retain his old language, in a few generations it becomes a barbarous jargon; if he tries to retain his old customs and ways of life, in a few generations he becomes an uncouth boor. He has cut himself off from the Old World, and cannot retain his connection with it; and if he wishes ever to amount to anything he must throw himself heart and soul, and without reservation, into the new life to which he has come. It is urgently necessary to check and regulate our immigration, by much more drastic laws than now exist; and this should be done both to keep out laborers who tend to depress the labor market, and to keep out races which do not assimilate readily with our own, and unworthy individuals of all races - not only criminals, idiots, and paupers, but anarchists …. From our standpoint, we have a right to demand it. We freely extend the hand of welcome and of good-fellowship to every man, no matter what his creed or birthplace, who comes here honestly intent on becoming a good United States citizen like the rest of us; but we have a right, and it is our duty, to demand that he shall indeed become so and shall not confuse the issues with which we are struggling by introducing among us Old-World quarrels and prejudices. There are certain ideas which he must give up. For instance, he must learn that American life is incompatible with the existence of any form of anarchy, or of-any secret society having murder for its aim, whether at home or abroad; and he must learn that we exact full religious toleration and the complete separation of Church and State. Moreover, he must not bring in his Old-World religious race and national antipathies, but must merge them into love for our common country, and must take pride in the things which we can all take pride in. He must revere only our flag; not only must it come first, but no other flag should even come second. He must learn to celebrate Washington's birthday rather than that of the Queen or Kaiser, and the Fourth of July instead of St. Patrick's Day. Our political and social questions must be settled on their own merits, and not complicated by quarrels between England and Ireland, or France and Germany, with which we have nothing to do: it is an outrage to fight an American political campaign with reference to questions of European politics. Above all, the immigrant must learn to talk and think and be United States. The immigrant of to-day can learn much from the experience of the immigrants of the past, who came to America prior to the Revolutionary War. We were then already, what we are now, a people of mixed blood. Many of our most illustrious Revolutionary names were borne by men of Huguenot blood - Jay, Sevier, Marion, Laurens. But the Huguenots were, on the whole, the best immigrants we have ever received; sooner than any other, and more completely, they became American in speech, conviction, and thought. The Hollanders took longer than the Huguenots to become completely assimilated; nevertheless they in the end became so, immensely to their own advantage. One of the leading Revolutionary generals, Schuyler, and one of the Presidents of the United States, Van Buren, were of Dutch blood; but they rose to their positions, the highest in the land, because they had become Americans and had ceased being Hollanders. If they had remained members of an alien body, cut off by their speech and customs and belief from the rest of the American community, Schuyler would have lived his life as a boorish, provincial squire, and Van Buren would have ended his days a small tavern-keeper. So it is with the Germans of Pennsylvania. Those of them who became Americanized have furnished to our history a multitude of honorable names from the days of the Muhlenbergs onward; but those who did not become Americanized form to the present day an unimportant body, of no significance in American existence. So it is with the Irish, who gave to Revolutionary annals such names as Carroll and Sullivan, and to the Civil War men like Sheridan - men who were Americans and nothing else: while the Irish who remain such, and busy themselves solely with alien politics, can have only an unhealthy influence upon American life, and can never rise as do their compatriots who become straightout Americans. Thus it has ever been with all people who have come hither, of whatever stock or blood. The same thing is true of the churches. A church which remains foreign, in language or spirit, is doomed. But I wish to be distinctly understood on one point. Americanism is a question of spirit, conviction, and purpose, not of creed or birthplace. The politician who bids for the Irish or German vote, or the Irishman or German who votes as an Irishman or German, is despicable, for all citizens of this commonwealth should vote solely as Americans; but he is not a whit less despicable than the voter who votes against a good American, merely because that American happens to have been born in Ireland or Germany. Know-nothingism, in any form, is as utterly un-American as foreignism. It is a base outrage to oppose a man because of his religion or birthplace, and all good citizens will hold any such effort in abhorrence. A Scandinavian, a German, or an Irishman who has really become an American has the right to stand on exactly the same footing as any native-born citizen in the land, and is just as much entitled to the friendship and support, social and political, of his neighbors. Among the men with whom I have been thrown in close personal contact socially, and who have been among my stanchest friends and allies politically, are not a few Americans who happen to have been born on the other side of the water, in Germany, Ireland, Scandinavia; and there could be no better men in the ranks of our native-born citizens. In closing, I cannot better express the ideal attitude that should be taken by our fellow-citizens of foreign birth than by quoting the words of a representative American, born in Germany, the Honorable Richard Guenther, of Wisconsin. In a speech spoken at the time of the Samoan trouble he said: “We know as well as any other class of American citizens where our duties belong. We will work for our country in time of peace and fight for it in time of war, if a time of war should ever come. When I say our country, I mean, of course, our adopted country. I mean the United States of America. After passing through the crucible of naturalization, we are no longer Germans; we are Americans. Our attachment to America cannot be measured by the length of our residence here. We are Americans from the moment we touch the American shore until we are laid in American graves. We will fight for America whenever necessary. America, first, last, and all the time. America against Germany, America against the world; America, right or wrong; always America. We are Americans.”

Search other blogs for: True Americanism
or Europeanized
or Immigration
or Illegal Aliens.

Not Global Warming but natural warming/cooling cycles

I just came in from shoveling snow off my father’s driveway. Growing up snow always covered the ground most of winter and therefore was fun to play in. Then most of my adult life we have had brown winters here in the Chicago area. Any snow would melt most the time in one day. Now for the last five years or so the snow has been staying. It is part of a natural warming/cooling cycle.

NOAA research shows that the tropical multi-decadal signal is causing the increased Atlantic hurricane activity since 1995, and is not related to greenhouse warming.“The earth’s climate is constantly changing owing to natural variability in earth processes. Natural climate variability over recent geological time is greater than reasonable estimates of potential human-induced greenhouse gas changes. Because no tool is available to test the supposition of human-induced climate change and the range of natural variability is so great, there is no discernible human influence on global climate at this time”. A recent survey among some 500 international climate researchers found that “a quarter of respondents still question whether human activity is responsible for the most recent climatic changes”. How decision-makers and the interested public deal with these scientific doubts and uncertainties is another matter. But it is vital for the health and integrity of science that critical evaluation and scepticism are not scorned or curbed for political reasons.

We should working for clean and more energy efficient ways of doing things. Lets just not do things like the Kyoto Protocal that could make things worse.



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Remake SciFi Classics?

In recent years, Hollyweird has had a total lack of originality. There has been a whole series of “the good, the bad and the ugly” remakes of movies and tv programs.

Fun with Dick and Jane (original) - Okay
Fun with Dick and Jane (remake) - Won’t waste my money, Might watch it on cable.
McHale’s Navy (original) - I watched it
McHale’s Navy (remake) - Would it have been better if it had also been set in world war II?
Planet of the Apes (original) - cheesy but fun
Planet of the Apes (remake) - Okay. Costumes were better.
Dukes of Hazzards (original) - Did you watch it just to see Daisy?
Dukes of Hazzards (remake) - Why bother?
Willy Wonka (original) - Fun. I liked it.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory(remake) - Far superior to the original. I liked that it followed the original story very closely but was totally different. So if done right, I like remakes.

So what science fiction classics would you want remade?

What science fiction TV shows would you like to see made into a movie?

Show and Tell by Michael Yon in Iraq

Michael Yon is an independent journalist living in Iraq. I have his link posted and you should check out his dispatches regularly. Here is his dispatch labelled "Show and Tell - A Photo Essay".

Aliraqi – Iraqi Forums

Today I was checking out the Iraqi news media web sites when I came across the Aliraqi BBS. It has some interesting posts on the upcoming elections in Iraq. It has sections on Iraq and the rest of the world. It also has sections on education, fashion, jokes and other stuff.

In the joke section, there is a Bush joke that is worth a slight smile but it was more interesting to read the response to someone saying they were from Iraq supporting President Bush.



Search other blogs for: Iraq or Bush Joke.