BIRTHDAY

It's my 63rd birthday this weekend and celebrations are already underway so I won't be posting much for a day or two but, for the moment, there are a few recent readings of interest below. As I write this I am listening to the wonderful music of J.S. Bach. Perfect birthday music for me. We have just had the cantata Wachet auf and have now moved on to Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben.

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ELSEWHERE

There is an excellent Australian satirical site here. It is in fact the funniest site I know but about half the references are Australian so readers elsewhere would not get the point of all of it. There is a post here, however, that I think most people would get -- libertarians particularly.

I had a laugh at this Russian comment on the English: "With English people emotions are like an illness." My comment on the same topic is usually: "Embarrassment is the English national emotion".

NOW hypocrisy: "China's one-child policy has had a devastating impact on the gender balance. China now has 119 boys for ever 100 girls, a gender imbalance that is far from the normal 103-100 ratio seen in industrialized nations across the globe. The imbalance has given rise to a culture of massive sex-trafficking and the kidnapping of teenagers and young adults to be forced into marriage.... And, where is the voice of the National Organization for Women (NOW) on this? Instead of expressing outrage at what is amounting to a systematic defeminization of the world's largest country, the now.org web site's home page includes, among other things, a complaint about the state court in New York refusing to recognize homosexual marriage; ... Its opposition to sex-specific schools (even though their superior educational results are undeniable); A spirited flogging of the falling-apart Duke lacrosse team rape case on behalf of the woman who brought the allegations. I would think China's "40 million missing girls" would at least merit a mention on NOW's home page. Nope."

When unions globalize: "Globalization continues to be a boon to mankind. Economic benefits once reserved to residents of the developed world are spreading rapidly throughout the developing world. Thanks to free trade, companies from rich countries are bringing improvements in health, safety, and environmental quality to their overseas employees and their communities. Across the world, countries freeing up their markets to foreign countries are benefiting the most. ... Yet another Western export threatens to derail this process. Labor unions are beginning to globalize, threatening to spread overseas the onerous rules and inefficiencies for which they're renowned in the West."

The disabled vs. the endangered: "The Smoking Gun Web site reported yesterday on the federal lawsuit filed by a New York man seeking to sunbathe nude with his service dog. Plaintiff Mark DelCore says that since 9/11 he has suffered from traumatic stress and a skin condition that requires full-body dosing by sunlight--with his animal for emotional support. His suit alleges that by banning service dogs on a nude beach, officials of Fire Island National Seashore violated the Americans With Disabilities Act. If the dispute were only between a disabled man and zealous park rangers, Mr. DelCore and his ADA claim might have a fighting chance. Buried in the fine print of his filing, however, is mention of an adversary that may turn out to be more formidable than any ranger. It seems that dogs are banned because they might disturb the piping plovers that breed on or near the beach. Uh oh. Protected wetland birds? Sounds like a trump card for the defense." (More details here)

Murderous British police to get a fine only: "No police officers will face criminal charges over the fatal shooting last year of an innocent Brazilian man who was mistaken for a suicide bomber by police, British newspapers said today. The Times, The Guardian and The Independent all carried reports that the Metropolitan Police officers involved in the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes on July 22 last year will not be brought before the courts. Instead, they said the force will face charges under Britain's health and safety laws for failing in it its "duty of care" towards the 27-year-old electrician, who was mistaken for a bomber following suicide attacks on the capital's public transport system two weeks earlier. A successful health and safety prosecution would mean an unlimited fine on the police authority but is unlikely to satisfy the dead man's family, who are keen for those responsible to be charged."

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and AUSTRALIAN POLITICS. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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