Pope Nears the Great Divide

Before anyone asks, no I am not Catholic. But it is still newsworthy that Pope John Paul II is in grave condition and may be dying. Many have had a lot of criticism of this pontiff, but he has certainly done many good things in his lifetime, especially his leadership in the effort to reconcile Christians and Jews.

In its latest bulletin on Friday evening, the Vatican said John Paul's heart and kidneys were failing, his breathing was shallow and his blood pressure had dropped to dangerously low levels.
"This is a life-changing night," said 26-year-old Roberto Mazzi, as he shuffled quietly into St Peter's Square. "He's the only Pope we've ever known and now he's dying. To be anywhere else, in any other mood, would be wrong."
Police estimated that as many as 70,000 people were in the vast, floodlit square as Saturday dawned, to be near the man who enjoyed the third-longest papacy in history and was a key world figure of the late 20th century.

It would truly be the end of an era.

History of April Fool's Day

I grabbed the following from an old version of a Wikipedia article. Unfortunately, the newest version has fake data as a prank. I guess you can't even believe an encyclopedia on April Fool's Day.

The origins of April Fool's Day are unknown, although various theories have been proposed. It is considered to be related to the festival of the vernal equinox, which occurs on March 21. Prior to the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in 1582, it was observed as New Year's Day by cultures as far apart as ancient Rome and India. New Year was originally celebrated from March 25 to April 1, before the Gregorian reforms moved it back to January 1. The English first celebrated the day on a widespread basis only as late as the 18th century, though it appears to have reached England probably from Germany in the mid-17th century. Its first known description in English originates with John Aubrey, who noted in 1686: "Fooles holy day. We observe it on the first of April. And so it is kept in Germany everywhere."

The custom of playing practical jokes on April Fool's Day is also very widespread and of uncertain origins. The victim of a joke is known in English as an April Fool; in Scots as a gowk (cuckoo or fool); and in French as a poisson d'avril (April fish). It has been suggested the custom may have had something to do with the move of the New Year's date, when people who forgot or didn't accept the new date system were given invitations to nonexistent parties, funny gifts, etc. Originally, April Fool's Day jokes concentrated on individuals (sending someone on an absurd errand such as seeking pigeon's milk) but in the 20th century it became common for the media to perpetrate hoaxes on the general population.

In other news, I've been battling program problems and server problems so posts will continue to be light.

Me Too

Following Nomad's example, I will not be posting today either...

The Truth Plain As Day

John Hawkings has up a great piece concerning the election count. The liberals just will not give up even though every scrap of fact and research is against them. But the, why left facts influence your views?

Federalism, Federalism, Federalism...

That's the meme coming from many conservative bloggers after the Terri Schiavo story. It's especially loud from some of the more libertarian bloggers who see this as an example of our government being controlled by religious nuts. Many blogs that I tend to enjoy have been very frustrating to read of late as they rant against anyone who dares believe that Terri's life is about more than politics.

They just don't get it.

Federalism is an idea, maybe even an ideal. But it's not the be-all and end-all that libertarians want to make it out to be. What good is staunch federalism if it allows an adulterous husband to end his wife's life against the wishes of her parents and with no verifiable account that it is truly even her wish? Call me a liberal, but I think the government has the duty to be involved. Consider the right to LIFE, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. LIFE is the first right assured to us by the government. When it comes to sparing life, the government has the moral duty to be involved.

Some will argue that only we religious nutjobs thought Terri was even still alive. Maybe we are the only ones, I don't know. Either way, she was a breathing human being who was responsive to the touch, voice, etc of her parents. To me, that sounds like a human being. Others argue quality of life. How do you judge quality of life? Unless you've walked a mile then I don't think you're really qualified to judge someone's quality of life when it comes to life or death. Who is really qualified to judge quality of life? Even if Terri was PVS, she still lived better than a full half of our world's population. She was comfortable, taken care of, etc. That's more than many people around the world get. Should we allow them to starve as well then? This quality of life argument is void because it is an impossible measurement.

To me, the Terri story reflects how out of touch the libertarians are in this country. They would like to see a GOP without those of us believe that God is a worthwhile consultant for our decisions. That's been the talk of late, how great the GOP would be without "all those religious crazies." But I have a different view. Maybe the GOP would be better without all the cold utilitarian types who are so sure that they have all the answers. In my experience, it is they who have become the closed-minded bigots obsessed with control. With their doctrine of secular supremacy and their faith of federalism, I see less in common with them then I do with moderate Democrats.

You Mean There Are Bad Guys Out There?

You wouldn't know it by listening to the liberals in this country, but apparently there are some bad people in Gitmo after all.

For those readers who continue to be baffled by the liberals' inability to understand the world in which we live, I will present for you here a recreation of the thought process that a liberal would experience upon hearing this news:

Perish the thought! You mean to tell me that there are people in the world who would want to hurt Americans? I just can't imagine that. It's obviously a great big lie by the Bush administration made up to scare us into giving them more power! I mean, I'll say out of one side of my mouth that EVERYONE hates America so much, but then out of the other side I'll just say that I'm SO SHOCKED that anyone would want to hurt us.

We now return you to your normalspeak programing. And just remember, these are the people who live on the "reality based" side of the spectrum.

Stuffed-SocksGate Returns

After all the bemoaning that the left was guilty of arguing that Sandy Berger was the victim of a political hachet-job, I wonder if they'll acknowledge they were wrong now that Berger has admitted that he knowingly stole the documents. Somehow, I doubt it.