harmonicminer

There is something peculiarly American in the story of the first Thanksgiving

On Thanksgiving Day we are asked to remember what Edmund Burke, in one of the most eloquent phrases to be found in all literature, described as “that little speck, scarce visible in the mass of national interest, a small seminal principle, rather than a formed body”—the tiny vessel, more accurately to be described as a “cockleshell,” the Mayflower, and its hundred passengers, men, women, and children, who sailed on her.

Twelve years earlier, in 1608, they had fled from religious persecution in England and established a new home in Holland. Despite the warm welcome extended by the Dutch, as contrasted with the persecutions they had endured in England, their love for their homeland impelled them to seek English soil on which to raise their children, English soil on which they would be free to worship God in their own way.

Finally, the Pilgrims landed, as we all know, on Plymouth Rock in the middle of December 1620, and on Christmas Day, in the words of Governor William Bradford, 1 they “began to erect the first house for common use to receive them and their goods.”

So was established the first English colony in New England.

Three years later, when the plentiful harvest of 1623 had been gathered in, the Pilgrims “set apart a day of thanksgiving.”

Read it all.

UPDATE:  So, if you read the essay linked above, did you note that it was written in 1955, before the entire panoply of Great Society programs in the 1960s was enacted?

It is common for people to thank God on Thanksgiving for His provision for them.   The problem with this focus is that well-to-do thieves might also thank God for their riches.  I am inclined to think that we Americans should be thanking God for the provision of freedom for us, and we should show our sincerity in those thanks by protecting that freedom, for ourselves and our posterity.  If, as a people, we give up that provision of freedom from God, for a temporary provision of sustenance from our government, we will have made a bad bargain indeed.

The Kossacks aren’t happy that Obama may keep Gates as Secretary of Defense.

More fuel for the belief that even Democrats think Democrats are weak on defense and only Republicans can serve as Secretary of Defense.

Obama may be considering steering a center-left foreign policy, as opposed to an extremely Left one. Another hint: his choice of Gen. Jim Jones for National Security Adviser.

We’ll have to see how this goes, but at least there is a small ray of hope here and there that the president-elect isn’t completely a captive of the loony Left.  What remains to be seen is if he understands the connection between national defense and a strong military that isn’t gutted to pay for social programs.  And, of course, we don’t know yet how he’ll handle himself in a crisis or challenge; unfortunately, his reflex seems to be inappropriate moral equivalence, at least when on the campaign trail.   But maybe he’ll “grow in office”.

Pray that he does.

One way to win an argument is to control the usage of words. If you can get the other side to use your definitions, or even just to use your terms with different definitions (which differences may be lost on those watching the argument), you’ve won half the battle. You’re certainly in better shape than if you have to use your opponent’s terms. We see this in lots of areas, the prochoice/prolife debate being the most obvious, but there are many others.

I’m reminded of the old Sci-Fi story, “To Serve Man“, which often seems to reflect the way our government “serves” us, at least economically.
Continue reading “Words mean things”

Rob Kall: The Obama-Clinton Cabinet? We Voted for Change, Not Recycling

It’s been a long time since Democrats have worked in the White House or have had cabinet positions. Maybe it makes some sense that to start things off, Obama would consider bringing in some democrats with White House experience. That, almost by necessity, means Clinton people, or pretty old Carter people.

Read it all, and try not to laugh out loud. The Left helped elect a machine politician, steeped in the Chicago method, of buying support from opponents with favors, and otherwise rewarding sycophants when possible. Obama has ALWAYS been a company man, living in a company town. And now they expect him to start throwing bombs, bringing in unknowns to staff key positions?  Heh.

It’s called “promoting from within the organization”.

I keep expecting Moses to step out of a bush or something.

Unexpected UPSET in presidential election

Powerline has the following quote from the head of Russia’s Communist Party, Gennady Zyuganov:

All Republican presidents have always defended national interests, ignoring the interests of other countries of the world. The new US president cannot but understand that it is impossible to seek and find answers to many global issues without the participation of such a great country as Russia.

Well, yeah. Republican presidents do usually defend the US national interest, and Democrat presidents sometimes don’t, because some of them are more “internationalists” than anything else. Nice that you noticed, Mr. Zyuganov.

And Powerline has some excellent advice here, about how to be a happy and reasonable conservative in the days ahead.

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Celebrating Obama’s victory with his grandmother in Kenya

Obama’s grandmother, overwhelmed by journalists seeking to interview her, was optimistic that her grandson would become the first black American president.

“He has come a long way and I know that he will be next president of America,” she said.

Obama’s Kenyan Roots

A barefoot old woman in a ripped dress is sitting on a log in front of her tin-roof bungalow in this remote village in western Kenya, jovially greeting visitors.

Mama Sarah, as she is known around here, lives without electricity or running water. She is illiterate and doesn’t know when she was born.

I heard on the radio today (ABC news) that as a result of the election of Obama, electricity is being brought to Mama Sarah’s home. I guess having a multi-millionaire grandson wasn’t enough to accomplish this: he had to be elected president first.

Hmm

Based on their performance in 2000 and 2004, I expect the major media to literally lie about the results they get from exit polling, as they try to affect the election like they did in 2000 and 2004.

The election night decision of the networks in 2000 to call Florida for Gore –erroneous, and done even before Florida had closed its polls– was the single worst intervention in America’s elections by the MSM in history. It cost Republicans across the country an untold number of votes and many seats in the House and the Senate, and almost cost Bush the election.

The second worst intervention was the bogus exit polling in 2004, which had effects across the country too complex to chart.

In both instances the MSM’s “decision desks” injured the basic functioning of our democracy, and tomorrow the trend will probably hold as MSM analysts –except the always-to-be-trusted Barone– work overtime to find in their numbers the results their polls have been predicting for a month. This dynamic will slow down any good news for McCain and accelerate any perceived good news for Obama.

Play the part of Charlie Brown if you like tomorrow and try and kick MSM Lucy’s football, but the best advice is believe nothing until all the polls have closed and the real results are tallied.

We’ve been fooled twice by media liars. If we’re fooled again, we are indeed the fools.

And the funny/sad part:  even if Obama wins, in the end, the media will still have lied, because they will have “called the election” before they REALLY knew the result.