February 2012
63 posts
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Paganism in the 21st century: Ethicists argue in... →
You do know that in ancient Rome and Greece, pagans all, they often “disposed” of unwanted and/or deformed newborns by leaving them outside the city walls to die of exposure? Welcome to the 21st century version:
The Abstract from the Journal of Medical Ethics: Abortion is largely accepted even for reasons that do not have anything to do with the fetus’ health. By showing that (1) both...
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10 things I learned in 40 Days for Life
This is the fourth or fifth time I’ve participated in the 40 Days for Life Campaign (February 22 to April 1). A few tips and observations:
You will cry each time you see someone come out after she has had an abortion—her face is always stunned and slightly disbelieving.
Prayer softens the heart (and by that, I mean my heart).
Being a witness is much easier than being a martyr.
Always wear...
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Cool Hunting Friday v 2.6 →
Pretty cool:
10. Glowing Man
Fashion photographer Jacob Sutton cast Artec pro snowboarder William Hughes in a glowing short film shot on the slopes of the French resort Tignes in the region of Rhone-Alpes. Hughes coasted down the mountain in a customized L.E.D. suit by electronics designer John Spatcher, saying “Filming in the suit was the most surreal thing I’ve done in 20 years of...
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Cool Hunting Friday v 2.5 →
The Clapper with a twist:
6. BANG! Lamp
Replacing the antiquated notions of switches and clapping is Taiwan-based Bitplay’s playful gun-controlled lamp, which debuted at the New York International Gift Fair. Those who grew up shooting ducks on their Nintendo will delight in the lampshade knocking off kilter when you pull the trigger.
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The Rev. Jesse Jackson on abortion →
From the Rev. Jesse Jackson in Right to Life News from January 1977:
…In the abortion debate one of the crucial questions is when does life begin. Anything growing is living. Therefore human life begins when the sperm and egg join and drop into the fallopian tube and the pulsation of life take place. From that point, life may be described differently (as an egg, embryo, fetus, baby, child,...
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40 Days for Life spring campaign →
Starting soon (February 22), the 40 Days for Life Campaign for spring 2012:
Just two weeks from today — starting on Wednesday, February 22 — a staggering 251 cities from coast to coast in the United States plus Canada, England, Australia and Spain will simultaneously launch local 40 Days for Life campaigns….
The coordinated international campaign will be conducted from February 22 through...
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HHS mandate and indirect cooperation with evil →
From Elizabeth Scalia at The Anchoress:
…How does this work? How does the illiberal language of the HHS Mandate — proposing unprecedented intrusion by the government into church matters — language that, pretty much all Catholics agreed in the first week could not stand, become codified in the next week with the approval of some of those same Catholics? Is this president’s word so...
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Penelope Trunk: What Facebook’s IPO means for... →
Penelope Trunk, always interesting:
After the Facebook IPO, Sheryl Sandberg will become number two on the list of richest self-made women. She is the COO of Facebook. For those of you not familiar with her career, there’s a nice summary in the New York Times. But the bottom line is that she is really smart (Harvard), a really hard worker (startups, Google, Facebook), a great speaker (here’s a...
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The King’s English: Test of faith →
From Glen Scrivener:
What is the Bible?
Sometimes Christians are the worst at answering that question. Many will reply: “The Maker’s Instruction Manual.” Or “God’s Road Map.” Most often religious folk will see it as, essentially, a moral guidebook for right living. But if ever there was a story to explode that misconception it’s this one. Abraham has his faith tested:
And it came to...
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“Mandate a cure in search of a disease” →
From Ed Morrissey at HotAir:
And why is this mandate necessary in the first place? Is there some great crisis of access to contraception and abortifacients among employed people that only employers can solve? In my column for The Week, I look at the CDC’s in-depth survey of contraception use and find out that the question of access never even comes up as a barrier:
…Here’s a question few are...
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Sr. Carol Keehan thanks pro-choice group in... →
Surprised? I’m not. (Well, actually I am a little–that Sr. Carol Keehan, president of the Catholic Health Association, didn’t respond to the pro-life emails as well). From LifeSiteNews.com:
After a person posing as a pro-choice leader thanked her for defending reproductive rights against the U.S. Catholic bishops, Sr. Carol Keehan of the Catholic Health Association thanked the individual and...
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N.C. nanny state: Preschooler’s homemade lunch...
[UPDATE] My suspicious nature says, “Follow the money.” Who has the contract to provide food and is getting taxpayer money for every meal they give out? From the John W. Pope Civitas Institute, more on the story:
A mother in Hoke County complains her daughter was forced to eat a school lunch because a government inspector determined her home-made lunch did not meet nutrition requirements. In...
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Telemachus for a new age
A little history is in order here to completely understand this political cartoon. Gladiatorial games had been held in Rome for hundreds of years, and then, overnight, they stopped.
And they stopped because of one man: Telemachus, a Christian monk, newly arrived to Rome from Egypt.
On that particular day (commonly held to be January 1, 404), the Romans were celebrating a victory over the...
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All Catholic, all the time
Not really, but that’s what it’s felt like for the past week or so. To anyone who wants a little history of the Catholic Church in the United States, check out:
American Catholicism’s Pact with the Devil by Paul Rahe
American Catholicism: A Call to Arms by Paul Rahe, correcting some minor errors and giving more info on the earlier post
Response to Professor Rahe by KC Mulville
And read...
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Who’s for and who’s against: Pick a side, any side
One way to figure out which side of an issue you should be on is to see who else is on that side. I learned this when living in California, the land of the ever-expanding propositional ballot. Those measures were often written to purposely confuse and confound the voter, so I would always check to see who wrote the proposition and who was for and against it.
So, let’s take a look at Pres....
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The politically-inspired food pyramid →
Before there was “global warming” and “climate change,” there was the government’s food pyramid:
Too bad there was little scientific evidence to back it up:
During the same period that we cardiologists and the health care community were promoting the low-fat/don’t count calories or sugar diet, the nation experienced its epidemic of obesity and diabetes. Cause and effect? We don’t know. But...
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AUL joins the fray →
From the Sacramento Bee:
Americans United for Life joined forces with other pro-life legal organizations to file the leading pro-life amicus brief before the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the Obama Administration’s healthcare law, violates the Constitution by forcing Americans to pay for abortion.
AUL President and CEO Dr. Charmaine Yoest...
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Because the Southern Baptists are down for the... →
From the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, a response to Pres. Obama’s non-compromise:
President Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services has issued a requirement that all insurance plans under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), also known as Obamacare, cover free-of-charge certain so-called “contraceptives” that are ...
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Six more things everyone should know about the HHS... →
From the USCCBlog:
1. The rule that created the uproar has not changed at all, but was finalized as is. Friday evening, after a day of touting meaningful changes in the mandate, HHS issued a regulation finalizing the rule first issued in August 2011, “without change.” So religious employers dedicated to serving people of other faiths are still not exempt as “religious employers.” Indeed, the...
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Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast: Billing the gov’t... →
From the Lufkin (TX) News:
Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast is a defendant in a federal lawsuit after a former Lufkin clinic employee alleged a multi-million-dollar billing scheme….
The updated complaint, filed in October 2011, alleges that while [Karen] Reynolds [former employee] was employed as a health center assistant, she was instructed by the organization to maximize billing revenue when the...
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Elizabeth Scalia: Obama’s HHS: Bring on the Penal... →
From Elizabeth Scalia at The Anchoress:
Sure and it begins to feel like Grandad’s auld sod, what with the elites getting comfortable with the notion of telling us what we can and cannot do, what business we may or may not conduct, what materials we can or cannot own…because we’re Catholics.…
Well, t’was ever thus, wasn’t it? They’ll be going after the home-schoolers, the crisis pregnancy...
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Back to the future: HHS regs for Feb. 15 federal... →
Okay, people, here it is, read it below: Obama’s great “compromise” on the HHS contraception/abortifacient rules, all decked out in government-ese. Where is Joe Wilson when you need him?
Because from the rules to be published in the Federal Register come February 15, we learn this:
Pregnancy is a disease, a “preventable” disease.
This “compromise” changes nothing: religious institutions...
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WSJ: “Immaculate contraception” →
Because sometimes, the headline is just too good to pass up. From the Wall Street Journal editorial page:
Here’s a conundrum: The White House wants to impose its birth-control ideology on all Americans, including those for whom sponsoring or subsidizing such services violates their moral conscience. The White House also wants to avoid a political backlash from this blow to religious freedom....
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Beware the Jabberwock: When language loses meaning →
A look at how the news media is framing the health care contraceptive debate, from J.E. Dyer at HotAir:
On retrieving my paper copy of the Wall Street Journal this morning, I saw the discouraging headline: Obama Retreats on Contraception
My first thought was, “Surely the Journal knows better than this. Why would they headline this story as if Obama had, in fact, backed off on the mandate? What...
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Obamacare architect: Expect steep increase in... →
Color me surprised…not. Because it never was about health care–it’s all about government overreach, always for our own good. From the Daily Caller:
…Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist Jonathan Gruber, who also devised former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s statewide health care reforms, is backtracking on an analysis he provided the White House in support of the 2010 Affordable...
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Manolo: Meanwhile, in the dystopian future… →
Because no one is like the Manolo:
The Empress Ming the Merciless prepares to give birth to the new age of despotism!
Indeed, the Manolo is only half joking, for as the more he watched the Madonna-tacular show of the halftime, the more he was struck by the unshakeable impression that this was the sort of Nuremberg Rally for the new age of crass narcissism aborning.
Beginning with its...
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WFB: Culture beats economics →
From Matthew Continetti at the Washington Free Beacon:
Polling shows that the economy remains voters’ top priority. But there are signs that the business situation is improving. The dropping unemployment rate is just one example of good economic news. U.S. growth may be subpar, but it is growth nonetheless. Conservatives would be foolish to think that the media will dwell on the economy’s ...
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Ed Morrissey: Bishops to Obama: No dice →
From Ed Morrissey at HotAir (remember Captain’s Quarters?):
After a long day of supposed “accommodation” and discussion, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops took a close look at the supposed adjustment of the HHS mandate yesterday. Their conclusion? It represents no change at all, and the bishops will press for a “legislative solution” to Barack Obama’s mandate…
They note that the...
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USCCB responds: “Unacceptable” →
From the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops, a statement on the administration’s so-called compromise that was announced earlier today:
Bishops Renew Call to Legislative Action on Religious Liberty
Regulatory changes limited and unclear Rescission of mandate only complete solution Continue urging passage of Respect for Rights of Conscience Act
WASHINGTON – The United States Conference of...
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Sr. Carol Keehan strikes again. . . →
During the debates/discussions about the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), Sr. Carol Keehan of the Catholic Health Association worked hard to get the legislation passed. Of course, she had no idea what was in it, and over the past few weeks, has expressed disappointment at the new HHS mandates on contraception coverage.
But, no worries, she hasn’t left the Democratic...
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Pro-life leaders slam White House ‘compromise’ on... →
Tell me again why women are entitled to contraception at no cost to them and at cost to the taxpayer or the insurance company? Why this issue? Why now? Why this benefit and not something else? From Lifesitenews.com:
The White House announced today that, instead of forcing religious employers to pay for birth control, it will force insurance companies to offer the drugs free of charge to all...
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Cool Hunting Fridays v 2.4 →
It’s time to read!
12. The 20 Most Beautiful Bookstores in the World
From Slovakia to California, Flavorwire pieces together an impressive display of the world’s most beautiful book stores, giving one more reason to celebrate the printed word.
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Effective compassion: Seven principles from a... →
From Christians for a Sustainable Economy:
The crisis of the modern welfare state is a crisis of government, and it is more than that. Too many private charities and foundations dispense aid on the basis of what feels good rather than what works. As a result, they end up providing, instead of points of light, alternative shades of darkness….
Private charities and foundations can do a better job...
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HHS mandate: Another weak response from a person... →
A letter to the editor in today’s Columbus Dispatch on the HHS mandated coverage for contraception, for which I can only say, “You can’t encourage government intervention in health care without realizing that what the government pays for, the government controls.” Were they just naive or amazingly terminally blind? I honestly don’t know, but I know they were wrong.
From Sr. Judith Ann Karam,...
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HHS Mandate 101 and why you should care →
From National Review, Kathryn Jean Lopez interviews Mark Rienzi, senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and a professor of constitutional law at the Catholic University of America:
MARK RIENZI: The mandate forces individuals and organizations to violate their religious principles by providing their employees with drugs that cause abortion, as well as with contraception and...
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Her choice, her problem: How abortion empowers men →
One of the best articles I’ve read on the burden, responsibility, pressure, and accountability put on women by society since abortion became a viable pregnancy option (by Richard Stith for First Things, Aug/Sept 2009):
Men these days can choose only sex, not fatherhood; mothers alone determine whether children shall be allowed to exist. Legalized abortion was supposed to grant enormous freedom...
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Washington Free Beacon: A new source for news →
Okay, when I first saw the name in passing, I thought it said “Washington Free Bacon” – is there nothing bacon can’t do? Check it out anyway.
From Matthew Continetti, editor in chief:
What would happen, though, if a website covered the left in the same way that the left covers the right? What picture of the world would one have in mind if the morning paper read like the New York Times—but ...
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Frederica Mathewes-Green: From pro-choice to... →
Whenever I get discouraged about pro-life progress, I re-read From Pro-Choice to Pro-Life, an essay by Frederick Mathewes-Green, written in 1999. It was one of the first things I read when I, in total confusion, went searching for clarity on the abortion debate once I discovered my [now former] church supported abortion unconditionally. This essay offers very practical advice and is written in...
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…and unto God that which is God’s
It seems as though the past few weeks have been all church (all the time), all government (all the time), and all individual liberty (all the time). Between the new HHS health care mandates that caught the Roman Catholic Church by surprise to the censoring of the Archbishop of the Military Services by the Army’s Office of the Chief of Chaplains, it truly has been an intersection among “the Church,...
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Update on Catholic bishop statements
Two links at the American Papist:
List of the 169 bishops (so far) that we know have spoken out about the new HHS/Obamacare mandates (this means more than 90% of bishops who head dioceses have spoken out against the Obama/HHS mandate). This list also links to each bishop’s statement.
List of the 8 that we have not yet seen a statement from, and as the American Papist says:
This is not an...
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HHS mandates: Render unto Caesar
What of the Catholic and other religious laity? Who speaks for them?
When the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) through the years urged that the government install universal health care, they may have been working from what they perceived as Christian motives (corporal acts of mercy) but what they were really encouraging was government intervention in all aspects of an individual’s...
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Catholic archbishop for the military speaks out...
And I use “censored” in the correct First Amendment sense (that of government interference)–in this case, it’s a twofer: 1) prohibiting the free exercise of religion and 2) abridging freedom of speech. From CNSNews.com:
…The message from the archbishop touched off a controversy both in and outside the military when the Army’s Office of the Chief of Chaplains told the service’s senior ...
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Michael Ramirez: A picture is worth a thousand... →
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Belmont Abbey to hold presentation on religious... →
Belmont Abbey continues its fight against the HHS and its mandates:
A presentation on Religious Liberties in America and the recent Health and Human Services Mandate
In response to the January 20, 2012 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services mandate that forces virtually all private health care plans to cover sterilization, abortifacients and contraception despite religious objections, the...
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Charen: "Unwed and imperturbed" →
Worth a read. From Mona Charen at National Review Online:
…The collapse of marriage among the lower and lower middle classes is rapidly tapping our national strength. Women from wealthier families get it. They generally wait until they’re married to have babies. They know that two parents create stability, financial security, and the social structure to optimize the chances of rearing happy,...
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USCCB: White House misrepresents its own... →
There are lots of euphemisms one can use: “mistaken,” “misspoke,” “inaccurate,” “fabricate,” “misrepresent,” “mislead,” etc., but the bottom line is very clear:
To lie (verb):
to speak falsely or utter untruth knowingly, as with intent to deceive.
to express what is false; convey a false impression.
And that is exactly (and quite rightly) what the USCCB is calling the Department of Health...
