Calling a Spade, a Spade

Bishop Thomas Tobin had a Dan Aykroyd moment in responding to Congressman Patrick Kennedy on Friday. I can hear Dan saying, "Jane, you ignorant s--t."

Congressman Patrick Kennedy's statement about the Catholic Church's position on health care reform is irresponsible and ignorant of the facts. But the Congressman is correct in stating that "he can't understand." He got that part right.

You can read the rest of Jill Stanek's article here.

He has chosen what is better

I love stories like this one.  It shows that people in the media can choose to listen to Christ.

Once a Calvin Klein model who smouldered bare-chested opposite J-Lo in a music video, and starred in Hollywood movies, Verastegui's brooding looks and aquamarine eyes attracted thousands of (invariably screaming) female fans.

Today, the 35-year-old actor is a daily Mass-goer, committed to abstaining from sex before marriage, who flies to Darfur to help the starving, provides financial help for women considering abortions and organises house-building missions in Mexico.

“I wasn’t born to be famous, or to be a movie star, but to love and serve Jesus Christ,” the former model and singer once listed as among the top 50 “hottest” Hispanics by People magazine will tell a gathering of young Catholics on his first visit to England this weekend.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates Stands Up

Well it appears the Defense Secretary Gate does have a spine.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday that the Obama administration cannot wait for the Afghan election to be resolved before making a decision on troop levels, appearing to be at odds with White House officials who have tied a decision on U.S. strategy to the resolution of the election and political stability.

Get the troops moving and improvements in the political situation will follow. Men and women are dying while politics is played by the administration.

Oversight Humor

Well it looks as if the Dems are less than thrilled at being shown as cowards -- they locked the Republicans out of House Oversight and Government Reform Committee room. You see, last week the Republicans were set to force a vote on subpoenas in the investigation into Countrywide Mortgage’s sweetheart loans to certain politicians. Well the Dems were a no show and a staffer filmed their empty seats in the committee room and also filmed them leaving meeting in private chambers after the mark-up was supposed to have started. These have been spliced together, music added and it is now posted on the Republican Oversight Committee webpage.

Cap & Trade, Global Warming, Climate Change Oh My!

I was going to post this yesterday, but didn't get to it. So here it is a day late.

First we have a video of Lord Christopher Monckton, who gave a presentation in St. Paul, MN on the subject of global warming and delivered a warning to Americans regarding the United Nations Climate Change Treaty that is scheduled to be signed in Copenhagen this December.



Next in case you missed the premiere of Not Evil Just Wrong Sunday night, you can read a couple of summaries - one from the Heritage Foundation:

http://blog.heritage.org/2009/10/19/when-environmental-activism-does-more-harm-than-good/

and one from BigHollywood.com:

http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/dmiller/2009/10/19/inconvenient-truths-surface-in-not-evil-just-wrong/

And finally for the crazy side of Global Warming, aka Climate Change...

PM Gordon Brown said negotiators had 50 days to save the world from global warming and break the "impasse". He predicts "the UK faces a "catastrophe" of floods, droughts and killer heatwaves if world leaders fail to agree a deal on climate change. Read the entire article here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8313672.stm

With fish darting amongst them in a blue lagoon, the Maldivian president and his top team have staged an elaborate stunt to publicize climate change. Billed as the world's first underwater cabinet meeting, President Mohamed Nasheed and 11 ministers, decked in scuba gear, held a meeting 4m (13ft) underwater. Read the article in its entirety here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8312320.stm

Yes we can... Win the war in Afghanistan

Michael Yon has a great post up at the Corner about the war in Afghanistan and Dexter Filkins' New York Times Magazine story “Stanley McChrystal’s Long War.” I urge you to read both articles.

We can succeed in Afghanistan, but General McChrystal needs the troops that he has asked for and our stay will not be a short one. If President Obama meant it when he called the Afghan war, a war of necessity, then get off the dime and give the General his troops now.

Watch Not Evil Just Wrong Tonight at 8:00PM EDT

I just learned that Not Evil Just Wrong will be streamed live tonight at 8:00PM EDT. This film is the antithesis of Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth.
Here are the live feeds:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/not-evil-just-wrong

http://bighollywood.breitbart.com

http://action.afa.net

Hopefully they can handle the traffic.

Kerry Opposes More Troops in Afghanistan

In an interview with CNN, John Kerry proves that we dodged a bullet when he was defeated in his run for President.

“It would be entirely irresponsible for the president of the United States to commit more troops to this country, when we don’t even have an election finished and know who the president is and what kind of government we’re working in, with,” Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat, said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

We should just leave them hanging while we wring our hands over the political situation. WRONG! If we are there, we are in 100%. Half measures will just get our soldiers killed.

Pro-Life Democrats Seek to Block Health Bill...

...if Pelosi Won’t Allow Vote on Amendment Barring Abortion Funding

Rep. Bart Stupak (D.-Mich.), co-chairman of the House Pro-Life Caucus, told CNSNews.com that Democrats who oppose government funding of abortion will try to block the health care reform bill from coming to a vote on the House floor unless House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) allows a floor vote on an amendment to explicitly prohibit abortion funding in the bill.

It is good to see some Democrats standing up for life, but will they really stand up and block the health care reform bill if their amendment fails?  Let's see them put their political money where their mouth is.  Call me skeptical, but I don't expect them to put it all on the line and stand up for life when it requires them to stand against their party.

Al Gore Will Not Answer Critics of Climate Change

Former Vice President Al Gore put forth his side of the debate over "climate change" at a conference with about 500 environmental journalists Friday in Madison, Wisconsin. During the question and answer period one journalist, Phelim McAleer, an Irish filmmaker asked Gore to address nine errors in his film identified by a British court in 2007, he stumbled and side stepped the question. When he attempted to push for an actual answer he was cut off and not allowed to finish.



McAleer's film "Not Evil, Just Wrong, The True Cost of Global Warming Hysteria" will be released on October 18th. Here is a synopsis from the press release for the film:

Global warming alarmists want Americans to believe that humans are killing theplanet. But Not Evil Just Wrong, a new documentary by Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney, proves that the only threats to America (and the rest of the world) are the flawed science and sky-is-falling rhetoric of Al Gore and his allies in environmental extremism.

The film warns Americans that their jobs, middle-class lifestyles and dreams for their children will be destroyed if the government rushes to judgment and imposes job-killing regulations on an economy already mired in recession.

Not Evil Just Wrong exposes the deceptions about global warming that scientists, politicians, educators and the media have been force-feeding the public for years, including fear-mongering about floods and dying polar bears.  The documentary shows how environmentalists are pushing the same kind of anti-human propaganda that triggered a ban DDT and condemned millions of children to death by malaria, a story recounted in the documentary. Not Evil Just Wrong asks: Is carbon dioxide the new DDT and are we taking the same risks with our future?

I wonder if Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney will win a Nobel Prize for their efforts. Everyone else seems to be winning one.

Bullets in Slow Motion

This is too cool not to post. Extreme slow motion video of bullets impacting different materials. The hollow points in the ballistic gel and the bullets disintegrating when they impact steel are just amazing.



I could watch over and over again. It's probably a guy thing, but maybe its just me.

Did Bill Ayers write Obama's "Dreams From My Father"?

This theory has been floating around for quite some time, but blogger Anne Leary of BackyardConservative ran into Ayers at Regan International on Monday and received a spontaneous confession.

Then, unprompted he said--I wrote Dreams From My Father. I said, oh, so you admit it. He said--Michelle asked me to. I looked at him. He seemed eager. He's about my height, short. He went on to say--and if you can prove it, we can split the royalties. So I said, stop pulling my leg. Horrible thought. But he came again--I really wrote it, the wording was similar. I said I believe you probably heavily edited it. He said--I wrote it.

• Was this the truth? There is quite a bit of evidence pointing that direction.
• Was he saying this just to see if it would go viral on the internet?
• Was this a lie? 
• Why would he admit this to a stranger in an airport, who had just confessed to being a conservative blogger?
  

Who knows, but it is interesting to think about.

Teen Gives African Village New Hope

I saw this article and was very impressed with this young man - innovation, resourcefulness, self-reliance and a dream.  I pray he goes far.   

Some people see lemons and make lemonade. William Kamkwamba saw wind and made a windmill.


This might not seem like a mighty feat. But Kamkwamba, who grew up in Masitala, a tiny rural farming village off the grid in Malawi, was 14 years old in 2001 when he spotted a photo of a windmill in a U.S. textbook one day. He decided to make one, hacking together a contraption from strips of PVC pipe, rusty car and bicycle parts and blue gum trees.


Though he ultimately had big designs for his creation, all he really wanted to do initially was power a small bulb in his bedroom so he could stay up and read past sunset.


But one windmill has turned into three, which now generate enough electricity to light several bulbs in his family’s house, power radios and a TV, charge his neighbors’ cellphones and pump water for the village’s fields and household use.


Now 22, Kamkwamba wants to build windmills across Malawi and perhaps beyond. Next summer he also plans to construct a drilling machine to bore 40-meter holes for water and pumps. His aim is to help Africans become self-sufficient and resolve their problems without reliance on foreign aid.

Donations for Burmese Immigrants

When:   Saturday, October 10  10am - 6pm & Sunday, October 11  10am – 6pm  
 
Location:  St. Jude Catholic Church Parking Lot – 2130 Pemberton Dr. (look for the donation truck)  

All donated items will be distributed amongst the over 6,000 refugees that are now here. 

Needed items:  They are truly in dire need of any used  or new clothing, shoes, socks, coats, household items, kitchen utensils, towels, pillows, blankets, sheets, toys (preferably that do not require batteries, since they cannot afford them), sports equipment (especially balls), used bicycles, furniture, etc.  
 
New donations: shampoo, toilet paper, paper towels, tissues, soap, toothbrushes, deodorant, underwear (especially kids sizes), etc. (We also welcome donations of all your unused “Complimentary hotel toiletry samples”!)

These folks are here legally and need our help.  Please do whatever you can to aid them in getting started.

Hollywood -- Intolerant, out-of-step, dictitorial, clueless...

A round up of the week's nonsense from the Hollywood crowd from BigHollywood.com.

Between this video-treasure of idiocy and the whole Polanski affair it’s as though someone wished for the dark pathetic heart of Leftist Hollywood to expose itself and the Good Lord was listening.

Why do we continue to put up with them?

Liar!

I do not relish using the word "Liar" as the title of this post, but I do not see a better way of stating my point. From President Obama's weekly address:

As we move forward in the coming weeks, I understand that members of Congress from both parties will want to engage in a vigorous debate and contribute their own ideas. And I welcome those contributions. I welcome any sincere attempts to improve legislation before it reaches my desk. But what I will not accept are attempts to stall, or drag our feet. I will not accept partisan efforts to block reform at any cost.

He and the Democrats do not welcome any contributions that are not aligned with the plan that they are pushing. Where are solid clear cut amendments that eliminate funding for abortion? Where are the conscience clauses? Where is tort reform? Where is the amendment enabling insurance sales across state lines? (This actually falls within their constitutional powers of regulating interstate commerce.) Where are the myriad of other amendments that have been proposed? Neither the President nor the Democrats are interested in debate or contributions from the Republicans. Liar is the only response that really fits his words.

Instead, I expect us to move forward with a spirit of civility, a seriousness of purpose, and a willingness to compromise that characterizes our democratic process at its very best.

Civility? Joe Wilson was excoriated for shouting "You Lie" during the President's address to Congress and he was wrong for doing so. But when Alan Grayson says that Republicans want sick Americans to "die quickly" and likens the current health care system to the Holocaust, does Nancy Pelosi or any of the Democratic leadership denounce him? No!

Actions speak louder than words -- all we hear from the White House and the Democrats is the sound of silence.