I realize that this item is from way back last year, but I wanted to put it on record:   http://www.nationalreview.com/article/429163/new-year-2016-predictions-latino-president-conservative-correction   We’ll see how well David French does.     Read more

    This is very troubling:   http://www.nationalreview.com/article/429395/colognes-mass-sex-abuse-new-years-eve-part-trend   Almost as troubling, though, was the astonishingly boneheaded response of Cologne’s mayor, Henriette Reker:   http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/07/world/europe/cologne-mayor-henriette-reker-germany-sexual-assaults.html?_r=0     Read more

    Hmmmmm.  This raises really serious issues:   http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/01/05/so-now-muslims-can-be-fired-for-praying.html     Read more

      This is a very big deal:   http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865644972/A-massive-new-resource-for-students-of-the-Book-of-Mormon.html   And it will grow bigger still.     Read more

    There are some things (especially in the opening paragraphs) with which I would quibble, but she makes an important point:   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tithi-bhattacharya/adventures-in-islam-is-th_b_8920010.html   Thanks to Jabra Ghneim for alerting me to this article.     Read more

    Some drinkers have begun a tradition of abstaining from alcohol during the month of January.  A few call it the “dryathlon”:   http://www.theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2016/jan/05/alcohol-abstain-dryathlon-dry-january-health-science-spoof     Read more

Today’s Book of Mormon reading is 1 Nephi 12.  Out of all that that chapter covers, I want to say something today about “the large and spacious building” to which allusion is made in 1 Nephi 12:18, but which was, of course, first mentioned as part of Lehi’s vision in 1 Nephi 8.   I’ve wondered for years, though I’ve done absolutely no research on the matter, whether that building might have looked something like those I feature in this entry:    ... Read more

    “The Barbarian hopes — and that is the mark of him — that he can have his cake and eat it, too.  He will consume what civilization has slowly produced after generations of selection and effort, but he will not be at pains to replace such goods, nor indeed has he a comprehension of the virtue that has brought them into being.  Discipline seems to him irrational, on which account he is ever marveling that civilization should have... Read more

    ISIS is developing sophisticated weapons that will enable it to attack civilian targets in Europe and beyond:   http://news.sky.com/story/1617197/exclusive-inside-is-terror-weapons-lab   North Korea is developing long-range missiles capable of delivering payloads throughout Asia and even to the western United States:   http://www.cnn.com/interactive/2013/04/world/north-korea-missile-capabilities/   (Will it be Kim Jong-un who puts an end to that stand-off in Oregon?)   And North Korea claims to have just detonated a hydrogen bomb:   http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/06/asia/north-korea-hydrogen-bomb-test/   “Meh,” say some.  “Big deal!”  It’s probably... Read more

    http://www.knowhy.org/content/did-lehi-know-poetry-arabian-desert     Read more