Here’s a story from the New York Times about Korean adoptees returning to Korea and advocating for stricter measures to reduce the number of adoptions, and, specificially, adoptions out of the country. Over the past six decades, at least 200,000 Korean children — roughly the population of Des Moines — have been adopted into families in more than 15 countries, with a vast majority living in the United States. Now, some 300 – 500 have returned to South Korea, which... Read more
Seemingly to justify their own policy, the AP has a story out (in the Trib today, in the Washington Post on Wednesday), “In Islam, a long tradition against depicting the prophet,” in which they provide the historical context but pretty much fail in explaining why U.S. and U.K. journalists should adopt a no-Muhammad-pictures policy. The key quote: Religious traditions built over the years have prohibited such depictions out of respect for Muhammad and to discourage idolatry, according to Muslim scholars... Read more
Of course we’ve got to talk about the now-infamous “James Taylor sings ‘You’ve Got a Friend’ to the French” clip. Note that I haven’t seen this. I’m taking a break at work (remember: I work at home, part-time, I don’t claim this as work-time), so I can link to the video, but I haven’t actually seen it, just read reporting on it, such as this item from Bloomberg, or, in the blogosphere, this piece from Ann Althouse. But, look: I... Read more
So I finally got around to watching infamous video of Obama’s remarks on the attack on Charlie Hebdo: And, yes, everyone is right that he seems unengaged and half-asleep. But here’ why Obama was soporific: the teleprompter was scrolling through his speech too slowly. All of the pauses? He was waiting for the next line of text. Of course, this is an explanation, not an excuse. For a short speech, with little content, he shouldn’t be using the teleprompter, and... Read more
So there’s a complaint floating out there that it’s inappropriate of the media and politicians to refer to “the Prophet Mohammed” because it implies an affirmation that he is, indeed, a prophet — where, at the same time, no secular journalist would use a label in reference to Jesus that implies any belief, e.g., it’s “Jesus” or maybe “Jesus of Nazareth” but never “Jesus Christ” or “Christ Jesus” or “the Lord Jesus Christ.” Annoyingly, I can’t find this any longer.... Read more
So yesterday I told you all about a couple things I’d read on the question of the “right” retirement age. And in some respects, I think that Farrell is spot on, that paid work can be a very good thing, even for people past a traditional retirement age. Look, I know, anecdotal experience again: Mom kept at her retail job, though admittedly with decreasing hours, and, whenever she didn’t want to work, she gave up shifts to others looking to... Read more
Anyone have experience with this? Know how to appeal? In any case, it’s a lousy start to a Monday. Read more
OK, “Part One” was just an invitation for comments. And I spent most of my free time over the weekend writing about other topics. But I’d been reading a book called Unretirement (subtitled, “How Baby Boomers are Changing the Way We Think about Work, Community, and the Good Life”, and authored by Chris Farrell) and recently came across two relevant articles: “When Outside Factors Dictate Retirement Age” – an article in the NYT shared by the Center for Retirement Research... Read more
Idiots. So I’ve written a couple posts on “moderate Islam” over the last couple days, and, as I tend to do, when an article on the topic appeared at the National Review’s Corner, I commented with a summary of my views and a link to the most recent post. Some idiot — actually multiple idiots — accused me of spam because I had linked to my post, and, in fact, reported my comment as spam. So far as I can... Read more
From my sole window to the world of the French people, an old high school friend who was in the US as the daughter of a expat, but who returned back to France to finish high school and has been there ever since (via facebook): Et voilà, une brêche dans le mur : l’auto-censure. D’est donc bien la France, LE pays de la LIBERTE , pas les USA. Défendons là ! Pas de brêche, pas d’aito-censure dans la presse et... Read more
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