Ponder

“As a wise man once said: ‘we will pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.’Unless the price is too high, the burden too great, the hardship too hard, the friend acts disproportionately, and the foe fights back.   In which case, we need a timetable.”

Thank you James Lileks
Make sure you check out the full text of his appropriately solemn, yet still amusing Screedblog post on the 5 year anniversary of 9/11.

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On Toothpaste and Tolerance

So Sunday afternoon I make a quick trip to the supermarket to replace the toiletries I had to leave behind in my hotel room in Dallas. Another day, another foiled terror plot, another $15 on deoderant, facewash and toothpaste.

It’s been making me think a lot lately. I mean, yesterday they arrested three guys from Texas for buying 100 cell phones at 3 a.m. from a Walmart. They were captured in their van with over 1000 cell phones, and casing photo’s of Michigan’s largest bridge. Somehow I don’t think they were planning on a mass telemarketing scheme of public transit officials.

If these folks aren’t setting off car bombs in Bagdhad, hijacking airliners in the U.K. or funding suicide bombers in Gaza - they’re buying cell phone chips for detonators and casing landmarks in the heart of the U.S.

I mean, these guys were 17-23 years old. Young Muslims who have ‘grievances’. And if you buy what the media is telling us, this is all our fault. If only we weren’t in Iraq, if only Israel wasn’t in Palestine, if only the crusades didn’t happen… The list goes on and on. And these ‘injustices’ were not even enacted upon these young men.

There’s this idea that any slander or harm done against Islam, or any Muslim person, state or idea is an attack on every Muslim. Remember the whole Muhammed Cartoon debacle? Radical Muslims believed that they should KILL people, because of a cartoon.

According to Steyn, the problem is rooted in identity.

“…a recent Pew poll…asked: What do you consider yourself first? A citizen of your country or a Muslim?

In the United Kingdom, 7 percent of Muslims consider themselves British first, 81 percent consider themselves Muslim first.”

I find that the average person finds this idea quite odd. But to me as a Christian, I do consider myself a Christian first and then an American.

But herein lies the difference, the moral and ideological view I hold to, tighter than my citizenship, doesn’t compel me to blow up innocent people or national infrastructure.

You can’t downplay the seriousness of this situation. Because I’m an American, Christian, infidel - I’m a legitimate target.

This is insanity.

At some point we need to stop coddling these monsters and take a stand against this crap, especially in media and the minds of people around us.
There are groups around the world other than Muslims who have had much greater injustice, insult and harm done to them - but they don’t air their grievances by detonating themselves in the public marketplace, at least not literally.

Shame on the liberal media for trying to make us, ‘understand the rage’ instead of condemn the slaughter.
Shame on the world community for their head-shaking, finger-wagging, resolution-passing inaction.
Shame on moderate Muslims for letting their voices be drowned out by the radicals.

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Independance Day

I’m on vacation in Colorado but I wanted to post this while I had the idea in my head.

July 4th is a time to think about this country and what it means to be American and patriotic.

 

Adjective

patriotic

  1. Inspired by patriotism; actuated by love of one’s country; zealously and unselfishly devoted to the service of one’s country; as, a patriotic statesman, vigilance.

I would offer an addendum to the popular defination.

Patriotism is believing the best about your country and your leaders, rather than assuming the worst. 

Think about that.

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Engagement Photo Session

Sarah and I went up to Santa Barbara this last weekend to do our engagement photo session with our wedding photographer.

They came out really really good and can be viewed here

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It’s beenawhile!

Since I, wrote a blog entry.
And it’s beenawhile, since I wrote anything at all.

 Anyways.  A decent amount has happened in the intervening time, too much in fact to try and do a catch up post.  Some highlights include getting an xBox360, passing the 100 day mark to my wedding, attending Jon Mabe’s wedding and going to Seattle for Ethan’s First Birthday. (Photo’s for the last two can be found on my flickr.

I should integrate my gamertag into the side margin in the next day or two, until then.  My Live ID is Phantom Archer.  This name, while mildly juvenile, hails back to my first handle in my first online game, Counterstike Beta.  emb3r was taken, as was archer, so I went with what I could.  I may change it later.

I want to clean up some of the links on the right margin. And the link colors, etc but CSS isn’t my speciality so it may take a bit of work.

The final change I want to make, is to start posting here the items I would normally post in the gh.politik forum and then just link back to here.  We’ll see how that pans out.

Zug zug.

 PS:  WoW Update -

Leafwind trying to help rebuild the broken guild (also happened during the interim, on the ides of May).  We just got into Molten Core for the first time since we reformed.
Shoros hit 50 the other day and is respec’d to full Holy.  Really enjoying Pally healing.
Daeger is my new rogue who’s 24.
Dorenne, the character I play with Sarah, is 24 as well.  We’ll be playing those once Sarah has her new ‘puter (iMac or simple Dell PC…hmmmmm).

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In the game of Life…

The other day I saw an old acquaintance from high school at the store and it really weirded me out.  I wanted to catch up and chit chat for a bit, but then I started playing out that conversation in my head. 

Me:  Hey Shaun, how’s it going?
Shaun:  Good, Jon. How about you?
Me:  Very well.  What have you been up to?
Shaun:  Oh, not much.  I have a couple more semesters to go at FJC, still working at the theatres on Birch Street.  How about you?  Still in school?  Working?
Me:  Oh, I got my degree in December.  I’m a Network Analyst for a company that makes Medical Instruments.  Engaged to be married in the Fall…

If I had this conversation, I would be doing the equivalent of waving as I drove my porsche by with the top down past a guy with a broken down civic on the side of the road.  My life is moving almost embarassingly fast.  I don’t feel guilty, or bad about it.  But I do experience some self-consciousness about my situation when I run to people and start doing some catching up.  I mean, how many people, by the time they are 23, have their degree, are married, are full time salaried employees of reputable corporations with a 401k,company stock, a great benefits package.  I would say not too many. 

Now I feel like an ungrateful child.  Here, everything in my life is going…perfect…and I’m whining about mild discomfort.

*sigh*

What are personal blogs for, I guess.

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Grolar Bears?

 

In an article from National Geographic’s website,

‘DNA analysis has confirmed that a bear shot in the Canadian Arctic last month is a half-polar bear, half-grizzly hybrid. While the two bear species have interbred in zoos, this is the first evidence of a wild polar bear-grizzly offspring.

Polar bears and grizzlies require an extended mating ritual to reproduce, Stirling said. Both live by themselves in large, open habitats.

To prevent wasting their eggs, females ovulate only after spending several days with a male, Stirling explained. “Then they mate several times over several days.” ‘

             Hey hey hey!

‘In other words, the mating between the polar bear and grizzly was more than a chance encounter. “That’s what makes it quite interesting,” he added.’
 
             Premeditated interbreeding? Highly irregularMaybe a little Brokeback Tundra going on here.

‘Stirling says the hybrid has no official name, though locals have taken to calling it a “pizzly” and a “grolar bear.” ‘

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Ick - S

This last Wednesday to…today I guess, I’ve been sick.  The cold, it is not fun.  Basically, yesterday and today, I feel alright until about 10pm at night but I have no voice.  I can whisper, I can crack like a 12 year old or I can talk in the Speecy Spicy Sausage voice.  Fun stuff.  So for serious I talk in whisper, for normal I talk in 12 year old and for comedic value I talk in the sultry tones of Heath Ledger.

Speaking of which, I watched Brokeback Mountain last week.  I have a fairly good response to it I think. Basically - the things that are important to me about movies, the criteria for good cinema, are all completely satisfied with the exception of one - Honesty.  I didn’t feel that the film was honest.  The directing, cinematography, writing, plot and acting were phenomenal.  But it didn’t feel to me as if they were in love.  So here I’m going to completely skirt the ‘can gay romance be love’ debate and just stick to my point.  It never seemed to me that their feelings for eachother were love because they were never exclusive, forsaking all others, faithful through and through - in love.  I mean…completely take out the gay issue.  Make it a white male and black female during 1830’s society.  Forbidden to start a life together, the couple sneak off to Brokeback Plantation or something and get it on.  But when they’re not together, their back in their lives, with their families, sleeping around with other people.  The point in the film that really drove that home for me was when Jack and Ennis are are on the mountain for the last time and they get in the argument about Jack going to Mexico.  And Jack’s outburst in response to Ennis’s criticism shows that he was more concerned with getting his desires satisfied than with any kind of relationship with him.  So back to our comparison from 1830 - the black woman has been sneaking off to the north to get some white lovin and get’s called on it and she replies with ‘I just needed the white lovin, but I still love you.’
It just doesn’t jibe with me.

Anyways.  That was my feelings about the film.  If someone asks me whether or not I liked the film, I tell them I thought it was excellent.  If they ask what I thought about the ‘issue’ of the film, I tell them to watch the movie.

In other news, the last bastion has fallen.  My friend Marky has succombed to the call of the WoW.  He went and got it over the weekend and we spent the evening and yesterday getting him to level 12, logged out in Westfall and ready to get moving on the new quests the next time we play.  We all started lowbie alts to play with thim, but that’s 7 different people, 2 more than are allowed in a group, so I guess 2 will be left behind and I’m fine with that being me.   I can’t have an alt for every one of my friends who plays so…guess I just hold out for the day when we’re all 60 and that will be fun.

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