Wednesday, February 28, 2007

[conscience] what will it allow you to do

Andrew Walker wrote an excellent piece on Friday, April 14th, 2006 for BBC News and I'd like to present a severely abridged version of it now:

On 9 April 1945, only weeks before the end of the war in Europe, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was executed on the direct orders of Adolf Hitler, already hiding in his bunker. The liberators arrived just 11 days later.

His crime? He helped a group of Jews to escape from Nazi Germany to Switzerland but much worse, in Hitler's eyes, he was also implicated in the July 1944 plot to kill the Nazi leader.

Coming from a well-heeled family in Breslau, Poland, Bonhoeffer was ordained a pastor in 1931 and was controversial from the start, seeking to convert Jews to Christianity. On the coming to power of the Nazis in 1933, the Pretestant Church split and Bonhoeffer and Martin Niemöller created the Confessing Church.

Bonhoeffer gave a radio talk which focused on the difference between a leader ("Führer") and a mis-leader ("Verführer") and was was cut-off in mid-sentence. Clearly, he was now a marked man and the Confessing Church was outlawed in 1937 although he himself became an officer in military intelligence, the Abwehr.

He also became a courier and diplomat to the British government on behalf of the resistance and lived for a time at Ettal, a Benedictine monastery outside Munich, where he worked on his book, Ethics, from 1940 until his arrest in 1943. In Ethics, he wrestles with the essential problem: how can a Christian, essentially a pacifist, justify murder?

His argument can be summarised thus: The demand for responsible action is one that no Christian can ignore. Christians are, therefore, faced with a dilemma: when assaulted by evil, they must oppose it through direct action. They have no other option. Any failure to act is simply to condone evil.

Today Bonhoeffer is honoured at Westminster Abbey in London as one of ten 20th Century martyrs, including Martin Luther King Jr and the murdered Archbishop of San Salvador, Oscar Romero, whose statues now grace the West Front of the famous abbey.

The problem for Bonhoeffer's legacy is that his example is used by everyone from rabid feminists to animal action to justify violence. How do you see the man and his legacy?

[wednesday evening quiz] ten questions about the arts

Who is she?

1
In Botticelli's 'The Birth of Venus', what is Venus standing on?

2 With which other painter would you associate painter Françoise Gilot?

3 Emanuel Radinsky was born in Philadelphia in 1890 and died in Paris in 1976. He was a surrealist painter and photographer. By which name is he better known?

4 In the film "Summer Holiday" with Cliff Richards, where do they drive their bus to?

5 Which Bob Dylan song was written for the film 'Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid'?

6 Which film began with the following narration? "I never knew the old Vienna before the war, with its Strauss music, its glamour and easy charm... Constantinople suited me better."

7 Which of the performing Marx brothers never appeared in any of the films?

8 Who had a 1993 album called 'Diva'?

9 Who composed 'La Mer'?

10 Who holds a trumpet on the Sgt. Pepper album?

Answers here.

[strange day] something in the air perhaps

Very strange day which got better later. From the very first client this morning it was clear the day would be difficult - cold, bitter - a sort of madness creeping into the people's minds. sometimes they'd just cross the road without looking, brains sort of dull.

Visitors to this site were few and I had the feeling it was a similar situation over in Britain. It was a day of impulsive actions and interestingly, the secretary at the ministry had picked up on it and put it down to the magnetic atmosphere outide.

People were very direct, short with one another, if not rude, demanding that this be done, that be done. Then it seemed to ease an hour ago, which is London's 4 p.m. To hell with it, let's have a drink was the decision.

Now - it feels better. I suspect it will pick up later and we'll relax and enjoy the evening but I further suspect that might be the cognac talking.

[house issue] 20,000th unique just now

At 09:22, London time, someone from Lambeth became my 20,000th unique visitor. Leaving aside the fact that someone like Iain Dale gets seven times this number in a month, I'm still very happy to have passed this milestone.

[china coughs] the world catches cold

Chinese youth - quite a few, aren't there?

Are you in the least concerned about this or is it just some boring old financial biz, nothing to do with you and besides, you hardly understand it?

Stock markets around the world plummeted Tuesday in a wave of selling set off by a plunge in China that was reinforced by worries of weakening economies. The falling prices continued in early Asian trading today. Though Shanghai's benchmark index was the first market to tumble, it was not clear what set it off.

But once the selling began, it spread first to other Asian countries, then to Europe and the United States. "It was sort of one of those days where somebody snaps their fingers, and the market's hypnotic trance is over," said Stuart Hoffman, chief economist of PNC Financial.

Does this worry you any? This power of China in the market economy, not to mention Stuart Hoffman's appalling grammar? I mean - what the hell's going on here? Would the former have happened twelve years ago?

[domestic mystery] where did those glasses go

Tell me if this has ever happened to you:

After reading as document, I took my reading glasses off and put them down near the computer, then went and did this and that in the other rooms. Came back to the computer to continue work and they weren't there.

Searched everywhere, in every room, even trying to retrace the steps taken to get to the various rooms. Nothing. Went to the little room to think it out. Came back and same again. Went over by the window and there they were, on top of some books.

Twenty years ago, I went to buy a fish tank and parked the car near the shop. The Honda hatchback had a large rear area and I put my wallet and credit card down in there, cleared space, picked up the wallet but not the credit card and headed for the shop. The hatch was closed.

Panic in the shop, back to the car, everything taken out, including the spare wheel. Nothing. Then I saw the card - sitting on the window tray area near the front passenger seat. On any other occasion I might have accepted that, except this time I knew absolutely I hadn't taken the wallet out, nor the card, until I'd gone to the hatch.

Have you had similar?

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

[garlic] efficacious or not

Monsters and Critics has reported that Stanford University researchers in California have determined eating garlic has little or no effect on lowering LDL, or 'bad' cholesterol, in humans.

One commenter then said:

Funny, I must be one of the exceptions to the proverbial rule ... or we need to investigate who funded the Stanford study. I read about natural cures for common diseases, but was skeptical. A friend told me that she was taking garlic pills for her high cholesterol, and she gave me a bottle. I began to take them, and my blood work showed normal readings. A month or two later, a client told me about Omega-3 fish oils. Today, my cholesterol is fine.

A decent diet, moderate exercise and a garlic and fish oil supplement works just fine. When was the last time a patented drug cured a disease? Answer? Never! Vaccines are typically a weakened form of the virus or bacteria. Penicillin is a naturally occurring mold. They cannot be patented. Garlic is a naturally occurring plant; therefore, it cannot be patented.

See a pattern here? There's no profit in a cure. There's no profit in something that you cannot put a patent on. Drug companies exist to make a profit for their stockholders. Period.

[investigation] conspiracy theory or research

There is a tendency to immediately label anyone who doesn't accept the consensus or the 'given out' view as a conspiracy theorist, aka kook or nutter. It trips so glibly off the tongue of those who have either not looked into a matter or else have an agenda.

Jan. 2, 1979: The U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations supported the Warren panel’s conclusion that Oswald fired the shots that killed Kennedy. However, the committee stated that a second gunman had fired at the motorcade from the grassy knoll — a key factor in its final conclusion that the president “was probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy.”

Jean Hill, Charles Brehm, William Newman, Mary Woodward, Maggie Brown, Jean Newman, Aurelia Lorenzo and John Chism all said they'd heard shots from the grassy knoll. Then there was James Tague who was hit by fragments when a bullet, which had logically come from the Dal-Tex building behind Kennedy, hit the path near Tague.

Now anyone who takes this admissable evidence and follows it to its logical conclusion - is that person a kook? To conclude that there were any number of people who wanted Kennedy out of the way is not even far-fetched in this instance.

But what about a far-fetched explanation? Such as the existence of Manchurian Candidates and Oswald as one of them, as well as Officer Tippett? They certainly existed at the time. Yes, that's a theory but based on three things - the likely scenario on the ground at the time of the assassination plus the established connections between the military and the psychological community. Plus the host of anomalies.

If you're willing to shelve your prejudices for the nonce and travel unfettered wherever the evidence leads you, if you're willing to consider all the evidence, no matter how inconvenient or unpalatable, unlike Sergeant Holcombe, that's hardly conspiracy theory. It's standard investigative technique.

[blogfocus tuesday] something old, something new

Some new blogs and some old this evening. And no, Guido is not in this one:

1 First off, Guano Forks explains why it's not always the better team which wins:

I remember watching Chelsea defeat Liverpool last year. On the day, Liverpool deserved to win. Yet Chelsea won through a sublime goal and Liverpool failed because they lacked even a competent striker. The parallel between politics and football is so evident. The best players, the better play, and the better tactics do not always bring success. The better campaign does not always lead to a win. I’m reminded of the last election when the Tories would have had the beating of the Labour Party if only they’d had a striker who could get the ball into an open goal.

2 Martine Martin writes of that ASBO in the picture with David Cameron:

Jobless, hooked on soft drugs, electronically tagged for burglary, no interest in the workings of the country... Sad. But he's just one of an army of kids failed at every level by the government, by the education system, by his community, and consequently by himself. I do wonder what David Cameron's family must think of this picture. If it was someone related to me, or a friend, I'd be very disturbed by it. How easily it could have been for real considering how many kids are getting shot in London, Nottingham and other cities in this country. Yet I doubt this boy would care even if he knew just how sick the timing of his little prank was. That's the worst part.

3 L'Ombre explains why biometrics are so illogical:

If a biometric is required to verify ones identity then the likelihood is that people and systems responsible for verifying ID will only check the biometric and not look closely at anything else. In other words if you can fake the biometric you are golden. This means that criminals have a large incentive to figure out ways to crack the biometric and since biometrics have so far proven relatively easy to crack, chances are that the crooks will find ways of doing this. So the biometric will merely be the excuse used by the government (or bank or ...) for why they let some fraudster walk off with your savings.

Nine more bloggers here.

[chippie for pm] join us on the bandwagon

Photo courtesy of Iain Dale

Magnificent launch by Iain of the Chippie campaign and I'm right behind it:

Click
HERE for Ann Treneman's hilarious sketch of my little chipmunk's campaign launch. Sadly I had to send my apologies... And there's further analysis HERE from Tim Worstall. here are some highlights ... I come to you straight from Hazel Blears’s launch for Labour’s deputy leadership and my ears are ringing. I don’t think it’s tinnitus. Indeed, I know it’s not. Instead it is a new condition called Hazelitis or, as it is destined to be known, Bleary Ear.

As I stated in Iain's comments section:

Go Chippie! Let's get her in there quick. We need someone of her high moral fibre and intellectual calibre. Not to mention her steadfast loyalty.

Now let's all get on board and get her elected! The very best bloggers are right behind her.