Thursday, January 01, 2009

Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind ?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne ?

For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

And surely you’ll buy your pint cup !
And surely I’ll buy mine !
And we'll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

We two have run about the slopes,
and picked the daisies fine ;
But we’ve wandered many a weary foot,
since auld lang syne.

For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

We two have paddled in the stream,
from morning sun till dine† ;
But seas between us broad have roared
since auld lang syne.

For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

And there’s a hand my trusty friend !
And give us a hand o’ thine !
And we’ll take a right good-will draught,
for auld lang syne.

For an understanding of the lyrics to this song verse by verse and the reason why we traditionally post it at the start of every year, see the thread connected to this thread for details.

May your year be blessed and prosperous!!!

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

I do not have much to say right now except to post a reminder for those who have forgotten about what we wrote in expository form last year on the subject of auld lang syne and its meaning. I will sing those words again at midnight tonight as the year passes into memory and the new one unfolds. It seems fitting therefore to remind readers of what interpretation I put on those words and how I view the significance of the event that will unfold at that time.

In the meantime, I will program this blog to post the customary annual lyric posting of auld lang syne at midnight tonight and wish to all who read this post and there loved ones a happy new year and many blessings in the year about to unfold before us.

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

RNC draft rips Bush's bailouts

Just a taste before we comment...

Republican Party officials say they will try next month to pass a resolution accusing President Bush and congressional Republican leaders of embracing "socialism," underscoring deep dissension within the party at the end of Mr. Bush's administration...

"We can't be a party of small government, free markets and low taxes while supporting bailouts and nationalizing industries, which lead to big government, socialism and high taxes at the expense of individual liberty and freedoms," said Solomon Yue, an Oregon member and co-sponsor of a resolution that criticizes the U.S. government bailouts of the financial and auto industries.

But you can be a small party government by running up the largest deficits in US history under a Republican president and congress??? Sorry guys but I am not convinced since you talk this way when not in power and then act like the Democrats with no concern for Constitutional principles when you are in power with a Republican president. As long as the president is a Democrat you do decently{1} but put a Republican in there and it is disgraceful. Tell me why you can be trusted this time to do things right if you get power back other than because Obama will be president. What happens if he fails to win re-election, then what??? Tell me and others what we can go on to trust you to do the right thing with Republican control of the government when you have no recent history of even decent performance in this area.

Talk is cheap.

Note:

{1} Not great but at least decently: that is my verdict on the 1/1995-1/2001 congresses under President Clinton. The congresses under President Bush from 1/2001-1/2007 were absolutely disgraceful and it makes all this talk about being the party of "small government" as hard to swallow as five star Chinese hot sauce.
Heaven help us! PM panic over country's defences (in 1978)

Of course Britain got Margaret Thatcher as PM not long after that. Let us hope that we will not be saying something similar after four years of the incoming Obama administration.

Sunday, December 28, 2008

On the Palestinians and Israel: 

One nice thing about gmail is it has email and chat archives which (like the archives of this weblog) are very helpful in reminding your host of arguments made, positions taken, or predictions prognosticated upon in years past.{1} With the current response by Israel to Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza, it seemed appropriate to revisit some{2} of our past statements on these matters many of which were not put on this weblog but which will nonetheless help in supplying additional colour to how your host views these matters. 

Oh and though the content of the quotes is the same, I did clean up the spelling and grammar glitches common to the more informal chat forum ones -particularly the really horrendous spelling and grammar in the first quoted source. To differentiate matters a bit, the chat and email sources will be in blue font and the weblog stuff in dark blue. Without further ado... 

[W]e agreed basically that whatever the motivations of the Israeli government was in turning over Gaza (and we know why they did that) that strategically, it was good for one key reason wait a minute...am mixing the story lines..with the Palestinian situation we agreed that whatever the motivations were for turning over Gaza (and it was US pressure as we know) that in the end it will help them have the arguments not to surrender the West Bank or Golan Heights...

[B]asically, they gave over an area with settlements and development with an economic base to some utter cretins who have demolished it thus the Palestinians cannot be trusted to govern themselves as they cannot even run a friccin 711 (except in this country of course lol). [Excerpt from an Email Chat (circa July 20, 2006)] 

And this next one which requires a small clarification; nonetheless... 

Israel gave over Gaza and the Palestinians proved they cannot self-govern hell, the only Palestinians who can run a simple 711 are American immigrants the rest are as useless as forward gears on a French tank. [Excerpt from an Email Chat (circa July 28, 2006)] 

It should be noted for the sake of context that those words were written before the election of Nicolas Sarkozy and a paradigm shift in our approach to France.{3} 

When writing on the Nobel Peace Prize being given to Sen. Al Gore in 2007 and some of the history of the award, criticism of some past recipients, etc, it occasioned these words among others from my keyboard: 

It stands to reason that any noble intention that the late Alfred Nobel had with this award would not always be realized when there is some secret committee doing the awarding. And whatever problems there are with some of the past recipients of the award, they are to some extent explainable. I will now note my problems with some of the recipients in the 107 year history of this award being given out... 

 --Yasser Arafat (1994) 

 Yasser Arafat was a terrorist who never did one substantial thing in his whole miserable existence to advance the cause of the Palestinian people or seek real peace. This made the 1994 awarding a laugher. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa October 16, 2007)] 

The basic principle animating this was outlined earlier this year after one of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's "Israel will soon disappear" comments; ergo I revisit it at this time: 

I do take a very simple approach to the subject of Israel: they would be foolish to play nice with people who wish to see them destroyed. That does not mean progress cannot be made but enemies who vow your death should renounce such views and demonstrate that they take those renunciations seriously or else to hell with them. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa June 3, 2008)] 

And of course the principles enunciated in the above excerpts admit of a variety of applications: 

[There's] nothing I love more than running across this kind of crap from "Internet Mecha" 

[The offspring of the European terrorists who originally stole our ancestral lands are guilty of receiving this stolen property. Receiving stolen property is no less a crime than stealing it.] 

[W]hatever one wants to say about the Mexican American war, the bottom line is, they lost. Besides, the McElhinney Gaza Scholastic Postulate applies here namely: if they cannot run Mexico without screwing it up royally, what makes them think they can handle greater land responsibility? (The postulate formed after Israel gave Gaza to the Palestinians who have fooked it up royally yet still want more territory to run.) [Excerpt from an Email Chat (circa August 21, 2008)] 

I trust by revisiting those comments my view of the recent actions taken by Israel against Gaza is adequately manifested; ergo that is all I will say on the matter for the present time. 

Notes: 

{1} Email and chat archive stuff while valuable as a resource is nonetheless not viewed by us in the same way as weblog archives because we usually only blog on matters when we have arrived at solidity of view on the matter whereas with email and chat correspondence there can be a degree of freewheeling in positions taken, analysis, or (and especially) predictions that we would not take in blogging on a subject matter. 

{2} There are a few others but they have been omitted from inclusion in this posting due to lack of time and the desire to not tangent out too far. 

{3} [P]olitics is the art of the achievable not the art of the perfect and I am satisfied for the time being to cease and desist any derogatory comments about either Sweden or France while I watch to see if things actually improve there as a result of this significant political paradigm shift. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa July 30, 2007)]
2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved

Of course this writer wrote on the fallacy of so-called "global warming" prior to 2008{1} but it does not hurt to remind readers from time to time particularly considering how much the fraud was embraced by not only incoming President Barack Obama but also Senator John McCain{2} in the last presidential election.

Notes:

{1} On the Fraud of "Global Warming" With Greg Mockeridge and Kevin Tierney (circa April 13, 2006)

[I]ndeed readers of this weblog know that we pronounced on the global warming matter some time ago[...] but it does not hurt to remind readers of this considering the magnitude of the confidence trick many are attempting to pull with the so-called "global warming" schtick. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa November 29, 2007)]

{2} On the subject of the environment, McCain gets a B. If not for his stance on global warming which is (at best) an unproven hypothesis, he would get an A. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 26, 2008)]