The Anchoress

Q: Do you really patronize the people you advertise?

A: Those I have any control over (in the right-hand sidebar) yes, I do. I’m about to purchase the excellent-looking C.S. Lewis & Narnia for Dummies from the ad at the top. I have written ad nauseam about the incredibly smooth, rich and completely addictive coffee by the Mystic Monks. I try to take ads on things I am personally interested in or have used and liked, although that is not always, 100% possible. The good news is, I’ve never had someone write me that they were disappointed in anything they’ve purchased through the site, so that makes me happy.

Q: How’d the doctor’s visit go?

A: Heh. We talked more about the price of gasoline and heating oil than my bloodwork. Apparently marine gasoline is even more expensive than auto fuel, and he’s considering keeping the boat mostly in the slip this year. Both the doctor and his clinician were saying they’d be fine with drilling off our coasts, since other countries are, anyway. I concurred. But my numbers are better, thanks.

Q: Ummm…What the…what the hell is this?

A: Awful, isn’t it? It’s called “enlightened liturgy” in some Catholic circles and “Giant Puppet Liturgical Abuse” in others. I’m in the latter camp. Ever notice how all liturgical dance looks the same? Lunge left, lunge right, leap and spin - it’s always the same. Fortunately, it looks like in 10 or 15 years, the Entertain-Me Happy-Fun-Time Mass enthusiasts will have pretty much faded away. My son Buster and a pal watched this with their jaws dropped in abject horror. That’s heartening. And so is this.

Q: The puppets do seem a bit much, and undignified, don’t they?

A: Well…according to Stephen Pinker in The New Republic, Dignity is Stooooopit!. Yes, you read that right, “dignity is stupid.” It’s a long piece; I haven’t finished it myself, but I will. Meanwhile Fr. James Martin, S.J. is pretty unimpressed, and I think a little sad that leftist intellectualism has been reduced to people saying “dignity is stupid” in print and “shut up, shut up, shut up” on the air. Yes…it is very sad. “You’re stupid” and “lalalala I can’t hear you” is sandbox rhetoric, and it permeates discourse throughout the United States in 2008.

Q: Well you’ve got to admit there’s a lot to be angry about in the United States in 2008. 5% Unemployment and 3% inflation! We’re practically in a depression!

A: Uh-huh, take the iPod buds out of your ear or look up from your videogame or blackberry while I remind you that 5.6% Unemployment under Bill Clinton was called “essentially full employment” and while you let Don Surber remind you of the economic catastrophe that was Jimmy Obama Carter:

…in June 1980 when Jimmy Carter was president. Inflation was 14.38 percent that month and unemployment was 7.6%.

If you didn’t live through it, try imagining it. There was a point where mortgages were up to 15%. Meanwhile, as Gateway Pundit relates our April Tax Receipts were at an all-time high, (I blame Bush), the record-low unemployment rate is challenging military recruiters (except for the Marines who met their recruiting goal by 142%) and ummm, people are letting their horses die, because of the terrible economy. And oh, yeah, the Democrats blocked domestic oil development this week. They don’t want to become less dependent on foreign energy. They just want you to drive less, boat less, pay more for goods and basically live kind of a dreary life. But rock concerts, blow-em-up movies and private jets…those things will still be available for the ones who can afford them.

Q: Tsk, you sound bitter, Anchoress.

A: No, I’m not bitter; I’m just tired of the nonsense; I’m tired of elected officials hog-tying America’s potential and capabilities for an unproven climate scam, I’m tired of a house and senate incapable of doing anything beyond spiting each other and obstructing any sort of change or progress on issues from energy, to education to social security to illegal (and legal) immigration. I’m tired of watching the nation simply roll over and accept the argument that the solution to anything is “more government and more bureaucracy” instead of simply rejecting that notion outright. I’m tired of being told that America wants and needs the sort of socialized medicine that is bringing supplemental-insurance purchasing Canadians down to the lower 48, and bringing Britain to her knees, rather than even attempting real-market reform, and I’m tired of not liking any of these candidates for president. It’s been a very long campaign season - it began right after the November ‘06 elections - and it has been dreadfully uninspiring. I want a do-over and all-new candidates, preferably none of whom are professional, career politicians. I know I can’t have it. But it’s what I want. I’m not bitter, but damn, I gotta tell you…I’m not happy, either.

Q: What did you think of Bush’s speech in Israel?

A: Thought it was exactly what he has been saying for the last 7 years. He’s never deviated from his message - the press just hasn’t been letting you hear it. Now that it got out, today, unfiltered, it sure has infuriated the left and the press. What is very interesting to me is how quickly the headlines and stories have moved away from Bush and any full-text, contextual display of the speech to making it all about Obama. Yes…it really is all about the O!

Completely escaping the attention of both the Dems and the press is the fact that Bush mentioned appeasement and they all jumped up and said, “hey, Obama resembles that remark.” Badly, badly played, Dems. McCain, are you watching?

You can get video of the speech (that’s excerpted), and you can get press stories with quotes (again, excerpted), but you have to go to the White House site if you want to read the full text of his excellent speech. That’s subtext, I guess.

Filtering and framing…that’s all the press is about, these days. And it’s working. In a short-attention span Nation, a headline, a sound-bite, a screen crawl - hey, I’m informed!

Meanwhile David Warren asks, Will Israel Survive another 60 years?. That’s the question. Caught between the tensions of post-modern nihilism and religious extremism that is choking Europe and doing its damnedest to tip America, it may come down to this: either Israel and the West survive, or Israel falls and the rest of us tumble, too. Sobering, no?

Q: But, Israel can’t fall! The Jews are the chosen people!

A: I know. But Einstein didn’t think so, and a lot of other folks don’t seem to, either. But then Einstein didn’t know everything, any more than any of us know anything.

Q: But wasn’t Bush mean to talk about Obama that-a-way?

A: Near as I can tell, Bush never mentioned Obama, and he could just as easily have meant James Earl Carter or Nancy Pelosi. The fact that Obama heard “appeasement” and he and the whole Democrat party AND the press started weeping and gnashing their teeth over it speaks volumes - it tells you they know their weak point, and they know the chosen one needs protection. As Glenn Reynolds said, When somebody condemns appeasement, it doesn’t help things to jump up and yell “Hey, he’s talking about me!”

And that’s why Glenn is the best at this game. Sums it all up in 20 words or less.

Obama seems to have a very delicate chin; he falls apart even when the punch isn’t meant for him.

Q: What do you think, close Gitmo? Maybe the bad guys will like us then?

A: Didn’t some guy who was released from Gitmo blow something up last week? I dunno. Rick at Brutally Honest has a day in the life of a Gitmo guard and Patterico has a multi-part post about a psyche nurse who has spent hours and hours with the prisoners. They’d be better able to answer that question than any of us. But closing it won’t make anyone like us. Remember, they hated us way, way back when - long before George W. Bush ever thought of running for president, even though the filters and frames have given you a very different narrative.

Q: You mean (sniff) they won’t love us, even if Barack Obama talks to them nicely?

A: No. I’m sorry. As Tony Blair astutely said after 9/11; “they killed three thousand, had they been able to kill 30,000, they would have.” As they said themselves, around that time, “you love pepsi, we love death.” They didn’t love us when Jimmy Carter talked to them. They didn’t love us when Ronald Reagan did not answer their bombing of our barracks. They didn’t love us when Bush 41 left Iraq before finishing the job (remember, back then, abandoning Iraqi’s was rightly thought a bad thing!), they didn’t love us when Bill Clinton left every attack on our interests, holdings and naval vessels go unanswered throughout the 1990’s, and they won’t love us when the next president is sworn in…they’re just waiting to see if the next president is going to be another strong horse, or another weak one. The last time they perceived a weak horse, we mourned.

When your enemy does not care whether he or his family lives or dies as long as he can kill you…this is a substantial enemy. Nice words won’t do the trick. Unless your nice words are prayers both for your own good and the good of your enemy. Perhaps we should give that a faithful and patient try.