Unca Darrell

NOVEMBER 29 / They practice what they preach

IT'S THE WEEKEND. Have fun with your family. And as you think of ways to celebrate Christmas with a gift to "the least of these," consider supporting Jimmy and Elaine Hamilton of East Stone Gap, Virginia. 

Four times each year for ten years they have traveled with like-minded friends to the poorest country in Europe, Moldova.

Each trip they visit three orphanages (about 360 children) and one institution for physically and mentally handicapped adults (about 350). 

The Hamiltons always provide medical care, leave behind much-needed medicines, and teach the good news of Jesus Christ.

Some trips also include eyeglasses, dental care, or Christmas gifts. The missions also help build relationships between the children and local Christians.

Financial gifts should be directed to the Hamilton Missions at East Stone Gap Baptist Church, Post Office Box 100, East Stone Gap, Virginia 24246.

Contact the Hamiltons directly with your questions or offers to support the mission in other ways -- with prayer, for example, or surplus medical supplies, or by volunteering to go with them to Moldova. 

NOVEMBER 28 / The scary things that judges might do

STUART TAYLOR dismantles the left's position -- and that of the Houston Chronicle -- on the federal lawsuit to restrict the Navy's use of sonar in training exercises.

How would soon-to-be-President Obama like it if his courts were to order the Navy -- his Navy -- to cripple its training in Southern California coastal waters in the use of sonar to detect enemy submarines, and thereby perhaps endanger the Pacific Fleet?

That's what four Democratic-appointed federal judges in California and two liberal Supreme Court justices voted to do in a recent case, to avoid any possibility of harming marine mannals, not one which has suffered a documented injury in 40 years of training off the California coast.

And that's the sort of thing that liberal groups want done by the judges.

NOVEMBER 28 / . . . just couldn't pull it off

The Chronicle tried to write a Thanksgiving editorial, but just couldn't pull it off.

For years, the Chronicle has demeaned the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, and other rites from the calendar of America's civic and religious traditions -- often by silence, other times by hijacking the day to whine about one triviality or another.

Never, ever did the modern Chronicle simply celebrate, happily, noisily, and unselfconsciously, with its readers. That would have gone a long way toward creating a bond between the newspaper and those it purports to serve: "We may have differences on one issue or another, but one this day let's put them aside and celebrate the ideas and values we share."

The problem, of course, is that the Chronicle shows little evidence that it shares any ideas or values with its traditionalist readers.

Still, Thursday's headline and subhead were promising: "Hope in the air: Americans can give thanks for an enduring democracy that keeps faith with its Constitution." 

NOVEMBER 28 / "Well, I don't know if I will beat it"

Q. You've said your Catholicism was helping you deal with your illness.

A. Well, nobody wants to die. I certainly don't. But all Christian faiths, and certainly Catholicism, hold that there's an afterlife, that we are not just dust to dust. And that's comforting, particularly now that I have an illness and there's very little chance I will recover. A priest who visited me told me I've been given a chance to prepare myself. So I began to think about my life and what I've done right and not done right and to prepare myself for the last days. I've found that reassuring.

NOVEMBER 27 / Whereas it is the duty of all nations . . .

WHEREAS it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favour; and Whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint committee, requested me "to recommend to the people of the United States a DAY OF PUBLICK THANKSGIVING and PRAYER, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially in affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness:"

NOW THEREFORE, I do recommend and assign THURSDAY, the TWENTY-SIXTH DAY of NOVEMBER next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering to Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty in which we have been able to establish Constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted; -- for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; -- and, in general, for all the great and various favours which He has been pleased to confer upon us.  

And also, that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions; -- to enable us all, whether in publick or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually; to render our National Government a blessing to all the people by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed; to protect and guide all sovereigns and nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us); and to bless them with good governments, peace, and concord; to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us; and, generally, to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

GIVEN under my hand, at the city of New-York, the third day of October, in the year of our Lord, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine.

/Signed/ G. Washington

NOVEMBER 26 / HOTTEST OCTOBER IN HISTORY! . . . not

NASA's HIGHLY POLITICIZED Goddard Institute for Space Studies first declared October the hottest on record, then -- set straight by more numerate bloggers -- admitted that it had made an accounting error: Some September numbers had inadvertently been carried forward to October.

On further review, then, the touchdown for global warming alarmists was called back and set as the 70th hottest of the past 114 years. Put another way, October -- like the rest of 2008 -- was uncharacteristically cool.

The full story is here and here.

NOVEMBER 26 / The Obama bounce

THE BEST EVIDENCE that uncertainty about the Obama economic team and policies had tanked the stock market came Friday. The day before the Dow Jones closed at 7,552, down a breathtaking 21.5% from election day.

Then came reports that Tim Geithner, head of the New York Federal Reserve, would be named Treasury Secretary and Bill Richardson, governor of New Mexico, would go to Commerce.

NOVEMBER 25 / A word from Round Top

Go here to sign up for the newsletter to get details on the "pie bailout plan" from Royers Round Top Cafe.

NOVEMBER 25 / Updated: Leaning toward unfavorable

ERIC HOLDER's fingerprints are all over President Clinton's shameful last-minute pardon of Marc Rich. The Washington Post stops short of saying this disqualifies Mr. Holder to serve as attorney general, but comes close.

NOVEMBER 25 / Multiculturalism 1, Americanism . . .

LAST FRIDAY  our local editorialists praised the Anti-Defamation League (and, by implication, the Chronicle itself, a cosponsor) for "No Place to Hate," a school program "to encourage civility and build comfort with diversity."

I have no complaints about the program or the editorial. God bless'em.

What's interesting, however, is not what the Chronicle said. What's interesting is that the Chronicle never writes similar editorials, without apology, that promote the history, traditions, and values of the exceptional country and state its readers call home.

Nor does it ever laud more traditional organizations -- church Sunday School programs and the Boy Scouts of America come to mind -- that do more to promote decent behavior by our young people on a single weekend than "No Place to Hate" has done or will ever do.   

At the Chronicle, it's a big thumbs up for multiculturalist "compiling recipes from foreign lands," but echoing silence for traditional patriotism and traditional methods of civilizing our young.