March 1, 2006

The Answer to Loneliness
Billy Graham writes, "Everyone experiences loneliness, but there is a Friend who will never leave us." Read more: http://www.billygraham.org/Dmag_Article.asp?ArticleID=645&BA=494&QR=116

Rebuking the 'Clergy Letter Project'
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/2/242006mc.asp
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I am reading a book by Maria Von Trapp (as in The Sound of Music) and am at the point where she writes about the Nazi's "peaceful" takeover of Austria. Of particular note was her statements that not only did the Germans change Austria's name and banned the playing of Austria's national anthem they immediately changed all the school principals and teachers.

In addition to banning even mentioning Austria, as mention of Christianity or Jesus in the schools were banned by the new enlightened order who told the children their parents were uneducated and to disregard whatever they learned at home on such topics as history, religion and morals.

It reminds me of the current climate in many schools where the argument to parents goes "you can't teach or mention 'X' in school, do it at home" while at the same time telling the students that they are smart and enlightened (with the implication that their parents are not) and to disregard whatever their parents teach at home (some of this is subtle, some isn't).
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Science journals delivering "political science"
Excellent article: http://townhall.com/opinion/columns/Michael%20Fumento/2006/02/23/187678.html

Chocolate Milk better than sports drinks like Gatorade at helping athletes
...A new study shows that plain old chocolate milk may be as good -- or better -- than sports drinks like Gatorade at helping athletes recover from strenuous exercise.

The study, published in the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism, was small in scale; it was partially funded by the dairy industry. But dietitians say the study should help to counter the notion that high-tech, expensive supplements are better than whole foods when it comes to athletic performance. They also note that milk contains key nutrients, such as calcium and vitamin D, in quantities that sports drinks can’t match.

"[Milk] is a sports drink ‘plus,’" Keith Ayoob, EdD, a registered dietitian and associate professor of pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, tells WebMD. "It will supply you with things you need whether or not you’re working out."

...In the study, nine male cyclists rode until their muscles were depleted of energy, then rested four hours and biked again until exhaustion. During the rest period, the cyclists drank low-fat chocolate milk, Gatorade, or Endurox R4. During a second round of exercise, the cyclists who drank the chocolate milk were able to bike about 50% longer than those who drank Endurox, and about as long as those who drank the Gatorade.

The findings suggest that chocolate milk has an optimal ratio of carbohydrates to protein to help refuel tired muscles, researcher Joel M. Stager, PhD, Indiana University kinesiology professor, tells WebMD...
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/02/24/health/webmd/main1342839.shtml

One in 1,000 Know First Amendment
Mar 1 2006- Americans apparently know more about "The Simpsons" than they do about the First Amendment.

Only one in four Americans can name more than one of the five freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment (freedom of speech, religion, press, assembly and petition for redress of grievances.) But more than half can name at least two members of the cartoon family, according to a survey.

The study by the new McCormick Tribune Freedom Museum found that 22 percent of Americans could name all five Simpson family members, compared with just one in 1,000 people who could name all five First Amendment freedoms.

...The survey found more people could name the three "American Idol" judges than identify three First Amendment rights. They were also more likely to remember popular advertising slogans.

It also showed that people misidentified First Amendment rights. About one in five people thought the right to own a pet was protected...
http://townhall.com/news/ap/online/regional/us/D8G2JI106.html

12-year-old Boy Sticks Gum on $1.5M Painting
DETROIT - A 12-year-old visitor to the Detroit Institute of Arts stuck a wad of gum to a $1.5 million painting, leaving a stain the size of a quarter, officials say.

The boy was part of a school group from Holly that visited the museum on Friday, officials say. They say he took a piece of Wrigley's Extra Polar Ice gum out of his mouth and stuck it on Helen Frankenthaler's "The Bay," an abstract painting from 1963.

“...Even though we give very strict guidelines on proper behavior and we hold students to high standards, he is only 12 and I don't think he understood the ramifications of what he did before it happened, but he certainly understands the severity of it now," said Kildee.

(What a crock, I understood the ramifications when I was 12!! Shame on his parents and shame on his school.)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060301/ap_on_fe_st/gummed_up_art

Computer Fact or Fiction?

Feb 23- One thing is true about urban legends (e-mail hoaxes): People love to repeat them. Better yet, they love to e-mail them.

...Did you see the picture of the 4500-pound, man-eating alligator caught in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina? Turns out he's not quite that big, and he's never been on this side of the Atlantic Ocean.

...owning a computer opens the door to a host of myths and tall tales about the care and feeding of your pricey info system. And because a computer can be an expensive, mysterious piece of equipment, many cautious people take some of this maintenance "advice" as fact…

Here's a simple true-false quiz designed to help get to the bottom of common computer misconceptions. Finally, here's some information you can feel good about e-mailing to your friends.
True or false? My PC will start behaving worse than a tired toddler if I don't power it all the way down at night, every night.
True or false? If I spill a drink on my keyboard, it's totaled.
True or false? If I stick a magnet near a floppy disk, it will erase the contents.
True or false? My PC is running slow and I have strange icons in my system tray, therefore I probably have a virus.
True or false? I can't have spyware, because I ran an anti-spyware program and it erased several items.
True or false? There's no way for me to remember all my passwords, so I need to make crib notes on a piece of paper and hide it well.
True or false? If my PC breaks under warranty, my PC company will replace the parts good as new.
True or false? My laptop's batteries will become less effective if I keep recharging them before they're empty.
True or false? I don't need to pay for tech support because my cousin's kid works with computers and helps me out when I have questions.
True or false? I'm ready to give away my old computer after I've deleted all the files.

See answers at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ttpcworld/20060223/tc_techtues_pcworld/124807

Iraqi Mayor Writes Thanks to "Avenging Angels" of America, WashPost Skips Letter

February 28, 2006 - It is not routine for our liberal media to see American troops as "avenging angels" against terror in Iraq. But it's interesting when they ignore Iraqis using those terms. Over at The Corner, Jim Robbins reports:

Mudville Gazette has a great rundown on a good news story from Iraq that the MSM* has chosen to spike. Seems that Najim Abdullah Abid al-Jibouri, the Mayor of the city of Tall Afar, wrote a lengthy thank you letter to the troops of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment for saving his town from the scourge of the terrorists. He writes that the soldiers "are not only courageous men and women, but avenging angels sent by The God Himself to fight the evil of terrorism."

Tall Afar used to be a ghost town run by bad guys; now it is peaceful and prosperous. This letter has been getting wide circulation on military email lists. The Washington Post had the letter but refused to print it. Imagine that!
http://newsbusters.org/node/4210

* MSM= Mainstream Media

CBS Slants Bush Poll No kidding!
February 28, 2006 -In its classic "fair and balanced" tradition, CBS slanted in favor of Democrats its poll that found Bush has a 34 percent approval rating and a 59 percent disapproval rating, an all-time high for a CBS poll.

On the bottom of the PDF version of the poll (page 18) it says how many Democrats versus Republicans were contacted.

"Total Republicans" contacted: 272.
"Total Democrats" contacted: 409.
"Total Independents" contacted: 337.

...The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press has a helpful table in this report (page 13) on what percentage of Americans consider themselves to be Republican or Democrat. It shows that in both 2004 and 2005, 30% said they were Republican compared to 33% who said they were Democrats. The new CBS poll (even after being weighted) had a population of only 28% Republicans to 37% Democrats.

...CBS failed to highlight a key portion of its poll on the Feb. 27 "CBS Evening News." 66 percent of respondents thought the media devoted "too much time" to Cheney's hunting accident.
http://newsbusters.org/node/4211

Great progress in Iraq
http://www.taemag.com/issues/articleid.18977/article_detail.asp

Lottery winners' good luck can go bad fast

Mon Feb 27- ...Steve Granger, 53, of Henderson, N.C., won $900,000 in the West Virginia Lottery in September... At a party recently, Granger heard someone say in an ugly tone, "There go those lottery people," as he and his wife passed by. A man he hardly knew asked him to invest in a gold mine. "I went through a phase where everybody was grabbing me thinking I was going to give them luck," he says.

Within days of winning a $41 million share of a Powerball jackpot in 2001, Patricia and Erwin Wales of Buxton, Maine, were sued by co-workers who claimed to be co-winners. The lawsuit was dropped...

Others have had difficulty with easy money:

William "Bud" Post, who won $16.2 million in the Pennsylvania Lottery in 1988, had a brother who tried to have him killed for the inheritance. Post lost and spent all his winnings. He was living off Social Security when he died in January.

Two years after winning a $31 million Texas Lottery in 1997, Billie Bob Harrell Jr. committed suicide. He had bought cars, real estate, gave money to his family, church and friends. After his death it was not clear whether there was money left for estate taxes.

Victoria Zell, who shared an $11 million Powerball jackpot with her husband in 2001, is serving time in a Minnesota prison, her money gone. Zell was convicted in March 2005 in a drug- and alcohol-induced collision that killed one person and paralyzed another.

Evelyn Adams, who won the New Jersey Lottery twice, in 1985 and 1986, for a total $5.4 million, gambled and gave away all of her money. She was poor by 2001, and living in a trailer...http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20060227/ts_usatoday/lotterywinnersgoodluckcangobadfast

US economy set to roar back

Feb 27- The US economy is set for a strong rebound in the first quarter of 2006, shaking off the hurricane-related weakness of the fourth quarter, a survey of business economists showed.

The survey of the National Association of Business Economists called for the economy to expand at a robust 4.5 percent pace in the current quarter -- the fastest since 2003 ...

..."Our forecasters expect the economy to shake off the effects of last years hurricanes and surging oil price."

The report based on a survey of 53 economists projected the overall pace of growth for 2006 at 3.3 percent.

...The NABE panel expects payroll employment growth of 2.1 million jobs in 2006 and 1.8 million in 2007, which is just enough to keep the unemployment rate steady at current levels (at technically 'full employment' level). http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/02/27/060227165436.9bzctfvz.html

N.Y. Times Praises Bolton's U.N. Human Rights Stand

(This is why W appointed him and why the left screached so much at his appointment)

Feb. 27, 2006- The New York Times has never been a big fan of John Bolton, but the Gray Lady has come out in support of his efforts to shake up the ineffectual U.N. Human Rights Commission.

"When it comes to reforming the disgraceful United Nations Human Rights Commission, America’s ambassador, John Bolton, is right,” the Times declares in an editorial.

"Secretary General Kofi Annan is wrong, and leading international human rights groups have unwisely put their preference for multilateral consensus ahead of their duty to fight for the strongest possible human rights protection.”

...Some of the world’s worst violators of basic human rights have won seats on the Commission and used their position to shield themselves from official criticism. Current members include Sudan, which is carrying out genocide, and Nepal, whose monarch has suspended basic liberties.http://newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/2/27/95413.shtml?s=ic

Iraqi People Continue to Disappoint the Pessimists

February 28, 2006-The Associated Press reported Monday that Sunni Arabs in Iraq are prepared to end their boycott of talks to form a national unity government, thus disappointing yet again those journalists who've been telling us for two years civil war is imminent.

It seemed last Wednesday as if the pessimists might finally be right after terrorists destroyed the Golden Mosque in Samarra, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam. Shia militias attacked more than a dozen Sunni mosques in retaliation. An unprecedented three day curfew was imposed in Baghdad in order to curb sectarian violence in which more than 100 people were killed.

...Both Sunni and Shia religious leaders have called for calm. The Moqtada al Sadr, whose militia was in the forefront of the retaliatory attacks on Sunni mosques, prayed publicly Saturday with the Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars. Thousands of ordinary Sunnis and Shias joined together in half a dozen Iraqi cities to demonstrate for peace.

"We have much more evidence of a strong national unity movement in Iraq," said Iraqi Web logger Haider Ajina of the weekend demonstrations. "This attack was supposed to plunge Iraq into sectarian mayhem and senseless massive killing. This did not happen."

These peaceful demonstrations for peace drew little attention from a news media that is eager to report on a civil war, even if it isn't happening.

"Nearly every Iraq story is inaccurate," wrote Ben Connable, a Marine major stationed in Fallujah, in an email to a friend. "The numbers are inflated, the damage exaggerated, the estimates are misleading, and the predictions are based on pure conjecture, often by people far removed from the problem."

"The Iraqi military and police forces have held together and they are doing their jobs," Maj. Connable said. "In 2004, the Iraqi military and police all but collapsed. The fact that Shia soldiers who make up the vast majority of the troops have stayed at their posts, held back the Shia militiamen, and prevented an increase in violence is remarkable. This should be one of the feature stories on the nightly news, but it barely received mention."

Those danged Iraqis. They continue to disappoint by failing to be disappointing...This is not to say there isn't plenty of sectarian tension. Things could go south fast if negotiations for a national unity government fail. But things could get better if those who attacked the Golden Mosque are caught.

Al Qaida, which is as eager to start a sectarian civil war as the New York Times is to report on it, is the principal suspect.

"The Golden Mosque bombing will turn out to be another major defeat for the terrorists, if for no other reason than it got the two major Shia factions, the Badr and Sadr groups, to stop fighting each other," predicted StrategyPage...
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/Commentary/com-2_28_06_JKE.html

David Bennett <><
http://www.freewill-predestination.com