Here’s a thought that won’t be of any help at all.

Due to my remarkable decrepitude, I can remember all the way back to the 1950s (it occurred to me recently that, since I was born in 1950, and 1950 was technically part of the decade of the 1940s, I was actually born in the ’40s. That’s cool. It explains that whole Bogart vibe I give off) and I remember when the culture war was very different.

When I was a kid, there was essentially only one pressure group trying to keep people from smoking. That was evangelical Christians. We considered smoking a sin, second only to the mortal sin of drinking. Or maybe dancing.

If you weren’t around back then, you can judge what I say by looking at old movies. Everybody smoked back then. Mothers smoked while feeding their babies. Waitresses smoked while serving meals. Business offices were as smoky as Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh was as smoky as Vesuvius on a bad day. Considering how dangerous they tell second hand smoke is nowadays, it must be a sign of God’s favor that any Boomers are still alive at all. Continue reading Never mind, then →

What columnists or bloggers do you read for political opinion or insight on the news? Do you read the writing of those you disagree with? I confess I don’t read any columnist regularly. I take in Olasky, Belz, Seu et al with World Magazine, both online and in print. I’ve gone to The American Spectator occasionally for comment on specific pan flashes. But I don’t look to anyone for contrary opinions and turn on NPR once in a blue moon. It would probably serve me well to understand opposing arguments, but I don’t have enough interest in it–at least, I haven’t had enough interest. How about you?

I’m going to be speaking up in Fargo, North Dakota next Saturday. I’ll be giving a PowerPoint presentation to the annual meeting of the Georg Sverdrup Society. G. Sverdrup was a prominent Norwegian Lutheran educator around the turn of the 20th Century. He was the chief intellectual of the Lutheran Free Church movement, a (pretty small) movement to merge Lutheran theology with congregational church government.

Only a small portion of his writings have been translated into English, and a major purpose of our little society is to translate his collected works. I’m editor of the journal, and I’ve been asked to do a talk on the subject, “Problems in Translating Georg Sverdrup.”

I like to use a lot of pictures in my PowerPoints, and here’s one I’m using to illustrate a point I won’t bore you with just now:

Continue reading Hoist up the John B.’s sail →

There seems to be some confusion about who won last night’s presidential debate.

In my capacity as Final Arbiter, I shall clarify.

John McCain won. He won strong.

No need to thank me. Just doing my job.

Mickey McLean at World Magazine reports on a Nebraska state senator whose lawsuit against God was recently thrown out of court.

I think I read elsewhere that the senator wasn’t actually in earnest (Gee, you think?), but was merely attempting to make some kind of point.

What kind, I have no idea.

Nor do I care.

Tonight’s the big night. Tonight I get the chance to see the television broadcast I’ve been waiting for, arguably the most important night of TV this year.

I mean, of course, the return of “Pushing Daisies” on ABC.

I wish somebody with Ned’s life-giving touch could give a massage to the McCain campaign.

Olasky writes: “Not only Sarah Palin is running against The New York Times. So is a new musical that opened on Broadway last month, A Tale of Two Cities.“ I wish I could see that play.