Friday, May 23, 2008
Praying for Ted Kennedy
- While the deep concern of a woman bearing an unwanted child merits consideration and sympathy, it is my personal feeling that the legalization of abortion on demand is not in accordance with the value which our civilization places on human life... Wanted or unwanted, I believe that human life, even at its earliest stages, has certain right which must be recognized - the right to be born, the right to love, the right to grow old.
Labels: America the Beautiful, Politricks, The Catholic Faith, The Culture of Death, The Culture of Life
Requiem Mass for Bishop Paul Tep-im Sotha
Labels: Commies, Royaume du Cambodge, The Catholic Faith
South Korea's New Bioethics Law
Labels: Bioethics, Corea, Law, The Catholic Faith, The Culture of Death
The World Day of Prayer for the Church in China
Labels: The Catholic Faith, The Holy Father, The Middle Kingdom
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Kumamoto's Rota
Labels: Nippon, The Catholic Faith, The Culture of Life
Injecting Babies With Mercury
Rastafahrenheit
It might not be 96° in The Shade just yet here in Pohang, but whenever the mercury rises, the classic by Third World pops in my head. Learn the lovely chorus, and then try singing "33°C in the shade." Sounds pretty stupid, huh? But the thought experiment validates everything I've ever said about the metric system — Metric Madness, Glorious Fahrenheit, The Axis of Anti-Metrication, Metric Tyranny Comes to Korea, Korea Goes Metric, The Return of the Nip, Down with the Metric System! Long Live the English Imperial System!, Metric News, and Dystopias and Metric Measures.
Labels: Anti-Metrication, Reggae, The Caribbean
Down With the Korea National Oil Corporation!
I drive diesel, too, and chose diesel for economic reasons. I have seen the cost of filling my tank jump from less than fifty to more than ninety dollars in less than four years, but never once did it occur to me that the government was in any way responsible for its price, except for making it more expensive with taxes.
I guess Mr. Sung has a point, since it is the Korea National Oil Corporation's iron fist, not Adam Smith's invisible hand, that is manipulates fuel markets here. But how much trust can be placed in an organization that just five months ago assured us that "it will be difficult in the foreseeable future for people to see oil prices beyond $100" — "Is the Era of $100 per Barrel Really Coming?"
Labels: Corea, It's the Stupid Economy, Peak Oil, The Dismal Science
Korean Race Suicide
A year-and-a-half ago, I quoted the pseudonymous Asia Times Online columnist "Spengler," with whom I often disagree, on this theme — Whoredom and Race Suicide. Said he:
- The collapse of traditional society has brought about a collapse of birth rates across cultures. Cultures that fail to reproduce themselves by definition are failed cultures, for the simple reason that they will cease to exist before many generations have passed.
Korean mothers, 80% of whom do not work outside the home, are unwilling to have more than 1.2 children. It gets uglier. Prostitution in South Korea "is big business, accounting for $20 billion, or 4.1 percent of the nation's total gross domestic product in 2002, just behind agriculture at 4.4 percent." It is also one of the country's most rewarded professions (see Room Salon Girls’ Salaries Investigated), and many young ladies forego marriage to reap its financial benefits, thus exacerbating the birth dearth. Again, Spengler:
- Prostitution is a form of psychic suicide; writ large, it is a manifestation of the national death-wish, the hideous recognition that the world no longer requires Ukrainians or Moldovans.
Labels: America the Beautiful, Corea, Demographics is Destiny, Family, The Culture of Death
A Day in the Life of Ahn Myong Chol
Labels: Commies, Family, Norks in the News, Tyranny
Serbian Day in Korea
Labels: Corea, Europe is the Faith
Miss Centenário Brasil-Japão

Parabéns! Congratulations to Senhorita Karina Eiko Nakahara, pictured above — Bancária de Mogi das Cruzes é eleita Miss Centenário Brasil-Japão. She says "tradições japonesas" are part of her daily life. The concourse took place in Ibirapuera, in São Paulo, the heart of Brazil's one million-strong Japanese community. I visited there in 1995 and had some Chinese food, always a safe bet when travelling in a foreign country.
Labels: Diasporas, Food, Las Américas, Nippon, The Fairer Sex
The Peakniks Were Right!
Labels: Agriculture, America the Beautiful, Peak Oil
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
A Korean Western Set in 1930s Manchuria
The above trailer is for The Good, the Bad, and the Weird (2008), to be released this summer. A lover of the genre, I look forward to seeing it.
[link via The Marmot's Hole and Korea Pop Wars]
Labels: Corea, The Middle Kingdom, The Seventh Art
The Smoke of Satan in the Ivory Tower
Labels: Leftism, Miseducation
The Rectification of Political Taxonomy
There are numerous terms in modern political discourse which have lost their meaning, endangering people with the loss of liberty or at least the inability to carry affairs on to success. Among the many terms in need of rectification, two stand out: "liberal" and "conservative." Somehow, social engineering and legislating behavior while raising taxes has come to be thought of as "liberal," whereas foreign wars of aggression waged through amassing debt is "conservative."
These terms regain some meaning by attaching the prefix "left-" to the former and "neo-" to the latter, and the one thing they agree on is that strong centralized power is needed to acheive their objectives. However, a complete rectification of the terms "liberal" and "conservative" is only possible by understanding them in terms of two political philosophies beginning with the prefix "paleo-."
Imagine an America in which Paleolibertarianism and Paleoconservatism were the two mainstream political philosophies in popular currency! Imagine an America in which what we now fancy to be "liberalism" and "conservatism" were relegated to the margins and recognized by most Americans as the dangerous ideologies that they are. Imagine an America in which Ron Paul and Pat Buchanan were representative of the country's two main political factions.
It would be an America in which people would be in no danger of losing their liberty, in which affairs could be carried on to success. It would be an America in which the designation United States would be rectified and recognized as a plural noun followed by the plural verb are not a singular one followed by is.
Labels: America the Beautiful, American History, Leftism, Neoconnerie, Paleoconservatism, Paleolibertarianism, Philosophy, Politics
The Whorification of American Girlhood
Labels: Consumerism, Decline and Fall, Popular Culture, Ugly America
"Lessons on Peacemaking from the Iroquois Confederacy"
Labels: America the Beautiful, American History, Indian America, Peace, War and Rumors of War
A Corporation Even Ralph Nader Could Like
Labels: America the Beautiful, Capitalism, Ralph Nader for President
Iraq Veterans Against the War
- "I was ordered multiple times by commissioned officers and noncommissioned officers to shoot unarmed civilians if their presence made me feel uncomfortable," Sgt. Jason Lemieux told a panel of lawmakers last Thursday in a packed public hearing on Capitol Hill. "These orders were given with the understanding that my immediate chain of command would protect our subordinates from legal repercussions."
- This occupation is unconstitutional and illegal, and I hereby lawfully refuse to participate, as I will surely be a party to war crimes. Furthermore, deployment in support of illegal war violates all of my core values as a human being, but in keeping with those values, I choose to remain in the United States to defend myself from charges brought by the Army if they so wish to pursue them. I refuse to participate in the occupation of Iraq.
Labels: America the Beautiful, Iraq, Militarism, Peace, Ugly America, War and Rumors of War
Nepals Maoist's Get Religion
Labels: Buddhism, Commies, The Subcontinent
A Mother Mourns; a Mother Rejoices

E-quaintance Sunny Lee has penned two first-hand accounts of the destruction of Chengdu, the first from which the above image comes — The smoke means that someone is forever lost and Amid destruction, a new life.
Labels: Disasters, The Middle Kingdom
Time for a Tactical Retreat on Marriage?
Rod Dreher says the decision was a "fait accompli because it is the natural consequence of deep historical forces that have moved through Western civilization for hundreds of years" and says our "quarrel is more with the men of the Enlightenment than with the justices of the California Supreme Court" — The heart of the marriage matter.
"The problem with today’s so-called 'conservatives' is that the rhetoric of democracy no longer serves the cause of faith, family, and traditional values," says Jeff Culbreath, noting that "'[t]he people' have already redefined marriage as a voidable, transitory business contract, for the subjective purposes of sexual pleasure and personal fulfillment, having no intrinsic connection to the begetting and education of children, and without any essential relationship to the health of our civilization and social order" — Democracy and Marriage.
Perhaps it's time to get the State out of the marriage business. Perhaps it's time to secede and form our own communities.
Labels: Decline and Fall, That's So Gay
Los Angeles Locuta Est...
Labels: America the Beautiful, Down Under, Heresy, The Catholic Faith
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Anti-war, Anti-empire, Pro-military
Mr. Bock is right to conclude that "this country is fortunate to have a military with deeply rooted traditions and an abiding sense of honor" and hope for it to "outlast the ignorant and arrogant civilians and theorists who were so instrumental in starting this unfortunate war in which so many honorable people have been killed and maimed."
Urging the "Fox" to speak up on Iran after his principled resignation, Ray McGovern praises him "for honoring the oath we commissioned officers take to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic" but reminds him that the "oath has no expiration date" — Dear Admiral Fallon.
Reminds Rep. Ron Paul, "Our foreign policy of interventionism is not only offensive to others, inviting further terrorist attacks, but it is ruining our economy as we tax, borrow and print the money to pay the bills of our empire" — The Economy: Another Casualty of War.
Labels: America the Beautiful, Decline and Fall, Foreign Policy, It's the Stupid Economy, Militarism, Republic Not Empire, Ron Paul for President, Ugly America, War and Rumors of War
Cell Phones and the Unborn
Labels: Health, Science, Technology, The Culture of Life
Mad Cows or Mass Madness?
- Tens of thousands of young internet-obsessed South Koreans, whipped into a frenzy by alarmist television programmes, a complex scientific paper on genetics and a hyperactive online rumour-mill, have held candlelit vigils protesting against imports of American beef.
Believing that the meat carries a high risk of BSE and that Koreans are genetically predisposed to contracting the linked Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the online masses have taken to the streets, cursing America and demanding that their Government should act to avert catastrophe.
First, the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) has said that it "sees that muscles, the meat itself, are safe whether the cows are under or over 30 months old" — World Body Speaks on U.S. Beef Row for 1st Time.
Second, "GI Korea" links to a report stating there "is no 100-percent assurance that Korean beef, or hanwoo, is completely safe for consumption" and that "Korea has not registered to be classified by the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) on the safety of its cattle against mad cow disease, so we don’t know just how safe our beef really is" — Korean Beef Less Safe then American Beef.
Finally, if all else fails, the classic tactic of diversion always works; the trump card of nationalism, even if raised over an "alleged plan," never fails to rally the masses — Seoul Slams Tokyo Over Dokdo.
Labels: Agriculture, America the Beautiful, Corea, Food, Nippon, Science, The Fourth Estate, The Internet
Post-Peak Conservatism
Labels: Conservatism, Peak Oil
Post-Bush Hegemonism
- The "free trade" elite in the United States, upset by the George W Bush administration's neo-conservative go-it-alone nationalism that disregarded multilateral means of securing influence, wants a "guerrilla assault" to return to the softer empire of corporate globalization. These corporate globalists are now bidding to control the direction of the US's economic policy, and they see the Democrats as their best chance.
Ehsan Ahrari agrees that "for America, that inevitable moment of decline has not yet arrived" — The mythical post-American era.
Labels: It's the Stupid Economy, Novus Ordo Seclorum, Ugly America
Materialist Philosophy Masquerading as Science
Labels: Confucianism, Philosophy, Scientism
Monday, May 19, 2008
The Ron Paul Smear Campaign Heats Up Again
This was not, as the author disingenuously maintains, "a vote merely offering 'condolences and sympathy' to the people of Myanmar." It was, rather, a veiled threat which "criticized Burma's military government for restricting broad international humanitarian support for cyclone victims" — US Lawmakers Urge Burma Military to End Aid Restrictions. Dr. No's sole vote of "no" was a principled stance against interventionist foreign policy. One can understand the Burmese junta's reluctance to let foreign aid workers enter their country keeping in mind these recent calls for war, linked to previously on this blog — The case for invading Myanmar and Is It Time to Invade Burma?
Here's a more recent and even more pathetic attempt by the same author to smear Dr. Paul— Ron Paul, the little guy's champion, turns out to be a millionaire. There may have been a time when assets of "between $2.29 million and $5.3 million" made one an oligarch, but that time is long since passed, largely due to monetary policies strongly opposed by Dr. Paul. And surely the fact that Dr. Paul applied the same frugality in his personal finances that he advocates for the American ecomomy accounts for relative wealth. (Good for him; no politics of envy here.)
In a particularly annoying passage, Mr. Malcolm betrays the reason for the smear bund's resurgence:
- Though a presidential political loser, Paul also has recently published his latest book, "The Revolution: A Manifesto," both a call to arms and a long-term source of income for Paul's struggle to take control of the Republican Party.
The enemy are the fake conservatives and moderates who got the nation into the Iraq war, who support big government and big spending and may well be planning a secret political union with Canada and Mexico using an unbuilt highway across Texas. Don't ask; it's just gospel.
Thanks to Paul's loyal thousands of followers, his new little book zoomed to the top of the Amazon.com bestseller list even before publication.
Now, his new book is also bouncing around among the top 10 on the bestseller list of the New York Times, which is not a libertarian publication.
As for the second paragraph, that neoconservatives are "fake conservatives" is self-evident; neocon Jonah Goldeberg quotes neocon Robert Kagan as saying, "The first thing that could be said about this neoconservative worldview is that there is nothing very conservative about it" — How neo are the neocons? That those who "got the nation into the Iraq war, who support big government and big spending" are an "enemy" is equally self-evident. As for the "secret political union with Canada and Mexico using an unbuilt highway across Texas," read up on Interstate 69 and the North American Union and draw your own conclusions. "Don't ask; it's just gospel." No, ask.
With Dr. Paul's book "at the top of the Amazon.com bestseller list even before publication" and "among the top 10 on the bestseller list of the New York Times," is it any wonder for this renewed attack. After all, for Dr. Paul, it was always about the ideas, not the man, and the ideas of a sane foreign and fiscal policy have the establishment scared.
Labels: America the Beautiful, Burma, Foreign Policy, It's the Stupid Economy, Neoconnerie, Paleoconservatism, Paleolibertarianism, Politricks, Ron Paul for President, The Dismal Science, Ugly America
Victor Jara's Case Closed
Here are two of my favorite songs of his:
Let me quote myself from an almost four-year-old post — Victor Jara:
- Victor Jara was a Chilean communist folk-singer tortured and murdered shotly after the September 11, 1973 coup d'état (Chile's 911) that brought General Agosto Pinochet to power. It is said that the soldiers crushed and burned his hands, gave him a guitar and demanded he play before machine-gunning him to death.
I laid a flower on his niche-grave when I was an exchange student in Santiago. In one of my classes there, I wrote an essay about him, which brought tears to my professor's eyes; she had been a friend of Victor Jara.
His music, regardless of its politics, is absolutely beautiful. It helped me to learn Spanish. Here is a site that offers many of his songs for free, as they are no longer available on commercial releases: Victor Jara rarities in MP3. Start with Te recuerdo Amanda, a song of working-class love.
Labels: Commies, Folk Music, Las Américas
Bolivian Baroque
Some music from the International Festival of Renaissance and American Baroque Music, a.k.a. the Chiquitos Missions Festival:
I've blogged about the region before — "The Last Paradise" and The Former Bolivian Republic of Santa Cruz.
Labels: Early Music, Las Américas, The Catholic Faith
Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris
Labels: Architecture, The Catholic Faith, The Eldest Daughter of the Church
South Korean Massacres
Is the US to blame? Of course not, but the Unites States gets blood on its hands when its imperial underlings perform evil, all the more reason for America to avoid the "foreign entanglements" and "entangling alliances" the Founders warned her about.
Labels: America the Beautiful, American History, Corea, Foreign Policy, Tyranny, Ugly America
Peacenik Pope
Labels: Peace, The Holy Father, War and Rumors of War
Rightwing Peakniks
Labels: Conservatism, Paleoconservatism, Peak Oil
Sichuan Earthquake News
The quake also seems to have damaged State censorship — China allows bloggers, others to spread quake news.
This is what leaders are for — Nation looks to Grandpa Wen for comfort.
The dark side rears its ugly head — "Black-hearted" conmen bid for China quake charity.
Labels: Disasters, The Middle Kingdom
"Unless the Grain of Wheat Shall Die" and "Against the Grain"
Labels: Agriculture, The Catholic Faith
Jimmy Mizen's Funeral
- Jimmy's father Barry, warned against demands for new laws as a reaction to his son's killing. He said: "It does not have to be like this. Perhaps we all need to look to ourselves and look to the values we would like and our responses to situations in our life. Sometimes we might be drawn into certain ways of our living. It is our choice but change has got to come from all of us."
Labels: Family, Law, Passings, The Catholic Faith
Omnes Sancti et Sanctæ Coreæ, orate pro nobis.



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