To sustain a single life is to sustain an entire world

From Salt + Light Blog:

The sudden decision of the Order of Canada Advisory Council to award the its highest distinction to Dr. Henry Morgentaler has put the spotlight once again on Canada’s abortion architect and activist and raised serious questions about the significance and integrity of the “the centerpiece of Canada’s honours system” which “recognizes a lifetime of outstanding achievement, dedication to the community and service to the nation”.

Henry Morgentaler began his crusade for the legalization of abortion in the 1960s. The 1988 Supreme Court decision that bears his name removed all legal barriers to abortion at any stage of pregnancy – since then, nearly two million future citizens have lost their lives to abortion.

Morgentaler, himself a survivor of the Dachau and Auschwitz concentration camps where he fought for his own survival, said that he has performed more than 100,000 abortions. One may wonder if he ever took to heart the teaching of his own Jewish faith that says: “to destroy a single life is to destroy an entire world and to sustain a single life is to sustain an entire world.”

When Canada honors someone who took the Hippocratic oath and has wreaked such hurt, havoc, sorrow and grief, something is wrong with the Canadian government commission that grants medals and a Governor General who, claiming Catholic roots when convenient, shows herself to be spineless, politically correct and without respect for human life. The recent controversy has also shed light on another dark area of Canadian society: that of the membership of government commissions that consist of patronage appointments who advance personal agendas, reward friends, lurk in shadows of “confidentiality” and hide behind structures and institutions. They pass themselves off as “government officials” when in reality they are not elected and do not represent the public.

During my six years as pastor of the Newman Centre Catholic Mission at the University of Toronto, I felt that I was on the front lines of a war zone against life. One of the most difficult aspects of my pastoral ministry at Canada’s largest university was dealing with many young women (and men) who had abortions. The poor and erroneous advice given to young, pregnant women at university-sponsored sex education centres directed them to clinics for “therapeutic abortions” for unplanned pregnancies.

An initial sense of “liberation” from termination of the unwanted pregnancy was almost always accompanied by deep guilt, trauma, anguish, nightmares for months, an inability to be around children, prevailing feelings of unworthiness, failed relationships, and sometimes a later inability to conceive. While much of the attention surrounding abortion is on the woman, I also saw first hand the devastating effects that it has on young men who fathered the children.

Those who experienced abortions and came to us at the Newman Centre were not fanatical Catholics but human beings who made bad choices, and had been deceived, crushed and terribly diminished. The Governor General was not there to console them.

Dr. Morgentaler and his agents and disciples did not have to deal with these individuals. They merely duped them. Our pastoral staff at the Catholic Chaplaincy was and is still there to help pick up the pieces, extend mercy, compassion and forgiveness, and help heal a broken society that suffers each time life is blotted out.

Henry Morgentaler clearly does not deserve to receive the Order of Canada. He debases the medal and those who have received it for heroism and the building up of Canadian society. Over twenty years of successive Canadian governments have been gutless and without courage to repeal the abortion law that bears Morgentaler’s name.

Perhaps the day has come when Canadians of good will who love life will rise up and say: “enough is enough.” The Canadian killing fields that are now found at the gateways of human life in our country must be transformed into sacred and safe places of life, liberty and security of every person.

Fr. Thomas Rosica, C.S.B.,
C.E.O., Salt and Light Catholic Television Network

On the Raptors

Okay, so I've purposely avoided writing about [my beloved] Toronto Raptors - especially during this bleak, uninspiring season - but I see that Ira Winderman of the Miami Sun-Sentinal made a couple of very perceptive comments after last night's Raptor's [painful, as in pulling teeth painful] victory over the [sorely depleted] Heat:

• If ever there was a cautionary tale about the uncertainties of the lottery, it was on display Monday in the form of Raptors center Andrea Bargnani. Imagine if that was your No. 1 overall pick?
• While T.J. Ford could shake free in the offseason, with Toronto to do all it takes to retain Jose Calderon, Ford no longer stands as a coveted commodity. He was outplayed Monday by Chris Quinn, who towered over him.

Documenting Distress

From Dinoscopus:

...the key to the last 500 (or 700) years of the history of mankind has been its apostasy, its slow but steady turning away from God, in particular from his divine Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. This eliminating of the true Messiah has left in men's lives an enormous gap to be filled, a gap unknown before the Incarnation. Hence a variety of false messianisms in modern times.

Communism is an outstanding example. It is the messianism of materialism. For it may be just as materialistic as the bourgeois society it seeks to destroy, even more so; and it certainly has nothing better with which to replace the residual human values of that society. Yet Communists are driven by a quasi-messianic urge to create their horrible new world. It is as though they are saying, "Better no god than your false hypocritical 'God'!" And to the extent that the God of the bourgeoisie is a false god, the Communist messianism rejecting it is not false. In this respect Communists may at least be credited with a messianic dimension. Similarly in the scream of protest of Rock musicians there is something just, however negative their protest proves finally to be.

Now Art, Literature, History, Culture, Music, each of them with a capital letter, are all worshipped as substitute religions by modern devotees who, because they have no present religion, pump up these by-products of true religion in the past to take its place. Hence the Dadaists' refusal of "Art", and their "re-definition" of art. "What is your Art?" they ask. "It is our godless god", say the Art-worshippers. "Your godless god is a urinal!" snorts Dada.

-- Bishop Williamson

why i deleted my twitter account

From gapingvoid:

Olympic Torch in San Francisco

photo by Scott Beale / Laughing Squid

George Patton quotes

From Signal vs. Noise:

A few [General] George Patton quotes:

"A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week."

"Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results."

"If you tell people where to go, but not how to get there, you’ll be amazed at the results."

"If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn’t thinking."

"Prepare for the unknown by studying how others in the past have coped with the unforeseeable and the unpredictable."

"Take calculated risks. That is quite different from being rash."

"The time to take counsel of your fears is before you make an important battle decision. That’s the time to listen to every fear you can imagine! When you have collected all the facts and fears and made your decision, turn off all your fears and go ahead!"

"Watch what people are cynical about, and one can often discover what they lack."

Eric Schmidt on Web 2.0/3.0

England

Type of the West, and glorying in the name
More than in Faith's pure fame!
Oh. trust not crafty fort nor rock renowned
Earned upon hostile ground;
Wielding Trade's master-keys, at thy proud will
To lock or loose its waters, England! trust not still.

Dread thine own power! Since haughty Babel's prime,
High towers have been man's crime.
Since her hoar age, when the huge moat lay bare,
Strongholds have been man's snare.
Thy nest is in the crags; ah, refuge frail!
Mad counsel in its hour, or traitors, will prevail.

He who scanned Sodom for His righteous men
Still spares thee for thy ten;
But, should vain tongues the Bride of Heaven defy,
He will not pass thee by;
For, as earth's kings welcome their spotless guest,
So gives He them by turn, to suffer or be blest.

-- John Henry Cardinal Newman

(from Catholic Church Conservation)

Top 10 Traits of a Rockstar Software Engineer

From Alex Iskold:

1. Loves To Code
2. Gets Things Done
3. Continuously Refactors Code
4. Uses Design Patterns
5. Writes Tests
6. Leverages Existing Code
7. Focuses on Usability
8. Writes Maintainable Code
9. Can Code in any Language
10. Knows Basic Computer Science

Newton on Tact

From Sutter's Mill:

Tact is the knack of making a point without making an enemy.

How to create "interesting, cool, and relevant software"

From raganwald:

The only workable system for generating interesting, cool, and relevant software is well-known. Find a bunch of really smart programmers and point them at a large problem space for which there are actual users, and for which new solutions are unconstrained by old designs.

—Mencius Moldbug, What's Wrong with CS Research

Note the desired outcome: Interesting, cool, and relevant software. Do not become mired in empty debate over the phrase "smart programmers." Instead, ponder the other three preconditions: a large problem space, actual users and most especially no constraints by old designs.

Alan Kay is purported to have said, "A fresh perspective is worth 80 IQ points." You cannot have a fresh perspective when you are encumbered by backwards compatibility.

Meta-level thinking

From Ola Bini:

I have been trying to figure out what characterizes some of the best programmers I know, or know about...

When people try to become better programmers there are generally a few different kinds of advices you can get. The ones that seem prevalent right now is (among others):

• Learn - and understand - Lisp
• More generally, learn a new language that is sufficiently different from your current knowledge
• Work with domain specific languages
• Understand metaprogramming
• Read up on the available data structures (Knuth anyone)?
• Implement a compiler and runtime system for a language

5 Rules for Making Money During a Recession

From The Huffington Post - Ann Handley:

• Don't cut the budget.
• Maintain strong launches.
• Get a little silly.
• Beware the slash and burn.
• You might as well dance.

Dates vs. Quality

From thisDev (Roy Leban):

What's the best way to avoid problems?

• Work at a small company (or in a small group) so you can set your own dates. Large organizations tend to be top down and impose schedules without any idea of what is actually happening.
• When you start out, set the date based on what you hope to accomplish. Or, set the date first, then pick a feature set you can implement in the time available. Or, iterate back and forth. But, whatever you do, don't set them independently of each other. I know this isn't news to anybody reading this blog, but it still seems to get ignored a lot.
• Be willing to cut anything -- anything -- if you have to make your date. Even features that are almost done. You can always ship them later. If you have an immovable force and an irresistible object, the dev team explodes.
• Be willing to change the date if you can't get the quality you want (my wife and I slipped our wedding date because we weren't going to have the quality we wanted on the original date we picked).
• Stay calm. No matter what, you will be dealing with the issue at the end.

They say, on the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog. Similarly, nobody has any idea what you were going to ship or (hopefully) when you were going to ship. They only know what you actually do ship. And, if you don't ship in the first place, it's pretty hard to ship updates.

The Ethics of Elfland

As much as I ever did, more than I ever did, I believe in Liberalism. But there was a rosy time of innocence when I believed in Liberals.

It is quite easy to see why a legend is treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of history. The legend is generally made by a majority of the people in the village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in the village who is mad.

-- G.K. Chesterton (Orthodoxy)

Five Years in Iraq - What's the Problem?

From The Huffington Post:

We know the numbers - 1 trillion dollars, 5 years, 775 detainees in Guantanamo, 935 false statements made by the administration, about 4,000 dead Americans, 30-50,000 wounded soldiers, over 100,000 soldiers with treated and untreated PTSD, almost a million dead Iraqis, 2 million internally displaced Iraqis and up to 3 million Iraqi refugees who have left the country.

But apparently this is not a problem...

...unlike the Jesus we remember this Easter, overcoming death to raise our own moral standards and free us from unproductive and selfish lives - the dead Americans and Iraqis are going to stay dead as permanent testaments to our lack of ethics, our economic barrenness, and our supreme selfishness. One thing is for sure - and maybe the mainstream media actually got it right. You can't blame Bush and Cheney, five years later.

-- Karen Kwiatkowski

12 Essential Rules to Live More Like a Zen Monk

From Zen Habits:

“We have more possibilities available in each moment than we realize.” - Thich Nhat Hanh

1. Do one thing at a time.
2. Do it slowly and deliberately.
3. Do it completely.
4. Do less.
5. Put space between things.
6. Develop rituals.
7. Designate time for certain things.
8. Devote time to sitting.
9. Smile and serve others.
10. Make cleaning and cooking become meditation.
11. Think about what is necessary.
12. Live simply.

White knights [?!]

From Crooked Timber:

Readers used to the natural order of things might be concerned by the implication that with such a giveaway price, the top brass at [Bear Stearns] might be forced to bear the financial consequences of events that were obviously beyond their control. Never fear. According to this Reuters report in the Guardian, while most employees up to junior executive levels will lose both their jobs and the shares they were encouraged to buy, with no “golden parachutes:

JPMorgan Chief Financial Officer Mike Cavanagh late Sunday said taking over Bear would generate about $6 billion in merger-related costs.

JPMorgan has not broken down those figures, but much of that will be earmarked for severance pay and potential exit packages for top executives like Schwartz.

A person familiar with the transaction told Reuters that roughly $1 billion of those costs would be earmarked for severance and retention.

Eternal Memory: Metropolitan Laurus

From ORA ET LABORA:

His Eminence, Metropolitan Laurus of Eastern America and New York, First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, has reposed in the Lord.

From what I have heard, he served the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts on Friday, then felt too ill to perform tonsures later that evening. He was found in his "skete" (his small cell a few hundred yards from the monastery) this morning, having reposed in his sleep.

The Lord chose to receive Vladyka Laurus on the Sunday of Orthodoxy...

Please pray for the soul of the newly-departed servant of God, Metropolitan Laurus.

May his memory be eternal!

Ban All Cars Getting Less Than 35 MPG?

In the midst of rethinking my own Jeep ownership (20/24 mpg US rating for the Liberty - but I doubt I get that much) I came across this commentary/opinion - via Autopia from Wired.com:

The former head of Royal Dutch Shell has gone way out on a limb and urged the European Union to ban all vehicles that get less than 35 mpg, saying it is the only way to significantly address global climate change and force the auto industry to build more efficient vehicles...

Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, who spent his career working for the giant oil company, says an outright ban is needed because so-called "gas-guzzler" taxes do not work - and aren't fair because they let those with the means to pay them skirt responsibility for reducing greenhouse gas emissions...

Moody-Stuart, who is currently chairman of the mining group Anglo American, says he is a great fan of the free market, "but like most things, they have a failing. Without regulation to channel their power, markets will not deliver things which are of no immediate benefit to the individual making his or her choice, even though they may be beneficial to society."

P.S. I just worked out my most recent gas mileage (US gallons): 12.3 mpg. (And that's with spending almost as much time on a tow truck hook as driving.) Groan.