Bioethics at work (/s)

The reason Stevie Wonder is blind is that he was a premie, and given too much oxygen. This cause overgrowth of retinal blood vessels, which resulted in blindness. about 400 cases are reported each year (and often the docs are sued when this happens: Something that is never part of the discussion). More HERE.

So today, the NYTimes reports on a study where some premies were given lots of oxygen and some given low levels of oxygen.

And (as we have been aware for years) guess what? The death rate was higher in those given less oxygen.

this is supposed to be a valid study, even though the death rate was higher in the low oxygen group of babies.

So why was the study done at all?

contrary to the NYTimes and the NEJM, the definitive study was done in 1980 (maybe they need to do a wikipedia search before they publish.

Studies on rats made this cause seem more likely, but the link was eventually confirmed by a controversial study undertaken by American pediatricians. The study involved two groups of babies. Some ^[20] given the usual oxygen concentrations in their incubators, while the other group had "curtailed" oxygen levels. The latter group was shown to have a lower incidence of the disease. As a result, oxygen levels in incubators were lowered and consequently the epidemic was halted. Each case of ROP avoided by withholding oxygen "may have cost some 16 deaths".^[21]

from:
Silverman, William A. (November 1980). Retrolental fibroplasia: a modern parable. Grune & Stratton. Retrieved 21 September 2013. Chapter 8: "The Consequences of Oxygen Restriction"

So someone sued, and lost because this was "not proven".

“This decision will mean, from a policy and practical point of view, that this kind of research is going to move on,” said Arthur Caplan, head of the division of medical ethics at NYU Langone Medical Center. He said if the judge had agreed to hear the case, “we’d have research slowing down, everyone waiting to see the outcome of a trial before starting projects.”

As for the New England Journal of Medicine authors, “they are a little enthusiastic,” he said, “but they are mainly right because they are breathing a giant sigh of relief that the legal system didn’t find enough to call the Support study researchers to task.”

ah but here is the point:
the article says it was lost on a technicality.

“As the old axiom goes, correlation does not equal causation,” Judge Bowdre wrote. She said the babies’ extreme prematurity “already put them at a very high risk.” The fact that the babies’ injuries “are consistent with” oxygen levels that could have inflicted them “does not show” that those levels caused them. 

 maybe not, but in these days when even small town GP's have pulse oximetry to monitor hypoxia in their patients, one wonders about the details, i.e. if the low oxygen level in the bloodstream was notice in the nursing notes.

Coffee and cocoa and black beverage

The Amerindians did invent cocoa, and there is an argument if it was only used by their aristocracy or if ordinary people used it. Well, maybe in South America, but in North America, caffiene containing beverages were used quite a bit.

WesternDigs reports:

A recent study — the largest of its kind ever conducted — analyzed nearly 200 samples of pottery from Southwestern archaeological sites, ranging from Colorado to Chihuahua and spanning 650 years of human occupation.  The results revealed that more than 20 percent of the ceramics contained traces of either cocoa or a potent concoction known as ‘black drink,’ made from yaupon holly, known to scientists as Ilex vomitoria.

what is most interesting is not that caffiene beverages were used, but that the plants didn't grow there...so this implied an active trade network.

“There are no known plants in the Southwest or Northwestern Mexico that have caffeine,” said Dr. Patricia Crown, an anthropologist at the University of New Mexico who led the study.
“So these caffeinated drinks required acquiring — through exchange or direct acquisition — materials from a distance: Mesoamerica, for either plant, or perhaps the Gulf Coast for the holly.” 

the "black drink" made from a holly type plant is discussed HERE. 

wikipedia article HERE.

more on Yaupon holly HERE.

and during the American Civil war, Yaupon tea was used as a substitute for imported tea or coffee...

Imagine: Catholics want the Pope to be Catholic

via Drudge at the WAPO

Conservative dissent is brewing inside the Vatican.

for "conservative dissent", read Catholics who believe in what the church has always believed and are tired of being pushed around by self styled "reformers" who destroy the mass, taught our kids in Catholic schools that masturbation was normal and not sinful, and who looked the other way when priests schtupped their sons.

theWAPO site won't let me sign in (maybe because I have a foreign connection or won't pay to read them).

But here is GetReligion's take on the matter.

quick summary: Conservatives hate Pope Francis because he is the liberal that we – as in the mainstream press – say he is, even though, dang it, he hasn't actually changed any of the loathsome doctrines that we think are so terrible. But we love this pope's quips, as opposed to his actual sermons and writings, and we'll keep printing those quotes over and over.

Oh, and if your don't like the version of Pope Francis that we're describing, then you oppose this pope. Or words to that effect.

But the key is that conservatives inside the Vatican are planning a revolt of some kind. We know this because some of them are talking about "confusion" in the church, confusion that – this is crucial – has nothing to do with the media's consistent portrayal of the pope as a heroic liberal seeking doctrinal reform, although he hasn't changed any yet. And why does the pope keep urging everyone to go to confession? Doesn't Francis know that no one goes to confession anymore, because that would imply that sin is real?

they say that the Pope is only letting "both sides" argue in the open.

No big thing about that. But the press has decided who are the "good guys" and ignore or demonize those fuddy duddies who are Catholic, while making their average readers think that the church is changing so shut up if you protest.

But there are protests and pushbacks


 Ignatius Press (which is run by faithful Jesuits in the USA) is not only publishing books about what the church understands as being marriage, but has now published a book on how a small coterie of European bishops tried to hijack the Bishops' meeting on the family.




 This too was reported on EWTN which has a nightly news program.

there are a lot of prophecies in both Catholic and Pentecostal circles about how the Catholic Church may schism when the career type bishops (mainly in Europe and some in the USA) would try a takeover of the church to make it the superchurch subservient to the NWO.


Reminds me of the Arian kerfuffle, where the sides argued and several of the emperors of Constantinople took the Arian side... but Athanasius, a "conservative dissenter" opposed him, was perseccuted, and the rest is history. (Athanasius eventually won).

and in the USA, the revolt against the "reformers" who did an Alinsky type takeover of the bishop's bureaucracy and many religious orders started here:

Cyberwar updates

GetReligion post about a HufPo article discussing how American Muslims are fighting against ISIS etc. propaganda on line.

Includes one Somali Muslim from Minneapolis and discusses the ISIS tweet campaign (again see below).

The "I can't believe it's butter" post of the day

Dead Racoon art honors a dead racoon.

#DeadRaccoonTO was resurrected at this year's butter sculpture showcase at the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto.
The dead raccoon, which Torontonians posthumously named Conrad,attracted a sidewalk vigil complete with flowers, a framed photograph and a donation box when its lifeless body lay on a sidewalk for more than 14 hours one July day.

headsup DaveBarry.

PJMedia article on garbage art.

no, they are not cute: They bite and they carry rabies.

Refugees? We don't want the Irish

To read the papers, one would think that the Syrian refugees were the first wave of such refugees since World War II.

Yet Europe (and all those US "anti war" activists of the 1970's who ignored the consequences of their activisim) forget the boat people.

Wikipedia:

The Indochina refugee crisis was the large outflow of people from the former French colonies ofIndochina, comprising the countries of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, after communist governments were established in 1975. Over the next 25 years and out of a total Indochinese population in 1975 of 56 million, more than 3 million people would undertake the dangerous journey to become refugees in other countries of Southeast Asia or China. Hundreds of thousands may have died in their attempt to flee. More than 2.5 million Indochinese were resettled, mostly in North America and Europe. Five hundred thousand were repatriated, either voluntarily or involuntarily.^[1]

and the Pope is asking for Catholics in Europe to welcome them...of course, since Vatican II Catholicism is pretty well dead in Europe, but never mind.

Yet it was churches and charity groups who did work to resettle these Vietnamese refugees in the west

The Roman Catholic Church, given its long history with the Vietnamese people, facilitated the relocation of a large number of Vietnamese boat people through its many Orders and charities. Involved in this work was the work of the Vietnamese Refugee Office of Caritas Italiana, a major Catholic Italian charity, under the leadership of Monsignor Tran Van Hoai.

But in the US it wasn't just the Catholics:  here is an article in People magazine telling ordinary Americans how to help. Lobby and give money to charities are in their list, but then there is this:

This may be the most urgent need. Unlike the earlier relocation effort after the fall of South Vietnam in 1975, agencies now recommend that groups rather than individuals sponsor new arrivals. The reason: If the responsibility is shared, there is less chance of something going awry. Convince your church, fraternal or civic group to become a sponsor. If you are not affiliated with such an organization, create one of your own with friends or neighbors. With the help of proper agencies, you and your group should be prepared at the outset to arrange for housing and jobs and to give advice on health care, language training and schools for the refugee or refugee family.

I remember when refugees were housed in old military bases, such as IndiantownGap, which was no longer an active base but used to train reserve/National Guard at the time.

And I remember how churches "adopted" families to help them in transition as they were resettled.

Thanks to propaganda, ISIS is openly bragging about their murders, but how many know about the "high death rate" in VietNam's "reeducation camps" or that Reagan arranged for the liberation of some prisoners to the USA?

Or that China resettled many ethnic Chinese (300thousand) who fled because they owned businesses and were considered the enemy, or later after the Chinese/Vietnam war made them unwelcome?

another story to remember: Although the local rich Arab states don't want to resettle these refugees, it is not just from selfish motives:( Yes, they are not integrated into these countries, and as a result,  often become "fifth column" infiltrators to terrorism).

One difference is that refugees are more welcome in the USA, despite the no-nothing rhetoric of Trump and his minions.

the Europeans who moan that the US/Canada should accept more ignore the huge influx of Mexicans and Central Americans that Obama is allowing to flow essentially unregulated into the USA.

Yet once this is regulated they will also be assimilated because most Americans are prejudiced, but still are Christians in culture and willing to accept strangers, albeit grudgingly, be they refugees from the Highland cleansing, the Irish potato famine, the kulturekampf, the Nazis, the drug wars of the Americas, or just ordinary folk like most of the Mexicans living in the USA or my husband's family who want to be able to find a decent job and raise their family where they are welcome.

More signs that TEOTWAWKI is nigh

Film about black family and people turning to God makes more money than a Hollywood film about "Rap" artists.

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A follow up on the 43 students killed in Mexico by local cops and finds the Mexican military were involved.
Editorial blames "our" gun and drug "habits" presumably made worse by open smuggling across the border.

 You mean Trump is right: maybe build a decent fence?

Strategypage background on what type of border fence actually works HERE 
and background on Mexico's problems of violence and corruption HERE.

But I shouldn't point fingers: The perpetrators of the Maguindanao massacre are still awaiting trial.

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Ebola Reston is still present in monkeys in breeding farms in the Philippines. But it hasn't made anyone "sick"...

Last outbreak just killed some local pigs and infected some butchers in a nearby city, making them mildly ill but none died.

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and AGGGGHHH! HE's BACK

Call a tub a tub?

Medievalist.com has a list of phrases that originated in the Middle Ages, including this one:

To call a spade a spade

The ancient Greeks had popular proverb for plain speaking: “to call figs figs, and a tub a tub. However, when the scholar Erasmus created his Adagia, a collection of Greek and Latin proverbs, he mistook the Greek word spade for tub. In his version, it was written ‘to call a spade spade’ and it became popular ever since.

Title VII and Holy Fools

So the latest two minute hate on Facebook is against a holy fool who refuses to add her signature of approval of gay marriage in Kentucky.

Imagine daring to hold the same opinion as President Obama (who had this opinion until two years ago).

Never mind. Not my fight (although with the Love nest fence now turning into solid walls, and other open coercion for not approving of the lifestyle, it may soon become my fight).

The only comment that I have put in some of the comment sections on articles discussing this news story was: What about Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Law?

Well, someone finally noticed, and Volokh at the WAPO indeed has a long legal analysis of this.

Under Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act, both public and private employers have a duty to exempt religious employees from generally applicable work rules, so long as this won’t create an “undue hardship,” meaning more than a modest cost, on the employer. If the employees can be accommodated in a way that would let the job still get done without much burden on the employer, coworkers, and customers — for instance by switching the employee’s assignments with another employee or by otherwise slightly changing the job duties — then the employer must accommodate them

yes, that is how I had always understood the law.

But I stand corrected on the actual law

my point so far has been simply to describe the American legal rule as it actually is, and as it has been for over 40 years (since the religious accommodation provisions were enacted in the 1972 amendments to Title VII). 

Those who are hyperventilating that Christians are exaggerating this as if they are victims, forget that those of us who opposed abortion went through these fights in the 1960's and 1970's.

I was "failed" for refusing to cooperate with abortion in medical school (the school backed down since I was a known Catholic. And yes, I would have sued).

 My best friend was not "exempted" because she was Hindu, and so was given the choice to fail her residency (and lose both her green card and ability to support her student husband), so she complied.

But what is interesting is that when the same hospital/medical school tried to force their Muslim residents to do abortions, they refused. Again,  the residency program gave them the same order. And you know what?

Their reply: If you do this, every Muslim in training in OB will resign.

The residency program backed down.

Notice that those saying nay were not Catholic or Christians?

But of course, the "message" had been sent. Because after my bad experience in Medical School I decided I could not get a residency in OB/Gyn.

Oh what about taking a residency in a Catholic hospital? Well, my best friend actually chose a Catholic hospital for that reason...but she spent three months rotation at the University hospital for specialty instructions, and they had power to terminate her in her residency. (No, I don't know if the nuns running the Catholic hospital were aware of the problem)

So yes, a holy fool in Kentucky has gone to jail for a trivial opposition that could easily have been accommodated by the government.

That sends a chilling message, as do all those politicians who wail: IF you can't follow the law, resign.

Oh, you mean you want ethnic cleansing of Catholics/Muslims/Orthodox Jews and Evangelical Christians from government jobs?

Or do you mean we should just follow orders?

Which brings me to this article, in FirstThings: The Ethnic Cleansing of the Medical profession.

Wesley Smith is right: north of the border there is a concerted attempt to erase the conscience rights of doctors, by demanding referrals for the killing of the unborn (who do not need to put in a request) and of the terminally ill (who thus far do) and, for that matter, of any other procedure deemed “medical.”...

Yes, the fight is coming.

And just the idea that we will have to bow to Government fiats instead of taking care of patients.

And you thought Sarah Palin's "Death panels" were paranoid nonsense.

Alpacas

Feeling depressed? Check out these Alpaca photos 

Source: http://justsomething.co/22-hilarious-alpaca-hairstyles/

Headsup Presurfer

Stories below the fold

It is the centennial of the Simarillion. The first stories were written in the trenches of the Somme (although the seed of the fantasies goes earlier to his school days).
If Tolkien's books are proliferating, it is because his son Christopher has edited his father's writings for publication, writes Birzer...

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1984, the Ballet.

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StrategyPage reports that ISIL trolls are using Twitter to spread their message and make people think it is more popular than it actually is.

And they use quadcopter Chinese UAV's, (i.e. drones) which are available commercially for a fairly low price. They are used to spy out the enemy.

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BBC posts ten photos of refugees fleeing war, economic and political tyranny.

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also from the BBC:

Who built the lost tunnels of Liverpool, and why were they built?
and since they were used as a garbage dump, lots of interesting historical artifacts are being found in them.

a couple weeks back, I posted a link and video about sea silk.
BBC now has an article about it HERE.


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AngloSaxon used alliteration for poems, which is why this headline caught my eye: (via Instapundit)

Macroscopic mechanical manipulation/ controls molecular machine array

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Stories from around the world

The saying "say the black do the red" is one of Father Z's sayings, but David Warren points out that the use of the two inks goes back to the ancient Egyptians.

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Father Z reports there is now a LEGO Mass set. for kids to play with.

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Gimodo asks: What disease was behind the Antelope die off in Central Asia? No answers yet.


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a new book by JRRTolkien is being published.  Sounds like a downer, worse than the children of Hurin...

. Tolkien’s Kullervo is the clear ancestor of Túrin Turambar, tragic incestuous hero of The Silmarillion. In addition to it being a powerful story in its own right, The Story of Kullervo – published here for the first time with the author’s drafts, notes and lecture-essays on its source-work, The Kalevala – is a foundation stone in the structure of Tolkien’s invented world.’

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Back to school shopping list...from the Middle Ages.

Number one: a wax tablet to use for notes...because parchment was expensive.

But even here, "scrap paper" is often reused for notes etc...as I was reminded when I asked the bank for an envelope and got a used one.

here is how to make a wax tablet at home.

slate tablets for scribbling notes/math in schools were used up to modern times: I am reminded of Anne of Green Gables, who smashed Gilbert's slate tablet over his head when he called her carrots.

MrsBrewer'sParlor has an article on their use HERE.

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Green lifestyle hint of the day

TiaMaria and I predate clothes driers, and lived back to the days when you hung the laundry in the back yard. So she sent via email these tips for using a clothesline:

Remembering Mom's Clothesline. 
THE BASIC RULES FOR CLOTHESLINES:  (If you don't even know what clotheslines are, better skip this.) 

1. You had to hang the socks by the toes... NOT the top. 
2. You hung pants by the BOTTOM/cuffs... NOT the waistbands. 
3. You had to WASH the clothesline(s) before hanging any clothes -   Walk the entire length of each line with a damp cloth around   the lines. 
4. You had to hang the clothes in a certain order, and always   hang "whites" with "whites," and hang them first. 
5. You NEVER hung a shirt by the shoulders - always by the tail!   What would the neighbors think? 
6. Wash day on a Monday! NEVER hang clothes on the weekend,   Or on Sunday, for Heaven's sake! 
7. Hang the sheets and towels on the OUTSIDE lines so you could   Hide your "unmentionables" in the middle (perverts & busybodies,   y'know!) 
8. It didn't matter if it was sub-zero weather... Clothes   would "freeze-dry." 
9. ALWAYS gather the clothes pins when taking down dry clothes!   Pins left on the lines were "tacky"! 
10. If you were efficient, you would line the clothes up so that  each item did not need two clothes pins, but shared one of the clothes pins with the next washed item. 
11. Clothes off of the line before dinner time, neatly folded in  the clothes basket, and ready to be ironed.  IRONED??!! Well, that's a whole OTHER subject! 
12. Long wooden pole (clothes pole) that was used to push the lotheslines up so that longer items (sheets/pants/etc.)    didn't brush the ground and get dirty. 

 And now a POEM... 

A clothesline was a news forecast,To neighbors passing by,  

There were no secrets you could keep, When clothes were hung to dry. 

It also was a friendly link, For neighbors always knew If company had stopped on by, to spend a night or two. 

For then you'd see the "fancy sheets", And towels upon the line; You'd see the "company table cloths", With intricate designs. 

The line announced a baby's birth, From folks who lived inside, As brand new infant clothes were hung, So carefully with pride! 
The ages of the children could, So readily be known By watching how the sizes changed, You'd know how much they'd grown! 

It also told when illness struck, As extra sheets were hung; Then nightclothes, and a bathrobe too, Haphazardly were strung. It also said, "On vacation now", When lines hung limp and bare. It told, "We're back!" when full lines sagged, With not an inch to spare! 

New folks in town were scorned upon, If wash was dingy and gray, As neighbors carefully raised their brows, And looked the other way. 
But clotheslines now are of the past, For dryers make work much  less. Now what goes on inside a home, Is anybody's guess! 

I really miss that way of life, It was a friendly sign 
When neighbors knew each other best... By what hung on the line. 

Here in the Philippines, the wash is still traditionally done in a tub, wrung out by hand and then hung out.

when we moved here, we had a US style washer, but it broke and since then, we use the local style: which washes and drains but doesn't spin dry. So we have a combo that includes a small spinner for this.

the clothes are traditionally washed and hung up on the roof, so they are not stolen and to catch the breeze to dry faster, but I have seen clothes hung out in the sunny side of the street in our neighborhood...



And here is a "how to wash clothese Filipino style" instruction video:

Gift Item of the Day

via Toxel:

Wake up to the smell of BACON

more about this at an old Wired article.               

but alas, the links to where it is sold have disappeared, so I suspect it is a joke      

more Bacon related products at Toxel HERE.   

yes, they sell bacon here, but locally what is available is lousy...

But you can find it in Manila, and the bacon cheezeburger I shared with Ruby in Manila last week was pure heaven...              

"They're digging at the wrong place!"

From Indiana Jones:

[the old man reveals writing on the back of the medallion, which states that part of the staff must be removed]
Indiana: Balloq's medallion only had writing on one side? You sure about that?
Sallah: Positive!
Indiana: Balloq's staff is too long.
Indiana, Sallah: They're digging in the wrong place!

well, in film 3 of the series, they "found" the Holy Grail in...Petra. (not really Petra, but that was the place where they filmed)

But today's Atlas Obscura has a post about the real place where the Holy Grail is located...
well, not really the Holy Grail, but a replica of the replica...

Tucked high in the Pyrenees, San Juan de la Peña ranks among the most important religious sites in the Aragon region of Spain thanks to centuries of royal pilgrimages, paired with legendary tales linking it with Christianity's most coveted treasure: the Holy Grail. (according to one story)  a Roman soldier acquired what is claimed to be the much sought-after Holy Grail at some point during the 3rd century CE. After transporting this most coveted relic back to his home at Huesca, a Moorish invasion caused the cup to be transferred to San Juan de la Peña where it would be safe from marauders. Little did they anticipate that Aragonese King Martino V would abscond with it to his palace in 1399...

source: Spanisculture 

more information here...

Guilty of being cute

CuteOverload will soon be celebrating it's tenth anniversary of promoting smiles.

Here is post number one:

and no, the site is not limited to cats:

Happy stories below the fold

Forgiving others protects women from depression....

but not men unless the men felt they themselves were forgiven.

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Silk bio-ink might help 3 D printing of organs etc.

The researchers combined silk proteins, which are biocompatible, and glycerol, a non-toxic sugar alcohol commonly found in food and pharmaceutical products. The resulting ink was clear, flexible, stable in water, and didn't require any processing methods, such as high temperatures, that would limit its versatility. The researchers say the novel material could potentially be used in biomedical implants and tissue engineering.

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Canada: Lentil capital of the world.

Canadian writer David Warren relates the immigrant that is behind this.

Canada; or more precisely, Saskatchewan; or more precisely, a certain Murad Al-Katib, is now the major player in the world trade for lentils, chickpeas, various other pulses and beans. Note that definite article.In anno 2001, none of us were growing lentils. (I’m still not.) And yet, then as now, much of Saskatchewan was as close to ideal lentil-growing territory as the planet could offer.

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Family news

So not only does our business compound have a third floor love nest, keeping our maids from washing clothing on the roof, but now there are metal mesh fences and locks to keep us from using our west garden, the laundry, and the tools/ladder that are stored in the garage.

There is a part in the will saying I am allowed to "enjoy" the entire property, but the will hasn't gone to court to become legal, because "there is no money", so I really have no legal rights here...presumably the next step is to insist that I pay the electric bill for this side of the compound.

So someone wants to play games.

But what bothers me is that the smaller white watch dogs are locked in there all night, no food no water...which means no protection for Joy or the granddaughter in the second floor apartment or the office... (Me, I have three dogs: Two of lolo's dogs and George the killer Labrador, all sleeping in the bedroom for protection. No, I don't have my Glock anymore).

Well, the good news is that I still don't think that "thou shalt not take the name of the Lord in vain" hasn't been broken, but the other nine, well, fuhgeddaboudit.

This post is just an update to Chona and family members who read the blog....The few non family members who read this blog can ignore this post.

Reading list: E.T. and Baptism

Right now (on Scribd) I am listening to the book Would You baptize an extraterrestrial..

So far it's great: and as a Catholic one is happy that scientists can explain the faith vs science kerfuffle is mainly a straw man argument used to manipulate the public.
One of the authors gives a talk here.

Stories below the fold

Stocks are tanking....there goes my retirement income.

Ah, but what is the story about South Korea and the Philippines being a bright spot now that China is tanking?

Don't ask me. I'm a doctor, not a banker.

so is the Philippines cracking down on corruption, the problem that discourages investment? Well, the old leftie bishop Cruz notes that the priorities are gay marriage, divorce and abortion. But this is merely kissing the tush of the Obama administration, not a grass roots issue, since 70 percent of the public oppose it despite propaganda here similar to that we saw in the US.

So is the move against the InC church partly to silence it's politically active voice against immorality?

As for corruption: Things are the same as usual: Three reporters killed last week, for pointing fingers at whose fingers are in the till.

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Grace says stop picking on the dentist who killed a lion. No, she doesn't have any "official" status, but like Hillary, she might succeed her husband.

Most of the outrage is astroturfed by animal rights types, of course, and they are pressuring the gov't to arrest all involved.

Zim is in big trouble again with China tanking, but now there is a rumor that a rich Nigerian will invest money there. They have trouble attracting foreign investment because they changed the law so that only locals could own factories/mines etc. The idea was to keep the money inside the country instead of exporting the wealth, but the result was, of course, discouraging people from investing because, hey why invest when you can't make a profit?

Here in the Philippines, a law limiting business and land to citizens is gotten around by businessmen marrying a local girl and putting the investment in her name.

Since China has a shortage of marriageable women, maybe they should encourage their businessmen etc. to stay and marry. Lots of Educated Zimbabwe ladies are available.

Maybe someone should tell Grace.

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what does Confucius have in common with Orwell?

Emphasizing the importance of correct language. Belmont club explains.

The ancient Chinese sage put great store on the use of the right name. Called theRectification of Names, his doctrine asserted that “social disorder can stem from the failure to call things by their proper names, and his solution to this was the rectification of names.” Names, said Confucius, had to convey the truth.
 

If names be not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. … Therefore a superior man considers it necessary that the names he uses may be spoken appropriately, and also that what he speaks may be carried out appropriately. What the superior man requires is just that in his words there may be nothing incorrect.

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The pope will visit the US, and Mom Jones is excited that it might mean Catholics will learn about his ecotheology and obey him and support President Obama's push to destroy the US economy.

from Pathos

As he showed on his July trip to Bolivia in a speech to members of popular movements, he also knows how to bypass the politicians and speak directly to the people, tapping into their desire for change. “He comes as a pope with a vocation to renew politics, leading change from below,” says Ivereigh.

Change from "below"? Bullcrappie.

The powers that be will spin this to try to bully people from above.

If the Pope really wants to talk to the "marginalized", maybe he should start with the middle class, who follow the rules and work hard and try to keep their families intact despite a hostile culture.

If he does try to push this crap, what really might happen will be similar to what happened in South America when the theologians pushed liberation theology or it's pale imitation of socialism in the name of Jesus: A rush of believing Catholics to join their local Pius X church, or if that is not available, the local Assemblies of God, where one can go to church to worship and to learn about the deity instead of being told that recycling and no air-conditioning is the way to go to heaven.

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