I love taking sixty year old black and white thumb print size photos and restoring to a much larger larger size. That is what I did with this one of my wife (right) and her two siblings in the early 1950s. She was quite a looker even at this young age. Continue reading Antiquity…
Water wheels such as this one found in Waterford Maryland were very much a part of America. They were the power that ignited the industrial revolution and are still around in the form of electrical generation such as the Hoover … Continue reading Water Wheels..
This is a continuation of the post about two distinctive worldveiws so prevalent in our society today. Let me say up front that even with violating my self imposed 500 word limit on posts this will only very lightly touch on the matter of good or evil. Lets pull a couple of quotes from yesterday’s post to concentrate on here. Still, the distinction is real and important — and its implications touch on areas of our cultural life far beyond criminal justice. It helps to explain, for example, the very different ways that Platonic liberals and Pauline conservatives approach sex — with … Continue reading Paul or Plato – Part II…
This is going to be one of those very philosophical posts so fasten your seatbelt. It is this idea of a fundamentally sinful humanity that inspires the harsh, punitive sentences of our criminal justice system — including capital punishment. It also provokes visions of merciless suffering in hell after death. We deserve severe punishment because we are free agents who knowingly choose to do what we ourselves know to be wrong. On the far side of a chasm stands a very different idea of humanity — one elaborated by Socrates and other characters in several Platonic dialogues. It holds that virtue is … Continue reading Paul or Plato??
Not all things creative are visual. Some are simple unsaid words and thoughts. Like most kids I read Huckleberry Finn at an early age. It was not one of my favorite books, I was more into Steinbeck and London at the time. But when we visited Mark Twain’s home in Hannibal Missouri I discovered that his legacy goes way beyond his most popular books. I have come to very much appreciate his words above… Continue reading I Recognize It But…
Originally posted on RedLetterLiving:
What About The Bible… ? (Chapter 2) I know that from all the rhetoric about this topic you are expecting the next word in the title to be “Clear” but actually for me it is “Fuzzy”. I don’t know how many times in my life I have heard the phrase “just study the bible for the answer to your problems. When a child dies from a fall in the bathtub the Christian answer to our total devastation is to “read the Bible”. It is as if we can just randomly open a page and then the… Continue reading I Read The Bible And Everything Became….
I must admit that I do quite a bit of my shopping now on Amazon. I go to the mall on maybe a monthly basis but that is more for the exercise than for shopping. But then again most of the shops in our college town mall are clothing stores and since my total repertoire in that area can be fitted in a two foot space in my closet there is really not much there for me. Things are changing for all us consumers. Netflix is causing a big shift in the video market, Apple tunes and such have taken over … Continue reading Going Out Of Business Sale….
Living in a rural area of Indiana and surrounded by forests the sight of a turkey is a fairly common event. But recently a young herd (or whatever you call a group of turkeys) wandered across our back property. There were … Continue reading A herd of Turkeys…
I see in the headlines that a New Jersey Senator is in trouble for passing out favors to his rich friends. The photo above was taken at the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library a few years ago. President Wilson started out his political career as governor of NJ. It is obvious from this shot that they had similar problems one-hundred years ago. Continue reading What's Old Is New….
In order to assure his victory Netanyahu flatly said there would be no Palestinian State while he was prime minister. Those words just might result in some tough love for US/Israeli relations. Bibi might finally realize that his actions have consequences. The current day Israel was at least partially created by a United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181 back in 1947 which mandated a two state solution for the Palestinian territory. There have been several attempts in recent years for the UN to once again declare a two state solution to the problem but the U.S. has threatened a veto each time … Continue reading Tough Love… The Consequences Of Your Actions…
I must admit that I love Shonda Rhimes and her creative mind! Grey’s Anatomy is probably my all-time favorite show and since I have been around quite a while that is a lot of shows. She shows us the challenges of life that many of us have never faced. I captured the quote above from a recent CNN broadcast talking about the Oscars. I have not watched that awards ceremony in many years but I do get glimpses of it and the meat parade that goes on as the actors enter the theatre are still very prevalent. It seems that those … Continue reading Containers They Carry Their Brains Around In…
The Palestinian problem is the primary driver for so much of what happens in the Middle East. To see a solution taken off the table by Israel is tragic for all the world. Give peace a chance….. Continue reading A Sad Day For The Possibility of Peace In The Middle East…
I started thinking about this post after I saw a PBS Special about Gunner Myrdal entitled “American Denial”. Myrdal was a famous Swedish sociologist that in the 1940s was asked by the Carnegie Foundation to study the “negro problem” in the U.S. He had a long and deep admiration of the United States and particularly the American creeds of equal chance, equal opportunity and equal justice. He spent several years investigating before he published his foundational report. Here is a little from Wiki about the man and his work: Myrdal believed he saw a vicious cycle in which whites oppressed negroes, and … Continue reading The American Creed..
This Land Is Your Land Song by Woody Guthrie This land is your land This land is my land From California to the New York island From the red wood forest to the Gulf Stream waters This land was made … Continue reading This Land Is Your Land…
I’m not sure what this piece of equipment is but I think it is a seeder. Whenever I look at these century old things I now marvel at the American ingenuity that it took to create it. Continue reading American Ingenuity…
What the world needs now is love, sweet love It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of What the world needs now is love, sweet love No, not just for some but for everyone I love the song lyrics above. They give me hope that someday, probably in the very distant future the world will turn to love but we got a long ways to go before that can even remotely become reality. In the interim I am just praying that the world has a little less spite tomorrow than it does today. Spite is such a destructive … Continue reading What The World Needs Now Is a Lot Less Spite….
I’ve heard it said the best way for Washington to create peace in the Middle East is to stop providing U.N. cover for Israel and eliminate the U.S. money that fuels Israel’s defiant behavior (more than $20.5 billion given just during the Obama administration). In effect, it’s Parenting 101: Make Israel responsible for its actions…. Toward the end of his diatribe to the GOP, Bibi offered up a simple remedy:“If Iran wants to be treated like a normal country, let it act like a normal country.”Presumably, that would include following international law. Great plan, Bibi. Heed it. SOURCE: War, War, and More War … Continue reading Parenting 101
I enjoy most historic sites I have visited around the country but I enjoy the ones with the reenactors the most. Most of these folks do it on a voluntary basis just for the fun of doing it. They, especially … Continue reading Ode To The Reenactors
Today is James Madison’s birthday. I have made it clear here on RJsCorner that he is my favorite political figure in history. He was a short and hard-working and modest guy. This country would be very different if he had not lived. Here is a quote of the ten things about him that many probably don’t know. Click on the source below to see the entire article. Madison really was the Father of the Constitution. He arrived 11 days early for the event, presented his Virginia plan of checks and balances as the foundation of the Constitution, and then worked … Continue reading Happy Birthday James Madison..
I have been blogging for about eight months now over at InSearchOfAmerica. It is quite different from this one in that it is dedicated to looking at all the great things about this country that I have discovered throughout my many years. Over there I talk about what is right about America. I continue to be amazed by how great this country is in so many ways. I am now in the process of putting in somewhat detailed travelogues documenting my many trips around this great country. It is fun posting there even if my visit count is only 10% of … Continue reading It's All A Game….
I know jelly fish in the wild is something you don’t want to tangle with but those I encountered in the San Francisco Aquarium were very surreal… Continue reading Surreal..
RJ's Corner - Having My Say 