February 2, 2012
(by David Deming, The Wall Street Journal, WSJ.com) – Most people think personal computing began in 1976 with the introduction of the Apple I. But we had personal computers in 1960. We just couldn’t use them to play videogames or surf the nonexistent Internet. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. We built our computers from kits and programmed them on our own. Instead of entertaining ourselves we developed critical thinking skills.
For Christmas 1960, my brother received a BRAINIAC electric brain construction kit. The Brainiac (brain-imitating almost-automatic computer) kits were conceived, designed and marketed by American computer scientist Edmund Berkeley (1909-1988). For $18.95, the purchaser received a kit containing pieces of Masonite pegboard, flashlight bulbs, nuts and bolts. Instructions included wiring diagrams for constructing a number of primitive computer circuits that could add, subtract, play tick-tack-toe and solve simple problems in logic. An advertisement described the computer as “fun to use and play with, and teaches you something new about electrical computing and reasoning circuits.”
Assembling the Brainiac was a challenge. Once it was built, you weren’t done. The wires on it could be arranged into 170 different circuits. So the Brainiac kit taught problem-solving skills, both in its assembly and execution. If this wasn’t challenging enough, the kit contained Edmund Berkeley’s manual on Boolean Logic. There was little in this pamphlet that I comprehended.
But that was all right. The very existence of the complicated technical materials notified us that there were vast worlds of information and learning to explore. The first task in climbing a mountain is to take note of its existence. In 1960, children were expected to rise up and meet standards set by adults. Self-esteem was something you attained by achievement.
My brother and I also read books. We gained an appreciation for the excitement and promise of science from the adventures of “Tom Swift Jr.” We built our vocabularies by perusing “Doctor Doolittle,” “Freddy the Pig” and the “Tarzan” novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs. We read science fiction by Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke and Ray Bradbury. We developed our powers of mental concentration and analytical thinking skills by learning and playing chess.
We watched television, but no more than a couple of hours a week. Even so, broadcast television in the early 1960s tended to be instructional, not vulgar or degrading. Episodes of the “Andy Griffith Show” contained lessons in morality, and Rod Serling’s “Twilight Zone” stretched our imaginations and intellects.
My brother and I both attended public schools. But our appreciation for education and science were acquired at home. We both went on to become scientists. I’m a geophysicist, and my brother became one of the world’s leading astrophysicists.
A modern personal computer has educational potential, too. But unlike the Brainiac, it is used today almost entirely for entertainment. Videogames have no educational value whatsoever. They are degrading, addictive and stultifying. The promise of the high technology developed by previous generations has largely been squandered.
Placing a book in the hands of a child is infinitely more beneficial than giving them any type of electronic device. Reading is an active intellectual promise that expands children’s intelligence, builds their vocabulary, and increases their command of language and thought. A modern computer is not an educational asset unless its use is closely monitored, restricted and supervised.
And education begins at home. There is little that teachers can do with children who have not been challenged at home but instead have been indulged and entertained with an array of electronic devices.
Education in this country would take a quantum leap forward if parents would take some simple steps: Instead of entertaining your children, set challenging intellectual goals for them. Remove all videogames from your home. Buy books and encourage your children to read them. Discretely allow limited access to educational material on computers and televisions.
If you set high standards, your children will rise to them.
Published February 1, 2012 at The Wall Street Journal. Reprinted here February 2, 2012 for educational purposes only. Visit the website at wsj.com.
January 26, 2012
(by Timothy M. Dolan, The Wall Street Journal, WSJ.com) – Religious freedom is the lifeblood of the American people, the cornerstone of American government. When the Founding Fathers determined that the innate rights of men and women should be enshrined in our Constitution, they so esteemed religious liberty that they made it the first freedom in the Bill of Rights.
In particular, the Founding Fathers fiercely defended the right of conscience. George Washington himself declared: “The conscientious scruples of all men should be treated with great delicacy and tenderness; and it is my wish and desire, that the laws may always be extensively accommodated to them.” James Madison, a key defender of religious freedom and author of the First Amendment, said: “Conscience is the most sacred of all property.”
Scarcely two weeks ago, in its Hosanna-Tabor decision upholding the right of churches to make ministerial hiring decisions, the Supreme Court unanimously and enthusiastically reaffirmed these longstanding and foundational principles of religious freedom. The court made clear that they include the right of religious institutions to control their internal affairs.
Yet the Obama administration has veered in the opposite direction. It has refused to exempt religious institutions that serve the common good—including Catholic schools, charities and hospitals—from its sweeping new health-care mandate that requires employers to purchase contraception, including abortion-producing drugs, and sterilization coverage for their employees.
Last August, when the administration first proposed this nationwide mandate for contraception and sterilization coverage, it also proposed a “religious employer” exemption. But this was so narrow that it would apply only to religious organizations engaged primarily in serving people of the same religion. As Catholic Charities USA’s president, the Rev. Larry Snyder, notes, even Jesus and His disciples would not qualify for the exemption in that case, because they were committed to serve those of other faiths.
Since then, hundreds of religious institutions, and hundreds of thousands of individual citizens, have raised their voices in principled opposition to this requirement that religious institutions and individuals violate their own basic moral teaching in their health plans. Certainly many of these good people and groups were Catholic, but many were Americans of other faiths, or no faith at all, who recognize that their beliefs could be next on the block. They also recognize that the cleverest way for the government to erode the broader principle of religious freedom is to target unpopular beliefs first.
Now we have learned that those loud and strong appeals were ignored. On Friday, the administration reaffirmed the mandate, and offered only a one-year delay in enforcement in some cases—as if we might suddenly be more willing to violate our consciences 12 months from now. As a result, all but a few employers will be forced to purchase coverage for contraception, abortion drugs and sterilization services even when they seriously object to them. All who share the cost of health plans that include such services will be forced to pay for them as well. Surely it violates freedom of religion to force religious ministries and citizens to buy health coverage to which they object as a matter of conscience and religious principle.
The rule forces insurance companies to provide these services without a co-pay, suggesting they are “free”—but it is naïve to believe that. There is no free lunch, and you can be sure there’s no free abortion, sterilization or contraception. There will be a source of funding: you.
Coercing religious ministries and citizens to pay directly for actions that violate their teaching is an unprecedented incursion into freedom of conscience. Organizations fear that this unjust rule will force them to take one horn or the other of an unacceptable dilemma: Stop serving people of all faiths in their ministries—so that they will fall under the narrow exemption—or stop providing health-care coverage to their own employees.
The Catholic Church defends religious liberty, including freedom of conscience, for everyone. The Amish do not carry health insurance. The government respects their principles. Christian Scientists want to heal by prayer alone, and the new health-care reform law respects that. Quakers and others object to killing even in wartime, and the government respects that principle for conscientious objectors. By its decision, the Obama administration has failed to show the same respect for the consciences of Catholics and others who object to treating pregnancy as a disease.
This latest erosion of our first freedom should make all Americans pause. When the government tampers with a freedom so fundamental to the life of our nation, one shudders to think what lies ahead.
Published January 25, 2012 at The Wall Street Journal. Reprinted here January 26, 2012 for educational purposes only. Visit the website at wsj.com.
Timothy Dolan is archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
January 19, 2012
NOTE: The writer of this commentary, Fran Tarkenton, is one of football’s greatest passing quarterbacks, he established lifetime records (all surpassed by Dan Marino in 1995) for most completions (3,686), most yards gained passing (47,003), and most touchdown passes (342) during his career with the Minnesota Vikings (1961-66, 1972-78) and New York Giants (1967-71).
(by Fran Tarkenton, The Wall Street Journal, WSJ.com) – On Sunday [Jan. 8], when Denver Bronco wide receiver Demaryius Thomas caught a pass from Tim Tebow on the first play of overtime and ran it all the way for a game-winning touchdown, the stadium erupted. At once, people cried that it was a miracle, and Mr. Tebow went down to pray on one knee in his signature pose. Millions of viewers already knew the first words he would say whenever a reporter caught up to him for a postgame interview: “First of all, I want to thank my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!”
Tim Tebow is not unique. Even on his own team, there are notably devout players like safety Brian Dawkins. In fact, the NFL has had a number of players who were outspoken in their faith. Think of quarterback Kurt Warner, who famously went from stocking shelves at a grocery store to a pair of league most-valuable-player awards and three Super Bowl appearances. Or Reggie White, one of the greatest defensive linemen of all time, who was also an ordained minister, nicknamed the “Minister of Defense.” The list goes on.
Religion certainly played a role in the game when I played. I grew up the son of a Pentecostal Holiness minister—we were charismatic before charismatic was cool. I was in church Wednesday night, Friday night, Sunday morning and Sunday night—every week of my childhood. I was there at the first-ever national camp for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, in Estes Park, Co., in 1956, along with everyone from legendary NFL quarterback Otto Graham to a young Don Meredith (although fellow quarterback Don and I didn’t make it to many of the meetings). When I went to the NFL, I needed special dispensation from the church to play on Sundays.
As a player, though, I never understood why God would care who won a game between my team and another. It seemed like there were many far more important things going on in the world. There were religious guys on both teams. If God gets credit for the win, does he also take blame for defeat?
For what it’s worth, my forays into hoping for divine intervention didn’t work out. I prayed fervently before each of the three Super Bowls we Minnesota Vikings played in. We played against the Dolphins, the Steelers and the Raiders. I don’t know about the first two games, but I was sure God would be on our side for the game against the Raiders! After all, they were the villains of the league, and it was hard to believe they had more Christians on their team than on our saintly Vikings. We lost.
Faith had a place in every locker room I was in. When I played for the New York Giants, team owner Wellington Mara, a devout Catholic, invited half the priests in New York City into the locker room before games. Sometimes it was hard to find my teammates among all the priests. I’m sure Mara hoped it would somehow help the team win, but it was never enough to get us into the playoffs.
Before every game, no matter what team I was on at the time, the coach would always ask the most devout player to say a prayer. This would happen after we’d already been out warming up—so we’d all seen the crowd, we were in full uniform…, and the intensity of the week had built up to a near frenzy in the locker room.
The prayer was always pretty much for the same thing: Let there not be any injuries, let everybody play a good game—anything except to win the game. No one ever asked to win the game, probably for fear that God would punish us for asking. After this moment of devotion, the team would all shout in unison, “Now let’s go kill those [guys]!”
We often attribute supernatural origins to football success, from Roger Staubach’s 1975 “Hail Mary” pass to Franco Harris’s “Immaculate Reception” in 1972, and we enshrine plays with names like the “Holy Roller” in 1978 and the “Music City Miracle” in 2000.
Although faith has been a part of football so long, a player like Mr. Tebow can still be extremely controversial among fans and pundits. But seriously, isn’t it refreshing that the chatter around the NFL is about a great athlete with great character who says and does all the right things and is a relentless leader for his team—and not about more arrests and bad behavior from our presumptive “heroes”?
Tim Tebow is the story of this football season, and a great story it is.
Mr. Tarkenton, an NFL quarterback from 1961-1978, is the chairman and founder of OneMoreCustomer.com.
Published January 12, 2012 at The Wall Street Journal. Reprinted here January 19, 2012 for educational purposes only. Visit the website at wsj.com.
January 12, 2012
(by Clifford D. May, NationalReview.com) – Iran is not our enemy. The regime that enriches itself while murdering, oppressing, and impoverishing ordinary Iranians; the regime that incites genocide against Israel, threatens its neighbors in the Persian Gulf, and vows to bring about a “world without America” – that is our enemy. This was one of the key points driven home by a trio of extraordinary individuals gathered for a dinner in Tel Aviv last week.
At the table were Bernard Lewis, for my money the greatest living historian of the Middle East; Uri Lubrani, Israel’s envoy to Iran prior to the fall of the Shah and an advisor to leaders of the Jewish state ever since; and Meir Dagan, a retired paratrooper, commando, and general who was recruited in 2002 by then-prime minister Ariel Sharon to rebuild the Mossad as an intelligence agency “with a knife in its teeth.” (Dagan stepped down from that post in 2010 and has been increasingly outspoken ever since.) A small group of young American national-security professionals – from the Hill [Capitol Hill], the Defense Department, Homeland Security, even the D.C. police department – broke pita with them. None of the three minimizes how dire will be the consequences should Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s finger come to rest on a nuclear trigger. The Iranian president subscribes to an extremist school of Shia theology that, General Dagan explained, looks forward to an apocalyptic war that would “hasten the arrival of the Mahdi,” mankind’s ultimate savior. But he thinks Ahmadinejad and his associates are not as close as many analysts believe to acquiring a nuclear capability. “Two years to have such a weapon, in my estimation,” he said.
If that is correct – a big if – it means we have a little time to find out whether tough measures short of military force can be effective. Dagan notes, too, that bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities would not end the regime’s pursuit of nuclear weapons: It will only delay it by perhaps two or three years. The technology, the expertise, and the components are all too readily available. North Korea and Pakistan both have them – and both have proliferated* them before. [*NOTE: Nuclear proliferation is the spread from nation to nation of nuclear technology, including nuclear power plants but especially nuclear weapons.]
The larger point is this: Guns don’t kill people; people kill people. It is the regime that rules Iran, more than weapons or the facilities in which they are produced, that constitutes the real problem. From that it follows that changing the regime – not destroying its hardware – is the higher goal.
Ambassador Lubrani…believes regime change is a realistic goal. Indeed, he is convinced there will be another Iranian revolution and that it can come about sooner rather than later – soon enough rather than too late.
Which raises the question: Based on the analyses of the historian, the diplomat, and the spy, can a coherent strategy be constructed? Can we in the West belatedly learn, as Lubrani put it, to play chess, a game of strategy invented in Iran? I’d argue that such a strategy might begin with six specific policies.
1. Tighten the sanctions noose to maximally increase pressure on the Iranian economy. That must be done carefully: Spooking oil markets and raising the price of oil will put more money, not less, into the regime’s coffers. But sanctions can work if we focus on reducing oil revenues to Iran. European countries should impose an embargo on purchases. Other countries should drive for discounts. The fewer the buyers, the higher the discounts – and the lower Iran’s oil revenue.
2. Isolate the regime diplomatically – for real. Long ago, when Ayatollah Khomeini ordered the execution of a British novelist for “insulting” Islam, or when Iranian officials first talked of wiping Israel off the map, or when, most recently, the British embassy in Tehran was attacked, serious diplomatic isolation should have been imposed: no funding of international agencies manipulated by Iranians, no visits to New York for Ahmadinejad or to Europe for Iranian oil czars, don’t even let Iran’s planes land in at Western airports. Now is the time.
3. Do not underestimate the potential for high-tech, cutting-edge cyber weapons to further delay the Iranian nuclear-development program. The Stuxnet worm, a cyber weapon for which no one has claimed credit, set Iran’s program back by at least a year. The West must maintain an offensive and defensive lead in this critical, new field of warfare. …
4. The threat of force must be credible. Iran’s rulers should lose sleep over the possibility that a military strike – against their nuclear facilities or against them more directly — may be seen by Americans and Israelis as the least bad option.
5. Help Syria break free of Iran. Under Bashar al-Assad, Syria has been Iran’s bridge into the Arab and Sunni worlds. Syria also has been the patron of Hezbollah, Iran’s terrorist foreign legion, and Hamas as well. An incredibly brave Syrian opposition is attempting to bring down the dynasty. The loss of Syria would be a heavy blow to the Tehran regime. America and the West should be doing all they can to support the rebels.
6. Iran’s anti-regime opposition also deserves moral support and material assistance. That should have begun in 2009 when, in the wake of blatantly fraudulent elections, mass protests broke out with demonstrators chanting: “Obama! Are you with us or against us?” Professor Lewis lamented: “We have not done a…thing to help them. It’s a mind-boggling absurdity.”
In addition to all of the above, recognize that this has become the top national-security priority: In what has been misperceived as an “Arab Spring,” the downtrodden masses in Egypt and elsewhere now may be coming to the conclusion that “Islam is the answer.” Iranians, having tested that proposition over decades, know it is the wrong answer. Rule by mullahs has made them less free and poorer than they ever were under the Shah. Lewis, Lubrani, and Dagan agree that these disenchanted Iranians may offer the last, best hope for the Muslim world – and for winding down the global war against the West.
The alternative is to risk the possibility that jihadis with global ambitions and nuclear weapons will make the 21st century history’s bloodiest era. That is the most important point that Lewis, Lubrani, and Dagan are attempting to communicate — at a dinner last week in Tel Aviv and on other occasions.
— Clifford D. May is president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies a policy institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
Originally published January 5, 2012. Reprinted here on January 12, 2012, for educational purposes only. May not be reproduced on other websites without permission from National Review. Visit the website at NationalReview.com.
January 5, 2012
NOTE TO STUDENTS: Before reading the commentary, define the words listed in question #1.
(by Melanie Kirkpatrick, The Wall Street Journal, WSJ.com) – A few minutes after the news of the death of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il flashed across computer screens on Sunday night–Monday morning on the Korean Peninsula–I received an email from a North Korean defector. The man, who is now living in Seoul and is a Christian, was exultant: “God blesses all of us,” he wrote. The defector’s sentiments will be shared by many, especially his long-suffering countrymen.
The best-known aspect of Kim Jong Il’s legacy is a nuclear North Korea. During his rule, which began in 1994 after the death of his father Kim Il Sung, the younger Kim accelerated the nuclear-weapons and ballistic-missile programs initiated by the elder Kim. He went on to proliferate both technologies to Iran, which today would not be on the brink of being a nuclear power if it were not for his assistance.
Kim Jong Il will also be remembered as a master manipulator of the Western powers, especially the U.S. The history of the failed denuclearization agreements says it all. On Pyongyang’s part, it is a history marked by lies, broken promises, and clandestine programs. On the part of the U.S., the history is marked by gullibility and wishful thinking. North Korea’s path to developing nuclear weapons and the missiles to deliver them would have been far more arduous had Bill Clinton and George W. Bush not accepted Kim Jong Il’s promises of future good behavior in return for economic benefits.
The late dictator leaves another legacy too: presiding over the world’s most repressive modern state. Kim Jong Il’s name belongs on the list of the most evil tyrants of our time.
President George W. Bush famously told journalist Bob Woodward, “I loathe Kim Jong Il,” a statement for which he was widely mocked in diplomatic and academic circles. Mr. Bush made this remark in 2002, when the world was just beginning to learn about the horrors of life in North Korea thanks to the testimonies of the few people who had escaped and reached safety in the free South.
In the decade since 2002, there has been a flood of escapees. From these men, women and children we have a glimpse of Kim’s human legacy: a brutalized and starving people, whose access to food is controlled by the state and dependent upon their perceived political reliability; the world’s most corrupt society, where the rule of law is nonexistent; and a gulag-like system of prison camps, where some 200,000 people are incarcerated, often with three generations of their families, for such “crimes” as listening to a foreign radio broadcast, reading a Bible, or disrespecting a portrait of Kim Jong Il or Kim Il Sung. Refugees frequently use the word “hell” to describe their country, and it is impossible to disagree.
Here are just two examples of Kim Jong Il’s reign of terror—one monumental in its impact on human suffering. First is the famine of the mid-to-late 1990s, which killed two million to three million North Koreans. This blood belongs on the hands of the dictator himself, who diverted resources to military programs rather than buy food for his hungry people, and who refused to introduce agricultural reforms that would make possible better and sustainable food production. He was only too willing to let millions of his countrymen die in order to pursue his nuclear ambitions.
The other example has to do with the defection, in 1997, of a high-ranking official, Hwang Jong-yop. Kim Jong Il’s initial response was to round up 3,000 of Hwang’s relatives—including people who had no idea they were related to the defector—and ship them off to the gulag. But his obsession with retribution did not stop at North Korea’s borders. He spent the next 13 years—until Hwang’s death from natural causes in 2010—dispatching a series of assassins to Seoul to attempt to murder him.
Kim’s personal eccentricities were legion [multiple; countless] – the ever-present boiler suit, the bouffant hair style, the elevator shoes. His personal appetites were legion too, akin to those of Nero or other famous hedonists of yore [the past]. In recent years, after his doctor reportedly ordered him to avoid his preferred cognac, he drank only Chateau Margaux, an expensive French Bordeaux. He was a great movie buff whose personal library was said to include thousands of films. In 1978, he arranged to have his favorite South Korean actress kidnapped from a beach in Hong Kong and brought to Pyongyang to star in North Korean movies.
There is one more notable aspect to Kim’s human legacy, and while it would be overly optimistic to make too much of it, it is nevertheless a hopeful one. In recent years, according to testimonies by refugees, more and more North Koreans have started to question Kim’s rule. The discontent doesn’t yet reach the level of organized dissent, but refugees report that there is a growing hatred of the Kim family dynasty. The hatred is more widespread than one would suppose in a state where most sources of information are controlled and where the regime propagates a cult of Kim family worship.
The hatred extends to Kim Jong Il’s son and announced successor, Kim Jong Eun. In recent months Kim Jong Eun is believed to have ordered a vicious crackdown on North Koreans who try to leave the country and on family members they leave behind. Recent roundups of people caught in possession of foreign DVDs, listening to foreign radio broadcasts, or using cell phones that can call outside the country are also laid at his feet.
None of this bodes well for the North Korean people in the near term. It looks like Kim Jong Eun can be counted on to do everything he can to perpetuate [continue] his father’s tyrannical [totalitarian] regime. In this, he will have the support and assistance of the elite ruling class, which benefits from the status quo.
In dealing with the new dictator of North Korea, however, the Western democracies would do well to reconsider the policies that failed to move the now-dead dictator. In this, they should heed the advice of the late Vaclav Havel, the Czech playwright and democrat.
In the last decade of his life, Havel took up the cause of the North Korean people and urged the world’s democracies to make respect for human rights an integral part of any discussions with Pyongyang. He wrote in 2004: “Decisiveness, perseverance and negotiations from a position of strength are the only things that Kim Jong Il and those like him understand.”
These qualities, absent from the West’s dealings with Kim Jong Il, deserve to be paramount in its dealings with his heir.
Ms. Kirkpatrick, a former deputy editor of the Journal’s editorial page, is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. Her book on North Koreans who escape and the people who help them will be published next year.
Published December 20, 2011 at The Wall Street Journal. Reprinted here January 5, 2012 for educational purposes only. Visit the website at wsj.com.
December 29, 2011
(by Anne Applebaum, WaPo.com) – According to its director, the Smithsonian’s Museum of American History needs new plumbing, new wiring and better lighting. So desperately does the building require renovation, in fact, that there is talk of shutting the whole place down for a year or two, of bringing in some fresher architecture, even of designing a “museum for the 21st century.” But while they’re at it, maybe the curators of this hugely popular, hugely prominent museum on the Mall should also spend some time talking about what, precisely, their museum is for.
I realize this is no easy task. Probably best known to generations of Washington children for its large collection of trains, the Museum of American History is the one part of the Smithsonian that justly deserves to be called “the nation’s attic.” It collects everything from first ladies’ gowns to family photo albums to old ballots. It owns, among other things, Helen Keller’s watch, Cesar Chavez’s union jacket, Thomas Edison’s light bulb, and a copy of Elvis Presley’s first album. Its current exhibits explore America’s campaign against the polio epidemic, the first 50 years of Disneyland, the impact of Brown v. Board of Education and the music of Latin pop star Celia Cruz.
Just about the only thing that the Museum of American History does not do, in fact, is teach anyone American history. That is, it doesn’t tell the whole American story, or even chunks of the American story, in chronological order, from Washington to Adams to Jefferson, or from Roosevelt to Truman to Eisenhower. When the museum was built in 1964, this sort of thing probably wasn’t necessary. But judging from a group of teenagers whom I recently heard lapse into silence when asked if they could identify Lewis and Clark, I suspect it’s now very necessary indeed.
Opinion polls bear out my suspicions. According to one poll, more U.S. teenagers can name the Three Stooges than the three branches of government. Even fewer can state the first three words of the Constitution. A San Francisco reporter once did an informal survey of teenagers watching Fourth of July fireworks in a park and found that only half could name the country from which the United States had won its independence. (“Japan or something, China,” said one seventh-grader. “Somewhere out there on the other side of the world.”) We’re not talking about ignorance of semi-obscure facts here: We’re talking about ignorance of basic information.
Given this yawning knowledge gap, the Museum of American History could perform a real service to its 3 million annual visitors just by telling them, in at least one or two permanent exhibitions, something about what actually happened. After all, museum visitors can see Mickey Mouse and his ilk any time. But many visitors, after their once-in-a-lifetime trip to Washington, won’t go to another history museum again. Ever.
I’m sure chronology isn’t the hottest thing in curatorial science these days, but a museum that tells a chronological story doesn’t have to be full of dusty displays and dull captions. The first room of the museum of totalitarianism in Budapest opens with a bank of television sets blaring fascist propaganda on one wall and a bank of television sets blaring communist propaganda on another. Without a single written word, the dilemma of Hungary in the 1940s becomes instantly clear. Apply the same ideas to the American Revolution — use music, pictures and, yes, George Washington’s candlestick — and it’s possible to fascinate even the most video-numbed modern American. Nor are cartoon characters needed to make U.S. history “relevant” either: The language of the American Constitution is the language of the civil rights movement and the language Sen. Barack Obama used in his speech [during the 2008] Democratic convention. An exhibition on the Civil War would naturally include Confederate flags and symbols, which are still the subject of controversy today.
None of which is to say that the museum needs to chuck out Evel Knievel’s motorcycle and Judy Garland’s ruby slippers or (worse) put them in a pompous exhibition called “Postwar Popular Culture.” Why not stick them on the top floor and jumble them together with the “I Like Ike” buttons,” Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone and the first sewing machine. Let visitors wander through the nation’s attic — but with a better understanding of how the nation got to be here in the first place.
Posted at WashingtonPost.com on June 22, 2005. Reprinted here on December 29, 2011 for educational purposes only.
December 22, 2011
(by Charles Stanley, Crosswalk.com) – What difference does it make who Jesus is? He lived 2,000 years ago, so how could that matter today? The truth is, knowing who Jesus is can mold your character, impact your belief system, and change your lifestyle. And more than that, it will determine your eternal destiny.
………..
One of the best ways to understand someone is to find out what he thinks about himself. Jesus said many, many things about who He was – He said that He is the Son of God (Matthew 16:16-17), that He and the Father are one (John 10:30), and that the Father is the One who sent Him. (John 5:37) He also announced that He did not come to be served, but to serve and that He came to give His life as a ransom for many (Matthew 20:28) – He came as a substitute payment in behalf of humanity. He agreed with His accusers when they called Him “King of the Jews.” His “I am” statements from the book of John reveal that He claimed to be the Good Shepherd who loves the sheep (John 10:11), the Bread of Life who can prevent hunger (John 6:48), and the True Vine who abides in us as we abide in Him. (John 15:1)
Jesus also said He was the Door to Heaven (John 10:9), and in John 14:6, He expanded on that thought: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but though Me.” That statement has caused many people to back away, thinking, “What a bigoted, egotistical statement! How narrow-minded to think that the only way to Heaven is through the person of Jesus Christ.” And yet, this man called Jesus is exactly who He says He is. He is the Good Shepherd. He is the Bread of Life. He’s the way, the truth, and the very life itself….
Now, if you believe all the other things Jesus said, but decide He can’t be the only way to Heaven, then you are saying He told partial truths or lies. You can’t have it both ways. Either Jesus is who He says He is, or He is not. So you cannot say, “Jesus is a good man, a wonderful teacher, an effective preacher, a great healer, philosopher, and humanitarian, BUT…” Whenever your belief in Christ’s validity has caveats, you make Him a liar. When it comes to all that He said about Himself, either He is a counterfeit and a fraud, or He is exactly who He says He is – the eternal Son of the living God, the Savior of the world, and the One who will some day judge each one of us.
And of course, to find out who Jesus really is, we have to look at His death. From the biblical accounts, it is obvious this was no ordinary death. His crucifixion was plotted by the religious leaders – the same men who had exaggerated the requirements of the Mosaic law and then coerced the people to obey in minute, burdensome detail. These same men were jealous of Jesus because their position of authority was threatened by His popularity with the crowds. So, in spite of the fact that they enforced the Law with others, these men were so ungodly that they were willing to lay aside one of the most basic principles in Scripture: “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13). They were committed and determined, at all cost, to kill this man Jesus. They felt so threatened by Him that they were totally blinded to the truth of who He was.
The death of Jesus was plotted by those who hated Him. And it was performed by Roman soldiers, a group that had no earthly idea what they were doing. They crucified two thieves, between whom they crucified the living God, clothed in human flesh, the sinless One born of a virgin, who began His ministry in the power of the Holy Spirit. He never harmed anyone. He never rebelled against the government. He never violated the law. It was a death He in no way deserved, and therefore, it looked like a vicious plot and a tragedy. But remember what Jesus said? – that He came to do His father’s will and to give His life as a ransom for many. So why was He dying? Because, together with the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, God the Father had planned His death before the world ever began, knowing that man would sin against Him and be hopeless and helpless to save himself.
On the cross, it was not simply a man dying; it was an…eternal scene in which God the Father placed upon His Son the sin-debt of all mankind, past, present, and future. And then God unleashed the full force of His wrath to punish Jesus – instead of you and me.
There is one more aspect to investigate if we really want to know who the man Jesus Christ is – we have to go beyond His death. That is not possible to do with anyone else, of course, but because Jesus is the Son of God and the living God, He did exactly what He had promised: He rose from the dead. Even His disciples were shocked, though He had told them ahead of time. With His resurrection, Jesus settled once and for all that there is life after death, not just for Himself, but for all who believe on Him. (John 11:25-26) His resurrection also proves that everything He ever said is true.
Jesus said He is coming back. Can we believe that? Yes, because the Bible says so, and also because all the other promises Jesus made that could possibly be fulfilled in His lifetime came to pass exactly as He had said.
Knowing the truth of who Jesus is means you are confronted with a decision: Will you believe the testimony of the Scriptures and receive Him? Or will you turn your back on truth and walk away to face a hopeless eternity? Next time you see a manger scene, remember who’s lying there – His life, His death, His words about Himself, and His resurrection. Jesus is not just a baby; He the Son of God, sitting at the Father’s right hand, with all the sovereign power of the universe, and with the offer of eternal life to anyone who believes on Him.
Posted at Crosswalk.com on July 7, 2006. Reprinted here on December 15, 2011 for educational purposes only.
December 15, 2011
(by Carol Platt Liebau, Townhall.com) – In 2009, The New York Times revealed that, before abandoning the idea, Barack and Michelle Obama had considered eliminating The White House’s traditional nativity scene as part of an effort to celebrate a “non-religious” Christmas. In light of that story, it wasn’t entirely surprising to learn that [in 2009], for the first time, the President’s Christmas card contains neither any mention of Christmas itself nor a quote from the New Testament. Obviously, the Obamas aren’t fans of overt displays of Christian religiosity.
The White House has told Fox News Radio that the card represents nothing but an attempt to recognize that Americans are celebrating other holidays at this time of year – not just Christmas. No doubt that approach is imbued with politically-correct, multicultural sensitivity, but it also, perhaps, reflects a world view that’s out-of-step with most regular Americans – and even America’s heritage.
Even setting aside the overwhelming predominance of Christmas observance in this country, it’s not clear why the elimination of “Christmas” (or any Bible reference) on the Obamas’ card is deemed necessary. How many reasonable Christian people would be upset by the use of “Happy Hannukah” in Israel or “blessed Ramadan” in a majority Muslim country? Would a normal Christian be incensed – even in a majority-Christian country like America – by being wished a “Happy Hannukah” by a Jewish person (or president!) or a “blessed Ramadan” by an observant Muslim one? Let’s hope not. After all, those are benedictions, not curses.
Efforts to promote “season’s greetings” and “happy holidays,” both in The White House and the larger culture, seem to rest on the assumption that “Merry Christmas” will offend those of other faiths, or of none. But is it truly so intolerable to be confronted with the indicia of a religion that is not one’s own? In a country that was founded on the concept of religious tolerance by all and toward all, it’s not clear why this should be the case.
What’s more, why should a religious holiday like Christmas be deemed unique in its potential to offend? In contrast to their apparent reticence to highlight the Christianity inherent in Christmas, the Obamas apparently perceive no insensitivity in celebrating holidays – like St. Patrick’s Day and Cinco de Mayo – that point out specific ethnic differences among Americans. Historically, our country has suffered far more internal turmoil based on race and ethnicity than on religion – and we have a far larger number of different ethnicities than religions. The difference in approach makes no sense.
Ultimately, it doesn’t matter whether a President uses the specific word “Christmas” on a card, as opposed to a Bible verse or some other religious element. What does matter is when the occupant of the highest office in the land attempts to transform the Christmas (or Hannukah or Ramadan) season into nothing more than a great big “happy holidays” opportunity. Intentionally or not, that approach serves to replace religiosity with some variety of civic secularism that swaps belief in God for a diffuse and undefined “holiday spirit.”
And for America, that’s a dangerous path. Religion not only provides meaning to life and illuminates life’s larger truths; it also helps a free people remain free by providing them with ways to govern themselves individually, without having to resort collectively to the heavy hand of government.
So permit me to say what the Obamas’ card does not: Merry Christmas.
Carol Platt Liebau is an attorney, political commentator and guest radio talk show host based near New York.
Posted at Townhall.com on Dec. 14, 2009. Reprinted here Dec. 15, 2011 for educational purposes only.
December 8, 2011
(by Bob Brody, NYDailyNews.com) – As soon as I had a mother-in-law, I had issues with her. For starters, she talked too much. She also talked too loud. Plus, she worried too much, tending to see the world as a problem that defied solution.
Every Thanksgiving at our Queens apartment, all these idiosyncrasies collided with combustible force. I’d like to say that I took them in stride and even found some charming. But that would be a lie. We were never going to get along, my mother-in-law and I — that much I could see from the start. The woman got under my skin more than acupuncture.
Still, I stifled my annoyance over my lot in life as her hostage, simmering instead. I never aimed a cross word at her, nor raised my voice to her, nor gave her anything like a dirty look. I bit my tongue and treated her with kid gloves. So it went for 23 years.
Then, in 1998, something strange and surprising happened. She suddenly stopped getting on my nerves — without acting any differently. I, in turn, tried harder to make her happy. After so long avoiding conversations, I started to talk with her. I asked about her life, listening as she reminisced. I took her for long drives. I treated her to dinner at the restaurant of her choice every Sunday at around 5. We actually enjoyed our next Thanksgiving together.
The following spring, at the age of 78, she went into the hospital for open-heart surgery. She suffered complications and lapsed into a coma, no longer able to talk. And on a sweltering June day, just as I had started to get the hang of getting along with her, she died.
Her name, by the way, was Antoinette. Antoinette Chirichella of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. But everyone knew her as Nettie. A handsome, olive-skinned woman, usually dressed in a sleeveless house dress. Warm brown eyes, a noble Neapolitan nose, graying hair frizzed high and a smile almost saintly.
Why my abrupt, late change of heart? Maybe Nettie grew on me. Maybe I simply grew up. Maybe it dawned on me that even though she might never change, I certainly could.
Maybe Nettie talked so much because she grew up with three siblings and had to compete for attention at the dinner table. Maybe she had to be loud because only then could her sister seamstresses hear her over the clatter of sewing machines as she slaved in a factory for 47 years.
Maybe, in those last months, I finally recognized how much I owed her. She had raised her daughter – without a husband, on a pittance – and then took care of our two children, too, while my wife and I worked. Nothing was ever easy for her, yet she never gave us an ounce less than her all. Nettie never second-guessed me, never questioned my bad decisions or came down on me when I got fired from my first job; never stopped believing in me even when I almost stopped believing in myself.
So I made amends with an act of apology long overdue. It was as if, toward the end, I had somehow sensed she might be around only a little longer and should make the best of the few moments we had left together.
Nettie has been gone for 12 years now, and I would give most anything to get her back, even if only for an hour, just to keep my apology going. I would love to see her just once more with her grandchildren, both grown so smart, beautiful and talented. We keep her cane on display in our living room, leaning against a dresser, as if to lend our family her support through eternity.
If I ever forget how to feel grateful on Thanksgiving, she’s all the reminder I need.
Brody, an executive and essayist in Forest Hills, Queens, blogs at letterstomykids.org.
Posted at NYDailyNews.com on November 24, 2011. Reprinted here on December 8, 2011 for educational purposes only.
December 1, 2011
(by Walter E. Williams, Townhall.com) – Thomas Edison invented the incandescent bulb, the phonograph, the DC motor and other items in everyday use and became wealthy by doing so. Thomas Watson founded IBM and became rich through his company’s contribution to the computation revolution. Lloyd Conover, while in the employ of Pfizer, created the antibiotic tetracycline. Though Edison, Watson, Conover and Pfizer became wealthy, whatever wealth they received pales in comparison with the extraordinary benefits received by ordinary people. Billions of people benefited from safe and efficient lighting. Billions more were the ultimate beneficiaries of the computer, and untold billions benefited from healthier lives gained from access to tetracycline.
President Barack Obama, in stoking up class warfare, said, “I do think at a certain point you’ve made enough money.” This is lunacy. Andrew Carnegie’s steel empire produced the raw materials that built the physical infrastructure of the United States. Bill Gates co-founded Microsoft and produced software products that aided the computer revolution. But Carnegie had amassed quite a fortune long before he built Carnegie Steel Co., and Gates had quite a fortune by 1990. Had they the mind of our president, we would have lost much of their contributions, because they had already “made enough money.”
Class warfare thrives on ignorance about the sources of income. Listening to some of the talk about income differences, one would think that there’s a pile of money meant to be shared equally among Americans. Rich people got to the pile first and greedily took an unfair share. Justice requires that they “give back.” Or, some people talk about unequal income distribution as if there were a dealer of dollars. The reason some people have millions or billions of dollars while others have very few is the dollar dealer is a racist, sexist, a multinationalist or just plain mean. Economic justice requires a re-dealing of the dollars, income redistribution or spreading the wealth, where the ill-gotten gains of the few are returned to their rightful owners.
In a free society, for the most part, people with high incomes have demonstrated extraordinary ability to produce valuable services for — and therefore please — their fellow man. People voluntarily took money out of their pockets to purchase the products of Gates, Pfizer or IBM. High incomes reflect the democracy of the marketplace. The reason Gates is very wealthy is millions upon millions of people voluntarily reached into their pockets and handed over $300 or $400 for a Microsoft product. Those who think he has too much money are really registering disagreement with decisions made by millions of their fellow men.
In a free society, in a significant way income inequality reflects differences in productive capacity, namely one’s ability to please his fellow man. For example, I can play basketball and so can LeBron James, but would the Miami Heat pay me anything close to the $43 million they pay him? If not, why not? I think it has to do with the discriminating tastes of basketball fans who pay $100 or more to watch the game. If the Miami Heat hired me, they would have to pay fans to watch.
Stubborn ignorance sees capitalism as benefiting only the rich, but the evidence refutes that. The rich have always been able to afford entertainment; it was the development and marketing of radio and television that made entertainment accessible to the common man. The rich have never had the drudgery of washing and ironing clothing, beating out carpets or waxing floors. The mass production of washing machines, wash-and-wear clothing, vacuum cleaners and no-wax floors spared the common man this drudgery. At one time, only the rich could afford automobiles, telephones and computers. Now all but a small percentage of Americans enjoy these goods.
The prospects are dim for a society that makes mascots out of the unproductive and condemns the productive.
Dr. Williams serves on the faculty of George Mason University as John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics and is the author of ‘Race and Economics: How Much Can Be Blamed on Discrimination?’ and ‘Up from the Projects: An Autobiography.’
Posted at Townhall.com on Nov. 23, 2011. Reprinted here Dec. 1, 2011 for educational purposes only. For a brief bio and more articles by Walter Williams, go to econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/vita.html.