From my observations, the people of Europe are evenly divided into two groups: those who want Obama to win and think he will, and those who want Obama to win, but think "they" won't let him.

OK, it's basically content-free, but it made me laugh.

The best President right now would be one who is unGodly boring, in every sense.

...and in other news, the Pot vs. Kettle debate continues, with the consensus tending towards "black".

...as a nipple ring.

Read it all. And weep.

...I'm moving to Canada. 

Just got a call from one of the local papers, asking my opinion about Obama and McCain.

Criticizing people for not wearing lapel pins is character assassination.

Office Space gets minus one star for reminding me of everything I loathed about living and working in America and curing me of any homesickness I felt (well, for the time being anyway, probably until I watch a baseball game).

It also gets minus one star for curing BoE of any illusions of wanting to live there.

It gets seven stars for being awesomely funny.

(I had only seen clips of it until now and never saw the whole thing.)

At least it's food for thought, no pun intended...

Worth listening to, all the way to the end.

I think it's worth noting that the second song you hear in the background happens to be an old Anglican hymn that is traditionally used at Remembrance Day and Anzac Day memorials, along with military funerals:

Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens; Lord with me abide.
When other helpers fail and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, O abide with me.

Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day;
Earth’s joys grow dim; its glories pass away;
Change and decay in all around I see;
O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

Not a brief glance I beg, a passing word;
But as Thou dwell’st with Thy disciples, Lord,
Familiar, condescending, patient, free.
Come not to sojourn, but abide with me.

Come not in terrors, as the King of kings,
But kind and good, with healing in Thy wings,
Tears for all woes, a heart for every plea—
Come, Friend of sinners, and thus bide with me.

Thou on my head in early youth didst smile;
And, though rebellious and perverse meanwhile,
Thou hast not left me, oft as I left Thee,
On to the close, O Lord, abide with me.

I need Thy presence every passing hour.
What but Thy grace can foil the tempter’s power?
Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be?
Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.

I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless;
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness.
Where is death’s sting? Where, grave, thy victory?
I triumph still, if Thou abide with me.

Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes;
Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies.
Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee;
In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.

"Abide with me", Henry F. Lyte

Rest in peace, Maj. Rogers.

(Hat tip to Jeremiah again.)

Hat tip to Jeremiah Cornelius.

I've seen some nonsense floating around the Web that John McCain supposedly doesn't qualify to run for the Presidency. Whatever you may think of him, it's simply untrue -- the result of a common misconception.

The premise of this is that McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone and not on US soil. To wit:

7 FAM 1116.1-4 Not Included in the Meaning of "In the United States"

(TL:CON-64; 11-30-95)

a. A U.S.-registered or documented ship on the high seas or in the exclusive economic zone is not considered to be part of the United States. A child born on such a vessel does not acquire U.S. citizenship by reason of the place of birth (Lam Mow v. Nagle, 24 F.2d 316 (9th Cir., 1928)).

b. A U.S.-registered aircraft outside U.S. airspace is not considered to be part of U.S. territory. A child born on such an aircraft outside U.S. airspace does not acquire U.S. citizenship by reason of the place of birth.

c. Despite widespread popular belief, U.S. military installations abroad and U.S. diplomatic or consular facilities are not part of the United States within the meaning of the 14th Amendment. A child born on the premises of such a facility is not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States and does not acquire U.S. citizenship by reason of birth.

Sounds damning, doesn't it? Well, it isn't.

Ius soli, the "right of the soil", is only one way to become a natural-born American citizen. The other way is ius sanguinis, "the right of the blood". Since McCain's parents were/are American citizens, he therefore is a natural-born citizen.

Similarly the Confessor is a natural-born American citizen and has American citizenship because I'm an American citizen. See US Code § 1401 (g):

(g) a person born outside the geographical limits of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents one of whom is an alien, and the other a citizen of the United States who, prior to the birth of such person, was physically present in the United States or its outlying possessions for a period or periods totaling not less than five years, at least two of which were after attaining the age of fourteen years...

Won't BoE be pleased to know she is an alien. Well, I always knew that, but I married her anyway. As for McCain,US Code § 1401 (c) says:

(c) a person born outside of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents both of whom are citizens of the United States and one of whom has had a residence in the United States or one of its outlying possessions, prior to the birth of such person...

German citizenship law is pretty much ius sanguinis only, but since his mother is German, he thus also gets German citizenship. Currently Gloriana only has German citizenship, but she is entitled to American citizenship as well (we just haven't bothered to go to the embassy to claim it). Should either child live continuously for 14 years in America, and reach 35 years of age (as per the US Constitution, Article II, Section 1), he or she would thus also qualify to run for President -- just as John McCain does now.

The US health care system now ranks dead last among 19 industrialized countries in a Commonwealth Fund survey of preventable deaths and timely health care. (To my surprise, Germany only ranks only eighth.) In the late 1990s it still was 13th on the list, but has failed to improve as quickly as the other countries.

Even the UK ranks higher. (And that, dear friends, is saying something.)

Ye gods.

Heh. Now that's dedication.

I was pretty bemused to see the slogan of Fred Thompson's Presidential campaign.



Security, Unity, Prosperity.

That happens to be almost exactly the words used by European politicians (particularly from the socialist left) for what they want for the European Union (Sicherheit, Solidarität, Wohlstand).

Hey, his campaign colors are even blue and gold.



O...kay. Well, maybe this is a sign that a President Thompson won't be saying any "Old Europe" nonsense. :-D

In my previous entry, I mentioned how the words for Guy Fawkes Day were running through my head as I woke up. And it did get me to thinking that the Fourth is of course called "Independence Day", as a sort of new beginning -- as if we started from scratch.

The thing is, of course, we didn't -- as those words about Guy Fawkes hint at.

You see, what the Revolutionaries and Founding Fathers were actually fighting for wasn't independence from Britain. They were fighting for their rights as native Englishmen. I think that tends to be forgotten a lot in all the patriotism on this day. Maybe that's what my subconscious was getting at.

In Britain and in particular in England, there was a long tradition of individual liberties that went back to the earliest days of Anglo-Saxon England in the so-called Dark Ages -- the right to trial by jury and the "hundreds", local councils that ran basic affairs. These early foundations led later on to developments such as Magna Carta (which actually was just a laundry list of rights of nobility versus the Crown, but that laid the cornerstone of Parliament's later supremacy) and Simon de Montfort's imposition of the power of council (and thus Parliament) over the Crown. The stones were slowly being laid for constitutional monarchy and with it parliamentary democracy.

Still later, the English Civil Wars (1642-1651) ended up firmly establishing the power of Parliament to choose the monarch and not the other way around -- and this was further anchored in the English Bill of Rights in 1689, the Act of Settlement in 1701, and the Act of Union in 1707. As an effect of these Acts, individual liberties also were increasingly firmly established -- the right to free assembly, free speech and so on. But unfortunately, these rights weren't being taken seriously by the Tory government of the day.

Thus the revolutionaries were fighting for what they saw as their rights as patriotic Englishmen. Franklin, Washington and all the others at first didn't want to break with Britain at all. Even the most radical Sons of Liberty didn't want it at first. Remember the war began as many as 16 months before the Declaration of Independence -- with the UK Parliament declaring Massachusetts to be in rebellion on February 9, 1775 and actual hostilities breaking out at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775.

Indeed the (in hindsight very naïve) hope among many was good King George would step in and tell Parliament to stop abusing the loyal colonists, who were true-blue Englishmen through and through. In the end the king did nothing of the sort and was horrified that the colonists had taken up arms against his realm (as he saw it).

Yet Britain was not by any means united in determination to crush the colonists. Many actively supported them, in particular the Whig Party in Parliament or William Pitt the Elder (for whom Pittsburgh is named). Indeed, had Britain -- the superpower of its age -- really been united in defeating us, we would have lost. Badly. As it was, the Whigs continually harried the Tories in Parliament, popular support for the war was brittle at best, and once the French entered the war on our side, the end of the war was only a matter of time.

It was only when there was obviously no hope that neither Parliament nor King would relent that the Declaration of Independence was conceived and signed -- and even then many in Britain didn't give up on us.

Thus the American Revolution wasn't really "anti-British" at all. In many ways, it was the British Revolution -- just it didn't take place in Britain.