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USH: Now, this bite from the Obama speech last night. It's a montage of The Messiah talking about himself. This runs a minute 17 seconds. None of these I's -- I, I, I -- is repeated. OBAMA: I accept your nomination. I thank you. I am grateful... I love you. I am so proud... I stood before... That's why I stand here......... Tonight I say... I don't know about you... I'm not ready... I quote... Americans I know... I don't believe... I just think... I am standing here... I see... I think... I listen... I remember... I stood... I hear......

A photo essay of Barak-O-polis at the link.

I contemplate divorce every day. It tugs on my sleeve each morning when my husband, Will, greets me in his chipper, smug morning-person voice, because after 16 years of waking up together, he still hasn't quite pieced out that I'm not viable before 10 a.m. ..snip.. Maybe one day, marriage -- like the human appendix, male nipples, or your pinky toes -- will become a vestigial structure that will, in a millennium or two, be obsolete. Our great-great-great-grandchildren's grandchildren will ask each other in passing, "Remember marriage? What was its function again? Was it that maladaptive organ that intermittently produced...

LAKE FOREST, Calif. — When John McCain and Barack Obama appear on the same stage today, they will vividly demonstrate the reach that has made the Rev. Rick Warren among the most significant evangelists of his generation. He's a megastar who leads the nation's fourth-largest church and reaches thousands of ministers through the Internet and crusades against poverty and AIDS. That globe-trotting work and his successful book — "The Purpose-Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For?" — puts him at the vanguard of a movement that inspires young, socially conscious Christians. But his willingness to soft-pedal political issues...

OK, Freepers...the Dem circus, er..convention is almost upon us, so let's see who is the best political prognosticator on FR. Bubba will address the convention Wednesday evening, and the contest is really quite simple. Guess the number of times in his speech ( without going over the actual number ) that Slick uses the word "I"

Democratic strategists loudly insist that the tawdry sex scandal consuming John Edwards will do no damage to the Obama campaign. Despite the very public embraces between the former North Carolina senator and the presumptive nominee, Obama apologists (can we coin a new term-- "Obamapologists"?) dismiss the Edwards case as an irrelevant distraction. After all, they say that their man never seriously considered his former rival as a potential running mate or even for a major cabinet post, so the unfolding disgrace of a one-time elected official bears no connection to Barack's visionary campaign of hope, change, and global redemption. For...

As the presidential candidates enter the three-month sprint to November, Barack Obama must be wondering: If that did not do it, what will? The antecedent of the pronoun "that" is his Berlin speech. The antecedent of the pronoun "it" is assuage anxieties about his understanding of the need to supplement soft power (diplomacy) with hard power (military force). He spoke in Berlin at the bullet-scarred base — it was in the crossfire 63 years ago as Russian troops neared Hitler's bunker about a mile away — of an 1873 monument to German militarism. To be precise, the monument celebrates the...

JUST LIKE the Obama girl, Obama has a crush on Obama. Barack Obama always was a larger-than-life candidate with a healthy ego. Now he's turning into the A-Rod of politics. It's all about him. He's giving his opponent something other than issues to attack him on: narcissism.

There are four things in America for which there is little forgiveness. The first is killing your wife, as O.J. Simpson discovered. The second is allegations of child molestation, as Michael Jackson found. The third is being old, as John McCain is rapidly discovering. And the fourth is having too many children, as I have found. Looking down at primitives with "too many" children is one of the last acceptable prejudices in the West. With our ninth child expected imminently, God willing, I find myself pitied and pilloried wherever I go. "Wow, that's a lot of kids," is a refrain...

In his victory speech over Hillary, Barack Obama soared rhetorically about his feelings of humility. And yet he hardly sounded humble: "generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children (with mounting excitement) that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick, and good jobs for the jobless. This was the moment when the riiiiise of the oceans began to slow, and our planet began to heal."[bolding added] Now politicians are allowed some rhetorical overkill, but this is straight into Star Wars territory. There are no real precedents for this...

‘That’s enough. That — that’s a show of disrespect to me.” That was Barack Obama, a couple of weeks back, explaining why he was casting the Reverend Jeremiah Wright into outer darkness. It’s one thing to wallow in “adolescent grandiosity” (as Scott Johnson of “Powerline” called it) when it’s a family dispute between you and your pastor of 20 years. It’s quite another to do so when it’s the 60th-anniversary celebrations of one of America’s closest allies. Last week, President Bush was in Israel and gave a speech to the Knesset. Its perspective was summed up by his closing anecdote...

This article by Rebecca Eckler, author of Toddlers Gone Wild!, is so offensive in so many ways it's hard to know where to begin. Here's one. Rebecca writes: "On behalf of my four-year-old, who has a Yahoo account in her name, I recently sent an e-mail to her father, who lives in Alberta. "'Hi Daddy,' I typed, as my daughter was fast asleep. 'Mommy has been talking about Mother's Day. I only have 143 pennies in my piggy bank. She's the best mommy ever. She's been pretty exhausted. I'd like to get her something nice. Can you help? Love you.'...

In a new book the Anglican clergyman explains why he wanted to formalise his 20 year relationship. “I always wanted to be a June bride.� As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I knew there'd be trouble. I'd just delivered an hour-long lecture on the relationship between religion and public discourse, and why religious fervour over homosexuality plays such a large and negative role in the securing of full civil rights for gay people. During the question-and-answer period, someone asked me about the forthcoming civil union between me and Mark, my partner of 20 years. The audience...

I can't decide if Gene Robinson should be made an honorary member of Herman's Hermits (second verse same as the first) or just be named Crybaby of the Decade. Sure does a lot of book tours for someone who wants to just be a simple country bishop. Can't you just hear the heavy sigh? Robinson is in London to promote his new book, In The Eye of the Storm. It is a spiritual memoir aimed, he says, at showing that he is more than "a one issue guy". The last of its five sections, however, sets a course for the...

The Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. has wriggled out from under sound bites and screen-grab loops to put himself into context in that most American of ways: on television. And he went deep into context — a rich, stem-winding brew of black history, Scripture, hallelujahs and hermeneutics. Mr. Wright, Senator Barack Obama’s former pastor, was cocky, defiant, declamatory, inflammatory and mischievous, but most of all, he was all over the place, performing a television triathlon of interview, lecture and live news conference that pushed Mr. Obama aside and placed himself front and center in the presidential election campaign. His rehabilitation...

Could a gene be partly responsible for the behaviour of some of the worlds most infamous dictators? Selfish dictators may owe their behaviour partly to their genes, according to a study that claims to have found a genetic link to ruthlessness. The study might help to explain the money-grabbing tendencies of those with a Machiavellian streak — from national dictators down to 'little Hitlers' found in workplaces the world over. Researchers at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem found a link between a gene called AVPR1a and ruthless behaviour in an economic exercise called the 'Dictator Game'. The exercise allows players...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A transgender man who is six months pregnant said in an interview aired by Oprah Winfrey on Thursday that he always wanted to have a child and considers it a miracle. "It's not a male or female desire to have a child. It's a human desire," a thinly bearded Thomas Beatie said. "I have a very stable male identity," he added, saying that pregnancy neither defines him nor makes him feel feminine. Beatie, 34, who lives in Oregon, was born a woman but decided to become a man 10 years ago. He began taking testosterone treatments and...

That triumphal barnburner of an Easter hymn, Jesus Christ Has Risen Today – Hallelujah, this morning will rock the walls of Toronto's West Hill United Church as it will in most Christian churches across the country. But at West Hill on the faith's holiest day, it will be done with a huge difference. The words “Jesus Christ” will be excised from what the congregation sings and replaced with “Glorious hope.” Thus, it will be hope that is declared to be resurrected – an expression of renewal of optimism and the human spirit – but not Jesus, contrary to Christianity's central...

The first openly gay Episcopal bishop announced he will have no official role in a meeting this summer of world Anglican leaders, saying restrictions that organizers wanted to place on his involvement had caused him "considerable pain." New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson had been told last year that he could not fully participate in the once-a-decade gathering in England, called the Lambeth Conference, as the world Anglican Communion sat on the brink of schism over his 2003 election. Still, Episcopal leaders had been negotiating with the Anglican Communion Office to allow him to join the event in some capacity....

Mars Hill Pastor Mark Driscoll preached on the still popular and still controversial topic of emerging churches in his latest sermon. But it’s an issue he normally wouldn’t teach to his mainly twenty-something church crowd in Seattle. That’s because Mars Hill attendants don’t use the language “emerging church” as many Christian leaders label them. The issue of the emerging church, however, was raised when thousands of people, who regularly tune into Mars Hill sermons every week through the Internet, voted to make it the No. 2 most popular topic they wanted Driscoll to address in a sermon series titled “Religion...

According to Kathryn Joyce, sneer-and-smear artist for The Nation, those who are concerned about the worldwide decline in birthrates are -- to put it mildly -- racist, neo-Nazis, who have a hidden agenda and (under the guise of demographic winter) are engaged in our age-old quest to control women's bodies. The Nation is this nation's oldest and largest-circulation leftwing journal (outside of The New York Times, of course). Joyce's screed, "Missing: The 'Right' Babies," will appear in the March 3 print edition, but is currently available online. Joyce believes -- with the faith of one immune to facts and logic...

I May Or May Not Leave Free Republic I'll decide after I finish this bottle of champagne.

For some people, ending a pregnancy is the only way to keep on living Yael Mishali Published: 12.26.07, 00:39 / Israel Opinion Abortion is a type of murder; I have no doubt about that. In this context we can debate over questions such as the duration of a pregnancy and when exactly do several cells turn into a person with a soul, but I have no interest in doing that. I accept the universal assumption that as of a certain moment, we are talking about a real person, and “aborting it” is a type of murder. And still, as a...

Mankind 'shortening the universe's life' By Roger Highfield, Science Editor Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 21/11/2007 Forget about the threat that mankind poses to the Earth: our activities may be shortening the life of the universe too. The startling claim is made by a pair of American cosmologists investigating the consequences for the cosmos of quantum theory, the most successful theory we have. Over the past few years, cosmologists have taken this powerful theory of what happens at the level of subatomic particles and tried to extend it to understand the universe, since it began in the subatomic realm during the...

The moment Julie Jarman set eyes on Zahina she was smitten. The seven-year-old girl from Tanzania was desperate for a loving home and Julie felt sure that she and her 11-year-old daughter could provide it. In turn Zahina would become the second daughter Julie longed for. "When I met her for the first time, she was a bit shy. I saw her hiding behind her social worker's skirt, peeping out at me with an enormous grin on her face. She was gorgeous. "She was with her foster parents in Somerset. Laura and I spent a week with them, taking things...

...Eight years earlier, he and I had met at a restaurant in Boston where we both worked late nights. We were each in the midst of deteriorating relationships and through our commiseration became close friends, confidants and eventually a couple. Our relationship was brief, intense and tumultuous, more addiction than love — a scalding hot bath that feels like comfort but in reality is scorching you. I think we both knew we were wrong for each other but didn’t care. We were young, lost and unmoored, each secretly terrified of the phrase, “your whole life ahead of you.” Depressed and...

If only it was the beginning of a media trend. Studio execs know that people from both sides of the political spectrum watch their shows. Considering the statistics, two-thirds of the country doesn't pay attention to politics, ever, so your actors are more likely to lose you money and advertisers when they spout off, then attract any net gain, (unless bad publicity is considered a gain). Just blacking out their inappropriate remarks helps keep attention on the actual show, not some self-important actors latest pet project. If the actor has a problem with that, go on the news and talk...

When it comes to energy, California has often been seen as the Promised Land. Beginning with oil and hydropower in the mid-19th century, and then later with renewable energy and efficiency in the 1970s and '80s, California has always leaped into the challenges of our energy conundrum with blindfolded gusto - and blazed trails in the process. Despite the Golden State's energy meltdown just seven years ago - remember the rolling blackouts, bankruptcies and the shenanigans of Enron and company? - all eyes today are again focused on California and its radical legislative agenda addressing the largest energy challenge of...

McGreevey tells wife: You'll get zilch from me BY ADAM NICHOLS DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER Saturday, September 15th 2007, 4:00 AM Jim McGreevey yesterday accused his soon-to-be-ex wife of "greedily" grabbing at the perks of being New Jersey's First Lady - and refusing to give them back. In legal papers packed with snide and catty comments, the openly gay McGreevey told estranged wife Dina Matos McGreevey she can expect to get nothing from him. Matos McGreevey had asked him to pony up $4,000 a month in alimony to help her live a lavish lifestyle like his. "Her jealousy and contempt...

A few years ago, my husband, Mark, and I were at one of those hip downtown restaurants sipping mojitos and nibbling on lime-spiked seviche when one of my bosses appeared from a cloud of Cuban-cigar smoke and patted my shoulder. When I introduced him to Mark, he naturally asked what he did for a living. We both froze. "I do some freelancing," Mark said. "He studied film at NYU," I said at the same time. Mark looked at me and shrugged. "I stay home with our daughter," he said, as my colleague quietly balked. "He makes it possible for me...

A new book is causing a storm of controversy by labelling children as annoying and pointless - a charge made all the more inflammatory by the fact that its author is a mother. Entitled No Kid: 40 Reasons Not To Have Children, Corinne Maier's book has sparked fury in France, where it was published. Here, Corinne argues her "no kid" case while another mum, Ursula Hirschkorn, stands firm for parenthood. Corinne Maier, 43, a writer, who lives with her boyfriend Yves, 45, a psychiatrist, daughter Laure, 13, and son Cyrille, 10, in Brussels, argues her case. Children are just too...

Hundreds of people posed naked on Switzerland's shrinking Aletsch glacier on Saturday for U.S. photographer Spencer Tunick as part of a Greenpeace campaign to raise awareness of global warming.

Something rather odd happened the other day. If you go to NASA's Web site and look at the "U.S. surface air temperature" rankings for the lower 48 states, you might notice that something has changed. snip

I've recently been strapping on the swamp boots to wade through something called Glory and Praise, perhaps the most commonly used Roman Catholic hymnal in the United States and Canada. Oh, it is sloppy and noisome work, logging the bathos, stupidity, banality, heresy, and textual vandalism. I've concluded, though, that there is one factor that touches every problem, something that helps explain these apparently disparate acts of mischief: -- the neutering of old masculine language about mankind and even God -- the heedless fouling up of the old poetry, to update a "thou" and a "thee" -- the seizing of...

Well, the big secret about Yasser Arafat's death is out, thanks to his lifelong comrade-in-terror, Ahmed Jibril. Jibril droolingly revealed that Arafat died of AIDS. According to Mark Steyn, this was "...pretty much an open secret in diplomatic circles. ... it prompted many knowing chortles among political types I mentioned it to today, along with fond reminiscences about Yasser's corps of hunky blond Scandinavian bodyguards - an odd bunch of chaps to find in Ramallah, but presumably they were doing the jobs Palestinians won't do." What's most important is that (a) Neither the vaunted "news media" nor any governments in...

Growing older has many drawbacks and one unalloyed pleasure: passing judgment on the younger generation. Lately, people have been scrutinizing the members of Generation Y and finding them deficient. What's wrong with the kids? A recent article in The Wall Street Journal reported that because they have been told since infancy that they were special, they believe it and expect to keep hearing it. "Bosses, professors and mates are feeling the need to lavish praise on young adults, particularly twentysomethings, or else see them wither under an unfamiliar compliment deficit," it said. To critics, this generation is an army of...

Hillary Clinton may suffer from a psychological condition that would raise questions about her fitness for office. In a book released today, respected political analyst Bay Buchanan reveals that Hillary bears all the classic symptoms of “clinical narcissism.”

John Travolta has boasted he is as famous as Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe. The star insists he is as iconic as Presley and Monroe but claims his belief in controversial religion Scientology keeps his feet on the ground. He tells The Scoop, "I have fame on the level of a Marilyn Monroe or an Elvis...

Check it out. United America: 2014, by Ben Maxwell, is now available on-line at both Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com. Here are URLs: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/104-5043457-9654302?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=united+america%3A+2014&Go.x=12&Go.y=9 http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1424152739/sr=8-1/qid=1174668532/ref=olp_product_details/002-5395432-2642427?ie=UTF8&qid=1174668532&sr=8-1&seller= http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/results.asp?WRD=united+america%3A+2014&z=y&r=1&cds2Pid=9481 http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&EAN=9781424152735&itm=1

Andrew Paul Gutierrez, a 67-year-old professor of ecosystems science in UC Berkeley's College of Natural Resources, has a word for those who believe human ingenuity and productivity are boundless. He calls them "cornucopians." He thinks cornucopians are misguided and prone to taking big risks that can backfire. That's one of the reasons he is upset that the university where he has spent his entire academic life is joining with oil giant BP in a $500 million, 10-year program to discover how to mass-produce clean, safe transportation fuels -- such as ethanol -- from biomass in an environmentally safe and cost-effective...

Fred Rogers saw it coming and knew it could be a problem. A group of psychologists released a study this week that found today's college students are more self-centered and narcissistic than those of previous generations. In part, the researchers pointed to overindulgent adults for raising children to believe they are "special" no matter what they do. Mister Rogers, of course, wrote the seminal song on this subject in 1967 -- the lyrics say "You are my friend, you are special." The researchers didn't blame Mister Rogers in any way. But the late, great pioneer of developmentally appropriate children's television...

The study, conducted by five psychologists, examined the responses given by 16,475 college students, between 1982 and 2006, on a written personality test called the Narcissistic Personality Inventory.....But the real source of today's narcissistic personalities, it seems to me, is the "liberation" movement of the 1960s (actually the late 1950s to early 1970s)....

The chickens have come home to roost. The first generation of students swaddled in the insanity of the self-esteem movement have emerged on the scene as arrogant, self-absorbed twits with an exaggerated sense of entitlement and self-importance. In short, they’ve been spoiled. Potentially, they’ve been ruined. The idiocy of social engineering in the classroom is again bearing catastrophic results. Here’s how we know. A group of five university professors has evaluated more than 16,000 personality profiles of college students gathered over the last 24 years. What they’ve discovered is that today’s young people have dramatically different self-concepts than the two...

NEW YORK -- Today's college students are more narcissistic and self-centered than their predecessors, according to a comprehensive new study by five psychologists who worry that the trend could be harmful to personal relationships and American society. "We need to stop endlessly repeating 'You're special' and having children repeat that back," said the study's lead author, Professor Jean Twenge of San Diego State University. "Kids are self-centered enough already." Twenge and her colleagues, in findings to be presented at a workshop Tuesday in San Diego on the generation gap, examined the responses of 16,475 college students nationwide who completed an...

The hanging of Saddam is not a narcissistic injury. It may seem like one, but it's not-- and why it's not makes all the difference in predicting what will happen next. http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2006/12/this_is_not_a_narcissistic_inj.html

Time's Person of the Year confirms we are a society of narcissists. This post has made the various lists (Digg, reddit, etc) because of the funny cover. I post the link here because I think this group would most understand the point I was trying to convey. http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2006/12/times_person_of_the_year_is_so.html

“Whom the Gods would destroy they first make mad.” — Euripides Old friend Euripides was referring to insanity, not anger, so in the interests of keeping my regular readers sane — and off the “to be destroyed” list of Zeus, Hera, and the rest — I thought I’d refute some of the madness circulating since the election. • While voters nationwide certainly gave the GOP a good smack upside the head, it is madness to talk about the results as some massive repudiation or defeat for the GOP. Unless recounts change results in one House seat in Connecticut and one...

Getting damn sick of every other post from some ninny trying to sound smart and important. Go get a blog you people, nobody cares!

Barbra Streisand has implemented stringent security measures on her US tour to deter any potential assassin. The 64-year-old singer demands metal detectors be installed at every venue door, extra security staff and police sniffer dogs patrol the auditoriums. According to documents obtained by website Smoking Gun, Streisand also requests plain clothes guards be "neatly dressed in dark jackets, blazers or sweaters". She also asks for 120 towels, 10 end tables, 10 floor lamps and five coffee tables at each concert venue.

Baby boomer and former president Bill Clinton is laying plans to celebrate his 60th birthday in grand style with a charitable fundraising extravaganza in New York late next month that will include an invitation-only concert by the Rolling Stones and contributor packages that run to $500,000.00 and higher. Clinton's daughter, Chelsea is serving as co-host of the three-day party. She will host a Saturday brunch on a weekend that also features a golf tournament at the Bayonne (N.J.) Golf Club, multiple receptions and a dinner at the American Museum of Natural History with the former president, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton...