Free Republic

  This is excerpted from the April 5, 1973 address “The Pragmatics of Patriotism” to the Naval Academy by Robert A. Heinlein, author and Academy graduate. Heinlein’s naval career was cut short by tuberculosis, which was the Navy’s loss but science-fiction readers’ gain. Some of what he says may seem old-fashioned, but there is nothing wrong with that. It is good to recall where we come from, and how much we owe to those who bought our freedom with their sweat and blood. Much has changed since 1973, but much hasn’t, including the anti-military feelings Heinlein describes. Note the...

Is Stranger in a Stranger Land by Robert Heinlein the Catcher in the Rye for the science-fiction set? Yes, I think you could say that about the 1962 Hugo winner in one important sense. When author J.D. Salinger died this past Wednesday, I must confess it was convenient for me (if not for him), because it got people talking about his most famous novel. The Catcher in the Rye occupies an interesting position in the literary landscape: It's inarguably a classic, and inarguably a popular classic at that — a book that a lot of people have not only heard...

Forget Evian or Vitaminwater. The latest beverage trend: 'Holy Water.'You need only go back to the first chapter of Genesis to see how elemental water is to the observance of faith: "And the Spirit of God," the Bible says, "moved upon the face of the waters." In the Torah, water is used to ordain priests and to purify the sons of Aaron before they enter the temple. In the New Testament, John baptizes Jesus with water from the Jordan River. Observant Muslims wash hands and feet before they pray, orthodox Jewish women take ritual baths once a month—and every Christian...

BERKELEY – A petite pink flower that hasn't been seen in 70 years has been rediscovered on the flanks of Mount Diablo in Contra Costa County by a University of California, Berkeley, graduate student. The Mount Diablo buckwheat, Eriogonum truncatum, "has been a Holy Grail in the East Bay for several decades," according to UC Berkeley botanist Barbara Ertter, who confirmed the identification in the field on Friday. Last reported in 1936, the flower was presumed extinct, she said, because its habitat has been overrun by introduced grasses. It is one of only three plants, all of them rare,...