Catching Up

I normally blog during my lunch hour. That's about the only spare time I have on my hands. But this week work has been all-consuming, and the stuff going on at home has been all-consuming there. So no posts this week yet, though I did start one on Monday (still in draft mode).

I decided to use today's post for catching up quickly on the draft and some other things that have been on my mind, however fleetingly. No particular order of importance.

Monday's attempted post:

I've been following Hugh Hewitt following the LA Times's pro-North Korea propaganda piece, both on his radio show and on his blog (here, here, here, and here).

Hugh has completely given up on the LA Times, because their front-page article about North Korea has proven that the Times has placed itself solidly on the side of a megalomaniacal, sadistic dictator.

Hugh was able to send some questions to the writer of the article, Barbara Demick, and he posted her answers, many of which make her seem like she's a reasonable person. Which makes me wonder whether the article was completely of her own doing, or if the LA Times editorial board specifically ordered her to leave out the negative aspects of the story.

Shark towing

There was a story out of New Zealand about three fishermen who had a shark the size of a car swim into their net. It hauled their boat out to sea before it tore its way through the net and swam off.

In describing the men's next decision, Sergeant Edward Keelan of Ruatoria police displayed the British Commonwealth's mastery of understatement. "Very quickly they decided that it might be best to start heading into shore as the company there mightn't be the best." Too right!

New Job Numbers

Interesting commentary by David R. Francis on the latest job numbers out from the US Labor Department. The good news is that 262,000 new jobs were added in February. The not-so-good news is a statistic that correlates with the job numbers. As Francis says, "In the past four years, the number of immigrants into the US, legal and illegal, has closely matched the number of new jobs. That suggests newcomers have, in effect, snapped up all of the new jobs."

He goes on to explain that this correlation is happening in Europe as well as the US, so if misery loves company, we've got it.

Stephen Ambrose Tours

Since I commute 60 miles each way to work every weekday, I spend some of that time listening to books on tape. The public library has a pretty good collection, and I've gone through a lot of the non-fiction section, including a couple Stephen Ambrose books. I loved Band of Brothers enough to buy the DVD of the miniseries.

Now I see that there are Stephen Ambrose Tours related to Ambrose's books, mostly to World War II sites. They look fabulous.

I'm also intrigued by the Civil War tour, since it covers the Western front of that war, along the Mississippi River. I've read the Michael/Jeff Shaara books on the Civil War, and those have focused more on the Eastern front with Lee's campaigns. It would be good to learn more about what happened away from Lee's battles.