The Pittsford Perennialist

The Devil Makes Three Perform "All Hail," "Do Wrong Right," and "Johnson Family"

2013-06-18T21:24:00.003-04:00

Lock Up Your Daughters!

2013-06-18T21:22:00.000-04:00

The Great Satan is on the prowl — Pentagon to Begin Training Women for Combat Roles by 2015.

Old Right and Hard Left Agree

2013-06-18T21:07:00.000-04:00

The American Conservative's W. James Antle III, CounterPunch's Arno J. Mayer, and Chronicles Magazine's Thomas Fleming on the folly of interventionism in Syria, respectively — Fighting Terrorism by Arming Terrorists, America: Its Own Worst Enemy, and USA Against America: Arming Jihad.

Reactionary Foreign Policy

2013-06-18T20:57:00.000-04:00

A conservative blog for peace posts the above.

Crypto-Jews in Colorado?

2013-06-18T20:56:00.003-04:00

The Smithsonian's Scott S. Warren reports that a "gene linked to a virulent form of breast cancer found mainly in Jewish women is discovered in Hispanic Catholics" — The 'Secret Jews' of San Luis Valley.

Hotter Than a Scottish Bonnet?

2013-06-18T20:55:00.000-04:00

The Smithsonian's Mary Roach takes on "the Naga King Chili (a.k.a. Bhut Jolokia), often ranked the world’s hottest" — The Gut-Wrenching Science Behind the World’s Hottest Peppers.

Ut Unum Sint

2013-06-18T20:54:00.000-04:00

"No one who is theologically responsible can celebrate the division of Christians from one another" — Catholics, Lutherans prepare for Reformation anniversary.

The Sacrifice

2013-06-18T20:53:00.000-04:00

Due to some time constraints, the boy and I went to Raul's Barber Shop rather than the opening game of the Batavia Muckdogs at Dwyer Stadium to see some Class A Short Season New York–Penn League action.

Gillian Welch and David Rawlings Perform "I Want To Sing That Rock And Roll," "Make Me Down A Pallet On Your Floor," "Elvis Presley Blues," "Look At Miss Ohio," "Red Clay Halo," "My First Lover," "Revelator," "By The Mark," "The Way It Will Be," "Caleb Meyer," "I'll Fly Away" & "The Weight" (with Old Crow Medicine Show)

2013-06-15T22:36:00.001-04:00

I've seen bits of this great show, but never the whole thing. Enjoy.

Has Edward Snowden Told Us Anything New?

2013-06-15T22:33:00.001-04:00

Seven years ago, during the Bush regime we learned that "has been collecting information on every phone call made in this country" — Government Monitoring About 200 Million Americans' Calls. Why is anyone surprise by what Edward Snowden has revealed?

From cryptogon.com we learn that his revelations are simply part of a "program, which has been known for years, [that] copies Internet traffic as it enters and leaves the United States, then routes it to the NSA for analysis" — PRISM Is Just Part Of A Much Larger, Scarier Government Surveillance Program. From the same source, we learn of Naomi Wolf's growing suspicions — My creeping concern that the NSA leaker is not who he purports to be ...

This "leak" could be simply a way of prepping the public for an even more dystopian future, since, as my alma mater's Michael S. Rozeff notes, "there is not a rock hard super-majority that is against the surveillance state" — The Machinery of Oppression.

Whatever the case, local letter-to-the-editor Robert Begy nails it — Big Brother prophecies seen in living color:

Another Self-Hating American Catholic Convert

2013-06-15T22:09:00.000-04:00

I, too, drank this same kool-aid soon after my conversion to the True Faith a decade ago — ‘Immigrants are more fertile,’ says Jeb Bush. "Immigrants are more fertile, they love families, they have more intact families, and they bring a younger population," etc., etc., blah, blah, blah.

I have serious doubts about those middle two points from personal experience, but the first and last are at least true, supporting his subsequent claim: "Immigrants create an engine of economic prosperity." Maybe so, but at whose expense? What about the jobless who are here?

"Cast down your bucket where you are," said immigration-restrictionist Booker T. Washington. Could the lack of intact families among poor black and white Americans have anything to do with the fact that fathers have no way to support their families, that they're being undercut by the importation of a cheap and exploitable labor force?

But American will not do these jobs! No, Americans will do these jobs, they will just ask for a decent wage. I myself worked in both agriculture and construction as summer jobs, alongside guys who were paid more and did the work full-time. No longer, probably, since the immigrants Mr. Bush lauds will work these jobs for far cheaper wages, being used to a much lower standard of living.

Higher up the pay-scale, in high-tech, H-1B visa-holders are held in indentured servitude by their employers, putting fellow American graduates in the STEM fields, who might get uppity and freely seek better jobs, at a disadvantage.

So what if many of these immigrants come from a nominally Catholic part of the world? Is it un-Catholic to look after your own? Tom Piatak, as he is wont to do, calls it like it is — Electing A New People.

Chris Thile and Michael Daves Perform "Sleep With One Eye Open," "Rabbit In The Log," "Bury Me Beneath The Willow," "Billy In The Lowground," "It Takes One To Know One," & "Roll In My Sweet Baby's Arms"

2013-06-13T22:27:00.003-04:00

Rochester Real Beer Week

2013-06-13T22:11:00.007-04:00

"Beer is proof that German monks loved us and wanted us to be happy, or something like that," begins Rebecca Rafferty's report — Rochester Real Beer Week 2013. "Nothing says summer like sipping on a cold, crisp beer on a hot sunny day," begins Anne Ritz's — Rochester Real Beer Week.

Pope Francis vs. the Gay Lobby

2013-06-13T22:07:00.001-04:00

Sandro Magister reports that "Francis wants to purify [the curia] from corruption and from the 'gay lobby'" — Bergoglio, the "Black Pope" Dressed in White. Spake the Vicar of Christ, "In the curia there are holy people, truly, there are holy people. But there also exists a current of corruption, it exists, it is true... There is talk of a 'gay lobby,' and it is true, it is there. We must study what we can do."

Nickel Slots Coming to Town?

2013-06-13T21:56:00.001-04:00

News of a "deal [a] could bolster the Senecas’ long-eyed plans to eventually build a casino in the Rochester area" — Senecas, N.Y. reach gambling accord. I'm not one for either race-based preferences or gambling, but I make an exception on both counts for Indian Gaming.

Race Suicide

2013-06-13T21:52:00.002-04:00

That's what they would have called this a century ago — Whites’ deaths outnumber births for first time. In the article we read that "the natural decrease in whites suggests that aging whites will increasingly come to rely on the younger, mainly minority population to underwrite social programs that will sustain them." Maybe they should have relied on their own kids, instead of spending their kids's inheritance (and their country's), as I have read on boomer bumper-stickers.

Paul Mealor's Ubi Caritas et Amor Sung by the Tenebræ Choir, Directed by Nigel Short

2013-06-12T21:43:00.002-04:00

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor.
Exsultemus, et in ipso jucundemur.
Timeamus, et amemus Deum vivum.
Et ex corde diligamus nos sincero.
Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.

Where charity and love are, God is there.
Christ's love has gathered us into one.
Let us rejoice and be pleased in Him.
Let us fear, and let us love the living God.
And may we love each other with a sincere heart.
Where charity and love are, God is there.

Shedding Light on Unenlightened Claptrap About the Enlightment

2013-06-12T21:31:00.000-04:00

Professor Kenneth Minogue dismantles a book whose "basic take on the Enlightenment is locked into secularist legendry—as if intellectual progress only began when philosophers questioned religious authority" — When the Lamps Went On. Writes the reviewer:

Our Western civilization is indeed remarkable, but the reason is that, well before the 18th century, it had been the only culture in the world exploring the possibilities of free inquiry and intellectual rigor. The complex beginnings of what makes the West different go back to medieval times and indeed in some respects back to Greece, Rome and Christianity itself. The individualists who transformed our world appeared all over Europe, rather fitfully in medieval times but from the 16th century onward with increasing confidence. As Montesquieu observed, European monarchies were quite different from both the Roman republic and the despotisms prevalent elsewhere.(Elaborating later on this last point, the reviewer notes that "authority is (as Hobbes argued) the self-generated moral basis of modern states, replacing the virtue of republics and the caprice of despotisms.")

The book's author, says Prof. Minogue, "thinks that it is the enlightened who have taught us to behave altruistically toward distant people we have never meet" and "admits that caritas is a Christian virtue but then solemnly explains to us that Christians merely practiced it so as to increase their credit with God." Counters the reviewer:

Whether it is the truth about reality or not, Christianity has been central to creating a gentle and decent (and philosophically lively) civilization of such power that our problem is accommodating the people who want to join it. "Go thou and sin no more" is way ahead of beheading or stoning sinners and probably ahead of counseling or psychotropic medication as well.The reviewer, after noting that the author's "cosmopolitanism is frightfully open to the customs of others (as long as they are not Christians) but low on allegiances," wisely concludes:

One benefit of Christianity was that it construed politics as a rather perilous activity carried on by imperfect people within some larger story about God and creation. The first figure who broke out of these confinements (apart from the monstrous Robespierre) was Napoleon. As we now know all too well, masterful radicals come in shapes more horrible than his, but the fashion for ideological enthusiasms to improve our world keeps on generating surprises. The thing about light is that it casts shadows.

Lisa Hannigan Performs "Knots"

2013-06-11T21:34:00.000-04:00

Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham Want Your Sons and Daughters to Die For These People

2013-06-11T21:20:00.002-04:00

Freedom fighters fighting for freedom from "blasphemy" — Teenager, 15, Executed By Islamist Rebels in Syria. The boy "reportedly refused to give a customer coffee" and "was arrested by Islamist rebel fighters for insulting the Prophet Mohammed, beaten and then executed in front of his family."

Hard Left and Old Right Agree

2013-06-11T21:14:00.001-04:00

CounterPunch's Christopher Pyle and Antiwar.com's Justin Raimondo respectively — Edward Snowden: Profile in Courage and Edward Snowden, American Hero.

The Pope Is a Fool

2013-06-11T21:09:00.002-04:00

A holy fool, like his namesake, as these articles suggest — I did not want to be pope, says Francis and Francis and the perils of an improv pope. In the latter article we read that he "compared overly grim Christians to 'pickled peppers.'"

Steve Earle Performs "Waitin' On The Sky," "Every Part Of Me," & "This City"

2013-06-08T22:14:00.000-04:00

Agreed that "what's most appealing about him is the wide-eyed, unmistakable fearlessness with which he goes about his life these days," as evidenced by his vocal opposition to the Iraq War and WalMart.

The Lumineers Perform "Ho Hey," "Big Parade," "I Ain't Nobody's Problem," "Flapper Girl," & "Slow it Down"

2013-06-07T21:39:00.000-04:00

In glorious black and white, interspersed with interviews. The play tonight next door in Canandaigua, New York.

I Am the Alpha and the Beta

2013-06-07T21:35:00.001-04:00

"How does one do obligatory beta things in the course of a relationship in an alpha way?" asks a reader of Chateau Heartiste, who answers with two posts, reminding us that "that 'aloof game' is not all there is to inspiring a woman’s love and fidelity through all four weeks of the month" — Bringing Balance To The Masculine Force — and that "striking an optimal balance between your alpha and beta behaviors" is the "ideal way for a man to direct a long-term relationship so that it’s maximally rewarding and minimally punishing" — Relationship Game: The Day-To-Day Alpha.