Iran: what should the West think & do?

What’s going on in Iran isn’t that different from what happened in Eastern Europe just before the wall fell. It also reminds us what happened in South Africa just before P.W. Botha decided that he must cede power to avoid a civil war and national bloodbath, or 1992 and Boris Yeltsin facing down the tanks prepared to overthrow the regime. Yet, at the same time, it could also be China just

Merry Christmas!

Imagine a snowy Christmas Eve, a small church in a little mountain village, deep inside a pine forest. Inside the church a kids choir is singing an unknown but amazing song … It might just have been better if I hadn’t already told my readers the wonderful story of Silent Night, because I could still have the chance to tell it right now! Yet, there is still something to be done to complete the

The winter of our discontent? No, it's Christmas time...

It has been snowing these last few days in North-Eastern Italy, and Christmas is a-coming. And to be sincere I would have no wish to talk about politics, but, just like nature, politics has its own times and seasons, and these are special and challenging times—no way to escape from the battlefield (believe me, you people who don’t like war movies, the term is not exaggerated!), nor would I wish

Changing how we view Islam

How sad! The civilized world is exposed to the truth of the brutality of Islam. Meanwhile many Muslim converts in the West are finding it more and more difficult to find excuses for the actions of their fellow Muslims. Well, never say die! Here is a handy reference for our Western Muslim readers to help them deflect the charges leveled against Muslims and to help convince others that Islam is

The US at the End of the Year 2009

~ “LETTERS FROM AMERICA” - by The Metaphysical Peregrine ~This has been a mean and combative year in the US.It didn’t get into full meanness until late summer. The House of Representatives tried to ram their takeover of the health insurance and health care industries before their summer recess, and failed. The reason they wanted to hurry up and get it done was because the American people were

What spiritual freedom is all about

I have a great story to share with you today, dear readers. It’s a simple quote, but it truly speaks volumes about what freedom, in a spiritual sense, is all about. But please allow me a few lines to introduce the Source and Author (both not very well-known).

The Book of Ecclesiasticus, also known as The Book of Sirach or Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach, or the Wisdom of Ben Sira, is a work from

La Toscana

         
        Italian souvenirs by Mirino

I alluded to the spontaneously generous way we were welcomed on our second day in Tuscany (Lavane) on Viewfinder. Such natural trust and generosity reinforces one's own believe in the essential goodness of human nature, hopefully still of the majority. Such 'random meetings', that in reality can never be qualified as such, are more often than

Something’s rotten in Denmark (but also in East Anglia, Asheville, and New York City)

“Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” So spoke Marcellus in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, first performed between 1600 and 1601, at the start of the Little Ice Age. Four centuries later things haven’t changed that much, according to Joseph D’Aleo, who is Executive Director of ICECAP, a former professor of meteorology and climatology, the First Director of Meteorology at the Weather Channel, and

It's A Climategate Christmas

“Oh Climategate Oh Climategate those hacked emails have sealed your fate

Oh Climategate Oh Climategate micheals trick was really great

Medieval Warming now is done, Also the Maunder Minimum

Oh Climategate Oh Climategate maybe now we can debate. […]”


Minnesotans For Global Warming announces their new Christmas Album “It’s A Climategate Christmas.” Actually there is no album: all they have

A glorious Revolution?

Can you read French? Mirino has a thought-provoking piece on the (glorious?) French Revolution. Personally, if you ask me what I think about it, I’d say that my favorite revolution is the American one… Sounds like I’m dodging the question? Nah, I never do that, I’m just taking my time (terrible question, you know…).

And science became a casualty of politics

Cathy Young has a fair and balanced piece on Climategate:

There is no doubt that refusal to accept human-made climate change is often self-serving. But the other side has blinders and selfish motives of its own. "Going green" has turned into a vast industry in its own right—as well as a religion with its own brand of zealotry. For many, global warming is the secular equivalent of a biblical

Berlusconi attacked. The day after

Yesterday, along with many other commentators, I argued that what happened to Berlusconi in Milan was strictly correlated to the political hatred which is intoxicating the public debate in Italy. (Silvio Berlusconi himself, reportedly, had a premonition that he would be attacked: In fact, he confided to Paolo Bonaiuti, his spokesman, on the way to Piazza del Duomo that he feared “something might

Where democracy ends and non-democracy begins

He was just leaving a political rally in Milan when his assailant got through security and hit him in the face. Then he was seen looking dazed and bloodied with what appeared to be a number of cuts. The attacker—a 42-year-old man who has received treatment for mental health issues for the last ten years—was holding a small statue of the Duomo, the city’s world-famous cathedral, in his hand.One

Apologizing to God and the world

Pope Benedict XVI has expressed “outrage, betrayal and shame” over the sexual abuse of children by priests in Ireland, and the Irish bishops have apologized as a group for the same. As a human being and an “observer of life” I can’t even imagine how they must feel, as a Christian and especially as a Catholic, well, I have no words for this. That’s why I call upon the apostle Paul to speak—a

Denmark: a farewell to Tibet

Do you remember what Barack Obama said soon after his meeting with China’s president Hu Jintao some three weeks ago? “We did note that while we recognize that Tibet is part of the People’s Republic of China, the United States supports the early resumption of dialogue between the Dalai Lama’s representatives and Beijing.” Well, now the “recognition” is running the risk of becoming a very popular

Look to the Star...

This post comes with a delay of one day (and some hours), in fact it was scheduled for the feast day of Immaculate Conception, which occurs on December 8. But yesterday something went wrong with my time management skills.., so I had to postpone the publication of this note. I hope She will forgive me for this as well as for my laziness in everything has something to do with my “contemplative life

Beyond any reasonable doubt?

As (almost) everyone already knows, Amanda Knox, the 22-year-old American college student who had been accused of murdering her British roommate Meredith Kercher in 2007 in the medieval town of Perugia, Italy, was found guilty of the crime in question and sentenced to 26 years in prison by an Italian jury. The trial took nearly a year. The court also convicted Knox’s co-defendant and former

Sanremo

       
          Italian souvenirs by Mirino

It's revealing how memories are so often 'punctuated by the palate'. Or is this limited to only those more orientated by their stomachs? Whatever, quite a few places spring to mind and make me close my eyes and smile blissfully again. 'Fisherman's wharf' in San Francisco, for example, where we ate lobster and 'sour bread' (as good as Parisian bread

The white cross and the minarets

Voters in Switzerland passed on Sunday with 57.5% of the vote a referendum banning the construction of minarets on mosques. Of course the referendum could have repercussions throughout the continent. In Italy, for instance, the anti-immigrant Northern League celebrated the surprising result with glee. “The forest of minarets, a dangerous symbol more of the threat of Islamic terrorism than a

Climategate - 5 (updated)

I - Derek Lowe offers a working scientist’s view (Via Glenn Reynolds):

I've been on long-running projects, especially some years ago, where people start to lose track of which numbers came from where (and when), where the underlying raw data are stored, and the history of various assumptions and corrections that were made along the way. That much is normal human behavior. But this goes beyond

How to pronounce Italian wine

This is a recent discovery of mine—via my new Twitter friend Pina (@Vino_Italiano)—and very welcome because I am a lover of wine, especially the best red Italian ones (of course I also love their famous French competitors, I’m not a chauvinist after all, even though it seems that, for instance, more wine is currently exported to the U.S. from Italy than from any other country..), wines to be

And Berlusconi kept his promise to the earthquake victims

Sorry, I missed it, but it’s time to redress the omission:When Silvio Berlusconi returns to L'Aquila tomorrow for the removal of the last of the tents put up to house the victims of the earthquake that struck the city on 6 April, he can expect a hero's welcome.The Italian prime minister may be under pressure over his private life and his attacks on the judges trying him for corruption. But,