It's good to have you a1anx.  Any friend of Delingpole, as they say....

I would criticize the NHS, not for its potential for provision of services to those in need, but for (from what little I know of it) its bureaucratic takeover of an industry.  I am actually happy to discuss the former, if free of the latter (much like the talk of immigration control and border security).

Interestingly, I didn't really intend this to be about healthcare, although it sort of ended up there... I was really just talking about the inevitability of death and the difficulty of not being depressed by that.  "Impending doom," well, yeah I suppose so - nobody lives forever.  The big picture helps us to appreciate historical context (and to learn from the collected wisdom of our ancestors), but it also makes us feel pretty insignificant, which can be depressing.

Case in point - it's 4am and I'm up because my Dad (we're visiting), a hospital chaplain, just got called in for emergency "organ donor" counseling.

Is Buick GM?  I know - stupid question.  :)  I've kind of wanted to buy a Buick.  I suppose that is what drives businesses that do silly (or awful) things.  People will almost always still buy whatever they like the best.

What a rotten time to be out of the state!  Sounds like you guys had a great time, though.

Joan looks really hungry in that picture.

Amazing, Doc!  I love it.  Someone should pop this over to the main page.  This is the sort of reminder that everyone should see ... would that I were a high school teacher of some sort.  Oh, well, I guess they'll get to hear all about "diversity" instead.

Of course, I know you've often commented on my posts - I was in no way offended by your complaint about length, but I did feel the need to stand up for the Richard Epstein long-winded types.  It's better when you're as knowledgeable as Richard, of course!

Sorry, I was in the car all evening...

I'm not sure that we do control the business world.  After all, business likes subsidies and monopolies, and what is government good for but cronyism?  That's the problem - government promises favors, and everyone expects to get something.  Civil "service," especially the public sector unions, is the biggest crony of them all!

Hey, I thought that was one of my shorter essays!  :)

Looks longer because of the video.  But if you play it and start reading... you can just stop when the music ends and call it good.

I hope you all have a great time!  I am driving down to Idaho this evening to visit family.  Please gripe about the traffic and the terrible bumper stickers on my behalf, though.

What?? Dave is going to the Seattle meetup?!  The week that my family is traveling to Boise?  oh, what luck.

Was just about to say... I know we've had this discussion before, but I think at some point you are considered a different religion altogether, or a cult (literally speaking).  I think the Episcopal church has long been unitarian rather than Christian.  Obviously you don't know what individuals believe, but as an institution, I think it has gone far enough outside to be completely outside.

ha!  Sounds fun.  I notice JOALT was a bit camera shy - why don't you ask a nice waitress to take a proper family photograph, huh?

I don't really get what you're talking about....

Was I too late?  Yeti, you going to PM me or what?  ;)

oh, this is what I get for never having had a facebook account!  I joined pretty much immediately (well, not as a member until 2011).  :)  But only through association with NRO.  The comments at NRO were terrible, and I haven't really been back since.  I still like national review, but - maybe it is the intangibles, maybe it is because the editors here will publish me once every hundred posts, and rich lowry never would - Ricochet is just so much better.

Happy anniversary!  I made scones.  Anyone who wants one is welcome to swing by.

I remember when Pat Robertson expressed - with great sadness, for anyone who knows anything about the man - the possibility that our rejection of traditional morals, as a country, might lead (or have led) to less protection from God.

That isn't the way I think, but I certainly don't begrudge his speculation.  It was in a spirit of sorrow for a country that really has been steadily rejecting Christian morality.  What Pat says is - whether correct or incorrect - out of love for the country and its people.

And liberals flipped their lids.

But of course they feel no hypocrisy when they wish that "providence" had killed hundreds of people and laid waste to "middle america" as a lesson to get with the times and be more progressive.  This was spoken in pure hate.  But it's ok because that hate is directed at the right people.  Imagine if this had been an earthquake in SanFrancisco instead.

Par for the course, isn't it?