JAMES N. writes:

This article about an “all-female Antartica expedition” ran in the UK, Ireland, and Australian mass media today. The events described in the article are only tangentially related to reality.

They are going in late Spring/early Summer (naturally). They are going by ship, not flying. They will “set sail from Argentina”, even though their group is gathering in Australia. This means they are going to the coast, not the interior. The closest part of Antarctica to Argentina is the Antarctic peninsula, which reaches all the way up to 62 degrees south longitude. The weather forecast for December 2 (the day they leave) at that location is for a low of 32F, so the “subzero temperatures” they are braving will be (at most) in the high 20s Farenheit, possibly as low as –2 Celsius.

And, best of all (according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation), “once they arrive, they will spend 20 days at sea carrying out important scientific work”, in other words, they aren’t even spending a night on land, not land even at 62 degrees south.

The ship, no doubt, will have an all male crew.

There are thousands of girls, maybe more, who, reading this, will imagine that these women are repeating the exploits of the great polar explorers, spending hundreds of days on foot under life-threatening cold and wind, with primitive survival equipment, which feats they have hitherto been denied because of “sexism.”
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  IN THE 15th and 16th century, small cradles for the Christ Child were used as devotional objects. They were sometimes given to women taking their vows. This example was made in 15th-century Netherlands and comes from the Grand Béguinage of Louvain, Belgium, which was opened in the 12th century for lay women. I saw this crib, which is only 13 inches in length, last weekend at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and was struck by its exquisite detail, with biblical scenes carved on the end pieces, angelic sentinels atop the posts, embroidered coverlet and tiny bells. Silk, gold thread, pearls and enamel are still visible all these years later. This lavish object suggests the royal character of the humble infant born in the stable, the infant both divine and human who would change human history forever. A tender and supernatural love must have inspired the cradle's creation and stirred those who venerated it.

HURRICANE BETSY writes:

From Market Watch:

“If you’re a young man and the breadwinner for your family, beware: It could harm your health and well-being.

A new study — presented Friday at the 111th Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association in Seattle — found that when young men are the family’s breadwinner, it may not be good for them. “We find strong evidence that, for men, breadwinning has adverse effects,” write the authors of the study. “As relative income increases — that is, as men take on more economic responsibility in marriage — psychological well-being and health decline.” (more…)

"BARRY SOETORO" contends the real purpose of Silly Jilly's recount effort (which cannot possibly succeed) is to clean up the traces of voter fraud before Trump takes office and orders an investigation. It's an interesting theory.

M. OLIVER HEYDORN of the Clifford Hugh Douglas Institute writes: The financial system, that is, the banking, cost accounting, and tax systems, can either serve the common good, or else it will serve an oligarchic elite at the expense of the common good. The present system serves, to a greater or lesser degree, an oligarchic elite. Ever-increasing indebtedness, the rising cost of living, heavy taxation, environmental damage and decay, lack of leisure, poverty and social unrest, physical and psychological ill-health, and incremental totalitarianism are the price we pay for running the financial system as a privately owned, self-serving monopoly. In order to restore the financial system to its proper place as a humble servant of the genuine interests of the common citizens, it is not necessary to nationalize the banks nor to alter, in substance, the nature of their day-to-day operations. All that is needed is to prohibit the banks from filling, as they do at present, the economy’s underlying price-income gap with additional debt-money and to fill that gap instead with 'debt-free' credit issued directly (in the form of a National Dividend distributed independently of work status) and indirectly (in the form of a National Discount on retail prices) for the benefit of each citizen. To this end, Social Credit proposes the establishment of a National Credit Office, free from political manipulation, to monitor and regulate a country’s financial system in line with what would be a truly common and mutually…

THOMAS DROLESKEY writes at Christ or Chaos:

The nonagenarian mass murdering tyrant, Fidel Castro has died. He was an unrepentant Communist revolutionary. He was an atheist. He sanctioned terror and death by firing squads before his takeover of Cuba on January 1, 1959, and thereafter, noting that he handed over the presidency of Cuba on February 24, 2008, to his partner in crimes against God and man, his brother Raul Castro. Various counts of the executions conducted by the Castro regime number between 85,000 and 100,000. Countless other thousands were tortured and imprisoned. Hundreds of thousands fled from Cuba in the initial aftermath of the Communist takeover, and many others still flee from this “people’s (one-party) democracy every year.

Although Jorge Mario Bergoglio was very friendly to the late murderer, I was heartened to see the following statement from him on Saturday morning, November 26, 2016, the Feast of Saint Sylvester the Abbot and the Commemoration of Saint Peter of Alexandria:

“On the feast of Saint Catharine of Alexandria, there died and descended into Hell the Grand Communist Murder and Tyrant, former President of Cuba, called Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz, who for more than fifty-eight years had been waging war cruelly against the Christian faith, his own people, and the nations of the Americas. All Christendom in general takes great pleasure in this death, for no one can imagine the great terror that barbarous despot had instilled in the hearts of all Christians, because of the lands he had terrorized, and those he would seek to gain each day. All Bishops are to hold held great processions through their cities, and to offer sacrifices, and many other devotions and alms, because it pleased God to deliver Christendom from so mighty an enemy.”

As readers can recognize quite readily, that message of jubilation upon the death of a murderous tyrant was not issued by Jorge Mario Bergoglio.

No, the message above is based upon the following summary of the reaction in the Christian world to the death of Mohammed II on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, September 14, 1481: (more…)

THE ANTI-NEW YORK TIMES examines the role of The New York Times in installing the brutal, Communist dictator Fidel Castro, who died on Nov. 25.

SCOTT CREIGHTON writes at American Everyman:

Four of the five people involved in that Nov. 17th phone conference which started this whole recount psyop are directly connected with or on the payroll of George Soros.

[…]

Though we can’t prove at this point that George Soros is behind the funding of this action, we do know that they aren’t being exactly transparent when it comes to publishing the names of the donors. In fact they are being quite opaque.

What we do know is this: almost every one of the players involved in this process have a direct link to George Soros who spent a lot of money trying to usher in the Age of Hillary this year. And he also tends to enjoy destabilizing various nations so that once chaos ensues, he is able to insert himself into the political mix and make some more money. (more…)

HEATHER Mac Donald at City Journal eviscerates the claim that Trump supporters introduced racial divisiveness into American politics. As Lawrence Auster pointed out many times, whites were forced to respond to the systematic, institutionalized hostility directed against them:

The Democratic Party is now merely an extension of left-wing campus culture; few institutions exist wherein the skew toward Democratic allegiance is more pronounced. The claims of life-destroying trauma that have convulsed academia since the election are simply a continuation of last year’s campus Black Lives Matter protests, which also claimed that “white privilege” and white oppression were making existence impossible for black students and other favored victim groups. Black students at Bard College, for example, an elite school in New York’s Hudson Valley, called for an end to “systemic and structural racism on campus . . . so that Black students can go to class without fear.” If any black Bard student had ever been assaulted by a white faculty member, administrator, or student, the record does not reflect it.

These claims of “structural racism and institutional oppression,” in the words of Brown University’s allegedly threatened black students, overlook the fact that every selective college in the country employs massive racial preferences in admissions favoring less academically qualified black and Hispanic students over more academically qualified white and Asian ones. Every faculty hiring search is a desperate exercise in finding black and Hispanic candidates whom rival colleges have not already scooped up at inflated prices. Far from being “post-racial,” campuses spend millions on racially and ethnically separate programming, separate dorms, separate administrators, and separate student centers. (more…)

  "Because the light and wisdom of this contemplation is very bright and pure, and the soul in which it shines is dark and impure, a person will be deeply afflicted on receiving it. When eyes are sickly, impure and weak, they suffer pain if  bright light shines on them. The soul because of its impurity, suffers immensely at the time this divine light truly assails it. When this pure light strikes in order to expel all impurity, persons feel so unclean and wretched that it seems God is against them and they are against God. Because it seems that God has rejected it, the soul suffers such pain and grief that when God tried Job in this way it proved one of the worst of Job's trials, as he says Why have You set me against You, and I am heavy and burdensome to myself? [Jb. 7:20] Clearly beholding its impurity by means of this pure light, although in darkness, the soul understands distinctly that it is worthy neither of God nor of any creature." -- St. John of the Cross, The Dark Night, from the Collected Works of St. John of the Cross, translated by Kieran Kavanaugh, ICS Publications, 1961; p. 402

  THANKSGIVING is a day for unity, not division. What are the things that unite us, whatever our political persuasions? The conditions of existence unite us. Here are three: 1. We were born; created, not self-begotten. 2. We will die. 3. Our souls will live forever. None of us differ in any of these conditions. The innate longing for unity is fulfilled. We are on the same boat. We are in the same vessel. We sail on the sea of time. We will sail on the sea of eternity. The immortality of the soul can be established with the use of simple logic. You don't have to get a degree in philosophy to see it. The soul is immaterial. It is not physical. It does not partake of physical death. Put away political thoughts. They will be there when you wake up tomorrow. Put away political knives. Cut the turkey instead. We are alike more than we are different. Gratitude is a universal need. We have such a beautiful country, which none of us deserve. We can be united in gratitude that we are so much united. We can be united as the collective recipients of undeserved gifts. Let the mountains receive peace for the people: and the hills justice. (Psalm 72:3) Happy Thanksgiving!  The editorial board and maintenance staff of The Thinking Housewife extends her wish for many blessings to you, whatever your beliefs.

FROM a Thanksgiving letter by Harry Crouch of the National Coalition for Men: I am not sure exactly how it works but the Department of Corrections unceremoniously dumps some released prisoners directly back into society. I spotted one last week late at night standing near our office building, about 50 or so feet away, bewildered, seemingly lost, in a pair of cheap sandals, wearing black knee length athletic shorts, no shirt, carrying a plastic bag with not much in it and no place in particular to go. It was chilly getting colder. He looked at me lost, wanted to ask me something… My arms were full of stuff; I wanted to give him a shirt or a jacket. I had to get rid of the stuff first. He said nothing. I said nothing. He turned, looked in a garbage can, and walked down C street toward where the woman lived on the corner across the street from the new $555 million dollar court house where $150,000 a year plus benefits judges will soon safely work. He was young, frightened, and alone in an inhospitable city.

IN THIS interview at True Restoration, Bishop Donald Sanborn, who endorsed Trump, looks at the election from a Catholic perspective, noting an uprising by working-class voters (non-working class is more like it) in rural and outlying America against the educated voters of the large urban blocs. Ironically, Trump is the quintessential New Yorker. If Trump fulfills major promises and does not compromise with the Republican establishment (Rudy Giuliani for Secretary of State? Yuck!), it may be a long time before the Democratic Party, with its commitment to globalism, appeals to this segment again. Bishop Sanborn comments on Trump's degrading, sexual talk about women and, while not dismissing it, says, regarding Trump's personal life, "Personal debauchery does not affect your ability to govern." Ideally, good morals and good governance go together. But oftentimes, debauched people seek power and make good rulers. Still, Trump sets an undeniably bad example in certain areas.

GIVEN the influence of American politics on Europe, will the victory of Donald Trump help propel Marine Le Pen to the French presidency? See excellent ongoing coverage of the upcoming May election at Galliawatch. A recent post looks at French reaction to the Trump election.  Tiberge quotes one commentator about the possibility of "Trumpify-ing" some of the candidates: No [French] candidate comes up to Trump's ankle. They lack the thing that gave him his success, the power to rise above the crowd. They depict Marine Le Pen as Donald Trump's sister, and vice-versa… it's completely false. She is engaged in a strategy of un-demonization, while Trump has always held his head high. He has never backed off and never submitted to political correctness. And then, Marine Le Pen is not new, she's a party. She has already run in elections, unlike Trump who does not come from the world of politics. This aspect also is lacking in France. We need a renewal in the French ruling class. Certain candidates try to act like Trump but take no risks. He endured numerous attacks, notably from the media. That would frighten away any French political leader.

HAMPSHIRE COLLEGE in Massachusetts has taken the American flag down from its campus flagpole in the wake of the election of Donald Trump. President Jonathan Lash wrote: “By removing the flag, the college will seek to focus our efforts on addressing racist, misogynistic, Islamophobic, anti-immigrant, anti-Semitic, and anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and behaviors.” That just about covers all the bases. By the way, it costs more than $65,000 per year to attend hate-free Hampshire, which is 60 percent female and 70 percent white.

LAST WEEK, the moon was reportedly the most remarkable it has been in appearance since 1948. They call it a “super moon” because of its close proximity to the earth. And it was super. Anyone — rich or poor — could look up and see the brilliant, luminous circle that had been not long before been what Emily Dickinson would call “a chin of gold” in the sky.

The Moon was but a Chin of Gold
A Night or two ago—
And now she turns Her perfect Face
Upon the World below—

Her Forehead is of Amplest Blonde—
Her Cheek—a Beryl hewn—
Her Eye unto the Summer Dew
The likest I have known—

Her Lips of Amber never part—
But what must be the smile
Upon Her Friend she could confer
Were such Her Silver Will—

How disappointing photos of the surface of the moon up close are compared to its appearance in the sea of night from here below. Even the view of a normal full or half moon is inspiring, but the surface of the moon, up close, is a relatively sterile, almost lifeless terrain. Interesting for its comparative impoverishment, amazing for all that it does not have. (more…)

TRUMP breaks his promise to pursue a host of serious allegations against Hillary Clinton.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN thought the turkey was preferable to the bald eagle as a national symbol, reports the website It's About Time. In Franklin's words: For my own part I wish the Bald Eagle had not been chosen the Representative of our Country. He is a Bird of bad moral Character. He does not get his Living honestly. You may have seen him perched on some dead Tree near the River, where, too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the Labour of the Fishing Hawk; and when that diligent Bird has at length taken a Fish, and is bearing it to his Nest for the Support of his Mate and young Ones, the Bald Eagle pursues him and takes it from him. “With all this Injustice, he is never in good Case but like those among Men who live by Sharping & Robbing he is generally poor and often very lousy. Besides he is a rank Coward: The little King Bird not bigger than a Sparrow attacks him boldly and drives him out of the District. He is therefore by no means a proper Emblem for the brave and honest Cincinnati of America who have driven all the King birds from our Country . . . If he had been persuasive, we might have sports teams called the Turkeys, instead of the Eagles.