Gather 'round

Two stories have caught my eye recently. Both are very positive, so I wanted to share them with readers.

The first is a story about America's next great gymnast. A 16 year old girl, Shawn Johnson, who seems very much to have a brain as well as athletic skills.
With quotes like these from her, I know I'll be paying closer attention to the Olympics.

"In my eyes, I've never failed because I've never given anything less than my best."

"I think going into any competition, I'm always thinking of myself and not paying attention to others," she said. "I don't feel any different from the first day I started. I love what I do and I don't let anything affect me."

"What leads my career is that you can't succeed in something unless you're having fun," she said. "I love my sport and that really has helped me to get where I am today."

Here's the whole story:

http://highschool.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=765329

The second story that excites me is about SpaceShipTwo. Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic Airways has released the design of their ship. Go take a look @:

http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/23/601315.aspx

I'm ready to go! Let's fly!

Minor editing.

Columnist Mark Steyn being sued by Canadian Islamic Congress...

Looks like some Canadian's are "offended" by a column Mark Steyn wrote in 2006 and he is now being sued. Here's the link:

http://www.macleans.ca/columnists/article.jsp?id=7&content=20080103_113631_1360

Here are the first two paragraphs:

Do you remember a cover story Maclean's ran on Oct. 23, 2006?

No? Me neither, and I wrote it. Such is life in the weekly mag biz. But it was an excerpt on various geopolitical and demographic trends from my then brand new tome, America Alone: The End of the World as we Know It. I don't know whether my bestselling book is still available in Canadian bookstores, but it's coming soon to a Canadian "courtroom" near you! The Canadian Islamic Congress and a handful of Osgoode Hall law students have complained about the article in Maclean's to (at last count) three of Canada's many "human rights" commissions, two of which have agreed to hear the "case." It would be nice to report that the third sent the plaintiffs away with a flea in their ears saying that in a free society it's no business of the state to regulate the content of privately owned magazines. Alas, I gather it's only bureaucratic torpor that has temporarily delayed the province of Ontario's en­­thusiastic leap upon the bandwagon. These students are not cited in the offending article. Canadian Muslims are not the subject of the piece. Indeed, Canada is not mentioned at all, except en passant. Yet Canada's "human rights" commissions have accepted the premise of the Canadian Islamic Congress--that the article potentially breaches these students' "human rights."

In a related issue, quoting another columnist:

"It didn’t attract much notice, but the General Assembly of the United Nations ended the year by passing a disgusting resolution protecting Islam from criticism of its human rights violations."

Here's that article:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/ukcorrespondents/holysmoke/dec07/islam-resolution.htm

I can't imagine any of our political candidates manning the ramparts in defense of free speech.

2008 !

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL MY FRIENDS AND READERS.