Breaking news! The New York Times ran a story that was fair to pro-lifers. Seems there was quite a lot of shock and revulsion over this; check the comments.  

Came with this photo spread, too. They warn you that the photos are graphic.

Too bad no one warns women that the procedure is very graphic before they do it. (The photos are of aborted fetuses.)

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eM18W9Oz9Bg&feature=player_embedded#]

Watch protestors at McGill disrupt Jojo Ruba’s presentation. I had heard of this but there’s something you experience in watching it. (For me it really drove home what idiots they are.)

(h/t)

Someone sent me these photos, and I do think it’s amazing what they can see going on “in there.” (Scientific language, I know.)

I also believe most abortions occur at about eight weeks, which is the photo above.

No jail time for triathlete who bound and savagely beat wife:

A jail sentence would be “counterproductive” for a Salmon Arm man and renowned Canadian triathlete who bound and savagely beat his wife repeatedly with a five-pound dumbbell while she begged him for mercy, a provincial court judge has ruled.

See, the point of a jail sentence in a case like this isn’t to be productive. It’s to be punishing. Doesn’t take a fancy law degree to understand that.

Up here in Canada it’s Thanksgiving weekend. Personally, I will be roasting a duck because the oven where I am isn’t big enough to accommodate a turkey. That’s just how flexible a cook I am. I’m not entirely sure how the beast will turn out, but I’m pretty confident the chocolate pumpkin tart will work just fine. It’s a Martha Stewart recipe – it can’t go wrong.

I have lots to be thankful for, and I will do my best to conduct myself accordingly.

Have a good one!

This almost sounds like a hoax: “Miracle” newborn survives fall through toilet onto train tracks.

In what has rightly been declared a “miracle,” a newborn baby girl has survived falling onto train tracks in India after being born in the train’s lavatory, the Telegraph reports. Pregnant Rinku Debi Ray was travelling with her husband and four-year-old to her parents’ home in Bihar, where she planned to deliver her second child, when she felt sharp stomach pains. She went to the washroom to alleviate them, and suddenly gave birth. The baby fell into the lavatory bowl and through the flap onto the tracks under the speeding train. Ray ran out of the lavatory and jumped from the carriage to find the child. Her husband, who pulled the emergency cord after seeing her jump, found her by the train track cradling the newborn girl in her arm. Mother and daughter are recovering from the ordeal in hospital.

You wouldn’t want to do that on purpose.

I’m going with appropriate, though in the past I would have said “uptight.”

Billy Graham had a rule. He was a powerful man, away from his wife and children more often than he was with them. Aware of the significance of his reputation and convinced of the moral value of the Gospel message, he took precautions to guard against his own human weakness. He gave his ministry colleagues explicit instructions: never leave me alone in a room with a woman who is not my wife.

This article is about how marriage is hard–harder for evangelical Christians than others, apparently. But since it’s true–marriage is very hard–admitting that will be the first step toward curbing our divorce/adultery epidemic. If marriage matters, and I think we all know it does, we would do well to start taking it a bit more seriously. Even if that means instituting “over the top” rules about not being in a room alone with a woman/man who is not your spouse.

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Rebecca adds: Interesting.  There’s a similar concept in Judaism which prohibits the seclusion of an unrelated adult man and woman, and the reasoning is the same.  I go back and forth as to how useful this is in reality.
It’s true that if you’re never alone with someone of the opposite sex, you’re highly, highly unlikely to have an improper relationship with them – unless you’re so brazen that you’d do it in front of witnesses, in which case you have other issues.  I worry that taking it to extremes can hinder all kinds of other things – I know male professors who won’t meet with a student of the opposite sex in their office, even during work hours, with the door open, but rather meet in a public room (for reasons other than religion), and while this may be prudent, it’s also sad that a closer, mentor-student relationship can’t be forged.  And some (extremely) strict rabbinical interpretations forbid adult men from being alone with even underaged children, even if they’re relatives, although I’ve yet to meet people who follow this ruling.  Of course, if your attractions are not to the opposite sex, does it follow that you should never be alone with anybody?  That would make normal social and work interactions tricky, to say the least.

Nevertheless, whether Billy Graham’s approach is a bit over the top or not, the pendulum has swung so far in the direction of blurring boundaries, obliterating privacy, and loosened norms that a steering in this direction can only be an improvement, even if we disagree about what the theoretical ideal would be.

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Brigitte says: If the choice is between uptight and this, I’ll take uptight any day.

There isn’t much information on that story so far:

The infants were discovered Sunday while Calgary police were investigating the death of a 27-year-old woman at a home in the 200 block of Taracove Estates Drive N.E., police said in a release Thursday evening. The deaths are considered “suspicious in nature,” they said.

The death of Harsimrat Kahlon is not considered suspicious, police said, but further testing is being done to determine why the woman died.

Autopsies on the newborns have been completed, but the cause of their deaths has yet to be determined, police said. Further testing is being done and it could take weeks or even months.

Police are not disclosing the gender of the babies, their ages or how long they had been in the home. No further details about this case will be released until tests have been completed.

At a news conference in Calgary, Duty Insp. Rob Williams, who read the contents of the news release, reiterated that police will not provide further details, including whether Kahlon had given birth to the babies or was their caretaker.

Despite the lack of information, police said they’re confident this is not a case in which a killer is on the loose.

Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 800-222-8477.

Taking the Pill apparently makes women like girlier men. Says so right here… I think.

Scientists say the hormones in the oral contraceptive suppress a woman’s interest in masculine men and make boyish men more attractive. Although the change occurs for just a few days each month, it may have been highly influential since use of the Pill began more than 40 years ago.

But I’m also not entirely indifferent to Johnny Depp or that new kid, Zac Efron. Right, then, scientists, another puzzle for you to solve.

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Rebecca wonders: So, what kind of drugs do you have to be taking to make you attracted to Tom Cruise?