Mencken, Puritans, and modern Leftists

H. L. Mencken once said, deridingly, “A Puritan is someone who is desperately afraid that, somewhere, someone might be having a good time.” It is not hard to imagine modern-day Leftists saying the same thing. Yet for all their profession of irreligiosity, the Leftists do have a religion of their own. Substitute “Leftist” for “Puritan” and “a lot of money” for “a good time” in Mencken’s quote, and you have a summary of the Leftists’ religious zeal to tax “the wealthy”.

There is an exceptive clause, though, that need to be added: “except if his or her name is Warren Buffet, George Soros, Teresa Heinz, or John Kerry.”

Thus spake Dr. Dean

From a post at the Corner at NRO:

And concluding his backyard speech with a litany of Democratic values, he added: "This is a struggle of good and evil. And we're the good."

Ah, when President Bush called certain regimes evil, the Demos were throwing tantrums. You know, you are not supposed to see the world in black-and-white terms. Evil is an outdated, pre-Enlightenment, Neanderthal concept. But now their new chair (who is a piece of furniture, according to Taranto) now utters the e-word, and that in reference to Republicans. Umm, I am speechless.

A sentence that ends with five prepositions

I got a kick out of this from the Impromptu of Jay Nordlinger today:

A reader says, "Remember the old sentence that ends in not one but five prepositions? A kid sends Mommy downstairs for a bedtime reading book. She gets the wrong one, so the kid says, 'What did you bring that book I don't want to be read to out of up for?' "

Michael Shiavo

I follow the story of Michael Shiavo with some interest, though I haven’t spent much time musing over all the ethical and philosophical issues. One thing I noted, however, is that the state (state in the sense of powers that be) has indeed become a beast that is opposed to the law of God, at least in the area of marriage. Nowadays no-fault divorce is granted at will (which Christ said is an affront to God who joined the two together), yet, as in the case of Shiavo, who committed adultery which is sufficient ground for divorce, he still retained “guardianship” over her and even wanted to pull the plug and get whatever money was left from her.

I have always thought that if the state has the power to grant marital status, it ought also enforce negative sanctions against adultery, etc., in keeping with what the law of God says. When this power has been abused and the concomitant duty has been neglected, I wonder if Christians who are married in the church need or should bother register their marriage with the state. Be that as it may, there are laws concerning inheritance and potential tax beneifts (or disadvantages, depending on your situation) which may still be considered. But the meaning of marriage is all but lost.

QTL and YQTL

Looking forward to the Hebrew class tonight. We are now learning the Qal YQTL paradigms. My esteemed teacher forbids us to use the terms “perfect” and “imperfect”. Rather, the paradigmatic verb forms QTL and YQTL are to be used.

Funny that Hebrew uses QTL (to kill) as the paradigmatic verb, and Greek uses lyo (to destroy).