The Action book is out: Summary, links, contents.

There will be discussion HERE.

Instapundit today points out that the recently qualified ballot initiative in San Francisco to ban and criminalize circumcision has shown its real motives, which are candidly antisemitic: Here PJ Media, with more comments here, the Anchores.. San Francisco is sick.

At the recent PCTS meeting, the papers were all about environmental theology in one form or another, and the phenomenon of global warming was generally and tacitly assumed in the background, whether it was explicitly cited or not. I pointed out that there is significant opposition to it in the scientific literature, and was asked for more information. Inasmuch as the answers to that question will take some time to gather, it seemed best to put them on a separate page, one that can be updated in a way that blog posts probably should not be. Here is a page with a few citations in regard to global warming.

When C. S. Lewis in The Abolition of Man addressed certain ideas circulating in his time, he gave pen-names to the authors of two books in order to deal with the ideas rather than with their authors: Gaius and Titius's book, and Orbilius's book. I would like to do something similar with an email that came to me in 2010, and deal with the ideas rather than their author. Call the author "Orbilian."

Orbilian sent me two emails, one of which I responded to in detail, 2010-06-16.

This email was longer than the first, and exemplary of double standards applied strictly and harshly against Israeli offenses, both real and imagined, and in no more than a perfunctory way to other actors far worse. It has bothered me since, and I debated whether it was better to respond or to ignore it. Since invective and bile against Israel can easily be found on the net, those parts of the email need not be repeated here, though I can certainly do so if necessary.

If I were to talk the way Orbilian writes, my Jewish friends would consider me an antisemite, and indeed, I would fault myself for antisemitism.

Let me respond only to one or two claims that are not so obviously false.

Orbilian recited a long list of alleged Israeli offenses, most of them imaginary or preposterous analogies. But among them was an incident that might have some credibility were its background not known:

>the attack on the U.S.S. Liberty in which 34 U.S. sailors were killed, 

See the Wiki article on Friendly Fire. Given the incidence of friendly fire by many, including the United States, to single out Israel strikes me as exemplary of Orbilian's double standard. What is striking about the Wiki article is the vast number of incidents, over many centuries, so many wars, and many beligerent powers. To single Israel out is evidence of prejudice.

Orbilian can't forgive Israel for defending itself successfully against neighbors out to destroy it utterly, and Orbilian portray's Israel's defensive actions as aggression. Since Orbilian hasn't published it, it's not necessary to parse that rant in detail.

Here is the nerve of Orbilian's rage against Israel:

>But, they have to give up the extreme Zionist view 
>that the whole of that land belongs to them 
>because some war-God gave it to them 3000 years ago.  

On the contrary, the modern State of Israel was founded not by God but by the United Nations. The history and texts from before the Balfour declaration up to the founding in 1947-1948 are complex, and involved many parties, but the overall motive was to provide a place where Jews are safe and cannot be expelled simply because they are Jewish, against a historical background of the worst antisemitism in history --- the Shoah. There is no more logical place than Israel itself. Arabs got the lion's share of the British Mandate, and Jews, resident in that area long before the Arabs, were given only leavings around the margins along the sea. What Orbilian cannot forgive is the Jewish character of the State of Israel, and that is what constitutes his remarks as antisemitic.

Others have noticed. Here Ed Driscoll has diagnosed AGW as akin to creationism.

I posted about it 2009-04-13.