Culture: May 2004 Archives

Fellow Pogophile and blogger Dawn Eden was saluted at the end of Joe Scarborough's MSNBC show last night as one of the former Florida congressmen's favorite blogs (transcript here, scroll to end), alongside blogosphere luminaries like Instapundit and Andrew Sullivan.

SCARBOROUGH: You know, our sex scandal blogger story may have left some of you asking, what's a blogger?

Well, mom and pop, a blogger is one who blogs. Speaking "Electric Company" style, our guests for that segment keep a political diary online. It's called a Weblog. Take the words Web and log and it becomes Weblog. But since kids don't have a sufficient attention span to piece two syllables together, the terms has been mercifully cut down to blog.

SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY's favorite blogs include Wonkette.com and Gawker, of course, InstaPundit, Dawn Patrol, AndrewSullivan, and the ArmedProphet. And the keepers of these blogs mix news stories with political viewpoints and personal stories, which really make blogs most interesting. And most blogs are updated daily using software that allows nimrods with little or no technical background, i.e., me, to update their blogs on a daily basis.

Now, if you haven't checked out blogs or this crazy Internet thing, I highly recommend it. I hear it's real big with the kids.

Congratulations to Dawn, who turns out a thought-provoking essay nearly every day, and has been certified by another Oklahoma blogger as an enigma:

Anyone that can mercilessly (and justly) skewer Hugh Hefner, relate personal stories about her friend, the panhandling music editor/heroin addict, thoughtfully compare clinical and situational depression, discuss Philip K. Dick's influence on G.K. Chesterson (and Orson Welles), tell a story (an application lesson actually) about working the basement of Warner Communications, and pepper the whole page with references from the scripture (KJV no less!) all on the same page is an enigma. Now what would you guess that person does for al living? Theology professor? Maybe Comparative Lit? Or Anthropology? Nope. Music Historian and author of the headline "Hurt in the Line of Doody."

By the way, the beginning of the Scarborough quote refers to a U. S. Senate staffer who was fired for using Senate computers to post to her blog about moonlighting as a prostitute. I guess it's sweeps month, so the only way blogging will make the TV news is if sex is involved. Dawn Eden writes about sex, too, but she shuns pop culture's glamourization of casual sex for insight into the real consequences of treating those made in God's image as mere implements. And she's called attention to Planned Parenthood's website for teenagers, which puts the lie to PP's rhetoric that they seek to help teens make responsible decisions.

Dawn Eden relates a jaw-dropping encounter with Dr. James Watson, co-discoverer of the structure of the DNA molecule.

I was introduced to the gaunt, aged legend by another scientist, who proceeded to tell Watson about his biomedicals company, which funded work in the genetics field.

Watson interrupted him: "Is your company geared towards research or service?"

The scientist paused for a second, taking in the unusual question. "Research," he answered.

"That's the problem with these companies today!" the Nobel laureate erupted. "Everyone's doing research in genetics and nobody's doing service. Because it's too controversial"—he sneered—"to help mothers so that they can give birth to healthy babies. ...

"They say I'm a killer," Watson went on, his tired eyes taking on fire. "It's those right-to-lifers."

"They say I'm a killer," he repeated, "and everyone's afraid of offending them." He was still looking at the other scientist. The scientist, whom I know didn't share his views, maintained an attentive silence—partly, I believe, out of gentlemanly respect, and partly out of not wanting to put gasoline on a fire.

But I had nothing to lose. So I took a deep breath, adjusted my jaw so it was back in line with my upper lip, and said, in the gentlest voice I could muster, "I'd love to know more about why you feel that way, as I'm a right-to-lifer myself."

Watson looked me in the eye and told me he was qualified to advocate in favor of mothers choosing to abort "unhealthy" children because he wished he could have aborted his own son, who is mentally handicapped.

He went on, unprodded, to say that he was an "unbeliever," so he was sure he would have had no moral qualms about killing his own child.

Just to clarify, by "helping mothers have healthy babies", he means helping them kill babies with the wrong genes.

Charles G. Hill comments:

If there's a Deep Truth here, it's this: doing good things, even great things, doesn't assure you a position on the side of the angels.