Yes, Virginia, There Is A Santa Clause

Every Christmas, once everyone is up, Christmas greetings were made, hugs were exchanged, the presents were opened, and breakfast was being made, I would read this first in the paper (ye olde parental units get an actual paper, and they live in NJ). It is a Christmas classic that has always touched my soul. While some people outside of the Tri-State area have heard of it, rarely do papers outside of the NY-NJ-Conn area see it in print, and I always direct them to read it online. I humbly bring it to you, and hope it touches you as much as it touches me:

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus

Editorial Page, New York Sun, 1897

We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Sun:

I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O’Hanlon

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a sceptical age. They do not believe except what they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.

He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus? Thank God he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!!

And a Merry Christmas from deep down in my heart to all my friends and visitors out there.

If you would like to know the background on the letter, you can go to the 2004 posting of this.

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

Read: Yes, Virginia, There Is A Santa Clause »

U.K. Needs To Radically Transform Society And Economy To Fight ‘Climate Change’

Funny how it always seems to come down to things like this. And carbon taxes

Labour would ‘radically transform economy’ to focus on climate change

A future Labour government would oversee an economic revolution to tackle the climate crisis, using the full power of the state to decarbonise the economy and create hundreds of thousands of green jobs in struggling towns and cities.

Rebecca Long-Bailey, the shadow business secretary who is driving the party’s climate agenda, said the UK’s “entire society and entire economy” needed to be refocused to meet the looming challenge of ecological breakdown.

“It could not be made clearer to us and people are starting to realise how incredibly dangerous this situation is,” said Long-Bailey, a close ally of the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and the shadow chancellor John McDonnell. “There is no option but to radically transform our economy.”

And how to accomplish this? Major government control. Surprise?

But in an interview with the Guardian she said the crisis was also an opportunity to bring well-paid, highly skilled jobs and economic regeneration to some of the most marginalised communities in the country.

Funny that this rarely materializes except via government funding, and those jobs disappear the moment government stops dumping massive amounts of taxpayer money into the “businesses.”

“If you knocked on a door in Salford, where I am from, although most people care about climate change it is not going to be top of their list of priorities. Most people just want to know how their life is going to be improved.

“So it is important for us to position ourselves as a party that is going to tackle climate change but turn that into an economic opportunity for the vast areas of this country that have seen decades of underinvestment and provide jobs for the future and provide that revitalisation that communities want to see.”

In other words, lie through their teeth.

Read: U.K. Needs To Radically Transform Society And Economy To Fight ‘Climate Change’ »

If All You See…

…is a world flooded from carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Blazing Cat Fur, with a post noting that SJWs now want the next 007 to be gender confused.

Read: If All You See… »

‘Climate Change’ Is Causing An Ever Growing Emotional Toll Or Something

It’s the time of the year where we should take pity on people who have been brainwashed into a doomsday cult and attempt to lead them back from the brink. Or laugh at them. Whichever

‘Climate grief’: The growing emotional toll of climate change

When the U.N. released its latest climate report in October, it warned that without “unprecedented” action, catastrophic conditions could arrive by 2040.

For Amy Jordan, 40, of Salt Lake City, a mother of three teenage children, the report caused a “crisis.”

“The emotional reaction of my kids was severe,” she told NBC News. “There was a lot of crying. They told me, ‘We know what’s coming, and it’s going to be really rough.’ “

She struggled too, because there wasn’t much she could do for them. “I want to have hope, but the reports are showing that this isn’t going to stop, so all we can do is cope,” she said.

The increasing visibility of climate change, combined with bleak scientific reports and rising carbon dioxide emissions, is taking a toll on mental health, especially among young people, who are increasingly losing hope for their future. Experts call it “climate grief,” depression, anxiety and mourning over climate change.

Perhaps the Cult shouldn’t be pushing utter doom daily from a tiny increase in the Earth’s average temperature, something that happens off and on

A 10-STEP PROGRAM FOR CLIMATE GRIEF

After the U.N. report was released, Jordan looked for a way to help her children cope. She saw a sign at her church for a support group that deals with the issue, the Good Grief Network.

Founded by Aimee Reau, 30, and LaUra Schmidt, 32, Good Grief offers a 10-step program to help people deal with collective grief — issues that affect a whole society, like racism, mass shootings and climate grief.

Read: ‘Climate Change’ Is Causing An Ever Growing Emotional Toll Or Something »

‘Climate Change’ Is Soon To Cause “Earthset” Or Something

Not only is this bit of moonbattery involve the Christmas season, but the Warmist uses a great event to push the Cult (this apparently came off the CNN wire originally)

50 YEARS AFTER ‘EARTHRISE,’ WE ARE RACING TOWARD ‘EARTHSET’

Fifty years ago, astronaut Bill Anders captured an iconic photo of Earth. Looking out a window of the Apollo 8 spacecraft on Christmas Eve, 1968, he glimpsed a splash of blue beyond the lunar surface. After a fumbling exchange in zero gravity, his crewmate Jim Lovell extended a roll of 70 mm color film. At 16:39 Universal Time, 240,000 miles from home, Anders aimed his Hasselblad camera and brought our world into focus in one of history’s most famous photographs.

“Earthrise” transformed the first crewed mission to orbit the moon from a nationalistic bid for prestige in the Cold-War-era space race, into something more profound: a dawning appreciation of humanity’s common destiny on a fragile planet in the vacuum of space.

The sight of Earth, bursting with color against the inky darkness of space and a barren moonscape, was “the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen,” Anders told Andrew Chaikin, a writer who later recounted the photo’s fascinating history for the Smithsonian. And the view was “totally unanticipated,” Anders said, because the mission had been so focused on going to the moon.

A beautiful event, brought to the world by the United States Of America. But…

Unfortunately, our oasis has begun to fade. And the fault lies not in our stars, but in ourselves. Rather than being wise stewards of Earth, we have despoiled it to the brink of environmental catastrophe.

Consider the recent, harrowing report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Even if global temperature increases are limited to 2 degrees Celsius — the Paris climate agreement threshold, which the world is nowhere close to achieving — the impact will be calamitous.

Without a drastic course correction, we will face deadly heat waves, rampant wildfires, food insecurity, water shortages, violent storms, rising sea levels and disappearing coral reefs. The US government shares this bleak outlook (at least outside the White House and other climate-denying precincts). Last month, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warned Americans to prepare for devastating impacts on their economy, health and environment. (snip)

That was the unmistakable message at the acrimonious global climate conference in Katowice, Poland, in December. With Earth hanging in the balance, the Trump administration redoubled its retrograde support for fossil fuels at the climate conference. Delegates finally agreed on a set of fundamental transparency measures, but only after an all-nighter in which they put off the most contentious issues until next year. Meanwhile, greenhouse gas emissions continue to accelerate “like a speeding freight train.”

A mere half-century after Earthrise, we are racing toward Earthset.

These cultists attempt to ruin everything. Yet they refuse to give up their own use of fossil fuels and walk the talk. Huh.

Read: ‘Climate Change’ Is Soon To Cause “Earthset” Or Something »

Migrants Blast Caravan Organizers For The Risky Journey

Remember when this whole migrant caravan was a grassroots affair organized within?

Caravan organizer Pueblo Sin Fronteras blasted by migrants over risky journey

Pueblo Sin Fronteras, a group of activists escorting the migrant caravan of thousands of Central Americans traveling to the U.S., is being blamed by many — including the migrants themselves — for encouraging such a risky trek.

The group, which is comprised of about 40 U.S. and Mexican activists, gave the caravan an option in October. The migrants were asked whether they wanted to continue to the U.S. southern border or stop in Mexico, where the government offered to let them stay.

Pueblo Sin Fronteras, or People Without Borders, warned the migrants the offer might be too good to be true and called on a voice vote — to which the crowd yelled to keep moving toward the U.S.

Since then, former allies and some migrants have said the group downplayed the risks involved, particularly for those with families and small children.

The organizers also were accused of misleading caravan migrants about how long they would have to wait on the Mexican side of the border to apply for asylum.

The U.S. government told them not to come. They were not invited. Perhaps they should stop listening to activists who really do not care about the migrants, they only care about their own political positions.

Adelaida Gonzalez, a member of the migrant caravan who traveled with her son and neighbor from Guatemala City, said she wished she’d accepted Mexico’s offer to stay and work in the southern state of Chiapas.

“We were never told along the way that it would be this hard,” Gonzalez, 37, said after she saw the border wall topped with razor wire and the long waiting list for asylum seekers.

What did she think she would find, an open arms welcome for a group that was, and still is, attempting to force their way into the U.S.? Invading? Attempting to force the U.S. to take care of them instead of our own citizens?

(Breitbart) Agents assigned to the Ajo Border Patrol Station came upon a group of 242 migrants while they were patrolling the border on December 19 about 15 miles west of Lukeville, Arizona, according to information obtained by Breitbart News from U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials. The following morning, Casa Grande Station agents came upon a group of 64 migrants while patrolling the border in the Tohono O’odham Nation. Both groups of migrants surrendered to the agents without incident, officials stated.

The agents reported both groups consisted mainly of family units — including juveniles and pregnant women. The groups came to the U.S. mainly from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. Officials did not say if these groups broke away from or were connected to the so-called caravan migrants.

Hence the reason we need a wall in certain areas.

Read: Migrants Blast Caravan Organizers For The Risky Journey »

Who’s Surprised That Warmists Are Blaming/Linking The Indonesia Tsunami To ‘Climate Change’?

So, a tsunami has hit Indonesia, and there are scores missing and 222 dead at this time. Some of the video is amazingly horrific. It was caused by Anak Krakatau, and ever growing volcano in the same area as the original Krakatau. But, of course, Cult of Climastrology

Read More »

Read: Who’s Surprised That Warmists Are Blaming/Linking The Indonesia Tsunami To ‘Climate Change’? »

If All You See…

…is horrendous heat snow that will either be worse or non-existent in future Christmas’, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is No Tricks Zone, with a post on biofuels causing more harm than (modeled) warming.

Read: If All You See… »

Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup

Happy Sunday! A gorgeous day in America. The sun is shining, birds are singing, and Christmas is just a few days away. This pinup is by Barbara Ellen Segner with a wee bit of help.

What is happening in Ye Olde Blogosphere? The Fine 15

  1. Weasel Zippers features a very good boy in a Santa costume taking care of the perps
  2. Vox Popoli covers social justice meritocricy
  3. This ain’t Hell…. has your Sunday feel good stories
  4. The Right Scoop covers video of a gun battle with an illegal alien released under Ca. sanctuary rules
  5. The Other McCain wonders if we can deport the NY Times
  6. The Lid notes that SJWs wanted the Gingerbread Man banned because sexism
  7. The Last Tradition laughs at Dems saying they’re for border security
  8. Powerline notes Trump doing away with yet another thing Obama
  9. Pacific Pundit discusses more Christians under assault for refusing to participate in a gay wedding
  10. Outside The Beltway notes that the impact of the shutdown will be limited (from a #NeverTrumper POV)
  11. Moonbattery covers why Obamacare doesn’t work
  12. Legal Insurrection features how much Dems spent on fake Russian bots
  13. Jihad Watch covers the Islamic State’s Christmas threat
  14. Climate Change Dispatch notes the increase of ‘climate change’ and Christmas doom stories
  15. And last, but not least, Jo Nova covers how hail proof solar panels are

As always, the full set of pinups can be seen in the Patriotic Pinup category, or over at my Gallery page. While we are on pinups, since it is that time of year, have you gotten your “Pinups for Vets” calendar yet? And don’t forget to check out what I declare to be our War on Women Rule 5 and linky luv posts and things that interest me

Don’t forget to check out all the other great material all the linked blogs have!

Anyone else have a link or hotty-fest going on? Let me know so I can add you to the list.

Read: Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup »

Chuck Schumer: GOP Should Give Up On Wall Or Government Will Stay Closed Or Something

Considering the opinion of Conservatives on government, how is this a threat?

CHUCK SCHUMER SAYS REPUBLICANS MUST ‘ABANDON’ WALL IN ORDER TO REOPEN GOVERNMENT

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Republicans need to “abandon” border wall funding if they want the government to reopen, just less than 24 hours into the partial shutdown.

Schumer, who has strongly opposed funding President Donald Trump’s border wall, saidthis on the Senate floor Saturday afternoon as the federal government is officially in a partial shutdown after Senate Republicans failed to receive enough votes to pass a short-term spending bill Friday that included funding for a border wall.

The New York senator also said Democrats are “open to discussing any proposal as long as they do not include anything for the wall,” showing Democrats are not willing to compromise on border wall funding.

It wasn’t all that long ago that Democrats, including Schumer, voted for legislation that would build a wall. In fact, that legislation is still in force, and requires government funding for the wall.

As far as an extended shutdown, do we really care? I’m sure a bunch of unhinged #NeverTrumpers are suddenly upset over the prospect of the government being “closed” (most of it isn’t), and I’ve read a few of them freaking out. But, if unnecessary jobs are being put off during the shutdown, then we need to do away with the taxpayers funding jobs that are unnecessary. And, really, as far as it goes, most things necessary continue as normal. Trump isn’t putting up all sorts of “Barrycades” like Obama did, blocking monuments and such in D.C. and around the country, trying to inflict pain (which the media refused to call him out on).

While I do not see the need for a full wall along entire border, just in certain areas and other measures would work wonders in reducing illegal immigration, it is refreshing to see a Republican fight for what we want. We’ve been calling for Republicans to fight back. Like Trump or loathe him, he’s doing what we have wanted for a long time.

Read: Chuck Schumer: GOP Should Give Up On Wall Or Government Will Stay Closed Or Something »

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