New Zealand Conservative

From the Wall Street Journal, an ancient gold exhibit from Crimea that has travelled to Europe, now may not be returned to it's mueseum given that Crimea is no longer part of Ukraine. Here's some background: The Scythians were nomads who inhabited much of modern-day Russia and Ukraine from about 600 B.C. to 300 A.D. They fought off their enemies from horseback with bows and arrows and interred their nobility in elaborate tombs, where they buried horses, gold and other treasured items alongside the dead. Higher-ranking Scythian warriors often had elaborate tattoos, according to Greek historian Herodotus, who described the Scythians as barbaric warriors at times prone to indulge in marijuana. Alexander Blok wrote about them in 1918, months after the October Revolution, in his famous poem "The Scythians." Frustrated by Russia's dragging involvement in World War I, Blok lashed out at Europe. He presented the Scythians as a savage eastern streak lingering in Russi...

Who was St. Valentine? Father O'Gara, in a post on the Christian Broadcasting Network , tells us: "He was a Roman Priest at a time when there was an emperor called Claudias who persecuted the church at that particular time," Father O'Gara explains. " He also had an edict that prohibited the marriage of young people . This was based on the hypothesis that unmarried soldiers fought better than married soldiers because married soldiers might be afraid of what might happen to them or their wives or families if they died." "I think we must bear in mind that it was a very permissive society in which Valentine lived ," says Father O'Gara. "Polygamy would have been much more popular than just one woman and one man living together. And yet some of them seemed to be attracted to Christian faith. But obviously the church thought that marriage was very sacred between one man and one woman for their life and that it was to be encouraged. And s...

Anyone know of any?

I find this sort of story disturbing. Islam takes over the most ancient part of the world, then makes no attempt to preserve anything old, and even destroys it, and then wants those who did carefully look after ancient items to give them back. Turkey has been accused of cultural chauvinism and attempting to blackmail some of the world's most important museums in the wake of its demands for the return of thousands of archaeological treasures. According to cultural chiefs in Berlin, Paris and New York, Turkey has threatened to bar foreign archaeologists from excavation sites in the country by not renewing their digging permits if governments refuse to return artefacts that Ankara says were unlawfully removed from Turkish soil. It has also threatened to halt the lending of its treasures to foreign museums, they say. The government in Ankara, emboldened by the country's growing diplomatic and economic clout, has repeatedly said that the retrieval of the artefacts is part of ...

From WDTPRS: Obama the Theologian invokes Christ while endorsing unnatural sexual acts, same-sex “marriage”. Fr. Z rants. Obama instrumentalized the Lord’s Sacrifice, the ultimate act of the love which is charity, to promote unnatural sex and the overturning of one of our most important societal bonds. We, according to charity, must act for the true good of the other. It is not for the true good of another person to help them to sin or to undermine Christian morals. But that is exactly what Obama is doing. This is an astounding example of both scandal and blasphemy. It is beyond absurd to to invoke the Lord’s Sacrifice in an attempt to violate our human nature and God’s laws. Obama invoked the Sacrifice of the Cross for the sake of justifying the destruction of the definition of “marriage”, as if that is “good” for people. It is NOT for the good of anyone, because it promotes and condones a sin that cries to heaven. We cannot wish that people sin. We cannot help them sin. ...

I was in the mall today, waiting to get my hair cut. As I do when I'm hanging around a mall, I browse. I love books, but hardly ever spend much time looking at the bookshops here, because they are typically full of cook books and crap fiction. It's so much easier to hone in on what I want online and order it. But today, since I had a bit of time I wandered into Whitcoulls where a new book by Philippa Gregory caught my eye. I opened up the jacket cover and read the following: The Lady of the Rivers is #1 New York Times bestselling author Philippa Gregory’s remarkable story of Jacquetta, Duchess of Bedford, a woman who navigated a treacherous path through the battle lines in the Wars of the Roses. Descended from Melusina, the river goddess, Jacquetta always has had the gift of second sight. As a child visiting her uncle, she met his prisoner, Joan of Arc, and saw her own power reflected in the young woman accused of witchcraft. They share the mystery of the tarot card ...

How many know what an impact the Reformation had on the way the poor were looked after? It occurred to me while on my retreat that the modern welfare system could learn a lot from the abbeys. Until the Reformation, the monastery offered alms to the poor and somewhere for people fleeing tyranny to hide. Post Reformation, the safety net was undone and people threw themselves on the charity of the local lay community. With the coming of the industrial era, the state started to take up the burden of poor relief. Related link: The modern welfare state could learn a lot from the Medieval monastery ~ Timothy Stanley, History and Politics

The biggest problem in education is government control. Government control of the curriculum and government control of who is allow to teach that curriculum. The only way at present in New Zealand to escape this control is to home-school, where there is no requirement that the teacher be registered nor that they follow the NZ curriculum. A number of people in the Blogosphere that think that the problem with education is leftism infecting the schools. Seriously, leftism is a minor issue. It's only piggy-backed onto a system that was already in place for the purpose of indoctrination of children. If all the leftists were removed from schooling tomorrow, the system that allows the government of the day to indoctrinate would still be in place. Very few today can imagine a world without compulsory schooling unless they think of some backward, third world country. So I offer the following quote from 19th Century America to show that people back in those times recognised that sc...

Really interesting historical post by John Ansell on New Zealand and the Treaty of Waitangi. EVERYTHING YOU EVER WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT THE TREATY, BUT WERE TOO TERRIFIED OF BEING LABELLED A RACIST TO ASK — Part 1: Maori Ask British for Protection From Maori I'm fascinated by the on-going fear of the French because of their retaliation against the Maori who killed some of their number and also the fact that the British didn't want another colony but were begged by Maori to save them from the French.

OK so Obama has declared the Iraq war to be over . Jolly good but what he really means is that US troops will be withdrawing - history for better or worse will continue to be written and it would be a foolish man who said that no more blood will ever be spilled on the Mesopotamian plain. But how many people know that in World War 2 Great Britain subdued a rebellious Iraq in a mere 29 days. Or that Great Britain and the Soviet Union gained control of Iran in just under three weeks in an exercise that cost Great Britain just 22 soldiers lives. My question is if it was so easy back then why is it so hard for the great powers to accomplish now?

So Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson have made a Tintin movie. I dunno I've watched the trailer and it don't seem very Tintin ish to me. A rip roaring yarn maybe but does it capture the essence and magic of Tintin? We will see Yesterday Lucia posted a trailer for Bitwa Warszawska or Warsaw Battle 1920 by Polish filmaker Jerzy Hoffman and that looks far more to my taste rather than Spielbergian eyecandy, which maybe dazzling perhaps in execution but of little substance. In any case the post from yesterday reminded me of this Jerzy Hoffman film I saw some years ago (and no Lucia it did not as far as I know see a New Zealand release). A scene from the film With Fire and Sword (Ogniem i Mieczem - a famous work of Polish literature which you can get in English translation ) This scene recreates the battle of Battle of Zhovti Vody fought between the Poles and Cossacks who were allied with the Crimean Tarters long long long ago. This is a great scene. Ukrainians do ...

In 1920 there was a little known war between the brand new Soviet Union and Poland, whereby Poland stood in the way of the imposing Communism by force over Europe. Over a million Soviet soldiers attacked Warsaw, certain defeat loomed - yet, despite all odds, the Poles turned them back. This victory is known as the Miracle on the Visula, as the invading Soviets were said to have seen Our Lady on a cloud over the city, thus causing confusion in their ranks and leading to their defeat. A Polish chaplain told me of the Miracle of the Vistula while kilted Scottish pipers played the Polish national anthem. He told me of that eve of the Feast of the Assumption twenty years ago when Our Lady's Poland fell back in demoralised retreat before the anti-God hordes of Soviet Russia. THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA " We were beaten," he said. " Bitterly and terribly beaten, demoralised, crushed. It was at that moment that the hearts of our men went out to her whom we had cr...

In his Year 9 class, my oldest son who used to homeschool and is now discovering the joys of a secular education, told me yesterday that many children in his class considered themselves slaves of their parents . I kid you not. My son was astounded. As he told me, they don't know what real slavery is. Many of them had a hard time getting their heads around a society with instituted slavery, where a person couldn't just beat up their master and run away. My son studied ancient Rome (and to a lesser extent, ancient Greece) while at home and thought his co-pupils were really missing out on a fundamental basic understanding of how the world works. I'm not sure better literacy and numeracy is going to solve this problem. UPDATE: It's seems I posted too soon. Joyful Papist has linked to another blog post where slavery is being redefined as being an earner by having the Government pay for a child's existence. Hmmm...

The Lincoln county war happened a long time ago, it was a range war. William Bonney the a teenager became entangled in it when his boss John Tunstall, a rancher who Billy admired was assassinated in front of him. He thus became a combatant with a chip on his shoulder and more blood was spilled. In an attempt to end hostilities Billy was offered amnesty along with other minor protagonists, an offer he accepted but one which was not honored - he escaped and was tracked down by Pat Garret in 1881 and that was the end of that. But apparently there has been a move to have him pardoned, the point of which escapes me, he'll still be dead and nothing will change what happened in those long off days. Anyway good old Governor Richardson of New Mexico found he had bought into a controversy he doesn't need and has decided the Pardon will not be forthcoming Here is Ry Cooder's very fine version of the Billy the Kid song. If you haven't heard it before you'll eith...

A link to a page full of links to good articles: Myths, Misunderstandings, and Controversies . Inspired by a comment on KiwiBlog . From one of the links: Crusade Propaganda : The crusades are quite possibly the most misunderstood event in European history. Ask a random American about them and you are likely to see a face wrinkle in disgust, or just the blank stare that is usually evoked by events older than six weeks. After all, weren’t the crusaders just a bunch of religious nuts carrying fire and sword to the land of the Prince of Peace? Weren’t they cynical imperialists seeking to carve out colonies for themselves in faraway lands with the blessings of the Catholic Church? A couch potato watching the BBC/A&E documentary onthe crusades (hosted by Terry Jones of Monty Python fame no less) would learn in roughly four hours of frivolous tsk-tsk-ing that the peaceful Muslim world actually learned to be warlike from the barbaric western crusaders. No wonder, then, that Pope John ...

A self proclaimed atheist from Australia has burned the bible and the Koran, and posted the event on you-tube. Mr Stewart is a commercial contracts lawyer at Queensland University of Technology. This morning he refused to answer phone calls. The assistant organiser of Brisbane Atheists wrote on the group's website last night "do you think I am in trouble????" He says people offended by the experiment are taking it "too seriously". "It's just a f...ing book, who cares," Mr Stewart says.

The You-Tube clip above is a digital fly-by of what the destruction of Warsaw by the Nazis would have looked like. A city that was home to a million souls lies in complete ruins. It's amazing that it was rebuilt. Related link : Was it all worth it? ~ The Economist

Today's Latin lesson included learning that Anno Domini means In the Year of Our Lord . I told the kids that our whole way of measuring the years is inextricably linked with when God came to earth. So, we have the years A.D. measured from when God was born as a man (though we know now it a few years earlier), and then we count backward from that point using B.C. (Before Christ). And even though there has been an attempt to replace A.D. with C.E. (Common Era) and B.C with B.C.E (Before Common Era), that fact that years are counted from the most significant event in history cannot be erased.

Five days into the battle for Iwo Jima, on the 23 rd of February 1945, the flag was raised on Mount Suribachi by the US Marine Corps. A few hours later a replacement flag raised by another group of marines. This second Flag raising was photographed by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal who captured one of the most celebrated images of the Twentieth Century. A Marine Corps cinematographer was filming beside him - below is that clip. There were six Flag raisers, Franklin Sousley, Harlon Block, and Michael Strank who died during the battle and the three survivors John Bradley, Rene Gagnon, and Ira Hayes who were returned to the United States and sent on a War Bond drive. Their story is told in the Clint Eastwood film Flags of Our Fathers derived from a book of the same name written by James Bradley, a son of John Bradley, one of the Flag raisers.

If you have seen the movie " Flags of our Fathers " you will know the story of the iconic photograph of the Raising of the Flag on Mount Suribachi during the Battle for Iwo Jima. Less than three months after that famous picture was captured the Photograph on the left was taken and in its time it was equally iconic. The reason for posting it today is that Abdulkhakim Ismailov the last survivor of the Red Army soldiers in this picture died on Tuesday at his home in Dagestan . Makes you think, old glory as raised on Mount Suribachi has gained two more stars since that day but remains essentially unchanged. While the flag that flew over the Reichstag that day in May in 1945 and which symbolized the end of World War 2 in Europe has been replaced by the Russian Tricolor, White, Blue and Red, which is a return to pre-revolutionary Russian Flag. And there are those amongst us who would change our flag, the flag which draped the coffins of those who gave their lives in that e...