My sister asked me today to write down a song that my dad wrote as a kid. She wants her daughter, my niece, to learn it. I think Dad told us that he was 12 years old when he wrote it. He never wrote it down, but he taught me to play the song, and I never forgot it. Now that Dad’s gone, I think I’m the only person in the world who knows how to play it, or knows how it goes.

I hope that will change now.

My sister’s request motivated me to learn (awkwardly so far) a music note-writing program called NoteFlight. I wrote down Dad’s piece over the last couple of hours and exported it to a .pdf. It also made a nice MIDI file which very roughly approximates what the song sounds like when I play it.

I’m pleased to share it with you. It’s not right that this neat little tune should be lost to the world, so here’s my attempt to preserve it. Pianists, feel free to print out the tune and give it to anyone you like.

Sheet music:

[pdf-embedder url=”https://patterico.com/app/uploads/2019/06/Dads-Song.pdf” title=”Dad's Song”]

(Hit the arrows at the bottom left of this embedded image to scroll back and forth between the two pages. You have to hover the cursor over the image to see the arrows.)

MIDI file (as a .wav). This sounds a little robotic as it’s just a rendition of a MIDI file by a computer program, but hey. It’s better than nothing.

Nice job, Dad.

[Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.]

[guest post by Dana]

Justice Nathalie Lieven has ordered a disabled woman who is 22 weeks pregnant, to undergo an abortion due to her mental limitations (she has the mental capacity of a “grade-school” child). Lieven claims that this decision has been made with the woman’s best interest at heart:

“I am acutely conscious of the fact that for the State to order a woman to have a termination where it appears that she doesn’t want it is an immense intrusion,” said Justice Nathalie Lieven in her ruling in the Court of Protection, June 21.

“I have to operate in [her] best interests, not on society’s views of termination,” Lieven explained, arguing that her decision is in the best interest of the woman.

The Court of Protection handles cases involving individuals judged to lack the mental capacity to make decisions for themselves.

The woman, who cannot been publicly identified, has been described as “in her twenties,” and is under the care of an NHS trust, part of the UK’s National Health Service.

Doctors at the trust wished to abort her pregnancy and argued that, due to her diminished mental capacity, the abortion would be less traumatic for the woman than giving birth, especially if the baby would then be placed in foster care.

This in spite of the young woman’s mother being against a forced abortion, and telling the court that she would take care of the baby herself:

Barrister John McKendrick, who is leading the legal team for the pregnant woman’s mother, says the court has “no proper evidence” that having an abortion will be beneficial to the pregnant mother. “Their evidence is premised on a narrow clinical view. The application must be dismissed,” McKendrick said. The pregnant woman’s mother has added that abortion strongly violates her family’s Catholic values and that she would raise her grandchild herself.

A social worker who works with the young woman also said the pregnancy should be allowed to continue.

Not good enough for Judge Lieven:

The judge said she did not believe the woman understood what it meant to have a baby.

“I think she would like to have a baby in the same way she would like to have a nice doll,” Lieven said.

Lieven also said she did not believe the woman’s mother, who already helps care for her daughter, would be able to offer care for a grandchild at the same time.

Without knowing the specifics of the mental disability (does she get violent, is she compliant, etc.), it’s as if the judge believes no one has ever taken care of more than one child at a time, or taken care of a young adult with a mental disability while providing care to a baby. If this is the real concern, and the young woman is under the care of the NHS, why not offer to provide home visits by nurses or health aides to assist the grandmother? Is this an impossible ask? If the woman is a practicing Catholic and attends church, would there be no effort made by parishioners to spend time helping her care for the baby and daughter? In my experience, coming alongside families in need is one of the best things church bodies do for those in their midst.

But to this court, terminating the baby’s life – a baby who is more than halfway through gestation – is the only viable option. It’s a neater and swifter fix to the problem. As if an abortion and its aftermath is not at all upsetting, painful, confusing, and an overall soul-crushing, heart-wrenching experience. How dare the court presume that this procedure will just be the simple excision of an intrusive interruption in the life of a young woman with diminished capacity. Nothing more than a little blip on the radar, as if the young woman doesn’t have a heart and a soul and a capacity for love.

The judge also decided that, along with giving birth, putting the baby up for adoption or placed into foster care would not be in the woman’s best interest. Again, the only viable option is ending the baby’s life because to the court, the baby in the womb obviously has no personhood:

“I think [the woman] would suffer greater trauma from having a baby removed [from her care],” Lieven said, because “it would at that stage be a real baby.”

Lieven clarified that the pregnancy “although real to [the woman], doesn’t have a baby outside her body she can touch.”

So everything but allowing the woman to give birth to her baby is in her best interest. This exemplifies an unbelievable level of inhumanity, and overreach by the Court. Ending the life of innocents seems to be the face of the NHS and socialized medicine: Charlie Gard.

It’s insightful to read a little background on Lieven:

As a lawyer, Lieven has appeared in court before in cases concerning abortion. In 2011, while representing the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, an abortion provider, she argued that British women should be permitted to medically abort their pregnancies at their own homes instead of in a hospital.

Five years later, Lieven argued in court that Northern Ireland’s abortion laws were a violation of the United Kingdom’s Human Rights Act.

In 2017, she said that Northern Ireland’s abortion laws were akin to torture and were discriminatory.

The BBC reports on ethical arguments concerning the abortion of babies with disabilities here, and concludes the report with societal goals on the treatment of those with disabilities. As you read, keep in mind that in this case, it is the mother who has a mental disability, not the baby, and keep in mind the court’s rationale for their order to have the baby aborted:

Modern society believes certain things about people with disability:

People with disabilities should not be discriminated against in any way
Society should do everything reasonable to remove anything that gets in the way of disabled people playing a full part in ordinary life
Prejudice against disabled people is not acceptable
Stereotypes about disability should be eliminated

It’s all so ironic when you consider that the grandmother willingly gave birth to a baby who with a disability, and now the daughter with the disability is pregnant and being forced to abort her baby because there is simply no other viable option in the eyes of the court. And while the grandmother may not have known about the disability before she gave birth to her daughter, at some point after she became aware of it, and yet chose to keep the child and not put her into foster care or give her up for adoption. Thankfully, there are still people in this sad world who believe in love, no matter what form its arrival takes in their lives. And even though the grandmother said she would care for the baby – a baby who has not been identified with any disability and is perfectly innocent in every way – according to the court, that is not enough to escape death. The baby must not be allowed to live. The grandmother, whose faith prohibits the taking of innocent life and who chose to love and care for her disabled daughter, is irrelevant.

P.S. According to reports, there is an ongoing investigation into the circumstances surrounding her pregnancy.

(Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.)

–Dana

[Headline from DRJ]

German politician’s murder raises spectre of far-right attacks:

Walter Lübcke knew how it felt to receive death threats. A senior politician from Angela Merkel’s CDU party in Hesse, the 65-year-old was well known in the region for his liberal attitude towards people seeking asylum.
***
Lübcke was found just after midnight on 2 June, reportedly by his son, as he lay unconscious and badly injured on the terrace of his own home in the sleepy village of Istha, in central Germany. He had been shot in the head at close range and died shortly afterwards in hospital.

The suspect has links to a neo-Nazi network:

They have identified Stephan Ernst, 45, as their main suspect. He is known to have had links to neo-Nazi networks and investigators are exploring a possible connection to the notorious NSU (National Socialist Underground) – an extremist group which shot dead 10 people, most of whom had migrant backgrounds, between 2000 and 2007.
***
According to government figures, there are 24,000 right-wing extremists in Germany. Nearly 13,000 are believed to have a tendency to violence.

Charlottesville murderer and [r]emorseless white supremacist, 22, who killed woman and injured dozens in domestic terror attack asks judge to commute his sentence …:

Lawyers for James Alex Fields Jr., 22, said in a sentencing memo that their client is too young for a life sentence, had a traumatic childhood ad is mentally ill.

He killed anti-racism activist Heather Heyer and injured dozens more when he drove his car into protesters who had assembled at a white nationalist rally.

Fields has shown no remorse for his actions and as prosecutors pointed out in the memo they filed last week continues to disparage the victim’s mother.

Excerpt from the James A. Fields, Jr. DOJ Victim Notification:

Fields expressed and promoted his belief that white people are superior to other races and peoples; expressed support of the social and racial policies of Adolf Hitler and Nazi-era Germany, including the Holocaust, and espoused violence against African Americans, Jewish people and members of other racial, ethnic and Religious groups he perceived to be non-white.  Fields also expressed these views directly in interactions with individuals known to him.

The common denominator in these stories is hate. And Nazis.

— DRJ

It is the second Sunday after Pentecost. Today’s Bach cantata is “Herr Jesu Christ, wahr’ Mensch und Gott” (Lord Jesus Christ, true Man and God).

Today’s Gospel reading is Luke 8:26-39:

Jesus Restores a Demon-Possessed Man

They sailed to the region of the Gerasenes, which is across the lake from Galilee. When Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon-possessed man from the town. For a long time this man had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell at his feet, shouting at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, don’t torture me!” For Jesus had commanded the impure spirit to come out of the man. Many times it had seized him, and though he was chained hand and foot and kept under guard, he had broken his chains and had been driven by the demon into solitary places.

Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”

“Legion,” he replied, because many demons had gone into him. And they begged Jesus repeatedly not to order them to go into the Abyss.

A large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside. The demons begged Jesus to let them go into the pigs, and he gave them permission. When the demons came out of the man, they went into the pigs, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

When those tending the pigs saw what had happened, they ran off and reported this in the town and countryside, and the people went out to see what had happened. When they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone out, sitting at Jesus’ feet, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. Those who had seen it told the people how the demon-possessed man had been cured. Then all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear. So he got into the boat and left.

The man from whom the demons had gone out begged to go with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return home and tell how much God has done for you.” So the man went away and told all over town how much Jesus had done for him.

The text of today’s piece is available here. It contains these words, reminding one of the way the demon-possessed man addressed Jesus as “Jesus, Son of the Most High God”:

Lord Jesus Christ, true Man and God,
You who suffered martyrdom, anguish and ridicule,
at the end also died for me on the Cross
and won for me Your Father’s favor,
I ask, through Your bitter suffering:
Be merciful to me, a sinner.

Happy listening! Soli Deo gloria.

[Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.]