So what was the "miracle"?
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rickathedj — 10 years ago(December 24, 2015 08:26 AM)
How about Macy and Gimbel shaking hands? LOL
The saga of getting my first novel on Kindle
http://ricksmidnightquill.blogspot.com/ -
rj-27 — 10 years ago(December 26, 2015 09:28 AM)
Or, Donald and Hillary?
Or German and British soldiers during WWI?
https://mises.org/library/will-peace#footnote1_oyehcpm
Democracy is the pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. H.L. Mencken -
rome_adventure — 10 years ago(December 27, 2015 09:21 AM)
I always thought the miracle was interpreted at the very ending.
He says "I must be a pretty good lawyer. I take a little old man and legally prove to the world that he's Santa Claus." But was that a miraculous endeavor? Or is Kris really Santa after all? -
rj-27 — 10 years ago(December 28, 2015 11:37 AM)
But was that a miraculous endeavor? Or is Kris really Santa after all?
No and No.
The letters from the PO only point to the idea that millions of children believe there to be a Santa Claus. Not that there
is
a Santa.
If Kris is Santa because he is the only one claiming to be the addressee, then that would be evidence, but not a miracle. If there are letters still being written to George Washington and I claim to be the first POTUS, not only makes for no miracle but of a case for delusional fantasy.
I find this an interesting discussion (such as it is), not only for the liberality with which people readily use certain terms and definitions, but also for the notion that myths are based in reality - a concept I readily concur to be true.
Democracy is the pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. H.L. Mencken -
montgomerydou55 — 10 years ago(March 07, 2016 09:47 PM)
Mencken was an enemy sympathizer in World War I. He disseminated the White House "bathtub hoax" as a red herring to draw the public's attention away from his traitorous inclinations.
I can also produce a newspaper article showing his anti-Semitism and racism as expressed in papers he directed, upon his death, not to be opened for about 25 years. When they were, they shocked even the sympathetic Mencken scholar who studied them. -
rj-27 — 9 years ago(May 03, 2016 09:36 AM)
Mencken was an enemy sympathizer in World War I.
Not to open up a Pandora's Box of historical revisionism here, but the only reason Germany and Austria were "enemies" is because Woodrow Wilson told us they were, in compliance with his friends the British who desperately needed US forces to turn the tide of war. I do not fault Mencken for not wanting US involvement in the most stupidly destructive and unnecessary war of all time.
I can also produce a newspaper article showing his anti-Semitism and racism as expressed in papers he directed, upon his death, not to be opened for about 25 years. When they were, they shocked even the sympathetic Mencken scholar who studied them.
Many, many men of renown have been blighted by racism, including Henry Ford and Abraham Lincoln. This does not mean everything they had to say about anything else is not worthy of consideration as valuable thinking.
I do not admire Mencken for his antisemitism or his atheism. I do admire him for his anti-state, anti-war and libertarian leanings.
Democracy is the pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. H.L. Mencken -
cajayson8301 — 9 years ago(May 28, 2016 06:17 PM)
The term miracle can be subjective so it's not confined into your myopic prism of its purely emanating off the most imaginable of circumstances. I'd venture to guess most people would cite Justin Bieber dropping out of music as symbiotic of a miracle, even though it'd not be preceded by an unnatural occurrence. That's precisely what I'd say the film illuminates: we can see miracles in the most unlikely of places.
Here you have an older gentleman who most New Yorkers walk past without realizing he can restore Christmas's foundation, i.e. a holiday derived off peace, love and humanity as opposed to its well known marketing ploys. Try finding an individual today who would buck the trend by infusing a pro good will message into an established money making holiday it's improbable that will manifest in recent years but anything is possible (which reflects upon society's constant gripes about Christmas: it's paramount to private enterprise, hence more may consume less to rebuke this unfettered desire for material goods. While most may share that person's vision of a values oriented Christmas, we know that big money can easily quash an idealistic mission). That's precisely why it's in essence a miracle: a low tier employee at a major department store galvanized how a nation ought to respond to Christmasdoing it so much that two cynical non believers bend their inflexible natures into accepting him as THE Santa Claus
On another note, here's the definition of supernatural per dictionary.com: "of, relating to, or being above or beyond what is natural; unexplainable by natural law or phenomena; abnormal."
I'd venture to state there was a miracle due to these abnormalities: from two stubborn women believing in Santa, a neophyte lawyer providing a legitimate argument behind Santa's identity, fundamentally shifting commercialism endeavors after a consistent splurging pattern (including on top brass executives usually impervious to changing market status quos)and can
ANY
of this truly be explained by nature? Absolutely not.
When God made Tom Cruise, he was only joking.