GINA COBB

What Do Men Want? Part One

By DemocracyRules

Also see: What Do Women Want?

The picture shows Madonna before she started writing children's books. 

Oh WE KNOW what men want, women exclaim.  But women don't know as much as they think.  In some ways men are more complicated than women.  Let me ask you this: if men are so simple, why is it so hard to predict what they will do next?  I'm going to argue that the main thing adult men want is LOVE.

A while ago I saw the biographical movie 'Sweet Dreams' about the  country-western singer Patsy Cline.  The male lead (played by Ed Harris) had been hanging around her for a while, trying to get to know her, and she was sitting with two friends in a bar when he showed up again. 

"We know what you want", said one.  He got angry and said, “Look, your equipment isn't lined with gold.  All women have a set.  I want you because of who you are and what you’re like.”  The women fell silent, and later Patsy married him.  He hit the sincerity button.  Let's talk about this button.

How Men Choose Women

The r-strategy
We all know lovers and wives are different, so let’s see if scientists know why.  I will use Intelligent Gene Theory (IGT) again, very similar to Selfish Gene Theory. The idea is that mating behaviors are designed to replicate a person's genes as effectively as possible. DNA constructs an organism which will optimally reproduce the DNA.  In this sense a human is a DNA reproduction device. For IG Theory, love is also a mating device invented by DNA.

I'll also discuss reproductive strategies that various species use.  Most men start out using an oyster's reproductive strategy, whereas women mostly behave like elephants.   

This refers to r/K Selection Theory, which identifies two main reproductive strategies.   Consider oysters.  Females send out a lot of eggs into the seawater.  Males send out a lot of sperm into the sea water.  Some of these meet and make fertilized eggs, which become larvae and eventually settle to the bottom and begin to grow as new oysters.  This is the r-strategy. The r-strategy relies on maximum fertility and minimum care for offspring. 

In contrast, elephants live about 50-70 years and the females have only a few offspring in their whole lives.  Pregnancy lasts about 22 months and it takes about 12 to 14 years to raise a young elephant to maturity.  Thus the female must go for quality, carefully selecting a mate, then carefully raising the baby.  This is the K-strategy.

Teenage boys behave like oysters.  At about 16 they “self-invent” the r-strategy, which they think occurred only to them. (It's instinct.) They will try to mate with as many attractive young women as they possibly can. Good idea, eh?  Animal species which use the r-strategy are usually not very intelligent.

The ideal girl for an r-strategy male has excellent reproductive fitness, is about 18 years old, and is rich.  The boy meets her once,  then leaves forever.  Meanwhile, she gets pregnant and lovingly raises his child without him. This enables him to pursue more rich beautiful 18 year olds.  The instinctive plan is to have dozens or hundreds of offspring with no long-term parenting responsibilities.

The r-strategy explains why teenage boys are so interested in  r-strategy females.  This usually fails as a reproductive strategy because r-strategy girls are uncommon, and they are not likely to suddenly settle down to raise this one boy's child. 

For most men, by the time we’re into our 20's we’re usually sitting around complaining to other men that this r-strategy is not working very well. Surprisingly to us, there aren’t very many rich, beautiful 18 year-old women who eagerly want to have casual relationships with us and bear our children.  Most nights we sleep alone. 

The K-strategy
Most adult men eventually switch to the K-strategy.  The K-strategy is really better for men anyway. Most r-strategy men feel unloved, and it's no wonder, because the r-strategy doesn't involve love.  Oysters don't need it.

But it’s not for nothing that men have written reams and reams of poetry, music and novels about love.  Men yearn for love, and we need it more than women.    

By the way, these descriptions apply to the average male and female.  With even a little thought we can all think of females who use the r-strategy.  The picture of Madonna is funny because it caricatures the r-strategy woman.  Also there are men who start out as elephants from the get-go.  Other men keep the r-strategy for life, and they are labeled "not marriage material”.

Anyway, men who adopt the K-strategy want a serious long-term relationship with one woman.  First they have to find one, then they have to arrange themselves to live with her.  Of course she will want to change her man, most men know that.  Men, if you want to know what changes you will be asked to make in the future, read items (a) to (f) here.  Resistance is futile.

Finding the right woman consists of looks and personality.  Men differ a lot about who they find attractive. Most men agree that Marilyn Monroe and Haley Berry are attractive, but about the average woman, men have very different preferences.  At least for both men and women, we know who is physically attractive to us in about two seconds.

Personality is much harder.  Usually the women men are attracted to are not attracted to the men.  Eventually a miracle happens and we find a woman who wants us.  No wonder we're so happy, it's like winning a lottery!

The next thing we do is find out if she is a K-strategy woman.   We don't want our wives to use the r-strategy.    This is because for a man the K-strategy only succeeds if his wife is faithful.  Otherwise a man may not perpetuate his genes. Raising another man's offspring is a genetic disaster.  No wonder men are so jealous.

This table shows how men find a K-strategy wife.  Men implicitly use this table whether they know it or not.  A man using a K-strategy tries hard to have high-quality children and ensure his own paternity, so he looks for a certain type of woman.  First, he should find her especially attractive, meaning he thinks her genes are high quality. Second, she should not use an r-strategy. Third, she should find him especially attractive, meaning she thinks his genes are high quality.

Then What?
Aha, now it gets interesting!  For a K-strategy man to stay with a woman, he needs three things.  She has to (1) be nice,  (2) look pretty, and (3) maintain physical relations. Then the man is happy.  If she does only two out of three, then the man is ‘unhappy’ in his relationship.  If she does only one out of three, it’s “in crisis”.  If she does zero out of three for a long time, the relationship is usually effectively over.  Nevertheless, it is usually the woman who divorces.

A lesbian I once knew was having trouble with her relationship.  The physical part of their relationship had stopped.  Then her partner ceased to take care of her looks.  It was as if her partner didn’t love her enough to make herself presentable.  Then she stopped bing nice.  She wasn’t mean or abusive, she just took little interest in my friend, became very inwardly turned, and was uncaring and blase about the relationship.  And then the relationship ended.

If you are in a relationship with a man, he probably finds you attractive.  Otherwise there would be no relationship. Remember the attraction part took each of you two seconds.  Since men are so visually driven, they look for women they find attractive,  then they ask them out.  You may remind him of his mother, favorite aunt, or ex-girlfriend (whom he really liked until she tried to kill him with an ice-pick, or something).  You may act or think or talk like his mother.   All of this is perfectly OK, many women are attracted to men who are like their fathers.

So if a man is still seeing a woman, the visuals are usually taken care of.  This also applies to women.  If a woman is still seeing a man, she probably finds him attractive.

Next: Part 2

___________________________________
References:
Selfish Gene Theory
Physical Attractiveness

The Biology of Gender

The Mating Mind

Amazing Shark-Attack Rescue at Middleton Beach

By DemocracyRules

h/t The Daily Telegraph

Amazing heroism in Australia.  Jason Cull was swimming at Middleton Beach, Western Australia, when he was bumped underwater.  He thought it was one of the many dolphins that frequent the area.  It quickly became an attack from a 12-foot white-pointer shark. 

The picture shows what happened next.  Joanne Lucas, a member of a life-saving club, bravely entered the area and is swimming Jason to shore.  They are the two heads in foreground.  By that time Jason's left leg had already been chewed up, but he fought the shark by jamming his fingers into one of its eyes.  As Joanne helps Jason to shore, in the background two of Jason's friends bravely kick the water to scare the shark away.  The shark's fin is visible closely following them. Photograph: Mark Bickerdike.

Everyone Survived!  Joanne Lucas, and Jason Cull with his wife Nicola:

The Girl They Called Irreversibly "Vegetative" and Almost Killed Is Spelling Out Full Sentences

Look who's alive today, and able to spell out entire sentences using alphabet letters?

Why, it's Haleigh Poutre, who was diagnosed as being in an "irreversible vegetative state" in 2005, and almost removed from life support.  Wrong, wrong, wrong:

Last winter, just as the state’s highest court was about to rule that a girl in an "irreversible vegetative state" should be removed from life support, 14-year-old Haleigh Poutre started to breathe on her own.

Haleigh, who spent the past two years at a pediatric rehabilitation hospital in Brighton, Mass., suffered a near-fatal head injury in September 2005.

Communicating with simple words and hand gestures and by spelling out full sentences by pointing to alphabet letters on a board Haleigh in December described to police the intense physical abuse she allegedly suffered at the hands of her adoptive mother and stepfather, Holli and Jason Strickland, The Boston Globe reported on Tuesday.

Incidentally, Haleigh’s sister, Samantha Poutre, has given police a new statement about Haleigh’s injury, which put her in a coma. Samantha initially told investigators that Haleigh was practicing a back flip when she hit her head on a basement pipe, according to defense lawyers.

Now, Samantha is saying that Jason Strickland kicked Haleigh down a flight of stairs.

. . . .  Jason Strickland brought a bruised and unconscious Haleigh to the emergency room of Noble Hospital in Westfield, Mass., on Sept. 11, 2005. He told medical professionals she had become unresponsive after suffering flu-like symptoms.

The Department of Social Services took custody of the Stricklands’ two other children within two days; one week later the couple was criminally charged with assault and battery in connection with Haleigh’s injury, according to the newspaper.

Did I mention that Haleigh Poutre almost lost her life as a result of the bad judgment of medical professionals, social workers, and judges?  Here's the backstory, from my post here on February 8, 2006:

Just one week after 11-year old Haleigh Poutre was hospitalized on September 11, 2005 with brain injuries caused by child abuse, the state of Massachusetts sought a court order allowing the agency to "let" Haleigh die (by taking away all medical support, food and water needed to live).  And less than one month after Haleigh arrived at the hospital, on October 5, 2005, the court issued an order allowing Haleigh's life to be terminated.

I guess the rule is:  When in doubt, remove life support quickly. 

Neurologists have said it can take as long as a year to determine whether such a patient can recover.  "With children, it is notoriously difficult to prognosticate following a brain injury," Dr. David Clive, a medical ethicist at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center, said last week. "They're supposed to have greater resiliency than an adult, and there are more stories of miraculous or late recoveries with kids than with adults. Here you have a child who needs to be given a longer window of observation before you assume the worst."

Social services spokeswoman Denise Monteiro said the agency sought approval to remove Haleigh's feeding tube and ventilator so they could have "options" in handling her case.

Let's not play games here.  The "option" that was sought was the option to remove life support prematurely, before anyone could determine whether death was inevitable or how much recovery was possible for Haleigh. 

And once the judge gave the premature approval to terminate Haleigh's life, exactly which God-like person at the social services agency was going to take over the life or death decision?  What are that person's qualifications for deciding who lives or dies?  Is that how we want it to work?  A social worker gets control over the ON/OFF switch for a child's life?  That's even worse than allowing a judge to decide who lives and dies, which is obviously not ideal either because a judge here issued an order allowing Haleigh's life to be terminated at a time when rehabilitation had not even been attempted and nobody could accurately predict Haleigh's prognosis.

I realize that Haleigh is just somebody's kid.  She's nobody special.  Her caretakers didn't care about her, as far as we know.  She was nobody special at all, except in the sense that every one of us is special.

But as humans with consciences and souls, we should care.  Where the adults responsible for this innocent child's life failed and committed or allowed criminal acts against her, we can and should step in to fill the gap, to help any way we can, and to help Haleigh salvage as much as possible of what's left of her life.

We should help her even if her prognosis is discouraging and her recovery is minimal.  We should help her even if she never again enjoys the same quality of life that God gave her.

You'd do that much for an adult firefighter.  You'd wait.  And once in a while, your long, long wait would be rewarded (Fireman's Recovery Stuns Doctors). 

You'd do that much for a soldier on life support with a brain injury.  You'd wait a long, long time.  You'd wait a good, long time for a president or other head of state, even if the chances of recovery were poorer for them than they are for Haleigh.

Haleigh's life is not less valuable than any of theirs.

God planted the same seeds of greatness within Haleigh that he planted in the firefighter, in the soldier, in the head of state, and in every one of us.

It comes down to whether every human life is precious.

Or disposable.

Now we have a girl who is very much alive and conscious.  She is a thinking, feeling human being able to, perhaps, testify against her abusers.  (The defense may have Haleigh's testimony thrown out, claiming that she lacks competency to testify.) 

How many more men, women, and children like Haleigh have been erroneously deemed "vegetatitve" and removed from life support, thereby terminating lives that still held promise and hope?  We can't know, but this story must surely give us pause.

There are many more procedural protections in place to save the lives of convicted killers than there are to save the lives of innocent men, women, and children who suffer brain injuries and whose prognosis is uncertain.

We must tip the balance back in favor of innocent life.

Navy Officer Was Prostitute

By DemocracyRules

Why did she do this?

From the ‘D.C. Madam case’.  Picture thanks to
http://www.rightpundits.com/?p=1335

In exchange for immunity from prosecution, Lt. Cmdr. Rebecca Dickinson testified in Federal court on April 10 that she worked for ‘D.C. Madam’ Deborah Jeane-Palfrey from October 2005 through April 2006.  She detailed having sex with almost every one of the hundreds of clients that Palfrey booked for her.  She used the name Renee.  She did this while also working at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.  She is 38 and has three children.

Her Navy career is almost certainly over because this is ‘conduct unbecoming an officer’.  She joined the Navy in 1986, and has had a sterling record.  Dickinson had two Navy/Marine Corps Commendation medals and four Navy/Marine Corps Achievement medals.   She was at the Naval academy from 2004 to 2007, and as a food services officer oversaw meals for 4,000 midshipmen per day.  She earned a degree while in Navy service.

I have no opinions about the big M Morality of this.  Moral opinions about this abound in other places and I will not add mine.  In the film “Belle De Jour:"

Protagonist Catherine Deneuve is toying with becoming an afternoon prostitute, and she asks her husband if he has ever been to a brothel. 
She - I wonder what goes on in them.
He - Listen, I have to work.
She - Please.
He - You go in, the women are there...
you pick one.  And after you leave
you're depressed all day.

I think this sums up the business quite well.

There are many facts about prostitution that people get wrong.  Here are a few key miss-truths. (1) “She was a high-class hooker.”  There is no such thing as a high-class hooker.  Prostitution damages the emotional lives of both participants, and there is nothing high-class about damaging your emotional life.  (2) “This woman’s life is over.”  No it’s not.  She can leave the Navy, move, change her name (or just use her middle name), change her looks slightly, and carry on trying to find a good life for herself like all the rest of us.

(3) “Men are all depraved.” Only a minority of men visit prostitutes.  As for women, the business of  female sex tourism is flourishing.  (4) “People are sick.”  No, humans are just animals with big brains, there’s nothing inherently sick or bad about being a human.  Other species also exchange benefits for sex.

(5)  “She must have been desperate.”  “Women are sexual victims.” “Prostitutes are victims of men”.  Research does not support the idea that prostitutes are “desperate victims.”  Most prostitutes are not desperate-looking street-walkers.  In most cities’ yellow-pages, large sections are devoted to escort services.  They are prostitutes.  Prostitutes are available from hotel concierges, cab drivers, and the Internet, including Craigslist.

There are many reasons for becoming a prostitute, just as there are many reason for becoming a carpenter. People make choices.  Characterizations of prostitutes shade into some bizarre idea that they are like crazy or stupid animals, or so drug addicted that they don’t know what they’re doing.  If you talk to them, you will find that they almost all know what they are doing.

One place to start finding some facts is The Sex Lives of Prostitutes, an Australian government publication.  Most of what the MSM says on this topic is false.

The most common reason women start prostitution is that she  knows someone who was exchanging sex for benefits of some kind, so she decides to try it.  This could be their best friend, their mother, their father, their sister, their brother.  Before they start, they are often already involved in other high-risk behaviors, like drug use, alcohol abuse, unprotected sex, and associating with other high-risk people.

This is a common route, but it’s not the only one. Some women don’t start until they are 50, and have no previous experience related to the job.  One of Lt. Cmdr. Dickinson’s colleagues was 56.

They all do it for money, but they often have high overhead and spend a lot of money.   The average lifetime profits of prostitutes is not very high, and few retire rich.  I think of them in comparison to people who work for tobacco companies.  People will often do a lot for just a little extra money.  Do prostitutes use drugs to stifle the psychic pain of being a prostitute?  Most prostitutes who abuse drugs and alcohol started it when they’re young, and they often  want to make money so they can use drugs.  They do usually experience emotional problems, and the drug-abuse-prostitution lifestyle often becomes circular for them.   However, many prostitutes don’t abuse drugs.

(6) “She’s a slut.”  Slut-labeling is older than Mary Magdalene.  It’s true that some prostitutes like sex a lot.  Many started sexual intercourse earlier than their peers.  These first experiences were mainly positive experiences for them, with males they loved. 

Many prostitutes have orgasms at work. 

“On the question of orgasmic experience a useful start might be the study of Wardell Pomeroy (1965). He destroyed any previous notions about prostitutes as being frigid, impassive, insensitive participants in prostitution. Pomeroy compared three groups of prostitutes: 83 gaol inmates, presumedly mostly ex-streetwalkers, with a median age of 30.3; 61 reformatory inmates, also mostly ex-streetwalkers, with a median age of 19.5; and 31 call girls, with a median age of 26.8. Although not truly representative of a prostitution population, Pomeroy's findings in Table 3.37 provide sufficient indication that prostitutes enjoy orgasmic experiences both at work and in private.

The configuration in Table 3.37 confirms the author's knowledge of prostitutes in Australia, that is, prostitutes orgasm more frequently in their private lives. The statement by some prostitutes that they never orgasm at work or they fake orgasms to please their clients is probably true, but it is not the case with a large number of women who seem capable of orgasms on the job. The mistaken belief that female orgasm is an expression of affection often leads to inhibitions with many prostitutes. Probable factors for explaining the difference in sexual responses in Pomeroy's sample groups are age (Group 2 being mostly teenagers) and class morality (Group 3 being mostly middle-class women).” – The Sex Lives of Prostitutes

Sex drive in women can be scaled to fit on a bell curve.  Some women have no sex drive at all, most have a normal sex drive, and some have a higher sex drive.  There are about 150,000,000 females in the USA.  Of these, half will want sex a least a little more than the average, or median woman.  A small percentage will want it much more than average.  They’re not sick or weird or victims, they’re just women, and woman vary.

I once had a friend who had sex with her boyfriend four times per day.  “Gee, that’s a lot!”, I said.  She was a completely normal, proper looking person who had no mental problems that I could see.  But she really, really liked sex.  Neither she or her boyfriend worked during the day, there wasn’t time.   He had other income, and she sold sex toys at women’s parties during the evening. She was very good at explaining how the toys worked!  She was not just having sex to please her boyfriend, playing the victim, acting as a sex slave, or any of that crap.  She was pleasing herself, and arranged her life in order to create some balance or harmony within her own particular physiology.  She wouldn’t consider prostitution.

But you can see how it goes for some women.  If they have a very high sex drive, are a bit lonely, time on their hands, a friend who is already doing it, like the power and control that comes with ‘professional work’, they might try it.  If they enjoy it, they might continue.  Viola une Belle de Jour.  I bet Lt. Cmdr. Dickinson was discreet, showed up on time, was never drunk or stoned, and was good at her work.

(7) “Wow, you mean it’s available for free?”  Some men of course go crazy with these stories because they dream that in some other dimension, some parallel universe, all the women are like my friend.  Sorry buddy, only in your dreams. 

Testosterone is the main mediator of sex drive, and men have on average about 10 times as much as women.  These excited men forget that in the movie “Belle de Jour”, the husband admits being depressed after meeting a prostitute.  Men need love more than women.  Men are less likely to initiate divorce than women, and single men are more prone to suicide and other self-destructive behaviors.  Single women live much more healthy and  balanced lives than single men. 

The bottom line is that the best sex by far is the sex you have with someone you dearly love.  It may or may not have all the technique bells and whistles, the duration may be a bit short, and the pleasure plateaus may not be stratospheric, but it is deeply satisfying because it is part of the expression and sharing of mutual love.  This is not rocket science, the Pope was talking about this the other day.  Science is just tending to prove that he’s right about this.

So why was Lt. Cmdr Dickinson moonlighting as a prostitute?  Because, in her life, given the choices that were available to her, she wanted to do it.

Can Money Make You Happy? Yes, If You Give Some Away

New research finds that spending as little as $5 on someone else can help make your day.

Feel free to test this theory by sending me money.

Arthur C Clark Goes Supernova

What an amazing talent he was. 

Science fiction writer Sir Arthur C Clarke has died aged 90 in his adopted home of Sri Lanka, it was confirmed tonight.

Clarke, who had battled debilitating post-polio syndrome since the 1960s and sometimes used a wheelchair, died at 1:30am after suffering breathing problems, his personal secretary Rohan De Silva said.

“Sir Arthur passed away a short while ago at the Apollo Hospital [in Colombo]. He had a cardio-respiratory attack,” he said.

His valet, W. K. M. Dharmawardena, said funeral arrangements would be finalised after his close family returned to the island from Australia.

Mr Dharmawardena said Clarke’s condition had begun to deteriorate in recent weeks and he had been in hospital for the past four days.

The visionary author of over 100 books, who predicted the existence of satellites, was most famous for his short story "The Sentinel," which was expanded into the novel on which Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" was based.

He was also credited with inventing the concept of communications satellites in 1945, decades before they became a reality.

Clarke was the last surviving member of what was sometimes known as the "Big Three" of science fiction alongside Robert A. Heinlein and Isaac Asimov.

If you haven't read any of Arthur C Clark's works, you've missed a lot.

To Some Obama Supporters, Hope IS a Plan

Paul Krugman of the New York Times -- not exactly William F. Buckley himself -- has noticed that a large part of today's left has "lost its sanity."

Problem Solving 101

I found this interesting and helpful from a personal development standpoint, and maybe you will too:  The Most Direct Solution to Any Problem by Steve Pavlina.

Recommended: Shield Your Joyous Ones

Recommended reading from The Happiness Project:  Shield your joyous ones

1888 Photo Offers Glimpse of Helen Keller at Age 8

A rare 1888 photo found in a New England family album offers a glimpse of Helen Keller at age 8, with her teacher, Anne Sullivan.

You do know the story of Helen Keller's life, don't you?  Most Americans do, but if you live in another country or if you're young, perhaps it's not a familiar story.  In that case, do yourself a favor and read Helen Keller's story or watch The Miracle Worker.

Two Years Ago Today on GINA COBB: The Likeable Side of Infanticide

Originally published on March 4, 2006:  The Likeable Side of Infanticide

Hand Her an Oscar; Suddenly She's an Expert on Everything

Best actress Oscar winner Marion Cotillard says the 9/11 attacks were made up and that the World Trade Center towers were destroyed because they were obsolete. 

Oh -- and she also questions the 1969 moon landing.

Clearly, being a logical thinker is not a prerequisite to achieving the highest levels of peer recognition in Hollywood.

This is a good iillustration of the potential hazards of listening to experts on subjects outside their areas of expertise.

If you want good advice on how to become an award-winning actor, ask Ms. Cotillard.  But if you want good advice on the worldside Islamic jihad or the space program, she clearly is not your go-to gal.  For that you're going to need someone who actually has a clue.   

Possibly the World's Most Elaborate Marriage Proposal

A man plans a seven-hour, 17-destination scavenger hunt leading up to a marriage proposal.  Impressive. 

Go Ahead -- Close the Door

The New York Times has an excellent article (via Instapundit) on the advantages of closing a few doors, based on research by Dan Ariely, a professor of behavioral economics at MIT.

Although it often makes excellent sense to keep options open for a while, there are also many day-to-day circumstances where saying "no" to activities and opportunities can free up time and resources to say "yes" to what we value more.

One Year Ago Today on GINA COBB: America, Iraq, and What It Means to Take a Stand

Originally published on February 23, 2007

America, Iraq, and What It Means to Take a Stand

Larry Miller has an outstanding column in the Daily Standard:  Hineni: The noblest Congress of them all.  Here's the opening:

THERE ARE TWO WAYS to say "I'm here" in Hebrew. Like any language, there are probably lots more, but here are the top two.

"Po ani" means I'm here, or I'm present, or just present, the correct form when someone is, say, taking the roll. We used that one in Hebrew school when I was a kid. Brill? "Po Ani." Ingber? "Po ani." Littman? "Po ani." Miller? Miller? Miller? (Okay, most of the time I'd cut class to watch Soupy Sales, but I still remember what po ani means and I think that's pretty good. Besides, we thought laughing really hard at comedians had a kind of Talmudic value anyway, turning jokes into prayers, sort of a Jewish version of transubstantiation.)

The more formal or deeper expression is "Hineni" (pronounced hee-nay-nee). It means "Here I am," and is mostly used when God personally calls on someone in the Bible to do something difficult and important. Abraham? "Here I am." Moses? "Here I am." It's very complete and emotionally charged, and implies, "Here I am: ready, willing and able." There's a special prayer on Yom Kippur called "Hineni" which starts, "Here I am in deep humility . . . "

I don't know if God is making a lot of personal calls these days, but I have a feeling most of our responses as contemporary Americans would be slightly more equivocal, at least initially, and would at one point include, "Okay, sure, but . . . It's a little sudden, that's all. Hang on, let me turn the game off."

"Here I am" is a powerful and layered statement, but there's another meaning to hineni, even deeper and more resonant: Here I stand.

Here I stand. It's not a meek thought; it's a bottom line. "Here I stand. Here I will make my stand. I know what will most likely happen, but it does not matter, since I will not be moving. This is where I am going to make my stand. Hineni."

Larry Miller has an outstanding column in the Daily Standard:  Hineni: The noblest Congress of them all.  Here's the opening:

THERE ARE TWO WAYS to say "I'm here" in Hebrew. Like any language, there are probably lots more, but here are the top two.

"Po ani" means I'm here, or I'm present, or just present, the correct form when someone is, say, taking the roll. We used that one in Hebrew school when I was a kid. Brill? "Po Ani." Ingber? "Po ani." Littman? "Po ani." Miller? Miller? Miller? (Okay, most of the time I'd cut class to watch Soupy Sales, but I still remember what po ani means and I think that's pretty good. Besides, we thought laughing really hard at comedians had a kind of Talmudic value anyway, turning jokes into prayers, sort of a Jewish version of transubstantiation.)

The more formal or deeper expression is "Hineni" (pronounced hee-nay-nee). It means "Here I am," and is mostly used when God personally calls on someone in the Bible to do something difficult and important. Abraham? "Here I am." Moses? "Here I am." It's very complete and emotionally charged, and implies, "Here I am: ready, willing and able." There's a special prayer on Yom Kippur called "Hineni" which starts, "Here I am in deep humility . . . "

I don't know if God is making a lot of personal calls these days, but I have a feeling most of our responses as contemporary Americans would be slightly more equivocal, at least initially, and would at one point include, "Okay, sure, but . . . It's a little sudden, that's all. Hang on, let me turn the game off."

"Here I am" is a powerful and layered statement, but there's another meaning to hineni, even deeper and more resonant: Here I stand.

Here I stand. It's not a meek thought; it's a bottom line. "Here I stand. Here I will make my stand. I know what will most likely happen, but it does not matter, since I will not be moving. This is where I am going to make my stand. Hineni."

A Life Support Miracle -- and a Hidden Tragedy

It was a miracle:  A man tells his wife off, and rouses her from a coma.

A desperate husband who learned a hospital was about to take his comatose wife off life support managed to awaken her doing the one thing he knew she hated — being "told off," it is reported by the Daily Mail.

Yvonne Sullivan, 28, of the English seaside resort town of Weston-super-Mare in Somerset suffered severe blood poisoning during childbirth July 5. The baby, named Clinton, died after the 14-hour labor and Sullivan fell into a coma moments later, according to the report.