6-year-old Michael Cooney, who has cerebral palsy, proves the doctors wrong and walks to greet his father returning from service overseas:
I’d love to add more commentary here, but really, there’s nothing to say except bravo.
Category Archives: Human Interest
Cure For The Common Cold Coming?
Looks like they’re on the right path:
Australian drug maker Biota Wednesday reported the stunning success of its antiviral compound, named Vapendavir.
Tested in 300 asthmatic patients infected with the cold-causing human rhinovirus, the clinical trial showed that cold symptoms eased quickly and the duration of the infection was shortened considerably.
Your Feel-Good Video Of The Morning: Boxer Greets Returning Soldier
If this doesn’t put a smile on your face, nothing will.
Amazon Announces Kindle Lending From Libraries
It’s hardly a secret that I like Amazon, but this press release might even impress non-Amazon fans:
Amazon.com today announced that Kindle and Kindle app customers can now borrow Kindle books from more than 11,000 local libraries in the United States. When a customer borrows a Kindle library book, they’ll have all of the unique features they love about Kindle books, including Whispersync, which automatically synchronizes their margin notes, highlights and bookmarks, real page numbers, Facebook and Twitter integration, and more. For more information about borrowing library books for your Kindle or free Kindle apps, go to www.amazon.com/kindle/publiclibraries. To start checking out Kindle library books, visit your local library’s website.
Gabrielle Giffords Makes It To DC For Vote
Now, a minor miracle. I don’t care what party you belong to, this has to be worth a standing ovation… which both sides of the House aisle give her.
Your Heartwarming Story About A Marine And A Stray Iraqi Dog
While in Iraq, Marine Major Brian Dennis and an Iraqi stray dog — later named Nubs — developed a friendship that turned into a lifelong companionship. Major Dennis (along with Kirby Larson and Mary Nethery) has since written a children’s book about his buddy: Nubs: The True Story of a Mutt, a Marine & a Miracle.
Dennis and his unit, part of a Border Transition Team, were deployed to help train Iraqi soldiers at a fort 15 miles east of the Jordanian/Syrian/Iraqi border, traveling between the fort and their forward operating base. During one of those visits, as Brian stepped out of his humvee, a mid-size dog resembling a German shepherd came up to the major. Nubs was the alpha dog of a pack of 12 to 15 strays. Says Nethery: “It was like the alpha dog meets the alpha Marine. It is definitely fascinating how that happened.”
[...]
After trying to care for Nubs as best he could, Brian once again had to leave. Two weeks later the unit returned and saw the dog was healing well.
This is the miracle part of the story: after the unit left, Nubs — determined to be with Brian – traveled a 70-mile stretch in a two-day period, enduring major hardships. Nubs found Dennis.
Read the whole thing.
The E-Pamphlets Are Coming!
During the time leading up to the American Revolution, one of the best ways the Founding Fathers had to spread their concepts, ideas, and information was through pamphlets, of which one of the most famous is Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. These short, inexpensive, quickly printed, easily distributed monographs were undeniably popular–Common Sense sold half a million copies in its first year, and that’s in just the original 13 colonies–and almost certainly framed the debate over independence.
Now a conservative imprint of HarperCollins Publishers is aiming to do the same thing with e-pamphlets for the popular e-reader platforms: Introducing Broadside Books’ new line, Voices Of The Tea Party.
The series publishes short, pamphlet-like political works on topics such as Obamacare (”First Do No Harm“) and grassroots activism (”Community Organizing for Conservatives“).
At $2 per e-book, the purpose of these long essays is to “reinvigorate and democratize the conservative intellectual movement by lowering barriers to entry for citizen-activists who have something important to say,” according to Adam Bellow. Bellow, the son of Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Saul Bellow, is the editor of Broadside Books.
And now, straight from the publishers’ website:
Voices of the Tea Party is a real-time collaborative forum for Tea Partiers around the country that delivers in-depth information on tactics, strategy, and policy from the on-ground activists through the use of inexpensive and easy to download e-books. The series will serve the vibrant online community of everyday American who launched and continue to drive the Tea Party movement, by taking their collaborative discussions to a much higher level. Tea Party suporters around the country will now be able to instantly access “best practices” that have succeeded elsewhere, hear the stories of others in the movement, and learn from Tea Partiers with specific policy ideas and expertise. Perhaps more important, they will be able to engage with other thought leaders by submitting their own e-book proposals for possible inclusion in the series.
I’ve already purchased and read First, Do No Harm on my Kindle. It was well worth the $1.99 I paid for it, and I’m eagerly awaiting the next entry in this series. God willing, this new idea will help spread conservative principles to the current generation.
By the way, if you don’t have a Kindle or other supported e-reader, there’s always the Kindle for PC app.
And kudos to HarperCollins for doing this!
A Fallen Hero Returns Home
Staff Sergeant Jason Rogers, USMC, has returned home to Brandon, Mississippi. Unfortunately, he did so posthumously.
The video is sped up to show more of the people honoring Sgt. Rogers, but I didn’t see any protesters. Of course, it might have been because my eyes got a little wet.
Via American Digest, H/T to PJ Tatler
Your Feel-Good Japanese Story For Today
Some US Navy personnel surprised some Japanese with some unexpected food and water supplies.
From the size of the shipment, I’d say this is something these sailors scrounged together and delivered on their own, not part of any organized US effort. All the same, these sailors deserve both our thanks and that of the Japanese people who received it.
Brian Preston offers some more insights:
You’ll see an older Japanese man a little ways into the clip, speaking to the camera. What he says is, essentially, that the townspeople had no idea the Americans were coming or bringing them anything. There was no announcement or anything about it. Which is true. Between the destroyed roads and the radiation fears, hardly anyone can even get to the Sendai area. But these US pilots did.
You’ll also see, near the end of the clip, a group of older men watching as the Navy man stacks boxes of supplies from the helicopter on the tarmac. They’re standing still watching him because they’re stunned. That plus the language barrier puts them in a position where they just don’t know what to do. But you can see one of them making little gestures with his hands, as if in prayer. That’s a sign of very deep respect and gratitude.
If you want to donate yourself to help these people out, I again recommend Samaritan’s Purse. Yes, they’re a Christian organization, but that certainly hasn’t stopped them from helping these mostly Buddhist and Shinto people who desperately need all the help they can get.
Your Feel-Good Japan Story: 4-Month-Old Reunited With Father
A little gleam of light amidst the gloom of the disaster:
Amid the mangled towers of wreckage and flooded debris, a country in despair is grateful for any cheerful news.
And today, the discovery of a baby girl who had survived for three days after the tsunami that devastated Japan provided just that.
Accounts as to how the four-month-old had survived were lost in translation – but it is believed she was plucked helpless from the rubble in Ishinomaki, in the state of Miyagi.
Against the odds, she was rescued apparently safe and unharmed after being spotted by a member of Japan’s Self-Defence Force.
The 4-month old baby girl is held by the Japanese Defense Force member that rescued her.
The baby and her father flee another tsunami warning.
Kinda warms your heart a little, doesn’t it?
If you have any to spare, please, give a little to help out. Myself, I prefer giving through Franklin Graham’s Samaritan Purse organization, but there are many other choices.