This Weekend: Concerts in the Garden

The 18th Annual Concerts in the Garden sponsored by the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra continues tonight. It's a great evening out, in my view.

Tonight hear Asleep at the Wheel, my favorite Texas swing band.

Saturday night the Vocal Majority Chorus performs. VMC is an award winning, Dallas based, all-male choral group. We heard them a few years ago at the same venue and they are good. Great actually. I have not heard Sunday night's Austin Jug Band.

There are concessions, you can bring a picnic, a chair or a blanket, and even a bottle of wine. It's a great night out. It's about $20 per person, not cheap but well worth the expense.

Go to the Symphony's website for more information: http://www.fwsymphony.org/citg/citg.asp. . .

Real Homemade Italian Water Ice

I'm back in Philly. Yesterday, I had my summer's first Italian Water Ice, lemon, of course. If you have never had one, don't confuse the real thing with what you see in frozen food sections with the same name. Or the old 7-11 Slurpee. Or Slushee. It's more like southern, homemade lemonade, but frozen, like a daiquiri. As I was enjoying the water ice yesterday I thought about the simple ingredients: lemons, water, and sugar. On a hot day it's just about the most enjoyable iced drink one can have. As a boy, we would buy them from the front-step, row home vendors in the Italian neighborhood. Somewhere halfway through you started looking for a lemon peel. Now, they are purchased from more respectable companies, but the product is the same, and I still look for a lemon peel.

Senator Obama . . .

Congratulations.

The Barack Obama story is a good one. It's an American one.

In the last 16 months the freshman Senator surprised everyone in winning the Democrat presidential nomination, especially his opponent, the Democrat heiress apparent. He ran a good, professional and patient campaign. He raised more money than all of the other candidates together. His web-based fundraising is the envy of all politicians. He has rock star status not seen since Ronald Reagan or more appropriately, JFK. And he has brought into the voting booths millions of young people while, at the same time, engaging the black community. Not a bad resume.

There is a "BUT" to my comments and it is this.

But -- the politics of envy, the roots of his ideology, are never a good foundation for action. Never, ever. Envy is never a reason to do good and is easily disguised as justice. Senator Obama's speeches and his book, The Audacity of Hope, show the influences of 20 years listening to Reverend Wright who is unapologetically a promoter of liberation theology, today's theological support for the old idea. Liberation Theology is an insidious doctrine in the way it redefines justice, and sometimes evil in the way it foments violent rebellion. That's not hyperbole. Envy and Revolution (Change) under liberation theology are easily disguised as Law and Justice. The proverbial wolf in sheep's clothe. The difference between Cain and Abel.

I don't want to take one bit of acclaim away from Senator Obama, frankly I'm proud of him and proud to be an American because of him. My misgivings are there, nevertheless.