A few pictures from my trip to Ottawa this week to visit my friends at the Institute of Marriage and Family Canada.

Parliament Hill

Glenn reading in the corner, when he should have been greeting members of Parliament. But it was a good book.

Bascillica of Notre Dame, with Huge Honkin Spider

Parliament Hill at sunrise

Today the Susan G. Komen Foundation unfortunately reversed its decision regarding Planned Parenthood under remarkable pressure from left-leaning groups. But it’s unclear whether actual funding will be restored, according to a Komen Foundation board member.

Planned Parenthood says it needs funding like this because they provide things beside abortion and contraceptive services, things like mammograms. (See PP President Cecile Richards saying so in the video below.)

Well, one young woman tried to find a PP clinic in various major U.S. cities who performed these legitimate health-care services. She didn’t find any.

The bulk of PP’s breast-health work is simply referring their clients to outside facilities. “Sorry, no help for you here.” In fact yesterday, Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure CEO Nancy Brinker and President Elizabeth Thompson revealed they halted funding to PP for this very reason.

“We have decided not to fund, wherever possible, pass-through grants. We were giving them money, they were sending women out for mammograms. What we would like to have are clinics where we can directly fund mammograms. “

Komen concluded that PP didn’t qualify as direct providers. It is difficult to find hard numbers on how many PP clinics actually provide mammograms, but most data indicates that the overwhelming majority of PP clinics do not provide such services; screenings that are unarguably so fundamental and important to women’s health. And that is exactly what PP says it all about.

Make no mistake. Planned Parenthood is nearly all about abortion. You can hear a PP staffer say so in the video above: “We are primarily a surgical facility.”

Let’s hope that Komen stays focused on women’s health, committed to those partner organizations who actually provide women with genuine health care. Of late, they are having to spend rather their time and energy responding to political thuggery. And that’s a shame.

Ok folks. The third person of my trinity of cool* – Leonard Cohen – is releasing a new album, Old Ideas, his first new one since 2004. This is one 77-year-old beautiful man and he has shown through this new disc that he’s not even close to slowing down. It’s a startling piece of work. Stream the whole disc for limited time at NPR.

But there is one song – “Show Me the Place” – a tender piano-backed prayer that I am just transfixed by, so I must tell you about it. The third cut, I thought this song was surely an old black spiritual, given its gravely pathos, strong theology and painful spiritualism, but it is a new Cohen original.

Jon Dolan at Rolling Stone illuminates the song and Cohen’s overall delivery well…

His Cookie Monster-does-Deuteronomy baritone has long transcended ephemeral considerations like melody and tone, and the somber piano and stark religious imagery – warmed by a French-Canadian parlor-folk accompaniment and background vocals from old pal Jennifer Warren – will remind many of ”Hallelujah.” “Show me the place where the word became a man / Show me the place where the suffering began,” Cohen growls, bringing to mind hard-nosed meditations on mortality by fellow septuagenarians Bob Dylan and Paul Simon. He’s staring down the eternal with unblinking honesty and a primordial sense of purpose.

You MUST listen to this song, linked in Dolan’s short review here.

Take in and relish how he gives you the last lines of this song.

“Show me the place where the Word became man / Show me the place where the suffering began…

*the other two persons, as if you had to ask: Bobby and Johnny.

So Van Halen announces a major 2012 US tour, stretching from mid-February to late-June, launching at – get this – the “KFC Yum! Center” in Louisville, KY. Actual name of the venue!

Come for the classic rock and roll and crazy DLR antics; stay for the chicken and biscuits.

The tour ends in early summer in New Orleans. I’m guessing the bad boys will play Popeye’s Spicey! Chicken Bowl for their last night.

But here’s the really weird thing. REALLY weird. Guess who VH’s opener for the tour is. Here are three guesses:

1) REO Speedwagon

2) David Bowie

3) Kool & the Gang

Answer here.

Classic rock and roll just got weird.  …And not in a good way.

I hope at least one concert promoter is now looking for work.

A talented young believer  posted a video of himself delivering a poem last week about what’s wrong the Church today and the thing has gone crazy-viral. Nearly 15 million views at this point. Quite remarkable.

Obviously, the piece is connecting with people. I would guess that most are connecting positively because they’re interested in seeing a better angle on their Christian faith that’s different than what they’ve been seeing. That desire is always good.

My interest is not the thoughts or offering of the young man who posted it, but the interest in the piece from his viewers.

Continue reading here at Christianity Today’s site…

Getting falsely accused and innuendo’d by gay bloggers is nothing new, but this has been an interesting week. See here, here, and here.  I wasn’t going to respond – the reaction such things deserve. But a friend at National Review Online asked me to respond, so I did.

Here’s my piece on the silly games played regarding this very serious topic.

Turns out his new employer also thinks he is the worst person in the world. And this is the NYTs telling the tale.