That I could stand stalwart in the hopes that they might live, inextricable from the scattered remains of courage that blow through the infinite passages we seek.
--Bridgid
I ran across this song a year ago. It is not only traditional for New Year's Eve (according to no less than Robert Burns who wrote Auld Lang Syne) but is also traditional as a farewell song to the dearly departed. My Mom and ASM826's Dad both passed this last year, and so this beautiful cover by the Face Vocal Band is a fitting end to 2020.
Mom and Dad loved light classical music, and I picked up that same affinity. Last year I (quite by accident) found this delightful piece by Ernest Tomlinson, Fantasia on Auld Lang Syne for Orchestra. It weaves not just Burns' magnum opus but snippets of 152 other songs as well.
To all our readers, we wish you a happy and prosperous New Year.
Apologies for the lack of posting - The Queen Of The World and I had a houseguest from the Camp Borepatch days, and while it was great fun it pretty much filled the days.
But folks are asking about the February blogshoot so let me poll the readership. Leave a comment if you can be in the area for a blogshoot on February 20. Also say whether you know of a range that could handle the crowd (we had over 20 for the first).
I'm pretty sure I can get the private range at the gun club this far out (and will make sure that the wires won't get crossed again - we will have both a 25 yard pistol range and a 200 yard rifle range). If we do it here again The Queen Of The World says she'll cater it again but some people couldn't make the trip and I'm happy to travel if there's another range.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
Philippians 2:5-8
We all know the story, that's the problem. We know it so well that we don't think about the story, and what it means. It helps to put the story in a different setting to make us think on the meaning again.
Huron Carol is the oldest Christmas Carol from Canada, and perhaps from the New World. It was written in 1642 by Jean de Brébeuf, a Jesuit missionary to the Huron tribes. It tells the story of the nativity in terms that were familiar to the Huron: instead of a stable, the baby was born in a lodge of broken bark. Instead of three wise men there were three chiefs from far off tribes. Instead of frankincense and myrrh there were gifts of fox and beaver pelts. He wrote in their native language, as necessity called for. If you would tell a tale, you must use words the listener will understand.
Tomorrow is the feast of the Redeemer. Amidst the holiday cheer, gifts, and yes, feasting, think on the familiar meaning as explained in a different tongue, a tale made new again.
Huron
The original words of the carol in the Wyandot language (Huron).
Ehstehn yayau deh tsaun we yisus ahattonnia O na wateh wado:kwi nonnwa 'ndasqua entai ehnau sherskwa trivota nonnwa 'ndi yaun rashata Iesus Ahattonnia, Ahattonnia, Iesus Ahattonnia.
Asheh kaunnta horraskwa deh ha tirri gwames Tishyaun ayau ha'ndeh ta aun hwa ashya a ha trreh aundata:kwa Tishyaun yayaun yaun n-dehta Iesus Ahattonnia, Ahattonnia, Iesus Ahattonnia.
Dau yishyeh sta atyaun errdautau 'ndi Yisus avwa tateh dn-deh Tishyaun stanshi teya wennyau aha yaunna torrehntehn yataun katsyaun skehnn Iesus Ahattonnia, Ahattonnia, Iesus Ahattonnia.
Eyeh kwata tehnaunnte aheh kwashyehn ayehn kiyeh kwanaun aukwayaun dehtsaun we 'ndeh adeh tarrya diskwann aunkwe yishyehr eya ke naun sta Iesus Ahattonnia, Ahattonnia, Iesus Ahattonnia.
English
The 1926 English version by Jesse Edgar Middleton.
'Twas in the moon of winter-time When all the birds had fled, That mighty Gitchi Manitou Sent angel choirs instead; Before their light the stars grew dim, And wandering hunters heard the hymn: "Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria."
Within a lodge of broken bark The tender Babe was found, A ragged robe of rabbit skin Enwrapp'd His beauty round; But as the hunter braves drew nigh, The angel song rang loud and high... "Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria."
The earliest moon of wintertime Is not so round and fair As was the ring of glory On the helpless infant there. The chiefs from far before him knelt With gifts of fox and beaver pelt. Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria.
O children of the forest free, O sons of Manitou, The Holy Child of earth and heaven Is born today for you. Come kneel before the radiant Boy Who brings you beauty, peace and joy. "Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria."
The opening weeks of The War To End Wars were nothing like what we think. In many ways it was worse for the men on the ground, which only makes the spontaneous outbreak of peace even more amazing. The bitterness that the soldiers of both sides must have felt would have burned bright, and yet the feelings of the season overcame all that.
When we think of that war, we think oftrenches, barbed wire, and machine guns. That's quite a good description of the western front, but not until 2 or 3 months into the conflict. Initially instead of a slog over No Man's Land, it was a war of movement, with massive armies covering hundreds of miles. August and September 1914 saw men pushed to their limits because they had to march 15 miles and then fight the enemy, and then wake up and do it all over again. And again. And again.
The losses were unbelievable. The first six weeks saw the following killed, wounded, and missing: 300,000 (France), 300,000 (Germany), 300,000 (Austria-Hungary), 250,000 (Russia), 200,000 (Serbia), 15,000 (Britain). That last seems out of place with the rivers of blood from the other combatants, but Britain's army in 1914 was not a mass of draftees - rather, it was a small force of professional veterans. 15,000 was a quarter of the entire force.
October followed up these million and a half with theKindermord, the "slaughter of the children". The generals were horrified at the losses, not so much because of the incredible human loss but because their forces were so rapidly depleted. Trainees were rushed from basic training straight to the front. At the First Battle of Ypres 60,000 of these kids were mowed down as they marched, singing, into the rifles of the Cold Stream Guards.
The German artist Käthe Kollwitz made a sculpture in remembrance of her son, Peter, killed in the Kindermord. He, like most of his comrades, was 18. You can see it if you go to theVladslo German cemetery in Diksmuid, Belgum. The grief and bitterness is captured in stone.
Only then did it settle down to trenches, barbed wire, and No Man's Land. So if anyone was justified in holding a grudge, it was everyone in a trench on the Western Front on December 24, 1914. And yet, this happened instead.
The Generals were less than amused, and cracked down in following years. Captain Sir Iain Colquhoun was Court-marshalled for his participation. After they convicted him someone recalled that he was related to the British Prime Minister, and so they swept it all under the carpet.
Historians now occupy the field of battle because all the eye witnesses are now long dead. All that we have are stories from those who remember those witnesses. But we know that December 1914 saw something unique in trench warfare: Christmas showed that the human heart still beat on the front lines. This song from 1984 was back when some of those men still lived, and John McCutcheon tells of how some of them came to his concert because they heard the song on the radio:
All our lives, our family our friends told us we were crazy. Couldn't possibly have happened to us. Then we heard your song on the radio and said "See? See? We were there."
My name is Francis Tolliver. I come from Liverpool. Two years ago the war was waiting for me after school. To Belgium and to Flanders, to Germany to here, I fought for King and country I love dear.
It was Christmas in the trenches where the frost so bitter hung. The frozen field of France were still, no Christmas song was sung. Our families back in England were toasting us that day, their brave and glorious lads so far away.
I was lyin' with my mess-mates on the cold and rocky ground when across the lines of battle came a most peculiar sound. Says I "Now listen up me boys", each soldier strained to hear as one young German voice sang out so clear.
"He's singin' bloddy well you know", my partner says to me. Soon one by one each German voice joined in in harmony. The cannons rested silent. The gas cloud rolled no more as Christmas brought us respite from the war.
As soon as they were finished a reverent pause was spent. 'God rest ye merry, gentlemen' struck up some lads from Kent. The next they sang was 'Stille Nacht". "Tis 'Silent Night'" says I and in two toungues one song filled up that sky.
"There's someone commin' towards us" the front-line sentry cried. All sights were fixed on one lone figure trudging from their side. His truce flag, like a Christmas star, shone on that plain so bright as he bravely strode, unarmed, into the night.
Then one by one on either side walked into no-mans-land with neither gun nor bayonet we met there hand to hand. We shared some secret brandy and wished each other well and in a flare-lit soccer game we gave 'em hell.
We traded chocolates, cigarettes and photographs from home these sons and fathers far away from families of their own. Young Sanders played his squeeze box and they had a violin this curious and unlikely band of men.
Soon daylight stole upon us and France was France once more. With sad farewells we each began to settle back to war. But the question haunted every heart that lived that wondrous night "whose family have I fixed within my sights?"
It was Christmas in the trenches where the frost so bitter hung. The frozen fields of France were warmed as songs of peace were sung. For the walls they'd kept between us to exact the work of war had been crumbled and were gone for ever more.
My name is Francis Tolliver. In Liverpool I dwell. Each Christmas come since World War One I've learned it's lessons well. That the ones who call the shots won't be among the dead and lame and on each end of the rifle we're the same.
This Christmas Eve, remember those caught up in the killing fields of Flanders, and the Ardennes, and Khe Sanh. And remember those who still stand post far from home and family tonight.
(This is something that I've posted each year for quite a while)
f) long-term, having a large class of unemployed, under-employed, and broke, hungry, shiftlesslumpenproletariatis how revolutions start. Middle classes do not revolt. This year has seen the biggest targeted wipeout of the middle class, worldwide, and shifting them to the lower class, than anything since the Great Depression. And we're still in the early innings of it, as COVID2.0 now appears to be clearing its throat.
g) That's before the blatant disenfranchising of a third of the adults in this country by the most ham-fistedly blatant electoral fraud (outside of every election in Central America, ever) in living memory.
Yup. You should go read the whole thing. And it's been a while since I posted this: New Gingrich on what the Second Amendment is really about. It's long, but really gets rolling at about 5 minutes in. Newt's point is exactly the same one that Aesop makes.
The Continental Congress was an unauthorized, unsanctioned, unlawful, treasonous, and seditious assembly, and every man-jack of them were eventually targeted for arrest and hanging.
This was written in 1943, as we had 15 million men overseas staring down the Nazi and Japanese super races. It's sadly newly fresh again, as Governors from sea to shining sea tell us not to go see our families for the Holidays - under threat of force of law.
Somehow I suspect I know how those 15 million men would have taken the orders from Govs Cuomo, Newsom, and Whitmer ...
I must confess that I'd never watched A Christmas Story until I met The Queen Of The World. It's just one of the many ways that she has improved my life.
It's awesome, and if you have never seen it, the line from the film to remember is You'll shoot your eye out. You see, the kid in the film wants a BB Gun for christmas and everyone tells him, well, you know. The Queen Of The World made me a T-shirt with that caption and the picture of a set of glasses with one lens shattered. I wore it to the gun show last weekend to great hilarity.
Anyway, via T-Bolt (you do read him every day, right? Thought so.) we find this most excellent mash up. Embedding seems to be broken in the new Blogger interface and the new one can't seem to find this video even though it's there (WTF, Youtube?) - bit it's worth the click.
Suppose you have one of those sweet, sweet M1 Carbines - you know the ones: light, short, handy, low recoil and fun to shoot all day. You lucky sumbitch.
December 1944 saw the German Army launch a blitzkreig on the western front, designed to cut the American Army off from the British Army, and drive to the port of Antwerp cutting off the Brits. It was Hitler's last roll of the dice.
For the first few days, things went all the German's way. They overran a lightly defended area in Belgium, making big gains towards their objectives. Only the crossroads town of Bastogne held out, bottling up part of the advance.
Eisenhower had kept George Patton on a shot leash - at the urging of British Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery (he and Patton detested each other), but now Ike needed his best field General. Patton turned on a dime and had six divisions point north to relieve Bastogne.
The problem was that the weather was awful. Clouds and snow kept the Army Air Corps grounded while the SS Panzer divisions ran wild. Patton turned to the Third Army Chaplain, Col. James Hugh O'Neill and asked him for a prayer for better weather. Here is what the Padre came up with, which was distributed to the entire Third Army, issued on this day in 1944:
Almighty and most merciful Father, we humbly beseech Thee, of Thy great goodness, to restrain these immoderate rains with which we have had to contend. Grant us fair weather for Battle. Graciously hearken to us as soldiers who call upon Thee that, armed with Thy power, we may advance from victory to victory and crush the oppression and wickedness of our enemies, and establish Thy justice among men and nations.
Amen.
The weather cleared almost immediately. Patton got Col. O'Neill awarded the Bronze Star for his intercession withe the Almighty.
Well, no - but everyone who is saying things like "ZOMG tHe amm0 factoryz ar3 bogarting t3h ammo" need to think on the old saying about war:
When it comes to war, amateurs think about strategy. Professionals think about logistics.
Now think on the 7M new gun owners this year: they've never owned a gun before. They think it's needed to protect themselves and their families in an increasingly lawless Republic. They got themselves a gun, joining us in the defense of the right to defend ourselves.
They also need a couple or 3 (or 10) boxes of ammo for their new heaters. So 7,000,000 time 4 (boxes) times 50 (rounds per box) is {scribbles on paper} 1.4 Billion rounds of ammo for new gun owners.
Yeah, they went to the front of the ammo line at your gun store. They bought a gun, and need ammo, amirite?
So how many billion rounds do you think that American manufacturers make each year?
Dwight (you do read him everyday, right?) sends a video of a CEO of an ammo manufacturer explaining this. Again, Youtube is weird about embedding so you need to click through.
UPDATE 21 December 2020 11:48: Oops, I forgot to give credit to Dwight who pointed me to this video. You do read him every day, don't you?
Other than the movie theater, the only other place that the American public seems to have a taste for classical music is at Christmas. I think that this is primarily due to popularizers like Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops, and particularly composers like Aaron Copeland and Ralph Vaughan Williams who here takes the familiar and spins it in new directions.
This is, of course, from the A Charlie Brown Christmas special. The Studio Execs were nervous about the show: the explicit Christian themes, the use of child actors, the lack of a laugh track. Of course, the show was a sensation: almost half of everyone who had the TV on that evening had it tuned to that show. This year is the show's 55th anniversary (!).
And yes, the music is as iconic as everything else from the show.
Now that I live in the Gunshine State, I went off to the Palmetto Gun Show to work the booth for my gun club. It was interesting (and fun). Here are some more or less stream of consciousness thoughts:
There was a good turnout. This was the opening day of the show but they do this every month. Traffic was brisk from beginning until I left after lunch. There were whole families there and every race in the rainbow was represented.
There were a lot of guns for sale on dealer's tables. I haven't been comparison shopping so can't say definitively about prices but in general they looked reasonably sane.
I'm not sure about the guys bringing their own heaters around to sell by themselves. One guy had what he said was a vintage WWII 1911 with web belt and holster and was looking for $1800. That seemed rich to me but ask I said I haven't been pricing on the antique market.
Ammo was at a premium. Pricing was high and it looks like dealers were buying out other dealers before the show started (and then marked each box up). While I'm not enormously well stocked, I'm well stocked enough not to have to spend $20 for 50 .22LR (!). I mean, seriously?
There was a LOT of Donald Trump stuff there, and not in a let's clear out the old inventory sense. People were walking around in MAGA hats and there was what looked like a lot of fresh inventory being scooped up by the crowd. However this plays out, The Donald is not fading away. Oh, yeah - several vendors had "Biden Is Not My President" T-Shirts for sale and I saw more than one dude walking around in them.
Didn't see any tables of Nazi memorabilia. Might be the first gun show I've been to that didn't sport that.
Where the heck is the jerky? I don't think I've ever been to a gun show where you couldn't buy any.
Finish Mosins were going for how much? Sure if you want a Mosin you want one done by the Finns, but the days of the box of $50 Mosins are long gone.
There was a big area where they were signing people up for Concealed Carry classes. It was mobbed.
Lots of people were interested in my gun club. A bunch asked about the Appleseed sessions we offer.
The last two are a good sign - people aren't just buying guns but in practicing and carrying them.
My takeaway is that the gun culture is very strong here in Florida.
It is very long, but detailed and nicely broken up with quotes from the report interspersed with commentary and analysis. If you are interested in this topic, or if you are interested in computer security, you need to spend some time reading this. Note that this is a two part series, and you need to click through to the first installment.
My take as a 35 year veteran of computer security? Angels and Ministers of Grace, defend us.
A couple weeks ago I posted What deer rifle for an old hunter? Many of you left comments and I'm happy to say that Tim emails saying that the hunt was a success and he got his deer. He has a nice After Action Report posted.
I agree with him that the local deer populations seem to be pretty strong. I used to see them regularly in Maryland and Wolfgang would chase 'em if he got a chance. He never got close, of course, but if you're a deer in a subdivision then neighborhood dogs will be an occasional encounter.
The Queen Of The World spotted this on Facebook. I reproduce it here without any commentary because it needs none.
Months after winning his 1941 Academy Award for best actor in “The Philadelphia Story,” Jimmy Stewart, one of the best-known actors of the day, left Hollywood and joined the US Army. He was the first big-name movie star to enlist in World War II.
An accomplished private pilot, the 33-year-old Hollywood icon became a US Army Air Force aviator, earning his 2nd Lieutenant commission in early 1942. With his celebrity status and huge popularity with the American public, he was assigned to starring in recruiting films, attending rallies, and training younger pilots.
Stewart, however, wasn’t satisfied. He wanted to fly combat missions in Europe, not spend time in a stateside training command. By 1944, frustrated and feeling the war was passing him by, he asked his commanding officer to transfer him to a unit deploying to Europe. His request was reluctantly granted.
Stewart, now a Captain, was sent to England, where he spent the next 18 months flying B-24 Liberator bombers over Germany. Throughout his time overseas, the US Army Air Corps' top brass had tried to keep the popular movie star from flying over enemy territory. But Stewart would hear nothing of it.
Determined to lead by example, he bucked the system, assigning himself to every combat mission he could. By the end of the war he was one of the most respected and decorated pilots in his unit.
But his wartime service came at a high personal price.
In the final months of WWII he was grounded for being “flak happy,” today called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
When he returned to the US in August 1945, Stewart was a changed man. He had lost so much weight that he looked sickly. He rarely slept, and when he did he had nightmares of planes exploding and men falling through the air screaming (in one mission alone his unit had lost 13 planes and 130 men, most of whom he knew personally).
He was depressed, couldn’t focus, and refused to talk to anyone about his war experiences. His acting career was all but over.
As one of Stewart's biographers put it, "Every decision he made [during the war] was going to preserve life or cost lives. He took back to Hollywood all the stress that he had built up.”
In 1946 he got his break. He took the role of George Bailey, the suicidal father in “It’s a Wonderful Life.” The rest is history.
Actors and crew of the set realized that in many of the disturbing scenes of George Bailey unraveling in front of his family, Stewart wasn’t acting. His PTSD was being captured on film for potentially millions to see.
But despite Stewart's inner turmoil, making the movie was therapeutic for the combat veteran. He would go on to become one of the most accomplished and loved actors in American history.
When asked in 1941 why he wanted to leave his acting career to fly combat missions over Nazi Germany, he said, "This country's conscience is bigger than all the studios in Hollywood put together, and the time will come when we'll have to fight.”
This holiday season, as many of us watch the classic Christmas film, “It’s A Wonderful Life,” it’s also a fitting time to remember the sacrifices of Jimmy Stewart and all the men who gave up so much to serve their country during wartime. We will always remember you!
Postscript:
While fighting in Europe, Stewart's Oscar statue was proudly displayed in his father’s Pennsylvania hardware store. Throughout his life, the beloved actor always said his father, a World War I veteran, was the person who had made the biggest impact on him.
Jimmy Stewart remained in the USAF Reserve following the war, retiring as a Brigadier General in 1968. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1985 and died in 1997 at the age of 89.
-- Ned Forney, Writer, Saluting America's Veterans
Actually, since this is Borepatch, you know that I can't just shut up and so will tell a personal anecdote about Jimmy Stewart. On a family vacation to Los Angeles to see grandparents (this would have been probably in 1972, but may have been 1967) we went on one of those Trolly Tours to see the houses of the stars. They would drive slowly past each of the houses while the tour guide gave a description of the roles and awards each star had. But at Jimmy Stewart's house the trolly stopped. The tour guide explained that if Mr. Stewart was home he would typically come to the window and wave. He did this because everything he had in life came from his fans, and the least he could do is thank them.
I don't recall that he was home that day but the contrast between him and the rest of the Hollywood bunch stuck with me all these years.
Every person has two educations, one which he receives from others, and one, more important, which he gives to himself.
― Edward Gibbon
This is a long, long post that you probably need to spend some time on (especially watching the embedded videos). This post is in particular for the folks that think that the end of America will be a cakewalk/simple/glorious. I don't argue with the Desired End State; I'm not at all sure of what will be left when it's all done. You know, this glorious future:
This is Monte Testaccio in Rome. It is a hill made entirely of broken pottery, and it dates to the first and second centuries AD. It's over 100 feet high, around a kilometer around, and historians think that it used to be much larger but has eroded over the last two millennia. The Roman "bread and circuses" was a huge welfare project that fed much of the city's population, and which required huge imports of not just grain but also olive oil - over a million gallons of oil each year, every year, for hundreds of years. The oil was shipped in big clay pots, but what do you do with the pots when you've distributed the oil? The Romans were the best engineers until at least the eighteenth century, and so they came up with an engineering solution: they made a mountain out of broken up pots.
And then it all fell, and fell so far and hard that it was forgotten. The Roman Forum itself - the political center of the Ancient World for four centuries or more - became a cow field, theCampo Vaccino.
The Testaccio-monte is being excavated today, and is a treasure trove of ancient Roman economic knowledge that had long since fallen into a barbarian black hole. You can skip this video if you don't care about how hard Rome fell; but if you think that the end of the American Empire will be comfortable you really should watch it all.
The Roman Empire was unique until the 1700s, in that large amounts of bulk goods were shipped all over their Empire. Back In The Day, you could eat off of dishes made in North Africa and drink wine from Greece even if you lived in England. But then it fell. And it fell so hard that it took a millennium to recover.
Kenneth Clarke's outstanding series Civilization confronted this head on in a way that looks to get him canceled in today's "everybody gets a trophy" world. Clarke really gets to the heart of the matter about what caused a great civilization to fall between about 7:30 and 10 minutes into his first episode. I recommend you watch all of them ( all 13 episodes), all the way through which will make you better educated than 90% of anyone you will ever run into.
And in answer to the inevitable questions, yes I did watch this series when it was shown on PBS in the early 1970s. Dad was a history professor and Mom was a librarian - of course they made me stay up and watch this. And so if you have a problem with posts about events with historical interests - posts of Borepatchian length - I blame my parents.
Except they never played this, which circles back to those who think that it's time to hoist the Black Flag:
Man, Freddy Mercury and Queen were a talent for the ages, although I'd also love to hear the music that was composed by Nero. Presumably he was also a talent for ages, but we will have to be satisfied with his final words: What a talent dies with me. Probably he was no Freddy Mercury.
None of this is to say it's not worth fighting for the America that we knew and grew up with. It's just to recognize that like Monte Testaccio, that may already be lost in the past. But we should also realize that the fight - if fought - will be brutal beyond our imagination. When Civilization falls, it falls hard and takes a long, long time to recover. The 1200 year recovery is shown well here between 2:30 and 5:00 into the video, although (as with all of the videos here) I encourage you to watch them all. Think of it as Borepatch University:
And so to the fall of Civilization: there have always been winners and losers, down through history:
Rome's Intelligentsia had been failing from the mid- Second Century, say around 140 A.D. The Dark Ages arrived by the Fourth Century. Certainly it seemed that way to the bulk of the population. Those who were not chattel slaves were bound to the soil as serfs by 330 A.D., by an act of Constantine. Sharecropping the hugelatifundiaestates, they neither knew nor cared who was running the show. An ever smaller elite, relying on a fabulously expensive bloated bureaucracy, held on by hiring barbarian mercenaries until the barbarians finally realized they were running the show in all but name. It was then but a short step, andsic transit gloria mundi.
Certainly the elites were horrified at the change. For them, itwasthe beginning of a Dark Age, as the skills they had carefully nurtured suddenly were seen to be worthless by the new Overlords. It's said that history is written by the winners; the history of the fall of Rome was written by the losers.
The current Intellectual Elite sound eerily similar to those ancient scribblers. A world view has run out of gas, and is looking like it will be replaced, and those at the top of Fortuna's Wheel fear that the wheel will keep spinning, and the only direction for them to go is down. The Progressive Agenda has had a 160 year run, but has not produced a truly first rate intellect since John Kenneth Galbraith, or possibly Pat Moynihan. The last 30 years have been a desert, where the interesting intellectual action has all been on the other side.
And so back to the original topic of the post, those who think that the end of America will be a cakewalk/simple/glorious. I don't argue with the Desired End State; I'm not at all sure of what will be left when things are done. It think it might be a lot like this (although I can't understand the language, but things get particularly spicy around the 5:00 mark). [Embedding is disabled, but I strongly encourage your to watch this]
Like I said, I don't argue with the Desired End State; I'm just not at all sure of what will be left when things are done. But I do have a feeling, like one written down in the 11th Century and put to music in the 20th. O Fortuna:
OFortune, like the moon you are changeable, ever waxing and waning; hateful life first oppresses and then soothes as fancy takes it; poverty and power it melts them like ice.
Fate – monstrous and empty, you whirling wheel, you are malevolent, well-being is vain and always fades to nothing, shadowed and veiled you plague me too; now through the game I bring my bare back to your villainy.
Fate is against me in health and virtue, driven on and weighted down, always enslaved. So at this hour without delay pluck the vibrating strings; since Fate strikes down the strong man, everyone weep with me!
Fortuna's Wheel has winners and losers. We shall all of us have to choose when we think we have more to win from another spin of the wheel. Just understand that while you might win, others might lose. Your calculus should consider who they are and whether fate should pluck their vibrating string.
Because when Civilization collapses, it falls hard. I posted before about the Fayum Mummy Portraits from the Roman Empire and how portrait painting was a thriving (and stunningly competent) part of their civilization. Then that civilization fell andit took a millennium to recover.
My opinion is that this was the greatest portrait (that we know of) for 1500 years, faded by 1900 years. It dates from around the reign of Emperor Claudius, or possibly Nero.
And then it was gone, as if it had never been.
In Egypt's sandy silence, all alone, Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off throws The only shadow that the Desert knows:— "I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the stone, "The King of Kings; this mighty City shows "The wonders of my hand."— The City's gone,— Nought but the Leg remaining to disclose The site of this forgotten Babylon.
We wonder,—and some Hunter may express Wonder like ours, when thro' the wilderness Where London stood, holding the Wolf in chace, He meets some fragment huge, and stops to guess What powerful but unrecorded race Once dwelt in that annihilated place.
The Pandemic has been particularly useful to the Powers That Be:
This is what the COVID hysteria is all about. Without this, we would all be allowed to know that COVID is a mild respiratory disease that is only dangerous to the very old and the very sick. This is why we are being lied to and locked up:
Amazon: profit up 100% Walmart: profit up 80% Target: profit up 80% Lowe’s: profit up 74% Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, Google: stock at record high
Wealth increase in the pandemic for founder/CEOs of Amazon: $91 billion Walmart: $38B Google: $37B Microsoft: $33B Facebook: $28B Nike: $8B Apple: $8B
Small businesses: collectively lost over $200 billion
The deal that Progressives made in the 1930s - the economy would provide a surplus that the government would use to buy social peace - is shattered, as the government finds that it has consumed the entire surplus, and is still hungry for more. The median family is worse off now then they were ten years ago, because they pay more taxes and make about the same. Government at all levels is squeezing the majority of the population at an increasing rate, taking a higher share of National Income, with no end in sight.
Now I'm sure that I could do a better job with the numbers (say, another 15% accuracy), but the trajectory is unmistakable, and is one thatMarx clearly understood:
Within thecapitalistProgressive Statesystem all methods for raisingthe social productivity of labourtaxesare put into effect at the cost of the individual worker [...] All means forthe development of productionraising of tax revenueundergo a dialectical inversion so that they become a means of domination and exploitation of the producers; they distort the worker into a fragment of a man, they degrade him to the level of an appendage of a machine, they destroy the actual content of his labour by turning it into a torment, they alienate from him the intellectual potentialities of the labour process [...], they transform his life into working-time, and his wife and child beneath the wheels of the juggernaut ofcapitalThe State. [...] It follows therefore that in proportion as capital accumulates, the situation of the worker, be his payment high or low,must grow worse.
- Karl Marx,Das Kapital
My changes are highlighted.
The only thing to add is that Donald Trump was a symptom, not a cause. Accelerating the immiseration of the Proletariat using Covid hysteria will lead to a very clear outcome, historically speaking. It will come faster with the collapse of legitimacy we are seeing in the Organs of the State.
I would think that a bunch of Marxist Intellectuals would understand this, but maybe they're too busy looting their political opponents to notice.
The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed - where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once.
With credible accusations of widespread fraud - more than enough to change the outcome of an election, and with the Courts seemingly unwilling to step in to guarantee a public and transparent audit and investigation, this seems to me to be more pertinent than ever.
TSG Harold Oberg was stationed at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. He had an 8mm movie camera with color film loaded when the Japanese attacked. He got color on-the-spot film of the day.
I must say that color film gives a completely different feel to the day.
I guess I'm officially an old fart. Pentatonix is a very talented young group who specialize in a cappella music - in my opinion the least forgiving type of music you can perform. With a backup band there's something playing that can ground you in tune; when it's a cappella it's just you and the audience. Like I said, this is a seriously talented young group of singers.
And yet I don't get the fashion sense of these youngsters. I guess that's OK - I'm certainly as old as their dads, and perhaps not too far behind some of their granddads.
Ah, well, this is very nice music, and the home Christmas videos of when they were small children is very well done indeed.
Down here in Florida we have a neighbor, Joe. Joe (like me) is from Maine. Unlike me, Joe is a 20+ year Marine Corps veteran. Also unlike me, Joe is in his 80s and is getting a little fragile, although he won't ever admit it.
Well last week I was chatting with him in front of his house. I remarked that the bottom step of his stairs was looking a little worse for wear. He insisted it was fine, but a closer inspection showed that the stair tread was rotting. After all, it was 20 something years old. I told Joe that I'd fix it over the weekend.
And so yesterday I went to Big Box Hardware Store to get 2x12 and assorted stuff. I cut it to length and painted it (didn't want to put an outdoor stair down unpainted on the underneath, even if it was out of sight. Especially if it was out of sight ...). Then I pulled up the old plank.
Damn if the whole thing wasn't rotten, especially the support planks. Back to Big Box Hardware Store, and lots of cutting of 2x4. And painting. And clearing out the old stuff, down to (yay!) concrete. Then building the support box, then putting the tread on. Rock solid; yay, me!
And then painting. And the new step looked so good - and the old steps looked so weathered) that I painted the whole thing again. Puff, puff, puff.
But Joe's front steps look good now, and I don't worry about his (or Mrs. Joe) stepping onto a rotten board and falling down. So mission accomplished. And an ibuprofen cocktail was just what the Doctor ordered.
It's interesting here in Florida. There are a lot of older folks, and people pitch in to look after each other. We like it here rather a lot.
I often say that classical music is alive and well, it's just decamped from the symphony hall to the movie theater. Today's composition from the soundtrack to the 1990 film Home Alone was nominated not only for The Best Original Song Oscar, but also for a Grammy. John Williams needs no introduction - for those of you who have never heard his music, go watch Star Wars for cryin' out loud.
The Queen Of The World not only suggested doing film scores for the Sunday Classical posts, but suggested this song in particular. She's not just a pretty face, but wicket smart as well.
This Christmas song is iconic. Surveys of listeners on which songs they like and which they dislike find this song at the top of both lists. Leave a comment about whether you love it or hate it.
This is a staple of the season - Cartoon Network annually runs the animated version of this, and if you're adventurous on Youtube you can find the Irish Rovers cover which is 100% pure distilled awesome.
Grandma got run over by a reindeer Walking home from our house Christmas eve You can say there's no such thing as Santa But as for me and grandpa we believe She'd been drinking too much eggnog And we begged her not to go But she forgot her medication And she staggered out the door into the snow When we found her Christmas morning At the scene of the attack She had hoof-prints on her forehead And incriminating Claus marks on her back
Grandma got run over by a reindeer Walking home from our house Christmas eve You can say there's no such thing as Santa But as for me and grandpa we believe
Now we're all so proud of grandpa He's been taking this so well See him in there watching football Drinking beer and playing cards with cousin Mel It's not Christmas without Grandma All the family's dressed in black And we just can't help but wonder Should we open up her gifts Or send them back (send them back)
Grandma got run over by a reindeer Walking home from our house Christmas eve You can say there's no such thing as Santa But as for me and grandpa we believe
Now the goose is on the table And the pudding made of fig And the blue and silver candles That would just have matched the hair on grandma's wig I've warned all my friends and neighbors Better watch out for yourselves They should never give a license To a man who drives a sleigh And plays with elves
Grandma got run over by a reindeer Walking home from our house Christmas eve You can say there's no such thing as Santa But as for me and grandpa we believe
Grandma got run over by a reindeer Walking home from our house Christmas eve You can say there's no such thing as Santa But as for me and grandpa we believe
He outlived his great rival, Jacques Chirac by 14 months. The two made an interesting contrast, embodying different aspects of the French character. Giscard - aristocratic, aloof, and cerebral - took the reins of power from Charles de Gaulle and his successor Georges Pompidou. Coming hard on the heels of les trentes glorieuses (the 30 years of rapid economic growth), everything looked possible. Giscard led the EU project, and even wrote a constitution for that organization which looked (in 1990) to become a super-state. The inability to think oneself into a new world is very French.
Chirac was more modest, in intellectual ambition if nothing less. Much, much more personable, I wrote this on his death which captures another side of the French character:
This is what I remember, as it captured the essence of the Franco-American relationship at the time. The playful scoundrel that you can't quite bring yourself to get mad at, and the long suffering friend who at the end of the day doesn't get mad at the scoundrel.
Both were allies to American administrations; both drove each of those administrations to distraction. That, too, is very French.
This was really filmed in the middle of the night, as you may have guessed. 500,000 Christmas lights “starred” in this display (that’s a half-million, people!!) 4,900 digital channels were utilized to ensure that the entire spectrum of the piano’s keyboard was featured brilliantly. 46,000 watts of juice were pumped to electrify this pizazz! A camera attached to a drone served as the primary angle to capture the captivating Christmas Spirit of these festive homes. The piano was actually being played. The police actually did show up. For real. (We’d like to thank them for their kindness and mercy. No pianists were harmed or jailed in the making of this video.
I love this. Go ahead - turn it up and bother the neighbors!
Perry Como had perhaps the biggest hit singing this but The Carpenters version is my favorite. Her death is one of the great tragedies of the music world.
I always find it funny when Liberals shy away from that term, proudly calling themselves "Progressive". I mean, who is opposed to progress? Alas, there's a difference between progress and Progress (at least as defined by Progressives).
Expect a new re-branding from them, because Progress has screeched to a halt:
It’s a very familiar landscape of ideas to anyone who knows modern history. Abolition of private property? Check. Constant intrusive surveillance? Check. Everyone’s personal lives dependent on the actions of cadres of apparatchiks? Check. Fawning propaganda about how wonderful life is in the worker’s paradise? Check. That is to say, when the World Economic Forum set out to imagine a new, exciting, cutting-edge future as a goal for humanity, the very best that they and their pet Danish politician could do is reinvent the Soviet Union.
That colossal failure of imagination, in turn, marks a historical inflection point of immense importance.
Over the decade and a half since I first started posting essays on the internet, one subject I’ve discussed repeatedly is the civil religion of progress: the belief system, as passionately held as any more obviously theological faith, that newer always means better and change is always good, that the ideas of the past have been disproved and the practices of the past rendered obsolete by the mere passage of time, and that history follows an inevitable trajectory from the ignorant squalor of the past to a shining gizmocentric future somewhere out there among the stars. That belief is the established religion of our society. Those who have the indepence of mind to reject it can count on facing the same sort of baffled rage you’ll reliably get by asking true believers hard questions about any other variety of blind faith.
What makes that baffled rage so pervasive these days is that progress hasn’t exactly lived up to its billing in recent decades.
This is a long but very important post by the blogger who used to post as the Archdruid. Here, he shows just how pathetically out of gas the Left's propaganda is. Highly, highly recommended. And his summing up is 100% spot on:
The Great Reset is being marketed by a gallimaufry of politicians, plutocrats, and tame intellectuals: some of the most cosseted people on earth, sheltered in a cozy bubble of privilege that keeps them safe from any untoward encounter with the harsh realities of life. Not for them the world the rest of us have to deal with—the bleak and violent urban neighborhoods, the grinding poverty of the countryside, the cracked and crumbling highways and bridges, the stealth inflation of shrinking product sizes and plummeting product quality! Flitting from gated residential communities or high-end condos to office towers to exclusive vacation resorts, they aren’t the Lenins of today’s world—they’re the Brezhnevs, the Andropovs, and the Chernenkos. They represent the end of an era, not its beginning.
The broad public reaction to the Great Reset, in turn, is a good measure of just how tone-deaf today’s corporate aristocracy has become. Across the political spectrum from far right to center to far left, people are regarding the prospect of being dependent on the vagaries of a vast and unaccountable corporate technostructure for their next change of underwear and their next day’s meals with the anger and mockery that it so richly deserves.
This brings some perspective to the election that the Left is trying to steal. It's these same people - the ones who are on the Wrong Side of History, who are trying to reset the propaganda clocks by 100 years - these are the people who think they can ram this down our throats? It is to laugh. They may be successful in the short term, but in the long term they will end up on the ash heap of history.
Quite frankly, that's the best case they can hope for.
