1755
French and Indian War: Braddock Expedition – British troops and colonial militiamen are ambushed and suffer a devastating defeat by French and Native American forces.
1815
Talleyrand becomes the first Prime Minister of France.
1821
470 prominent Cypriots, including Archbishop Kyprianos, are executed in response to Cypriot aid to the Greek War of Independence
1850
U.S. President Zachary Taylor dies, and Millard Fillmore becomes the 13th President of the United States.
1868
The 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, guaranteeing African Americans full citizenship and all persons in the United States due process of law.
1875
Outbreak of the Herzegovina Uprising against Ottoman rule, which would last until 1878 and have far-reaching implications throughout the Balkans
1944
World War II: Battle of Tali-Ihantala – Finland wins the Battle of Tali-Ihantala, the largest battle ever fought in northern Europe. The Red Army withdraws its troops from Ihantala and digs into defensive position, thus ending the Vyborg–Petrozavodsk Offensive.
1958
Lituya Bay is hit by a mega-tsunami. The wave is recorded at 524 meters high, the largest in recorded history.
1962
The Starfish Prime high-altitude nuclear test is conducted by the United States of America.
1972
The Troubles: In Belfast, British Army snipers shoot five civilians dead in the Springhill Massacre.
***
Pittsburgh Pirates center fielder Oneil Cruz accepted an invitation Tuesday to compete in Monday's Home Run Derby in Atlanta.
***
In the 1960s and 1970s, scientist Paul Ehrlich popularized the idea that the Earth was being threatened by what he described as a population bomb.
"No intelligent, patriotic American family should have more than two children, and preferably only one," Ehrlich said in a 1970 interview, warning that crowded U.S. cities faced a "fatal disease — it's called overpopulation."
Prophecy is tougher than it looks.
***
After graduation, many top international students can extend their stays temporarily to work in their fields of study, boosting American companies. This opportunity comes through the Optional Practical Training program—which would end if Mr. Trump’s nominee for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Joseph Edlow, has his way. Such a move would threaten the ability to attract top international students and would jeopardize a talent pipeline for American business.--wsj
***
Socialism and Free Association
The drift towards tyranny is always with us; like gravity, there is always some man or idea spreading an attracting field. Energy is always necessary to prevent a people from being pulled into the tyrant's orbit.
Anne Applebaum, in Iron Curtain, details Stalin's dynastic efforts in Eastern Europe, first as a Nazi partner then as an independent totalitarian contractor. It contains some interesting observations on tyranny as practiced by real experts, first Hitler, then Stalin. Hidden in it is some practical advice for free people.
She references the historian Stuart Finkel, who had the startling observation that communists have always acted more forcibly to undermine free association than to undermine free enterprise. When Lenin launched the New Economic Plan in the 1920s, Applebaum notes, the "systematic destruction of literary, philosophical, and spiritual societies continued unabated." Similarly, in Poland under the Nazis, Germany's war aims were not completely military."The object of the German occupation of Poland," she writes, "had been to destroy Polish civilization." After signing a pact to divide up the region between them, both Hitler and Stalin invaded Poland in September 1939. Under Hitler, much of the country's upper class was executed or sent to concentration camps. Stalin recognized a master when he saw him. The Soviets committed Nazi-style mass murders, most infamously the Katyń Forest massacre, which saw 22,000 Polish officers and other prisoners of war executed. "The Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were, for twenty-two months, real allies," Applebaum writes. At the end of the war, there was almost literally nothing left of Warsaw.
After the war, the Soviets in Poland continued this broad cultural warfare. They attacked anti-Nazi groups(!), the Polish Boy Scouts, for example. Catholic Church groups were a high priority with their close-knit communities and their international connections. Some organizations were absorbed. The Polish Women's League, a group of earnest volunteers set up to feed refugees in train stations, was infiltrated by Soviet bureaucrats and turned into a mouthpiece for party dogma.
What Hitler and Stalin later did in Eastern Europe was not an attempt at a simple military victory. Both were attempting to destroy a people, to obliterate the social fabric, to deconstruct the very infrastructure that people used to live and work. Why? Because tyranny can be resisted by a people who see themselves as a people, as an entity. The nucleus of a "people" is hard to control.
Finkle's observation should not be forgotten: Free association is much more dangerous to tyranny than free enterprise.
Pittsburgh Pirates center fielder Oneil Cruz accepted an invitation Tuesday to compete in Monday's Home Run Derby in Atlanta.
***
In the 1960s and 1970s, scientist Paul Ehrlich popularized the idea that the Earth was being threatened by what he described as a population bomb.
"No intelligent, patriotic American family should have more than two children, and preferably only one," Ehrlich said in a 1970 interview, warning that crowded U.S. cities faced a "fatal disease — it's called overpopulation."
Prophecy is tougher than it looks.
***
After graduation, many top international students can extend their stays temporarily to work in their fields of study, boosting American companies. This opportunity comes through the Optional Practical Training program—which would end if Mr. Trump’s nominee for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Joseph Edlow, has his way. Such a move would threaten the ability to attract top international students and would jeopardize a talent pipeline for American business.--wsj
***
Socialism and Free Association
The drift towards tyranny is always with us; like gravity, there is always some man or idea spreading an attracting field. Energy is always necessary to prevent a people from being pulled into the tyrant's orbit.
Anne Applebaum, in Iron Curtain, details Stalin's dynastic efforts in Eastern Europe, first as a Nazi partner then as an independent totalitarian contractor. It contains some interesting observations on tyranny as practiced by real experts, first Hitler, then Stalin. Hidden in it is some practical advice for free people.
She references the historian Stuart Finkel, who had the startling observation that communists have always acted more forcibly to undermine free association than to undermine free enterprise. When Lenin launched the New Economic Plan in the 1920s, Applebaum notes, the "systematic destruction of literary, philosophical, and spiritual societies continued unabated." Similarly, in Poland under the Nazis, Germany's war aims were not completely military."The object of the German occupation of Poland," she writes, "had been to destroy Polish civilization." After signing a pact to divide up the region between them, both Hitler and Stalin invaded Poland in September 1939. Under Hitler, much of the country's upper class was executed or sent to concentration camps. Stalin recognized a master when he saw him. The Soviets committed Nazi-style mass murders, most infamously the Katyń Forest massacre, which saw 22,000 Polish officers and other prisoners of war executed. "The Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were, for twenty-two months, real allies," Applebaum writes. At the end of the war, there was almost literally nothing left of Warsaw.
After the war, the Soviets in Poland continued this broad cultural warfare. They attacked anti-Nazi groups(!), the Polish Boy Scouts, for example. Catholic Church groups were a high priority with their close-knit communities and their international connections. Some organizations were absorbed. The Polish Women's League, a group of earnest volunteers set up to feed refugees in train stations, was infiltrated by Soviet bureaucrats and turned into a mouthpiece for party dogma.
What Hitler and Stalin later did in Eastern Europe was not an attempt at a simple military victory. Both were attempting to destroy a people, to obliterate the social fabric, to deconstruct the very infrastructure that people used to live and work. Why? Because tyranny can be resisted by a people who see themselves as a people, as an entity. The nucleus of a "people" is hard to control.
Finkle's observation should not be forgotten: Free association is much more dangerous to tyranny than free enterprise.
1 comment:
Reader beware :Anne Applebaum suffers from a major case of TDS
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