For Whom the Bell Tolls

On this day:

401
The Visigoths, led by king Alaric I, cross the Alps and invade northern Italy.
1421
A seawall at the Zuiderzee dike in the Netherlands breaks, flooding 72 villages and killing about 10,000 people. This event will be known as Sint-Elisabethsvloed.
1686
Charles Francois Felix operates on King Louis XIV of France’s anal fistula after practicing the surgery on several peasants
1803
The Battle of Vertières, the last major battle of the Haitian Revolution, is fought, leading to the establishment of the Republic of Haiti, the first black republic in the Western Hemisphere.
1903
The Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty is signed by the United States and Panama, giving the United States exclusive rights over the Panama Canal Zone.
1916
World War I: First Battle of the Somme– in France, British Expeditionary Force commander Douglas Haig calls off the battle which started on July 1, 1916.

1926
George Bernard Shaw refuses to accept the money for his Nobel Prize, saying, “I can forgive Alfred Nobel for inventing dynamite, but only a fiend in human form could have invented the Nobel Prize”.
1949
The Iva Valley Shooting occurs after the coal miners of Enugu in Nigeria go on strike over withheld wages; 21 miners are shot dead and 51 are wounded by police under the supervision of the British colonial administration of Nigeria.
1961
United States President John F. Kennedy sends 18,000 military advisors to South Vietnam.
1978
In Jonestown, Guyana, Jim Jones led his Peoples Temple cult to a mass murder-suicide that claimed 918 lives in all, 909 of them in Jonestown itself, including over 270 children. Congressman Leo J. Ryan is murdered by members of the Peoples Temple hours earlier.
1999
In College Station, Texas, 12 are killed and 27 injured at Texas A&M University when the 59 ft Aggie Bonfire, under construction for the annual football game against the University of Texas, collapses at 2:42am.

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The Democrat polling apparently shows their supporters want them to "fight." Over what? What is their point? Epstein, files they've controlled for the entire Biden Regency?

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“By 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s.” --Paul Krugman

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The Dems say they are looking for a leader. When a group has Stockholm Syndrome, who do you send out to negotiate?

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Is citizenship simply a matter of geography? American principles are demanding, and not everybody may qualify. Certainly not all philosophies are consistent. Thacher said America was an idea. Can you qualify simply by showing up?

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For Whom the Bell Tolls

Today is the anniversary of the final Iran-Contra Report in 1987. As time has gone by, few can discuss the particulars, though, at the time, it was a serious scandal among people who cared about government in the U.S. In essence, the American government illegally sold weapons to Iran, an antagonist nation, in hopes of securing the release of American hostages taken by Iran, and used the money to fund a rebel group in Nicaragua in violation of U.S. law.

All this started when the Iraniams, angered by American support for the Shah, took an entire embassy hostage. A series of inept American reponses resulted, Carter's reelection damaged, and Reagan was elected.

The world was horrified by the attack on the embassy, the Americans furious and warlike, and Reagan defused everything--and supported some friendly South American rebels. Those responsible in the government were indicted and eventually were pardoned by Bush.

The government works on its own script, works around the law, and, when caught, forgives itself.

Some in government believe they are working for a higher purpose and must subvert the country to save it. In this instance, the administration felt that war was a serious option that the Iran-Contra trade averted. A little crime to prevent a large one. A small sin to save many. This risk is always with us because some delude themselves that their personal vision is so much grander, wiser, and precise than the laws agreed upon by all. They, personally, know more than the republic.

New visions of righteousness are stirring, posing a risk to the nation unseen since the insinuation of homicidal Marxism in the 50s. Three notions specifically designed to distort the vote and empower a minority are in open discussion: gerrymandering, expanding the number of states to distort the legislature, and packing the Supreme Court to ideologically alter the country's nature and vision. These three ideas would violate the country's founding principle, the creation of a government subservient to the people. These three notions manipulate the country for the partisan vision of a few--in essence proving the original criticisms of the country's founding correct: that power can never be diffused, that a few men will always scheme to take that power, and that most men will accept it.