Legislators are unrestrained from organizing themselves into predatory majorities; pennies and dimes are taken from an unwary majority and dollars are delivered to alert interest groups.--Bethell
The deadliest natural disaster in the U.S. was the Galveston hurricane of 1900, which killed between 8,000-12,000 people.
CNN’s Jim Acosta asked Cuba’s Castro why his socialist government jails dissidents, and whether he would free them. “Dáme la lista!” Castro thundered at Acosta, a second-generation Cuban-American. “Give me the list of political prisoners, right now!” Interestingly, Acosta did not have a list. Or a name. Apparently he was depending upon some generalized accepted belief rather than specifics. That tells a lot about American news. He get to ask a penetrating question publicly to one of the world's great tyrants and he can't back it up?
Hundreds of years ago the highlands of Scotland and Ireland were dotted with a type of dwelling called "blackhouses." These were long narrow buildings, often laid in parallel to other blackhouses, with dry-stone walls and thatched roofs rendered black with soot. The smoke came from a peat fire that was lit at all times in the center of the kitchen and living area. These houses had no chimneys--no chimneys--and very small windows leading to a suffocating accumulation of smoke inside. The smoke escaped through the porous roof, slowly blackening the turf or straw in the process. So the inhabitants were living in smoke all the time.
The upside was the smoke killed bugs living in the roof--which was good since most housed both people and their animals.
Smoked thatch was also considered an excellent fertilizer. So every year, the roof was stripped down and the blackened thatch used to fertilize their fields, while the roof was rethatched to supply for next year. The were so named because new “white houses” were built as a result of stricter heath regulations that required separation of humans from their livestock and animals--houses built with stones and lime mortar rather than stone and earth.
Some of the blackhouses were still inhabited until the middle 1970s, although later construction had fireplaces and chimneys.
The upside was the smoke killed bugs living in the roof--which was good since most housed both people and their animals.
Smoked thatch was also considered an excellent fertilizer. So every year, the roof was stripped down and the blackened thatch used to fertilize their fields, while the roof was rethatched to supply for next year. The were so named because new “white houses” were built as a result of stricter heath regulations that required separation of humans from their livestock and animals--houses built with stones and lime mortar rather than stone and earth.
Some of the blackhouses were still inhabited until the middle 1970s, although later construction had fireplaces and chimneys.
There was a brutal editorial regarding Obama's visit to Cuba in the WashPo. It argues that his appearance bolsters the savage government there. But we have the Saudis as friends.
In 1906, borrowing from John Bunyan, President Roosevelt made his famous speech labeling as "muckrakers" the new breed of investigative writers -- Ida Tarbell (Standard Oil), Lincoln Steffens (municipal politics), David Graham Phillips (Senate politics), Ray Stannard Baker (treatment of minorities), Samuel Hopkins Adams (patent medicines), Upton Sinclair (the meat industry), and others. "In Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress you may recall the description of the Man with the Muck-rake, the man who could look no way but downward, with the muck-rake in his hand; who was offered a celestial crown for his muck-rake, but who would neither look up nor regard the crown he was offered, but continued to rake himself the filth of the floor.... Now it is very necessary that we should not flinch from seeing what is vile and debasing. There is filth on the floor, and it must be scraped up with the muck-rake: and there are times and places where this service is the most needed of all the services that can be performed. But the man who never does anything else, who never thinks or speaks or writes save of his feats with the muck-rake, speedily becomes, not a help to society, not an incitement to good, but one of the most potent forces for evil."
What is....the Tollense River Battle?
“If Judge Garland is confirmed, he could tip the ideological balance to create the most liberal Supreme Court in 50 years.”--NYT. But everyone says--including the NYT--that he is a "centrist." In a column in the Wall Street Journal, Juanita Duggan, president and CEO of the National Federation of Independent Business, wrote that Garland is so against small business and so much for big labor that “this is the first time in the NFIB’s 73-year-history that we will weigh in on a Supreme Court nominee.” What worries the NFIB, she explains, is that “in 16 major labor decisions of Judge Garland’s that we examined, he ruled 16-0 in favor of the NLRB (National Labor Relations Board).” Elsewhere in the Journal, the editorial board wrote that they can’t think of a single issue on which Garland would vote differently from the four liberal Justices that already sit on the bench. It was written in the SCOTUSblog that Garland favors deferring to the decision-makers in agencies. “In a dozen close cases in which the court divided, he sided with the agency every time.”
So, not surprisingly, Obama has nominated a man to the Supreme Court who agrees with him. What a shocker.
The rumors continue. Did Ivanka Trump name her baby after Ted Cruz?
The Little Sisters of the Poor are suing the ACA. The Obama administration has been unrelenting in its fight to force the Catholic nuns to violate their beliefs and pay for abortion-causing drugs and contraception, arguing that they are essential health care services. Meanwhile, some other health plans have been “grandfathered” in and are not subject to the mandate. That is, it is not essential to their employees. These include plans offered by ExxonMobil, Chevron, Visa Inc. and PepsiCo. Furthermore, the U.S. Military includes a family insurance plan that does not offer the mandated services. So it is not essential to them. And, according to the website, one in three Americans do not have a health plan that satisfies the mandate. The Little Sisters say that since so many employers are offered exemptions under various justifications, there is no reason that they should not receive a religious exemption as well. They will be fortunate if logic--and democratic sensibilities--triumph over bigoted dogmatism.
Golden oldie:
There is an astonishing sound bite making the rounds that is so unbelievable as to demand a witness. Spoken by Chris Cuomo, son of Andrew and host of the CNN "New Day," who said, on Cuba: "What is the point of the Communist regime other than to make everyone equal by lifting everyone up?" Similar to Creationism in its proud and defiant stupidity.
Ecdysiast: noun: A person who disrobes to provide entertainment for others. ETY: Coined by writer and editor H.L. Mencken in 1940, from ecdysis (shedding or molting), from Greek ekdysis (casting off), from ek- (out) + dyein (to put on). USAGE: “Lena Dunham drenched the market with her formidable musings under the title of Not That Kind of Girl, a biography memoir in the great tradition of Pamela Anderson and other literary ecdysiasts.” Rex Murphy; The Year in Activist Feminism; National Post (Canada); Dec 27, 2014. I usually don't like coined words but this is just too good.
Back in the 1920s, when fascism was a new political development, it was widely -- and correctly -- regarded as being on the political left. The left's vision is not only a vision of the world, but also a vision of themselves, as superior beings pursuing superior ends demanding the power to achieve them.
There is an interesting article about some skeletal remains of a large scale from Bronze Age Germany that implies a huge battle, maybe 4000 men. These men were not locals, not farmers and were very diverse in geographic origin. The time was about 1250 B.C., suggesting they stemmed from a single episode during Europe’s Bronze Age along a 3-kilometer stretch of the Tollense River--about 100 years before Troy. Dig co-director Thomas Terberger, an archaeologist at the Lower Saxony State Service for Cultural Heritage in Hannover, said, “There’s nothing to compare it to.” It may even be the earliest direct evidence—with weapons and warriors together—of a battle this size anywhere in the ancient world. There was reason for skepticism. Before Tollense, direct evidence of large-scale violence in the Bronze Age was scanty, especially in this region. Historical accounts from the Near East and Greece described epic battles, but few artifacts remained to corroborate these boastful accounts. “Even in Egypt, despite hearing many tales of war, we never find such substantial archaeological evidence of its participants and victims,” UCD’s Molloy says. Then this surprising comment: “For a long time we didn’t really believe in war in prehistory,” DAI’s Hansen says. Now that statement is worth a lot of thought.
On average, someone in the U.S. is killed by a drunk driver every 40 minutes. I don't know about now, but 30 years ago in East Germany a driver with any alcohol at all in his blood would have his car impounded and sold. The State can do powerful things to individuals in the cause of The Good.
100 years ago, when 15 states established America’s first minimum wages, labor reformers then believed that a legal minimum would hand a raise to deserving white Anglo-Saxon men, and a pink slip to their undeserving competitors: “racially undesirable” immigrants, the mentally and physically disabled, and women. The original progressives hailed minimum-wage-caused job losses among these groups as a positive benefit to the U.S. economy and to Anglo-Saxon racial integrity.
Many people believe sincerely that women are significantly underpaid and that the reason for this underpayment is ignorance, prejudice, bigotry, or misogyny on the part of producers who produce goods or services in part by employing human labor. If so, if American oil-company executives come to hate Russians, could American oil companies thereby purchase crude oil from Russia at prices significantly below the prices that they pay for similar-grade crude oil produced elsewhere?
A question on equality to ask every American: Would you like the U.S. government to let an extra 5 million impoverished people a year into the United States or would you like more government spending on freeways and government schools?
AAAaaaannnnnddddddd.....a picture of blackhouses:
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