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‘What they saw’

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The headline on this piece quotes a source saying that investigating NYPD officers were ‘sickened by what they saw’ in the e-mail evidence in the Hillary investigation.

How trustworthy the sources are here is beyond me; I’m not familiar with the websites from which this information comes, so I leave that judgement to those who know more about them.

What I do know, because I remember the late 1990s during the Clinton pre-impeachment scandal(s), is that all the right-wing forums were a-buzz with rumor and speculation every time someone leaked new ‘revelations’ about the Clintons’ misconduct. Every time, the headlines screamed ‘Latest bombshells will finally expose the Clintons! Smoking gun found!‘ or similar sensationalism. Whatever it was, there was always something that was promoted as being ‘the Big One! This is it! This will make Clinton resign!’

As history shows, no matter what was revealed, it was never enough to cause the shameless Clintons and their minions and defenders to admit anything, much less to retire in disgrace. They brazened it out till the bitter end, even being so bold as to trash the White House when they departed. Of course the liberal lying media denied what happened, following their pattern of covering up anything done by ‘their own.’ If you search on the subject you will find the media sycophants calling the damage just ‘pranks’ and mischief, downplaying it, if not outright denying that it happened.

This is what happens with a dishonest media machine; Thomas Jefferson wrote so often of the vital importance of a free and independent press. We are now living the consequences of not guarding against the corruption of the media, and the concentration of media control in a few, very politicized hands.

So, it may be that these latest ‘bombshells’, this time involving much more than ‘juvenile pranks’ like trashing the White House, or worse even than the Lewinski lewdness, will prove devastating to the corrupt Democrat crime machine and all their degenerate associates and contributors. We can hope.

But personally I am not investing too much in this latest story, not until it is actually out in the open, if ever. It may prove to be yet another of many damp squibs, as with virtually all of the ‘explosive revelations’ against the Clintons in the late 90s.

The thing is, our enemies, the ‘progressives’, liberals, Democrats, are people who are generally lacking in morals, especially as regards sexual behavior. Even when sexual behavior becomes transgressive to the point of violating the laws of God and man, they have no sense of shame. They generally can’t be shocked, being very amoral people in a deep sense. Oh, sure, they have perfected the art of feigning shock, when they can find a political enemy caught in some compromising situation  — like when some Christian minister is caught in sexual misbehavior. Then they suddenly are full of high morals, reacting with condemnation, for example, if the misbehavior happens to involve homosexuality — while normally they champion, no, celebrate homosexuality. And look at how they defend, even now, Roman Polanski.

They are not like normal people who recoil from certain things naturally; they are hardened in their amorality; everything is excused as a lack of understanding on our part; everyone is a victim of genes or childhood trauma (child abusers, for example) or their behavior is called good and natural (transsexualism, homosexuality, bestiality).

There is nothing much that can shock them, and when it comes to politics they would defend the Devil himself because after all he is one of their own.

So, we’ll see what develops. It would be a great surprise, and decidedly a good thing if some eleventh-hour revelation brings down the Democrats and all their associates and enablers, especially in the media. That would be the kind of deus-ex-machina we need, but if they are to be defeated it may just be down to the usual factors: let the elections play out, and pray that the vote-rigging does not work this time for the Democrat machine.

A generation’s passing

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Tom Hayden, one of the founders of the Students for a Democratic Society in the 1960s, is dead. Some will be familar with the SDS in connection with Bill Ayers.

Hayden may also be known to some people as the ex-husband of Jane Fonda.

Now, just for those who keep track of these things (namely the ‘boomer-haters, who are cheering on the deaths of their favorite villains) Hayden was born in 1939. Do the math. Or to make it easy, he was a member of the ‘Silent Generation‘, the one before the hated baby-boomers, who were born beginning a year after WWII ended. From what I remember reading, that generation was the ‘don’t rock the boat’ generation, a sort of go-along-to-get-along group of people. This source credits that generation with giving America ‘Civil Rights’, and it is a fact that the Civil Rights coup took place well before the boomers were out of grade school.

And speaking of the Sixties and the influential figures of that era, many of them were not political activists as such. For instance Bob Dylan, born Bob Zimmerman, or (((Bob Zimmerman))), as if anyone does not know, just won a Nobel Prize in literature of all things. Whatever. I confess I listened to Dylan when I was young, although from the first his song lyrics seemed opaque and excessively arty, but then in the Sixties ‘folk’ music was all about messages and social causes and protest; it was not meant to be just music to dance to or to express teen-age angst, like rock ‘n roll.

Dylan was for obvious reasons a hero to the left in the 60s and on into the 70s and even the 80s. Somewhere along the line he professed to be a born-again Christian, but in time that passed and he was reported to be involved in the Lubavitch sect of orthodox Judaism. Who knows what his beliefs are; he seems truly to have no fixed beliefs. It is odd that among many ‘traditionalist’ conservatives he is revered; why, I don’t get. Tastes vary.

Whatever he is or was, Christian, Jewish, ‘progressive’, conservative, he was not a baby-boomer, though to many people he will likely always be a symbol of that generation, rightly or wrongly.He was also a ‘Silent Generation’ member like Hayden. His politically-tinged songs, often with themes of the downtrodden, minorities, social justice, etc., did more to advance those causes, in my opinion, than did the work of the political activists like Hayden and the SDS, who were on the fringe.

It is odd that many figures on the left, or who spearheaded the social upheavals that gave birth to the counterculture, were members of older generations. An example: Timothy Leary, the LSD guru and pioneer, the ‘turn on, tune in, drop out’ guy, was born in 1920.  1920! He was a ‘Greatest Generation’ member — and possible government agent, according to the link just above.

Does it matter, this categorizing of people by their year of birth, or by an arbitrary generational label? It certainly matters to a lot of younger people, who are eager to apportion blame for all that is wrong in today’s world.

We live in a world which forbids us to notice obvious patterns, or to make sweeping generalizations. That’s bad, for reasons which are self-evident. We are not to notice race or ethnicity or color, and now we are told that our sex, determined at conception, is not to be defined; we are to pretend there are no patterns. But there is such a thing as making overly sweeping judgements based on something as vague as generational categories, which are, after all, arbitrarily defined

But whoever is responsible for what (going back to Adam and Eve, if you want to be thorough about this blame-fixing), what’s done is done. And as I’ve repeatedly pointed out, during this election season, the older generations are less likely to vote Democrat and liberal in general than are each of the successive generations. Those facts need to be noticed and taken to heart, rather than be ignored as lefties are wont to do.

‘Chronic kinglessness’

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The term ‘chronic kinglessness‘ is apparently a coinage of Curtis Yarvin, better known as the NeoRx guru, Mencius Moldbug.  In this thought-provoking post from Free Northerner, we are told that the idea of ‘chronic kinglessness’ comes from Thomas Carlyle, though I haven’t found that exact term attributed to him, but whatever its source, the subject is an interesting one, and very apposite to our time.

The blog piece quotes from a British MP, Rory Stuart, in an interview from 2014, in which Stuart says that the dire political situation in his country (and the rest of the world, apparently) is due to the fact that no one has any real power.

“But in our situation we’re all powerless. I mean, we pretend we’re run by people. We’re not run by anybody. The secret of modern Britain is there is no power anywhere.” Some commentators, he says, think we’re run by an oligarchy. “But we’re not. I mean, nobody can see power in Britain. The politicians think journalists have power. The journalists know they don’t have any. Then they think the bankers have power. The bankers know they don’t have any. None of them have any power.

[…]It’s like the wizard of Oz. This is the age of the wizard of Oz, you know. In the end you get behind the curtain and you finally meet the wizard and there’s this tiny, frightened figure. I think every prime minister has sort of said this since Blair. You get there and you pull the lever, and nothing happens.”

This, says the blog piece, is chronic kinglessness.

The blogger postulates that there really is no one in effective charge. The problem, he says, is not one of a world run by a cabal or an oligarchy of faceless men, a huge far-reaching conspiracy, as many of us believe, but of there being a vacuum at the center — insofar as there is a center.

It’s an interesting thought, especially for those of us who have spent so much time and who have written so many words over the years analyzing or opining or speculating about the cause of the rampant madness in the world.

It would be an almost comforting thought, in a way, to believe that to be the case. And I am willing to entertain that possibility if only because it would be preferable to believe that it is a ‘Wizard of Oz’ scenario, in which whoever is at the center is just a big humbug (as ‘Oz the Great’ said he was) or just an inept and insecure little man (or group of men) hiding behind a show of power and bluster. If only that were known to be the case.

I can’t say it might not be true. But let’s just suppose for the moment that it is true. What then? How do we rectify the situation, as we are about to careen off the cliff in a driverless, brakeless vehicle?

I can’t do justice to the essay here but I encourage you to read it in its entirety.

I will say that I agree with many points made by the writer, but I tend to agree with the commenter NZT, who says, among other things, that this apparent lack of power is often just a cover for lack of will to do certain things, whether for political or ideological reasons — or just for reasons of sloth and ineptitude, or even malice. The question raised about lack of action by the administration on behalf of the kidnapped girls in Africa, taken captive by Boko Haram, was probably an example of a show of concern being made for political (PC) reasons, but lack of real commitment to do anything. In our corrupt world, showing ‘good intentions’, or virtue signalling, too often stand in for actual caring and ‘compassion.’ What one does means less than saying the ‘right’ things, or the politically correct things. Even for presidents.

And in connection with this question of ‘who is in charge’, who holds the real power, and how does one obtain legitimacy to exercise power, I immediately thought of the writings of Étienne de La Boétie, whose work Discourse on Voluntary Servitude I excerpted years ago on the old blog. Among the main points of that work was that tyranny was always made possible by the acquiescence of the populace. Of the tyrant, he wrote:

“[H]e has indeed nothing more than the power that you confer upon him to destroy you. Where has he acquired enough eyes to spy upon you, if you do not provide them yourselves? How can he have so many arms to beat you with, if he does not borrow them from you? The feet that trample down your cities, where does he get them if they are not your own? How does he have any power over you except through you? How would he dare assail you if he had no cooperation from you? What could he do to you if you yourselves did not connive with the thief who plunders you, if you were not accomplices of the murderer who kills you, if you were not traitors to yourselves?

[…](Y)ou can deliver yourselves if you try, not by taking action, but merely by willing to be free. Resolve to serve no more, and you are at once freed. I do not ask that you place hands upon the tyrant to topple him over, but simply that you support him no longer; then you will behold him, like a great Colossus whose pedestal has been pulled away, fall of his own weight and break in pieces.”

It may be that Rory Stuart, the Tory MP who was quoted at the beginning of this post, is engaging in some deceit himself, attempting to deflate all the ‘tinfoil hat conspiracy theories’ that are out there, attempting — as we’ve read of paid operatives doing on the Internet — to discredit those who point to what is going on under our noses, and those who see patterns at work.

Who knows? It is certainly something to ponder, though it seems as if there is little time to philosophize, as things rapidly build to — what?

Wikileaks on deleted e-mails

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From Wikileaks latest, Hillary Clinton and her people deleted 33,000+ e-mails, knowing that it was illegal to do so.

This brings to mind the Nixon tapes during the Watergate hearings back in the 1970s, wherein the media treated as shocking the idea that Nixon’s secretary (on his orders, allegedly) purposely deleted parts of those tapes. All of 18 minutes of the tapes! Compare that to the potentially damning material in tens of thousands of e-mails. Notice the obvious difference in the way the media treats the two situations.

Hillary? Give her the benefit of the doubt, by all means. Maybe she wasn’t aware she was doing anything illegal — yes, she’s supposedly a brilliant woman, has been a ‘co-president’ with her reprobate ‘husband’, was supposedly a hot-shot  lawyer and an Ivy Leaguer with a high IQ but she didn’t know? Which is it? Brilliant woman, or simply ignorant of the law?

But Nixon and the missing 18 minutes? He was an evil, diabolical man who was obviously covering up some kind of serious wrongdoing.

And remember, the genius Hillary was one of those who was part of the Watergate investigation. It’s ironic that now she is caught doing the kind of thing for which Nixon was so reviled by the likes of Hillary and the leftist media. Does this fall under the heading of ‘karma’ to which the lefty New-Agers are always alluding? If so, then it’s fitting.

‘Come and take it’

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The following is a reworking of a post I made about 9 years ago on the old blog:

This time ever year, the ‘Come and Take It!’ festival, in Gonzales, Texas, is held. Gonzales County is where six generations of my kin have lived and died.

Gonzales, as it happens,  was the site of the first shot fired in the Texas Revolution, on October 2, 1835. For this reason, Gonzales has been called the ‘Lexington of Texas,’ and ‘the Birthplace of Texas Independence.’

The ‘Come and Take It’ festivities include a battle re-enactment at Pioneer Village, races, a historical presentation, parades, food booths, and music.

From Wikipedia:

“Gonzales is one of the earliest Anglo-American settlements in Texas, the first west of the Colorado River. It was established by Empresario Green DeWitt as the capital of his colony in August 1825. DeWitt named the community for Rafael Gonzáles, governor of Coahuila y Tejas.

[…]Gonzales is referred to as the “Lexington of Texas” because it was the site of the first skirmish of the Texas Revolution. In 1831, the Mexican government had granted Green DeWitt’s request for a small cannon for protection against Indian attacks. At the outbreak of disputes between the Anglo settlers and the Mexican authorities in 1835, a contingent of more than 100 Mexican soldiers was sent from San Antonio to retrieve the cannon.

When the soldiers arrived, there were only 18 men in Gonzales, but they refused to return the cannon, and soon men from the surrounding area joined them. Texians under the command of John H. Moore confronted them. Sarah DeWitt and her daughter sewed a flag bearing the likeness of the cannon and the words “Come and Take It,” which was flown when the first shots of Texan independence were fired on October 2, 1835. The Texians successfully resisted the Mexican troops in what became known as the Battle of Gonzales.”

After this opening shot in the Texas revolution was fired, a number of dramatic events led the way to the independence of Texas. Along the way were decisive events, such as the Alamo, and the terrible massacre at Goliad, and the victory at San Jacinto.

These events are part of my family history, as they are for many old-stock Texas families; they are real events to me, not just dry dates and facts in a history textbook. There are family names on those memorials, citing the names of my kin who died there. The Goliad massacre is especially heart-wrenching:

“Boys, they are going to kill us—die with your faces to them, like men!”……two other young men, flourishing their caps over their heads, shouted at the top of their voices: ‘Hurra for Texas!’

Can Texas cease to cherish the memory of those, whose dying words gave a pledge of their devotion to her cause? — Capt. Jack Shackelford, Survivor of the Massacre”

It’s surprising how few people outside Texas are aware that Texas actually won its independence from Mexico. There is a kind of tragic irony to the fact that at this time, there is talk of a merger between the United States, Canada, and Mexico. I have to wonder what my Texan colonist ancestors would think had they known that only a few generations after their heroic efforts to win Texas’ independence, that Mexico would seemingly be taking Texas by stealth colonization and by demographic conquest. I can only believe my steadfast forefathers would be astounded at the actions of our present-day leaders and their kowtowing to a failed third-world country to our south, and at our submissive posture.

My ancestors, along with other DeWitt colonists, were there by invitation of the Mexican government. Those colonists were productive, industrious, can-do people; they created Texas in what was an untamed wilderness. There was no Mexican settlement there of any note; the Mexicans could not establish flourishing colonies therem because they were not able to subdue the fractious Indian tribes. So they brought in Americans to do that.

The colonists were not needy, not coming hat in hand, to ask for employment or help from Mexico. They were self-reliant, unlike the colonists who are coming north now into the United States. Despite their recently-coined reputation for ‘hard work’, today’s Mexican colonizers are in no way comparable to those Americans who came and built Texas.

Now the situation is reversed, with Mexicans colonizing Texas, largely by stealth, although most of our politicians are giving the Mexican colonists tacit approval and a covert invitation. Inviting them, it appears,  to come and to take Texas, which it seems they are enthusiastically doing.

gonzls

Our Texas forefathers, when they flew the ‘Come and Take It’ flag, used that phrase in defiance of the Mexican authorities, in refusing to surrender their cannon. When they used these words, they were knowingly echoing the defiant taunt ‘Molon Labe‘ – or ‘come and take them’  by Spartan King Leonidas, directed at the Persian King Xerxes at Thermopylae . Xerxes offered to spare Leonidas and his men if they gave up their weapons and surrendered. Xerxes refused, knowing they were vastly outnumbered. ‘Molon labe’ — ‘come and take them’, was the defiant answer of the Spartans, despite the fact that they  numbered only three hundred. Still, they held off the much larger force of 600,000 Persians for seven days. They fought to the last man. Although they were crushed by the Persians, their brave example inspired the Greeks to resist the Persians and later defeat them at Salamis, which was a momentous and decisive victory, affecting the whole course of Western history.

Interestingly, many liken Thermopylae to the Alamo:

“There are times when a defeat can become a triumph. Just as the heroic death of the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae gave courage to the rest of Greece; so the last stand of a handful of brave Texians in a fortified Mission became a rallying cry for Texas’ independence: Remember the Alamo!”

Like the roll call of the defenders of the Alamo, the name of every individual Spartan who died at Thermopylae was remembered for as long as ancient Sparta endured. They were engraved on a stone tablet in Sparta that could still be read over seven centuries later. Will the Alamo still stand in 700 years? Would it matter? It is what the Alamo represents that is immortal, not the tangible remains of the buildings. Heroism, once achieved and honored, is never forgotten entirely.”

In paying tribute to those massacred at Goliad, Gen. Thomas Rusk, in his poignant speech at the site, said

“FELLOW SOLDIERS: In the order of Providence we are this day called upon to pay the last sad offices of respect to the remains of the noble and heroic band, who, battling for our sacred rights, have fallen beneath the ruthless hand of a tyrant. Their chivalrous conduct entitles them to the heartfelt gratitude of the people of Texas. Without any further interest in the country than that which all noble hearts feel at the bare mention of liberty, they rallied to our standard. Relinquishing the ease, peace, and comforts of their homes, leaving behind them all they held dear, their mothers, sisters, daughters, and wives, they subjected themselves to fatigue and privation, and nobly threw themselves between the people of Texas and the legions of Santa Anna.

There, unaided by re-inforcements and far from help and hope, they battled bravely with the minions of a tyrant, ten to one. Surrounded in the open prairie by this fearful odds, cut off from provisions and even water, they were induced, under the sacred promise of receiving the treatment usual to prisoners of war, to surrender. They were marched back, and for a week treated with the utmost inhumanity and barbarity. They were marched out of yonder fort under the pretense of getting provisions, and it was not until the firing of musketry did the shrieks of the dying, that they were satisfied of their approaching fate. Some endeavored to make their escape, but they were pursued by the ruthless cavalry and most of them cut down with their swords. A small number of them stand by the grave – a bare remnant of that noble band. Our tribute of respect is due to them; it is due to the mothers, sisters, and wives who weep their untimely end, that we should mingle our tears with theirs. In that mass of remains and fragments of bones, many a mother might see her son…
[…]while liberty has a habitation and a name, their chivalrous deeds will be handed down upon the bright pages of history.”

And will their chivalrous deeds be remembered, when Texas is de facto Mexican territory, a Spanish-speaking province, which will no doubt see this history very differently than we, the posterity of those massacred there? Are we honoring their memory by meekly giving back what they bought with their blood?

These are questions I ponder when I think of those fateful events in Texas. Will the Alamo still stand in 700 years, the Alamo Journal writer cited earlier asks. Given current trends, will the Alamo still stand in 70 years, much less 700? Will the Lone Star flag still fly over it then, or the Stars and Stripes? Or will the Mexican flag with its bird of prey be flying there? If anyone remembers the Alamo, will they remember that small group of valiant defenders, or will they be honoring Santa Anna?

I hope the writer is right; that the heroism of those Texas patriots at the Alamo and at Goliad and all the rest,  will be remembered and honored; I hope that what they fought and died for will not be overturned by our supine tolerance of the slow-motion invasion which threatens now to undo all that our forefathers shed their blood to establish.

‘Immigration…will go on’

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Tiberge at Gallia Watch posted a video of one Federica Mogherini, whose title is High Representative on Foreign Affairs of the European Union, speaking on immigration. Tiberge introduces the video by saying ‘This will cheer you up.’ Now, I have been in dire need of cheering up lately; I’ve been unusually dispirited, hence the sparse posting here. But obviously the content of the video is not likely to cheer any sane person up; Tiberge was obviously being wry and ironic.

From the speech by Miss Mogherini:

I know it’s something some of you don’t want to hear but it’s a reality. There are seven billion people on the earth and more and more inequalities. If immigration is well-managed it can bring incredible opportunities for those who leave their country and for those who welcome them. Let’s be realistic. You can see the democratic tendencies in Europe.

 So it is not a phenomenon that needs to be stemmed, on the contrary. We will continue to manage immigration in an efficient manner all the while respecting human rights. It must be beneficial to everyone.”

Well, obviously, Signorina Mogherini, no, we don’t want to hear this. And no, immigration is not beneficial in any way to ‘your‘ country or to any of the rightful inhabitants of Western/once-White countries.To the contrary, it is destructive, dangerous, and a blight on our countries. It benefits only those greedy business owners with an insatiable lust for more profits (via cheap labor, and selling their products or services to the ‘immigrants) or possibly to politicians who are on the take.

I never heard of this Mogherini female, though apparently her father was a movie director. No doubt she has not lived in the world inhabited by ordinary people, likely having been brought up in a very rarefied atmosphere. In any case she was involved in Communist activities from a young age (she is a Gen-Xer, by the way, for the generational warfare fans out there). She has also been very pro-Islam.

Islam holds a place in our Western societies. Islam belongs in Europe. It holds a place in Europe’s history, in our culture, in our food and-what matters most-in Europe’s present and future. Like it or not, this is the reality.

Further, the Wikipedia entry says that

According to columnist Llaus Jurgens, Mogherini believes that “political Islam should be part of the equation in fighting terror and in particular the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant” and “she did not say that political Islam should become Europe’s new masterplan”

Speaking of Europe’s ‘new masterplan,’ I blogged a while back about an alleged plan afoot in Europe which involves the Powers-that-Be basically making a covert surrender to Islam, in exchange for their retaining their privileged positions. Mogherini’s words, plus the actions of Western leaders generally, makes me more and more inclined to lend some credence to that talk of some kind of deal struck between Western ‘leaders’ and Islam.

9/11: Fifteen years on

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I remember 9/11/2001 vividly, as do all of us who were old enough to realize the import of what happened then.

Who ever would have imagined, looking back to that day, that fifteen years later we would have a much larger Moslem population in the aftermath of that horrible attack on our country?

In the years since 9/11/2001, the whole subject of the destruction of the ‘Twin Towers’ of the World Trade Center has become very controversial, thanks to the fact that there is now a sizeable percentage of people who reject the official version of what happened that day. Those who believe the official version are often reviled as fools and dupes, as ‘patriotards’. But those who reject all the details of the official story disagree amongst themselves as to just what did happen, and who was responsible.

I don’t want to dive into that controversy today, on this fifteenth anniversary of that horrible day. Suffice it to say that I’ve become something of an agnostic about what happened, and about who was ultimately responsible. I don’t have my own theories of what happened; I am no expert. I am not an engineer, or in any  way qualified to argue about whether the tower could collapse from the heat of the fires caused by burning jet fuel. Few of us are qualified to do that, and we have to rely on conflicting opinions of those who are experts.

The most I can say is that it seems as though the event was at least allowed to happen, just as Pearl Harbor was allowed to happen.

Beyond that, it seems to me to be futile to try to theorize about the details of what happened. I think it seems obvious that we will never know for sure.

And above all, I think it fitting that we take some time to remember the 3,000 or so people who were killed on that day. On the five year anniversary, during my first year as a blogger in 2006, some 2,996 volunteer bloggers each wrote tributes to one victim of the attacks. I was assigned to write a tribute for a couple who were on one of the planes out of Boston. Doing that simple act somewhat personalized things for me; learning something of the people I was assigned to memorialize made them real to me, more than just a statistic.

We do know, if we know nothing else, that thousands of our fellow Americans were needlessly killed on that day, and we know, sadly, that their deaths were preventable, avoidable. And we know how those many deaths could have been prevented. But “our” government refused to take the obvious measures to prevent the attacks and the deaths, and they still refuse to do what they should and must do. Instead they choose to knowingly increase the odds of another such attack sooner or later. It’s only God’s grace that has kept another such attack from happening so far. But for how long?

May those lost on 9/11/01  rest in peace and may God continue to have mercy on us.

What we’ve lost

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Ehud Would at Faith and Heritage has posted another of his worthy essays  on the subject of ‘The Way We Were.’ He begins by citing a 2003 piece by Gary North, which appeared on Lew Rockwell.com

In that piece, North mentions a scene in the classic 1934 movie, It Happened One Night,in which passengers on a Greyhound bus have a spontaneous sing-along. I remember that scene. Oddly enough I recently saw another 1930s movie with a similar scene.  Coincidentally, I wrote a blog piece some years ago about the loss of our social cohesion and commonality, and cited as an example a scene from a 1943 movie, The Human Comedy.

In it, young men in uniform, on their way to be shipped out to the front, engage in a sing-along. The song they agree to sing is an old hymn, ”Leaning on the Everlasting Arms.” I found that very poignant in the context of the scene, where the young men, off to face possible death in battle, sing ”What have I to dread, what have I to fear? Leaning on the everlasting arms.” I thought of how a movie of today would never have such a scene, and would never include a Christian hymn, at least not in a positive light. And worse than that, is that a random group of soldiers or Americans in general would not be likely to know that song by heart, or to even be familiar with it — even in the Bible Belt of the South. Today’s churches most often shun the old hymns sung by generations of our forefathers in favor of bland, vague ‘love songs’ that may or may not mention Jesus, or God; these songs are called ‘praise songs.’ But in the world of 1943 America, most heartland Americans knew songs like ‘Leaning on the Everlasting Arms’, and not only knew them but would sing them unashamedly in public, as in that train scene. Such would not be the case today. We were a more closely-knit people then.

So yes, these scenes of communal singing amongst strangers on public conveyances were not some kind of quaint ‘Norman Rockwellization’ of the old days by Hollywood, but were not far-fetched at all. Americans in general had certain common customs and shared experience, a shared culture. We were much more a nation and a people then, in a cultural and social sense, because we were a people descended from common ancestors, with a common history, language, and religion. Now multiculturalism has destroyed that, and we are a grab-bag of peoples divided by mutual suspicion in many cases, or at least wary of ”offending” each other or some third party who may be eavesdropping on private conversations. People have been arrested for things said in private conversations.

The America of 2016 is very much a different country than the one many of us grew up in. I hear this sentiment expressed even by people who grew up in the 1980s, so it is not peculiar to the oldest citizens now.

One of the things that is most unattractive for me about much of the ‘far right’ of today is the utter cynicism toward the past that is on display amongst some of those under 40 or so. They are in agreement with the left that the old America is dead and gone and that the clock can never be turned back in any way, nor should it be. In fact many of them have accepted the left’s depiction of the pre-PC America as mostly a falsified, whitewashed (in more ways than one) memory of what was really an already-corrupt America, and that there was no idyllic America, no golden age. No, there is no perfect or spotless  era, but the America of old was definitely a happier and more peaceful and a safer time. Those who say otherwise are likely expressing ‘sour grapes’ sentiments, or else they are people who actually prefer the leftist-created ‘America’ in which there is more ”freedom”, freedom to transgress.

The left has destroyed our social cohesion in many ways, and it is not just in a racial and ethnic sense that they have undermined our country; it is in a social/ethical/religious sense. They have given us a post-Christian — no, anti-Christian replacement America, and many of the younger generations prefer this part of the Left’s reconstructed America. The past appears bland, homogenous, conformist, and boring to many of those weaned on the Left’s cynicism.

So even on the ”right”, the Left has succeeded in creating division.
In the religious sphere, the Left has subverted Christianity so that Babelist, multicult ‘churchians’ go to battle against their brethren who hold to the more truthful and more Biblically-grounded faith of our fathers. And sad to say, many of these politically correct Babelists are in denominations that were once known as ‘conservative’ and Biblically sound. The Southern Baptists spring to mind, and institutions like Bob Jones University, which has repented of it previous political incorrectness in opposing miscegenation.

I’ve gone far afield from the points made by Ehud Would in his piece; I do recommend you read it.

As for the popular view that looking to the past is useless and counterproductive, what about this:

Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.”

However, the next verse says:

“But they said, We will not walk therein.”

The more things change…

‘Dixie’ banned at Ole Miss

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‘Ole Miss’ has caved again.

The University of Mississippi’s marching band will no longer play any variation of the song “Dixie” – a tradition some seven decades old at football games and other sporting events.

The University’s Athletic Department confirmed to Mississippi Today on Friday that the song, which was the unofficial anthem of the Confederate States of America during the Civil War, will no longer be played at athletic events.”

The Confederate Battle Flag gone, ‘Colonel Reb’, the school mascot/symbol gone, and now the song ‘Dixie.’ What next? What will be banned next? Because, I assure you, ‘they’, meaning the South-hating SJWs, and Southern-born ‘cucks’, plus Northern transplants who should have stayed in their home states where they needn’t be offended — plus the ever-aggrieved blacks, will not rest. They go from strength to strength because they are unopposed. Why are Mississippians, real Mississippians, so passive in letting this go unchallenged? Are there no people who simply want to defend freedom of expression as a principle, even if they don’t care about the South?

What will be next to fall?

The songs “Dixie,” “Dixie fanfare,” and a pregame arrangement containing themes of “Dixie” will no longer be played by the band, known as the The Pride of the South.”

The Pride of the South? How have they let that name stand all this time? The South is not supposed to have any pride, according to the heritage-destroyers and the rewriters of history. If there is any pride of the South, or pride in the South and what it represents, it must be PC-whipped out of the Southron people.  That seems to be the agenda. And it seems to be right on schedule.

The article notes that the Band Directors chose not to comment on this announcement. I don’t know who they are, but I would guess that they are probably not Southern-born or Southern-bred, just as with the Ole Miss Athletic Director, Ross Bjork. It seems that few Southron people are in positions of influence and authority so that outsiders now determine their future, people with little to no understanding of the Southron people and their unique history and heritage. And that is probably by design. The South is now occupied territory, since 1865.

My late uncle, a rather tough Marine, told of one time, back in the 1990s, when he was on the highway driving home and the song, “I Sang Dixie” by Dwight Yoakam played over his car radio. It was the first time he heard it, and he told of how he had to pull over until he could dry his eyes. The song is a tearjerker for those of us who understand what ‘Dixie’, the place and the song and the people, mean to us. I had the same reaction to the song when I first heard it, and it still affects me, even more so, considering that soon, singing “Dixie” will be ‘hate speech’. Probably even the name ‘Dixie’ will be forbidden, eventually.

Our forefathers are turning in their graves. That they fought so hard and so bravely, against such odds, only to have their heritage erased bit by bit and their descendants demoralized and alienated from them would be more than they could endure.

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