We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
We linked to a piece about the Israeli police this morning. It's not a good idea to assault Israeli police.
Civilization - civilized behavior - is a thin veneer. At the extremes, if we aren't armed, all we have is the thin blue line. I happen to be armed at home. I can legally carry, but I don't bother. I believe I can not legally carry in NY State anyway and Mrs. BD and I do love visiting NYC. Plus 2 of our kids live there quite happily.
I don't know the details of NYC police protocol, and I am not saying that these guys should have been shot (maybe), but should they have been tased and roughed up at the very least? As a relatively law-abiding citizen, I do not expect to put up with this behavior. It could be police, or it could be me.
Would not bother me at all if the cops had shot the bad guys. What good would jail do? In Rikers, you'd get macho points, respect, for assaulting a police officer.
Our English bibles are titled "Holy Bible," so it matters. Might be a translation from Latin or Greek or something, but from what? I get that "holy" is a Germanic term, later anglicized by those Anglo-Saxons. It seemed to mean whole or complete or, by extension God-connected in some special way, like Heilige Nacht.
Having been raised Protestant, I do not quite get the ideas of holy or sacred. They feel like kind of pagan terms to me, like the unapproachable statues of Athena or Apollo in Greek temples, or the Holy Cow, and there are the Holy Roman Empire and the Holy Grail and The Holy Land. I guess the ideas I was raised with do not connect much that is material with the transcendent - except Jesus - but what do I know or understand? Not much, but I do appreciate CS Lewis' discussions about imagination and every kind of mental life.
I am not a materialist. I do not understand existence at all but I feel it's beyond normal, or beyond human comprehension.
Well, the whole world has always been crazy about wealth and power. That's what "History" is about anyway. It's a soap opera. I think most of my European ancestors were serfs, but Protestant merchants by the time they sailed to the US. History doesn't care much about regular people. Of course, I have my share of Viking blood which has not done me any good.
Europe did not have much to offer the world until the Renaissance in Italy. Given the big world, Europe was sort of a backwater.
I should have seen this thing before I took Medieval History in high school because I had no context:
I Was Told to Approve All Teen Gender Transitions. I Refused. For six years I worked at a hospital that said all teenagers with gender dysphoria must be affirmed. I quit my job to blow the whistle.
As much as I enjoy The Great Courses, I am happy to see Hillsdale put its own courses online, free.
I am in the middle of their Basic Chemistry course. Good fun, but not a real college Chemistry 101 course.
Yeah, the Periodic Table is remarkable.
You might be different, but in secondary school and college, I always would have benefited from a broad overview before going into the weeds. Hillsdale's Chem series is like that.
Too late have I loved you, O Beauty so ancient, O Beauty so new. Too late have I loved you! You were within me but I was outside myself, and there I sought you!
In my weakness I ran after the beauty of the things you have made. You were with me, and I was not with you. The things you have made kept me from you, the things which would have no being unless they existed in you!
You have called, you have cried, and you have pierced my deafness. You have radiated forth, you have shined out brightly, and you have dispelled my blindness.
You have sent forth your fragrance, and I have breathed it in, and I long for you. I have tasted you, and I hunger and thirst for you. You have touched me, and I ardently desire your peace.
Every 5 or 6 months, we are due a Costco expedition. Clothes soap, dish soap, ketchup, capers. ribeyes, lamb chops, excellent olive oil and butter, Irish cheese, Mexican coffee, good still hot baguettes - all that good stuff. Mrs. BD sorta wanted a big screen TV because they are so cheap, but I pointed out that we never do TV.
My gym trainer teases me that I'm not a real American if I don't watch TV at night. He likes football. To each, his or her own. The thing about Costco is that there are people from everywhere in the world of every imagineable language, color, size, age, and shape. Amazing, everybody enjoying the abbondanza.
It is interesting to feel like a minority but it just sorta amuses me. Not Mrs. BD so much.
How many high school students know this stuff? I wish I had had this big picture when I was in school. I learned bits and pieces, but not the big picture.
The US did not know how to do this, not that the US could have. The NVA was relentless. It is so strange that Vietman is a nice place now for tourists, but so are Germany and Japan.
Was Vietnam another proxy war? The NVA was not stupid. Tanks? That was WW2.
Illegal migrants from all over the world. It is an invasion, of sorts, without arms. There are many routes to legal immigration and most Americans are ok with that. Who wants open borders?
By the way, peanuts are, of course, not nuts even though they look like nuts. Like so many foods that the world loves, peanuts originated in Central America.
1,400 years ago, when Islam was created in the 7th century, Iran was Zoroastrian—today Muslim. Iraq was Christian; today it’s Muslim. Turkey was Christian; today it’s Muslim. Lebanon was Christian; today, with a Muslim majority, the Christians are disappearing from there. Egypt was Christian; today it's 92% Muslim. ..
In The Little Book of Stupidity, Sia Mohajer draws on extensive research and makes surprising connections among ten of life's most pervasive cognitive biases. It is a story about how stupid we can all be...
Full performance of Fast Car by 
PETA