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.
Knights, Jerusalem, the Seljuk Turks - the history of the Crusades and the future of Islam, by Rubinstein in The New English Review. One quote:
The knights who entered combat against Muslims and pagans did so for Christian objectives. This led to a radical change in Christian thinking about war. Before the Crusades, the Church was ambivalent about killing and wounding in war. St. Augustine helped to formulate the idea of a “just war" by arguing that killing carried out in obedience to divine command or legitimate public authority did not violate the commandment "Thou shalt not kill."[14] Nevertheless, even a “just war” did not receive the Church’s wholehearted approval. A war that the Church promoted and blessed, such as the First Crusade, had been unthinkable.
Pope Gregory VII (1073-85). was the prelate most responsible for the Church’s changed attitude towards war.[15] One of his favorite quotations from Scripture was “Cursed be he who keepeth back his sword from blood.” (Jeremiah 48:10).[16] Gregory proclaimed a new type of Christian soldier-saint.[17] Before Gregory, Saint George and Saint Sebastian had become saints in spite of having been soldiers. As a result of his teachings, men became saints because they had been soldiers. The long-range consequences of this transformation remain with us to this day.
F-16, call sign Stroke 3, dodging 6 SAM launches during Desert Storm
As the package proceeded to the Iraqi border the weather become steadily worse until everyone was in the weather, unable to climb out into the clear. As planes got out of position, the package finally broke out into the clear just past the Iraqi border. At this time, a large calibre AAA gun began firing on the aircraft. The AAA consisted of extremely large airbursts that looked like big black rain clouds. The AAA, coupled with the confusion of sorting out the package formation, resulted in 25% of the package being sent home at that time. Meanwhile the package, now a 12-ship, pressed on to Baghdad.
As the flight approached the Baghdad IP, AAA began firing at tremendous rates. Most of the AAA was at 10-12,000ft (3,658m), but there were some very heavy, large calibre explosions up to 27,000ft (8,230m). Low altitude AAA became so thick it appeared to be an undercast. At this time, the 388th TFW F-16’s were hitting the Nuclear Research Centre outside of the city, and the Weasels had fired off all their HARMs in support of initial parts of the strike and warnings to the 614th F-16’s going further into downtown went unheard. The F-15’s also provided air cover and departed with the first part of the strike group. Again, a warning that went unheard. Without knowing it 614th TFS F-16’s were all pretty much alone in downtown Baghdad with no air cover and no electronic support assets.
A low overcast deck covered the northern portion of the city which extended south to the point where the AF Headquarters and the Republican Guard Headquarters were mostly obscured, and the package commander, Maj. John Nips Nichols, called a weather abort for those two targets. The southern portion of the city was clear, and the oil refinery was clearly visible to Crud and Stroke flights. As they approached the action point to roll in on the refinery, an SA-2 launch warning was received. The fighters turned to honour the threat missile launch warning, and some SAMs were seen in the air, but they were not an immediate threat. The remaining F-16’s each pinpoint bombed separate refectory towers on the site, and set the refinery ablaze. The destruction was so complete that the flames from the refinery were seen on Cable News Network (CNN) film for the next two weeks.
As the initial SA-2 launch warning faded however, Maj. ET Tullia, Stroke 3, received additional SA-2 and SA-3 acquisition warnings that went unheeded as he rolled in on the towers. The high angle diving delivery, combined with the on-board ECM pod delayed a full SAM missile system acquisition until he pulled off the target and turned south. As the missiles closed, ET's tape reveals the screams of the radar warning receiver into his headset of a missile launch. The missiles overshot and harmlessly detonated above his aircraft, and he turned back to the egress heading.
Multiple SAMs were launched at the package, some ballistic and unguided and some tracking with a full system lock-on. In spite of this, some members of the package refused to jettison their bombs until clear of the city to avoid possible damage to civilian non-combatants. One of the missiles guided toward Clap 4, piloted by Capt. Mike Cujo Roberts. A missile break warning sounded over the radio and Cujo saw the missile as it guided towards him. It passes behind his aircraft and detonates, and Cujo believes he is safe until his aircraft begins to pitch over and he loses control. As the jet approaches negative 1'g', Cujo ejected over downtown Baghdad. No one observed an ejection, nor saw a 'chute.
Living in my new home state of South Carolina, I’ve come across some really interesting history. The story of building the Dreher Shoals dam impounding the Saluda River and creating Lake Murray is a real story of trial, error, engineering expertise and perseverance. Built to provide electric power to Columbia and a large section of South Carolina, the lake and it’s watershed is under the control of South Carolina Electric and Gas (SCE&G).
In addition to the interesting and varied flora and fauna, Lake Murray has a very interesting military history. Due to its rather unique layout, it was considered by General Jimmy Doolittle to be the perfect place to practice bombing runs prior to the raid on Tokyo. The target was Lunch Island – a small, 10 acre former hilltop located just south of the mid-line of the lake. Flying out of Owens Field in Columbia, the B-25s would circle North and start their runs from the North West. The United Stated Navy also used to practice torpedo runs on Lunch Island. Eventually, Lunch Island became Bomb Island and that name has stuck.
Post WWII and up until the mid-60’s, Bomb Island was partially used for recreational purposes – picnics and such. SCE&G would burn off the island occasionally to keep the brush down. It was around this time that Mother Nature decided that she would take control of Bomb Island during the summer and give it over to a bird called the Purple Martin.
The Purple Martin is a member of the swallow family and is the largest of the North American Swallows. It is primarily an insect eater and has the ability to maneuver like a fighter plane when munching down on mosquito’s, dragonflies, moths and other morsels it finds edible. Their migration pattern starts in early July to fly overland down through Mexico and into Brazil.They are related to the Swallows of Capistrano.
What is also unique about the Purple Martin at least in the Eastern US is that they seem to have made Bomb Island their summer home.Nobody has a solid reason for why this bird likes Bomb Island –speculation ranges from no predation to a certain kind of bush that they seem to favor for roosting.From late June through early September, the Purple Martins return to Bomb Island in the evening like clockwork right at sunset leaving in the early morning the next day.
I witnessed this entirely by accident on Monday evening. I was out on the lake planning on taking some sunset pictures over Spencer and Bomb Island.I grabbed some images of Spencer Island and zipped out to Bomb Island.When I got there, the viewing fleet was starting to arrive and I remembered the Purple Martins massing at sunset.To tell the truth, I was not quite ready for what I witnessed.
It starts about ten minutes before sunset – you see one or two swallows swooping along the water, zipping up in the air and back down again. Eventually, one or two become ten or twenty, then a couple of hundred.
Eventually, they mass above the island in a cloud of birds – it is simply an amazing sight as they form these huge vortexes of swirling birds.They swoop down onto the island and they back up again doing this a couple of times before it gets dark and they settle down on the island with a few stragglers coming in behind the main group. This image is about 1/8th of the island and the birds above it.I apologize for the lousy image but I was using a long lens wide open at 1600 ISO to get the shot.I’ll try and get a better one next time I go out there in the evening.
It is estimated that there are anywhere from 750,000 to 1,000,000 birds on the island over night at the peak of the season.There are so many birds that they have shown up on radar images from Columbia International Airport. Radar image credit - Clemson University Meteorology Department.
It’s an amazing show Mother Nature puts on over Bomb Island and it’s a lot of fun to watch not only the birds, but the fleet that shows up to watch the show.This whole spectacle has spawned a mini industry in taking people out to the island to watch the Purple Martins.
Oh, just to put paid to the evening, I got this image – it was quite an evening.
The Glorious Revolution was in many ways England’s great gift to the world. It established those fundamental principles of good governance which best allow man to achieve and to exercise his fundamental rights.
I don't suppose NASA will mind my posting this ancient clip of the first "moon landing" (ha-ha, wink-wink). I'm sure they'd hate to see those ugly 'hoax' rumors start up again.
"NASA CENSORS BLOGGER - WHY??" screams the New York Post.
No, along with their global warming hoax, I'm sure NASA will want to keep this baby free from any controversy and safely under wraps. We won't be bothered as long as we toe the party line and at least pretend it happened.
With that said, this clip is a refreshing breath of air from the usual frenzied documentary-style show, where the scene changes every 2.1 seconds and you rarely get a chance to just sit there and contemplate the damn thing.
If you're really old and were alive back in the 80's, you might remember those airplane shows where each 1-hour episode would be on a specific plane. It'd be on some ancient WW II bomber and there'd be endless minutes of it just... flying... along.
No machine guns a'blazing, no enemy fighters on the attack, no 500-pounders being dropped, no narrator blathering away; just the big plane lumbering along and the drone of the engines. Using the same camera angle. For minutes upon end. You had to be a real lover of flying to watch those shows — but for those of us who were, it was terrific.
That's the title of a fascinating essay by Aaron at FP. (link fixed). A quote:
... a moral resurrection was essential. This meant not merely an overhaul of the Soviet political and economic systems, not merely an upending of social norms, but a revolution on the individual level: a change in the personal character of the Russian subject. As Mikhail Antonov declared in a seminal 1987 essay, "So What Is Happening to Us?" in the magazine Oktyabr, the people had to be "saved" -- not from external dangers but "most of all from themselves, from the consequences of those demoralizing processes that kill the noblest human qualities." Saved how? By making the nascent liberalization fateful, irreversible -- not Khrushchev's short-lived "thaw," but a climate change. And what would guarantee this irreversibility? Above all, the appearance of a free man who would be "immune to the recurrences of spiritual slavery."The weekly magazine Ogoniok, a key publication of glasnost,wrote in February 1989 that only "man incapable of being a police informer, of betraying, and of lies, no matter in whose or what name, can save us from the re-emergence of a totalitarian state."
A rescue from the "spiritual slavery" of Socialism.
Actually, no blood relation to Andrew Breitbart, today’s investigative PR Superman at leaping tall piles of Leftist BS. Zisha (stagename Siegmund) Breitbart was a poor Polish Jew who in the early 1900s was heralded by schtetl dwellers, and by gentile audiences in Europe and America, as “Superman of the Ages” and “Iron King” for his feats (and tricks) of strength.
But of all the speculative theories surrounding the creation of Superman, one exceedingly likely influence has been virtually ignored—a real-life Jewish strongman from Poland who 1. was billed as the “Superman of the Ages”; 2. advertised, on circus posters, as a man able to stop speeding locomotives; 3. wore a cape; 4. looked—with his chiseled movie-star face, wavy hair, and massive upper torso—like the future comic book idol; and 5. performed his death-defying feats in 1923 and 1924 in Cleveland and Toronto, Siegel and Shuster’s [the conceivers of Action Comics Superman] respective hometowns, when they were impressionable nine year olds.
Master German filmmaker Werner Herzog made a biopic of Zisha Breitbart's life in 2000, Invincible. Herzog takes some film liberties, but “Herzog did accurately portray Breitbart as a sensational popular variety artist and a proud Jew who inspired hero-seeking Jewish children—likely among them Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster.”
Here’s the trailer for Invincible.
Zisha Breitbart died in 1925 from the after-effects of a rusty nail in one of his acts.
Breitbart’s funeral, an Orthodox ceremony, was attended by thousands of Yiddish and German-speaking Jews as well as gentiles from the circus and variety stage world. One moving obituary quoted a passage from Zechariah: “Wail, O Cypress, for the Cedar has fallen.”
I home, and there we to bed again, and slept pretty well, and about nine rose, and then my wife fell into her blubbering again, and at length had a request to make to me, which was, that she might go into France, and live there, out of trouble; and then all come out, that I loved pleasure and denied her any, and a deal of do; and I find that there have been great fallings out between my father and her, whom, for ever hereafter, I must keep asunder, for they cannot possibly agree. And I said nothing, but, with very mild words and few, suffered her humour to spend, till we begun to be very quiet, and I think all will be over, and friends, and so I to the office, where all the morning doing business.
Plus sa change, plus c'est la meme chose. Sam is frequently figuring out how to deal with Mrs. P's complaints and discontents. He liked to hang out with jovial, cheerful folks between business or government deals, often returning home late from the theater or from taverns in a well-lubricated condition.
One can spend many enjoyable hours keeping up with Sam's diaries, which are more interesting - and better-written - than any Tweets or Facebook posts you will ever read. He did love life, and entered fully into it with a sense of fun and with enough discipline to make it work.
Interestingly, NYC's Broadway was an old Lenape Indian trail into the Bronx and Westchester, later extended by the Dutch to run up to the Dutch settlement of Albany (the current Rte. 9).
We now call the North River the Hudson River. The road along the wall is Wall St. That canal, now filled in, is Broad St. Another Dutch canal further uptown, long filled in, is now Canal St.
The verdict seems unanimous. From presidential speeches to role-playing games, the crusades are depicted as a deplorably violent episode in which thuggish Westerners trundled off, unprovoked, to murder and pillage peace-loving, sophisticated Muslims, laying down patterns of outrageous oppression that would be repeated throughout subsequent history. In many corners of the Western world today, this view is too commonplace and apparently obvious even to be challenged.
But unanimity is not a guarantee of accuracy. What everyone “knows” about the crusades may not, in fact, be true. From the many popular notions about the crusades, let us pick four and see if they bear close examination.
The original argument against the Bill of Rights as an amendment to the Constitution in the US was that it would make it appear that those were the only rights of the people and of the states.
"Enumerated powers" do not enumerate the rights of the people, but delimit the powers of the state (all Maggie's readers know that). Randy Barnett discusses. A quote:
...before there was any Bill of Rights, defenders of the Constitution claimed that the enumeration of power in Article I would protect the liberties of the people, making a bill of rights unnecessary.
The people opposing the Bill of Rights amendments had a good point.
Snap above is on the country road in the hilly Tiber Valley driving from Todi to Montefalco, with the charming town of Todi in the distance, on the hill. Italy is good about having a sharp distinction between town and country. Little-to-no sprawl. Except in the big cities, you go from urban density directly to vineyards, olive groves, or forests full of deer, cinghiale, eagles, even wolves and, best of all, the ferocious and dangerously-expensive Wild Black Truffle. People like to live in towns, where they can walk to work and shop, and can say bon giorno to their neighbors.
Bit of history
A quick history and geography of Umbria in central Italy, northeast of Rome, to put my forthcoming travel pics in context. It is generally similar to the history of the entire area we now term Italy.
Central Italy was the prehistoric land of the Etruscans (hence "Tuscany" - land of the Etruscans) and of the less-known Umbri. They were, relatively speaking, peaceful and prosperous farmers and traders. When Rome began its imperial expansion around 250 BC, Umbria up along the old trading route to the Adriatic (which the Romans later termed the Via Flaminia) seemed like an obvious target.
The Romans did their Roman thing there for 600 years until the empire began to unwind and Goths and Lombards moved into Tuscany and Umbria both by immigration and by arms in the 400s-500s. In many ways, these waves of invasion became sort of Romanized and Christianized, in time. The Byzantines were in the mix then, too.
Warring feudal duchys and kingdoms dominated the dark ages in this part of Italy, during a time when the declining Roman regions were also set upon by piratical Saracens (mainly seeking slaves for the Middle Eastern slave trade) and Normans (seeking adventure), until Papal power exerted itself and built an authoritarian, theocratic peace by the 1100s and 1200s. They were big on building castles with which to assert their powerful churchly presence, but from the days of the late empire people were building their own keeps and walls to defend themselves from foreigners and also from their neighboring towns. The Roman Legions had previously made walls and keeps unnecessary: the Roman armies had been the wall. The Pax Romana.
The Papal State pretty much controlled central Italy, perhaps to its detriment, until the Italian nation was invented 150 years ago. Roman Catholicism was pretty much corrupted by money and politics, during that era, including the Benedictines.
2011 is the 150th anniversary of that political event. Garibaldi, etc.
Geography
Geographically, southern Umbria divides itself into three regions: The north-south-running Tiber Valley where the Tiber flows south towards Rome, the fertile north-south running Valle Umbra which is like a mini version of California's Central Valley, and the eastern Valnerina which is the area in the majestic Appennines where the river Nera flows down to eventually join and magnify the Tiber.
We visited and stayed in incredible hotels in each of those three areas of Umbria. As in Roman times, rural and quaint Umbria is a popular Roman getaway place, full of bikers, motorcyclists, foodies, and hikers. It's only a 2 or 3 hour drive from Rome, and it is packed with "unspoiled gems."
Most of the towns were Umbrian first, Roman later, and then Medieval-Renaissance. Except for towns damaged by the war (like Terni) or by earthquakes (like Foligno), there is a lot of Renaissance, generally built on Medieval town footprints.
Except for Assisi with its bus-loads of pilgrims, we saw few non-Italian tourists and only one American couple - friendly folks from Montgomery, Alabama! Some Brits, Aussies, Austrians, and Dutch. We tend to meet people when we travel. That's part of the fun.
Todi, Amelia, Orvieto, Montefalco, and Perugia are on hills in the Tiber Valley. Towns in Umbria tended to be built on hills for defensive purposes, which is why exploring Italy is such a good physical workout. Assisi, Spoleto, Spello, and Terni are along the western edge of the Apennines where they rise from the plain. Norcia, and our monastery hotel, are in the mountains themselves near where the Nera emerges from the mountains.
Weather
Best times for Italy or any Mediterranean travel are Spring and Fall. May and October are perfect. Italy climate here.
I will have lots more fun travel pics soon - Pic below of the Valle Umbra, looking west from the Assisi hillside:
Pic below from the garden of our 6th C. Benedictine monastery hotel in the Valnerina in the Apennines, with a small hillside olive grove (doubling as parking area) below the wall. It is no wonder that people love to visit Italy: it has the food, the history, the scenery, the quaintness, the vino, the art and architecture, and the delightfully tough and fashionable Italian gals.
Mrs. BD and I have been taking the William and Mary course in Medieval History (with the delightfully Asperger's-ish Prof. Daileader via The Teaching Company) and we are enjoying it immensely. I do not like to sit unless I am at work, but this course gets me into a chair after work. (We live and thrive on the Teaching Company courses at my cottage, as readers know.)
The Prof says that the wealth of the Middle Ages came from a combination of trade and the renewal of currency in the form of the Italian Florin, the introduction of the heavy plow, the replacement of slavery with serfdom, a doubling of Europe's population - and the Medieval Warm Period which made it possible to grow better crops much further north than in the Dark Ages - and further north than today. Greenland was farmland.
The Warm Period was far warmer than the world today. People benefited. That's why we pray for Global Warming (but also doubt that humankind will be so lucky. With our luck, we'll get the next Ice Age and all be screwed except for Dr. Merc).
War is in some ways the most human of activities: it is about defining and achieving objectives in cooperation with some people, all-out opposition from others, in a contest that draws on every talent and tests every virtue that we have. Even those of us whose life plans do not involve storming up a hillside under enemy fire can learn from the way Clausewitz analyzes leadership and war. More, to ignore war in an education is to leave students ignorant about one of the central features of civilization and human life.
My seating companion at a very pleasant dinner last night engaged me in a conversation about the Moslems - the Moors - in Spain. My friends tend to be people with many interests and pursuits. Luckily for me, my aging brain remembered some of the history, but I wanted to quickly review it today. This was a good quick source: Muslim civilization in Spain (711-1492)
She knew all about it, and is taking a course in Ottoman art and design at Yale. We wondered what had happened to to Moslem civilization, and how and why it deteriorated to the point of its apparent current barbarianism. I speculated that perhaps it was not Islam, but the Ottoman Empire which had a civilization relatively independent of religion, as the Romans had, but I was just trying to maintain the level of the conversation.
Photo: One does not tend to associate the culture of the Alhambra with the current Middle-Eastern Islamicists who seem more focused on destruction than creation.
Bottom Line: “We lost the war in Vietnam.” That is irrefutable. The continuing arguments are about: who “we” are, why, who is responsible, and what could have been.
As someone who has been deeply involved in these debates since the 60s (including serving in Vietnam, USMC intel at 1st MarDiv HQs), I have to recommend an enlightening book and an essay.
The book is better than the Pentagon Papers which presented a hodge podge of US decision makers comments during the earlier phases of the war. This book is the candid after-action, after fall of South Vietnam, considered writings by leading South Vietnamese generals. The Vietnam War: An Assessment By South Vietnam’s Generalsis edited by highly regarded historian Lewis Sorley.
The monographs cover every conceivable aspect of the war, from combat operations to budgets, from relations with advisors to logistical support, from uniforms to pay to desertions to refugees to bombing to pipelines to prisoners of war to combat rations to family support and even South Vietnamese society. A considerable amount of this material, based on the firsthand observations of these highly placed Vietnamese authors, is to be found nowhere else.
By no means can supporters of the US in Vietnam take comfort in the book. The authors provide enough quotes to fill any anti-war essay. Lewis Sorley comments: “I think, for one, that they are in many instances far too hard on themselves and on the Vietnamese in general, both politically and militarily. They make few excuses, and instead are forthright in assigning, and assuming, blame.” That is, also, a strength of the book. It is an honest assessment, which if actually read by critics of the war and today’s students, cuts through the perplexities about our ally and battleground in the Cold War. Sorley: “Now, we know, however, that when well armed and equipped, and well led, they performed gallantly and with spirit.”
At almost 1000 pages, the book is comprehensive, well-written, and possibly the most valuable on the war.For length and price ($60), and for failing to meet one-sided prejudices, few will read it. But, anyone at all serious about understanding the perplexing questions and arguing with any integrity must read it. I’ve taken weeks to read it, at almost every page learning something new, and at many pages having my prior views enlightened. Similarly, noted and knowledgeable critic of the US in Iraq and Afghanistan, Tom Ricks, in preparing his own forthcoming book on the Vietnam War calls this book “terrific (and massive).”
Fortunately, historian Mark Moyar presents an enlightening essay that will help students of the Vietnam War understand the conflicting historical accounts, Vietnam: Historians at War. It is an invaluable survey of the “orthodox” historians of defeat (“…most academic and journalistic accounts of the war written during and shortly afterwards depicted Vietnam as a bad war that the United States should not have fought. Antiwar history of the Vietnam War thus acquired the label of “orthodox” history.”) versus the “revisionist” historians who disagree and have unearthed formerly unreleased or unknown facts.
The recent revisionist histories, in contrast to some earlier revisionist works, have generally been backed by voluminous research, captured in numerous footnotes. Although not all of their authors are excellent scholars, they are generally more rigorous in their analysis than their orthodox counterparts, because they are so often challenged that they have become adept at anticipating and countering contrary assertions. Because experience has given revisionists a better understanding of the importance of wrestling with differently minded people, they have also been much more willing than orthodox historians to invite the opposing side to conferences they organize….Slowly but surely, the revisionist view is gaining ground.
If a student needs an understanding of the historiography of the Vietnam War and a guide to differing accounts, Mark Moyar’s essay is a great launching point.
P.S.: For historical record, below is the never before published look back at the last diplomatic days of South Vietnam as told by its longtime Ambassador to the US, Bui Diem, at a conference last year.
I find it intriguing that what should be one of the most easily-answerable questions in history:
Who first sailed around the world?
has an incorrect answer.
Ferdinand Magellan, right?
Not even close. All he did was go the equivalent distance. He sailed from Europe to the Philippines, then back again, then, later, out to the New World, around the southern tip and across to the Philippines... where he promptly hired himself and his band of cutthroats out as mercenaries to fight for a local warlord and got an arrow through his noggin as a reward.
So, while he went the equivalent of, he never actually sailed around the world.
So, who did?
The fact that almost nobody knows is what makes this such a great PR victory for Spain, who Magellan sailed for. When you cheat history, you're in the big time.
...the primacy of local or township government in American society made it possible for a great number of Americans to participate in political institutions on a regular basis. Whether as Fire Chief or head of the St. John’s Mint Festival, whether as Dog Catcher or Mayor, Americans were continually forced to turn away from themselves and to attend to the life and business of their neighbor. The long habit of such participation in public life convinced Americans that, despite their equality, they need not and could not be indifferent to the particulars of social life. This also preserved Americans from the tendency to invest their political beliefs in a few general ideas. Accustomed to the details of daily participation in political life, they did not let what is often called (wrongly, I think) “ideology” substitute for active engagement in the public realm. This was possible chiefly because the actions of political life were largely confined to the local level, even when the legislation directing that life occured far away.
Almost finished putting the Christmas stuff away, and amusing myself by refreshing my memory about Henry Hudson's voyages.
Given what a careful exploration he did, I am surprised he never ventured up the St. Lawrence, which Cartier had discovered in 1535 and which Champlain was exploring at the same time as Hudson's trip. Also, I am reminded that the English Jamestown settlement existed a couple of years before his Dutch-sponsored 1609 trip, and that the West Indies, South America, and even Peru had been settled by Spanish long before, in the 1500s.
The Spanish knew where the gold was, and it wasn't in New England.
I have always been interested in the history of the idea of retirement. Not interested because it is something I want to do (I could financially do it today if I wanted to), but interested in why an intact, healthy person would not want to fully participate in society by being a productive member.
My Grandpa worked until he was felled by a stroke at 86, and my Dad worked until macular degeneration made him incapable of driving around age 76.
Private pensions (especially from the railroads) began in the late 1800s but it wasn't until the New Deal and Social Security that the option to be put to pasture became widely available. Roosevelt was, of course, highly motivated to remove workers from the labor force in an effort to reduce unemployment, and that was the main impetus for Social Security.
In 1900, 65% of men over 65 worked. By 2000, it was 17%. Of course, nowadays many jobs build in forced retirement. I saw some stats somewhere that about 40% of retired men return to some form of paid work within three years of retirement, but I don't recall the source.
Although some employees sitting in cubicles may long for the end to their work lives, sun-drenched days with tee-times, knitting and visiting the grandchildren, Howard Stone said retirees shouldn't retire, at least in the traditional sense of the word.
"Those who say 'I'll never work again' are making a major, major mistake. Because they're going to find themselves adrift, away from a community purpose and a sense," he said.
I found a good piece, with lots of numbers, on the economic history of retirement in the US. It begins:
One of the most striking changes in the American labor market over the twentieth century has been the virtual disappearance of older men from the labor force. Moen (1987) and Costa (1998) estimate that the labor force participation rate of men age 65 and older declined from 78 percent in 1880 to less than 20 percent in 1990 (see Table 1). In recent decades, the labor force participation rate of somewhat younger men (age 55-64) has been declining as well. When coupled with the increase in life expectancy over this period, it is clear that men today can expect to spend a much larger proportion of their lives in retirement, relative to men living a century ago.
Comment from Dr. Bliss: Excellent subject. A few random thoughts:
- I think many folks want to be able to retire. Many enjoy their jobs much more once they have the financial freedom to quit.
- People I have talked to who have retired young, such as cops with full pensions at age 45, and Wall Streeters who walk away with bags of money around the same age, almost always take on a second career of some sort.
- Psychologically, being retired can feel like being unemployed or sent out to pasture. When people retire in their 50s or early-mid 60s, a workplace loses their experienced wise ones who have "seen it all before", and the experienced wise ones feel useless.
- A comment about people who "hate their jobs." People love to bitch about their jobs. But without the job, they lose a lot of human contact, a structured place to use their brains or abilities, and a role in the world.
- Hedonistic retirement: The idea of the fun and sun and travel retirement has been sold hard to the middle class over the past 30 years. From what I have seen, it isn't all it's cracked up to be. A vacation can be a refreshing change of pace and change of senery, but an endless vacation can be like a meal made of all dessert courses: cloying and unnutritious.
- People who do not return to work after retirement, but who jump into unpaid labors of love, like community service projects, local politics, working for charities, churches, and non-profits, often seem to feel a good sense of satisfaction in "giving back."
- "Meaningful work." I hate that expression. All work is useful and contributes to society, whether it is raising one's kids, milking the cows, flipping burgers, or selling bonds. People who use that expression should think hard about what they mean by it. Furthermore, folks who want their work to provide them with meaning may be barking up the wrong tree.
Knights, Jerusalem, the Seljuk Turks - the history of the Crusades and the future of Islam, by Rubinstein in 
The Purple Martin is a member of the swallow family and is the largest of the North American Swallows. It is primarily an insect eater and has the ability to maneuver like a fighter plane when munching down on mosquito’s, dragonflies, moths and other morsels it finds edible. Their migration pattern starts in early July to fly overland down through 
Mann has now written 
I don't suppose NASA will mind my posting this ancient clip of the first "moon landing" (ha-ha, wink-wink). I'm sure they'd hate to see those ugly 'hoax' rumors start up again.
Fascinating.
It's been quite a while since we've had a Pepy's Diary post, but this piece of 
Seemed to me, today, that our economy is stuck in a great molasses spill, but this time the molasses is from the government. 
My seating companion at a very pleasant dinner last night engaged me in a conversation about the Moslems - the Moors - in Spain. My friends tend to be people with many interests and pursuits. Luckily for me, my aging brain remembered some of the history, but I wanted to quickly review it today. This was a good quick source: 
I find it intriguing that what should be one of the most easily-answerable questions in history:
Almost finished putting the Christmas stuff away, and amusing myself by refreshing my memory about