Showing posts with label Finland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Finland. Show all posts

Sunday, March 10, 2024

Friday, March 10, 1944. Soviets say no to Finns.

The Soviets rejected a Finnish reply to armistice terms requesting further guarantees.

Ireland rejected a U.S. request that it expel Axis diplomats.


An award winning Irish army boxing team was photographed on the same day.

The Red Army made major advances on the Ukrainian front.

The Political Committee of National Liberation, Πολιτική Επιτροπή Εθνικής Απελευθέρωσης was formed.  Often called the "Mountain Government", the communist body was opposed to collaborationist in Athens and the royal government in exile.

American forces captured Talasea on New Britain.  On Bougainville, the Japanese took Hill 260 but lost ground to an American counterattacks elsewhere.


PT Boats at Bougainville, March 10, 1944.

The Japanese attacked rear positions of the British 17th Indian Division in Burma.

U-343, U-450, U-625 and U-8459 were lost in the Atlantic.

The Fighting Seabees, which is a pretty bad movie in my view, was released.

Last prior:

Thursday, March 9, 1944. Bombing of Tallinn.

Friday, March 8, 2024

Wednesday, March 8, 1944. Battle of Imphal begins.

The Battle of Imphal began in northeast India.  British forces had plans to deal with the assault, but initially underestimated the large-scale size of the Japanese offensive.

The Japanese attacked American forces on the beachhead on Bougainville.

The Finns asked the Soviets for guarantees as part of a negotiated peace.

The 8th Air Force raided Berlin for a second day, losing about 10% of a 580 bomber force in spite of an 800 fighter escort.

The British government announced post-war plans to build 300,000 houses.

A general strike in the "Italian Social Republic" was put down by the Germans.

Pvt. Ray E. Thiel, Long Island, Calif., of 3rd Bn., Mortar Platoon, 504th Parachute Infantry, cleans 81mm mortar near Cisterna, Italy.  March 8, 1944.

Last prior:

Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Monday, March 6, 1944. "Black Monday"

The first large scale daylight bombing raid on Berlin occured.  The raid, remembered as Black Monday, involved 814 bombers and 944 fighters from bases in southern England.  69 bombers were lost.

Miss Donna Mae II sustaining damage after the B-17 drifted under another B-17 dropping its bomb load. The plane would go down with all eleven crewmen.

P-51 pilot Donald Blakeslee would fly the first such aircraft over the city.  An early American fighter pilot, he first joined the RCAF in 1941, he served in the USAF until 1965 and passed away in 2008 at age 80.

For those watching Masters of the Air, it is depicted in Episode 7.

The Red Army took Volochysk.

Finland rejected a Soviet peace proposal that included interning German troops that were inside of Finland and restoring the 1940 borders.  The proposal was very similar to what the Finns would accept the following September and represented, effectively, a defeat, which is likely why it was not accepted, in part, at this time, although it was also surprisingly generous on Moscow's part.


Company B, 2nd Chemical Bn. Cassino area, Italy. 6 March, 1944.

The U-744 was sunk in the Atlantic, and the U-973 was sunk in the Arctic.

Orderlies from 25th Field Hospital loading wounded Chinese soldiers into airplane.

Albanian partisan Ramize Gjebrea age 20, was executed by a partisan firing squad for "immoral behavior", that being having intercourse with a male partisan.  She was engaged to another person.  The charge was denied by both parties, but she was convicted and, on this day, shot.


This is interesting partially as Albanian partisans were Communist dominated, but as was often the case with Communist partisan groups, and even Communist societies, traditional morality was strictly observed even though Marx had expressly rejected it and Communist revolutionaries most definitely did not observe them.

Baker City, Oregon, weather station.


Saturday, February 24, 2024

Thursday, February 24, 1944. Big Week Climax.

 

B-26 “Marauder” bomber roars over Luftwaffe airfield at Leeuwarden, Holland, February 24, 1944.

The Gothaer Waggonfabrik (Gotha) aircraft plant was hit as part of the Big Week.

The plant had been targeted for February 22, but bad weather had prevented the raid from occurring.  On this day, 239 B-24s raided the plant.

Typical for such things, the US Army Air Force regarded the raid as a huge success.  In reality, however, the lead bombardier, who controlled the run ins via the Norden Bomb site, suffered from anoxia due to a faulty oxygen mask and mistook Eisenach as the primary target. Forty-three bombers accordingly followed his error. Thirty-four B-24s were shot down, twenty-nine were damaged.  Three aircrewmen were killed, six wounded and 324 went missing.  169 bombers did get through, and the plant was heavily damaged.

The Messerschmidt plants at Regensburg and Augsburg were hit and heavily damaged as well.  Production was disrupted, but as Albert Speer noted, the damage was to the frame plant which was quickly put back into production.  Had the engine plant been hit, results would have been different.

It was the climax of The Big Week.

The Allies prevailed in the Battle of Arawe.

The Red Army took Rogachev.

Finnish Prime Minister Edwin Linkomies announced that Finland wanted to restore peace with the Soviet Union.

The U-761 was sunk by tow U.S. Navy PBY's assisted by two Royal Navy destroyers.

The U-257 was depth charged and sank on the same day.

Merrill's Marauders began their march north in Burma.

U.S. Army 81 mm mortar crew on Bougainville, February 24, 1944.

U.S. Navy Gunner Frank S. Hughes giving instructions on firing a M1 Thompson Sub Machine Gun on the fantail of USS Gambier Bay (CVE 73), February 24, 1944.

Packard Motor Car Company, Detroit, Michigan, at an altitude of 500 feet, looking at 90 degrees. Photographed by Naval Air Station, Detroit, February 24, 1944.

Wednesday, November 1, 2023

Thursday, November 1, 1923. Walton arraigned, Krupp signs, Baltic treaties, Finnair founded, George Washington Cornerstone laid, the wages of sin.

Oklahoma was impeaching its anti Klan Governor.


Gustav Krupp signed an agreement with the French which established operating conditions for his mines in the Ruhr.  He was released from prison fourteen days later.

Estonia and Latvia signed a mutual defense treaty.

Finnair was founded as "Aero Osakeyhtiö".  It had one airplane at the time, a Junkers F.13 seaplane.

The George Washington Memorial cornerstone was laid.












Recently retired, at age 29, Irish mob gangster Bill Lovett was murdered in his sleep at an abandoned store in Brooklyn.  Lovett was a well-educated man who loved animals, and a distinguished World War One veteran, but a dedicated alcoholic who could be very temperamental when drunk.  He'd been in the Irish mob before and again after World War One, but had recently given up crime and drinking after marrying.  He fell off the wagon on October 31 while downtown for a job interview, and went to sleep in the store with a compatriot.  He was apparently murdered by other Irish mobsters.

Tuesday, September 12, 2023

Wednesday, September 11, 1923. The British Empire in Southern Africa.

Southern Rhodesia became a British colony when the British government took it over from the British South Africa Company due to a 1922 referendum.  Prior to that time, it had been informally been known as Zambesia, based on the Zambezi River. It would form a government on October 1 and would retain its status, sort of, as a British colony until 1964.  

Flag of Southern Rhodesia.

Southern Rhodesia, massively British in terms of its colonial character, saw itself in that fashion, and its white residents had been highly supportive of World War One.  They would be again of World War Two.

Flag of Northern Rhodesia.

In 1953, it was confederated by the British with Northern Rhodesia, which had a larger landmass.  In the 1950s, it began to fall apart with the rise of African nationalism.  Northern Rhodesia became independent and changed its name to Zambia in 1964, interestingly changing its name during the course of the Olympics, and therefore entering the games with one name and exiting it with another.

Flag of Zambia.

When Northern Rhodesia became independent, with the cooperation of the British government, it struck fear into Southern Rhodesian whites, and the country, which was controlled by them, issued its Unilateral Declaration of Independence as Rhodesia in 1965.  The winds of change already well set in, Rhodesia, while it had cooperation from various countries, was unrecognized by any.  It fought an increasingly losing battle against African nationalist forces in the 60s and 70s, and returned to British colonial status brief in 1979, before becoming the current state of Zimbabwe.

Rhodesian flag.

Unfortunately, since independence its history has not been a happy one, as it fell to one party rule under Robert Mugabe, something it only recently overcame.  Zambia, spared a post-colonial war, has fared better, and indeed uniquely for a post colonia African nation, had an Acting President in recent memory who was of European (Scottish) descent.

Finnair, the Finnish national airline, was incorporated as Aero O/Y.

The Convention for the Suppression of the Circulation of and Traffic in Obscene Publications was signed in Geneva by members of the League of Nations. The anti pornography treaty is still in effect, accepted and amended by the United Nations, although a person would hardly know it.

Bulgaria arrested 2,500 Communist suspected of plotting an uprising.

Monday, April 3, 2023

Far away places with strange sounding names. Elections in other countries. 2023, part 1.


I comment from time to time on the elections of other countries, so I decided to finally just put those comments in trailing threads, rather than stand alone posts.  

We'll see how it works.

April 3, 2023

Prime Minister's Seal for Finland.

Finland popular young prime minister, Sanna Marin, will be replaced, probably by Petteri Orpo in an extremely close race.

The Finish parliamentary election reflects results that show the country going from a center left coalition to a center right coalition.  The probably new PM, 53 years of age (still young by American standards these days) promises to continue to support Ukraine.  This edges the country towards a more nationalistic stance.

Commenting on the Ukrainian War, the new probable PM stated:

First to Ukraine: we stand by you, with you.  We cannot accept this terrible war. And we will do all that is needed to help Ukraine, Ukrainian people because they fight for us. This is clear.

And the message to (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is: go away from Ukraine because you will lose.

Concerns over the economy seem to have been the main issue in the election. 

Saturday, March 25, 2023

Thursday, March 25, 1943. Axis allies looking for the door.

Germany warned Finland, through Joachim von Ribbentrop, that German would not tolerate Finland making a separate peace.

Sarah Sundin reports that Spain closed its border with Nazi occupied France.  

She also notes:

Today in World War II History—March 25, 1943: Battle for convoy HX-231 begins (through April 8), the first time an Allied Atlantic convoy beats off German U-boats without loss.


Sunday, March 5, 2023

Monday, March 5, 1923. Reds.

The Soviet Union, which claimed to respect the rights of nations, delivered a protest note to Finland over Finland's negotiations with the League of Nations over Karelia, which should have been Finland's.

Soviet barbarity would later assure that it ended up in the USSR, and then later in Russia.  A general Soviet policy of Russification, which settled lands with Russians, means that Karelians, a Finnic people, are now minorities in Russian Karelia.

On the same day, Lenin wrote Stalin on a personal matter.

Dear Comrade Stalin:

You have been so rude as to summon my wife to the telephone and use bad language. Although she had told you that she was prepared to forget this, the fact nevertheless became known through her to Zinoviev and Kamenev. I have no intention of forgetting so easily what has been done against me, and it goes without saying that what has been done against my wife I consider having been done against me as well. I ask you, therefore, to think it over whether you are prepared to withdraw what you have said and to make your apologies, or whether you prefer that relations between us should be broken off.

Respectfully yours,       

Lenin 

Lenin's wife was one Nadezhda Krupskaya, who was also a Bolshevik and very active in party affairs.  She's long out live her husband, dying in 1939, just before the start of World War Two.   


She managed to survive Stalin's purges, even intervening to attempt to save some condemned Reds.  No doubt her status as the wife of the original Red dictator insulated her from such attacks.


It's widely asserted that Nadezhda wasn't Lenin's only love interest, and that French Communist Inessa Armand was his mistress.  This is hard to prove, however, even though it is flatly asserted as being the case in many histories referencing Lenin.  They had met in France while Lenin was living there, and she came to Russia following the Revolution.  Becoming overworked in Revolutionary Russia, Lenin urged her to go to the Caucasus for a holiday, which was suffering from an epidemic and which still had armed opposition to Communism. Supposedly, Lenin was unaware of this.  She contracted cholera there and was buried in a mass grave at the Kremlin Wall Necropolis, being the first woman to be accorded this dubious honor.

Igor Sikorsky, who felt Soviet barbarity, incorporated the Sikorsky Aero Engineering Corporation in the U.S.

The state of Washington got around to adopting an official flag.

It's incredibly boring.

It's original appearance:


Still boring.

Casper read of railroads to be built, $1.00 gasoline, and the dangers of ardent wooing.




Friday, September 2, 2022

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist XXXVII. Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra? Quam diu etiam furor iste tuus nos eludet? Quem ad fīnem sese effrenata iactabit audacia?*

Let's do a post that's guaranteed to somehow offend everyone. 

 Cicero denounces Cataline.*
Is politics nothing other than the art of deliberately lying?
Voltaire.

Lies, Blinders, Hypocrites

Al Franken's 2003 book, written before his stint in Congress, and before his political fall from grace.  Copyrighted image posted under the fair use exception.

Al Franken, the left wing comedian, was Minnesota's Senator from 2009 to 2018. 

My goodness, 2018 seems so long ago, it's like a different world. 

Franken tended towards biting social and political satire.  It's not everyone's cup of tea, but he was funny as a rule.  He migrated towards being disgusted, principally with the political right, and in 2009 entered the Senate.  His downfall came due to one Leeann Tweeden in an event which, while it would seem Hollywoodescque in some ways now, probably wouldn't have led where it did if it were to break as a story now. 

Tweeden was one of those figures who came up due to being exposed, literally, in Hugh Hefner's monument to juvenile male fantasy, which has now been exposed as related in every fashion to the worst sort of sexual crimes imaginable, that being the Playboy magazine rag.  Having prostituted herself photographically, she leveraged that into a sort of career, which in turn ended up with her being assigned to a tour for the troops in Afghanistan, sort of like one of those now embarrassing events memorialized in grossly exaggerated form in Apocolypse Now.  You know, big boob babe appears in front of troops, with musicians and comedians, so they can ogle over her. Franken trespassed a line that shouldn't have been crossed, by her account, in some forced kisses that were part of rehearsals.  I'm not discounting that he did it, and that this was completely wrong.  The fact she perceived them that way gives credence to it. **
[Y]ou may fool people for a time; you can fool a part of the people all the time; but you can’t fool all the people all the time.
Abraham Lincoln. 

Following that, other women came forward, as universally seems to be the case in these instances. Were the accusations true?  I don't know.  I didn't follow them at the time, and it is, I'd note, seemingly universally the case that this occurs.  Having said that, in some of these instances, such as those involving Bill Cosby, some of them definitely are pretty believable.But should Franken have resigned? I didn't think so at the time.  Yes, that made him a cad of a sort, but 2018 was already two years after the election of an individual to the Presidency who had made a completely crass comment about grabbing women's genitals.  Franken wasn't accused of that, and a large percentage of the voters, although not a majority, voted for that candidate, Donald Trump.  Soon, Republicans accused of gross sexual misconduct would disregard it, as in the case of Matt Gaetz.  Franken may have done the honorable thing, but he may have in fact been more honorable in his resignation than he needed to be, or the times called for. 

He seems to have recognized that now. This past February, Franken commented that he regretted resigning from the U.S. Senate and noted that he might run for office once again.  He probably ought to. 
So why am I bringing this up? 

One of the things that propelled Franken into office was his disgust with "lying liars". That disgust doesn't seem to exist anymore either. I've noted this before, but as a Catholic, I'm in that branch of Christianity, which is the largest, whose theologians regard lying as so serious that some theologians hold that all lies are sins, no matter how trivial.  They further hold that some lies are mortal sins. And yet one of my co-religious based his campaign for high office in the state on lies. 

You can't judge the state of another person's soul, but you can hold contempt for his conduct.  One person has already held such contempt for the conduct that she has resigned rather than serve under him.  Maybe he doesn't believe they're lies.  But that says something about the season of lies we're now in, in that case.  You can't blind yourself to lies, and you can't willfully disregard the truth in order to opt to believe in them as you want them to be true.
One idiot is one idiot. Two idiots are two idiots.  Ten thousand idiots are a poltiical party.
Kafka.

Unintentional Irony: 

A recent headline:

"Cards Against Humanity” Game Creator To Send Wyomingites’ Money To Pro-Abortion Group


The killers, in the movie, The Killers, played by Charles McGraw and William Conrad.

No kidding.  An inventor of something "against humanity" is for killing infants.

Makes sense.

Recently, the news has been just thick with irony, and ironic headlines, including additional ones in this area.

The violent complaining about violence.

An abortion clinic, which was not yet in operation, was hit by a while back by a female arsonist in Casper recently.

Now, I don't condone arson, but I don't condone being dense either.  Here's the headline that appeared after the clinic was burned.

Abortion clinic founder after fire: This world seems to be encased in violence

Really?

Abortion is the epitome of violence.  You can't cite the world getting violent as a defense to your own violence. It'd be like the Germans complaining about a concentration camp being bombed on the basis that bombing is violent.

"My goodness, Fritz, the Americans dropped a bomb inside the camp wire. . . the world sure is getting violent".

Men:  Shut up, speak up, now shut up.


Here's another abortion related headline:

Abortion Rights Advocates Say They Need More Men's Voices

For decades men have been told that abortion is none of their business and that indeed, once they withdraw, so to speak, nothing that happens is their business.  Indeed, men who are opposed to abortion are told to butt out.

You can't have it both ways.

If men have a say in the issue of abortion, they also have a say, indeed a coequal one, in whether a baby is to be aborted.  That is, the mother ought to inform the father, and he ought to get a veto over the abortion.  

That would actual recognize that this is at least a two person affair, or rather three.

That probably isn't the male voice they're seeking to elicit.

Some things never change.


In the further unintentional irony category:

Gen. Jacqueline Van Ovost
The character of war is changing. We won’t have the luxury of operating under the same conditions as yesterday.

A statement that's true about every single war fought since the first war was fought.  

D'uh.

We love the high price of petroleum, but hate the high price of gas. . . They aren't connected, are they?

And speaking of trying to have things both ways, a local politician was posting stuff like this nearly every day on Twitter:

Americans woke up today to a double whammy of record inflation and record gas prices. Gas tanks and wallets are running on empty.

@POTUS

owns this record inflation, and American families can’t afford his spin.

I've noted this before, but in Wyoming, high prices mean lots of oil field jobs.  Low prices mean no oilfield jobs.  If we want oilfield jobs, we need high prices.

With the price dropping, by the way, the same fellow hasn't congratulated President Biden on dropping the price.

Weird.

Speaking of politics. . .

Politicians need fun

Under-fire Finnish PM Sanna Marin says even politicians need fun

I'm sure that's true.

She probably actually said:

Jopa poliitikot tarvitsevat hauskaa

Marin is 36 years old, and surely at that age even politicians deserve to have fun.  

And, we would note, unlike less youthful politicians in the US she isn't spouting slop form Twitter or Twitter alternatives all the time.

Well, this year, why not?

Newly Released Sasquatch Data Shows More Wyoming People Are Bigfoot Believers

Sure, in a year in which a slight majority of Wyoming Republicans think an out of stater who has been in the state for only a decade, and who seems to have never really had to struggle independently for his place in the world would make a good Secretary of State, why not Big Foot?

On this:

Over the last 50 years or so, there have been 28 reported sightings in Wyoming of a tall, muscular creature, covered in dark hair, with long arms, leaving behind huge footprints. 

That would not be our presumptive Secretary of State.  He's only been in the state about a decade , as noted, and does not appear to be hirsute.

I've already noted an effort by the outgoing legislature to remove election responsibilities from the incoming election questioner.  It won't happen.

Elected officials, by the way, in Wyoming take this oath:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support, obey and defend the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of the state of Wyoming; that I have not knowingly violated any law related to my election or appointment, or caused it to be done by others; and that I will discharge the duties of my office with fidelity.

This would require said incoming individual not to be screwing around with elections, however, as a former legislature that was already his duty.

Which raises the amusing question of whether the Chief Justice of the Wyoming Supreme Court can refuse to swear in an oath breaker.  I.e, if we know that somebody is facially breaking the oath, thereby breaking that fidelity they've sworn to uphold, can the office be denied.

That won't happen, but it's an interesting thought.

"Am I blue. .  "

Lady Gaga says she hopes 'purple' Texas turns blue at Arlington concert

M'eh, who cares what she thinks?

Gaga, one Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, is just another yapping voice following the Madonna route of getting a good Catholic education and then forgetting what it taught so that she can get a career based on her presentation of her image, and then asking to be taken seriously.

Serious people are to be taken seriously.  You can't build up a career on silly fluff and then demand to be taken seriously, even if you are by that time actually serious.

Speaking of the serious. . . 

As she really is.

Melisa Raouf became the first woman to advance to the finals of the Miss England contest to abstain during the pageant from wearing makeup.

Good for her.  Makeup is stupid. Women should eschew it.

Poor Karen's

I think I've known two women named Karen.  One was the wife of a former partner of mine.  The couple divorced.  I don't know why, but I never knew her that well.

The other is a young Mexican American woman whose family owns a restaurant.  She's not superficial or entitled.  She's probably too serious to be insulted by the current misuse of the name Karen, an example of which is presented below.

Lauren Boebert: “Joe Biden is robbing hard working Americans to pay for Karen’s daughter’s degree in lesbian dance theory.”

What?

Boebert somehow manages to reduce serious issues to absolute nonsense. 

Why do people vote for her?

So here we have the issues of societal debt, student debt, and its impact on American society and education, a set of issues that are complicated and serious.  We also have the issue of, I guess, homosexuality, maybe, which is an issue that's never really been sorted out at the existential level  And what is Boebert saying about these heavy issues?

Who knows, but it sounds dim.

Slacker Baristas?

If you are that slacker barista who wasted seven years in college studying completely useless things, now has loans, and can’t get a job, Joe Biden just gave you 20 grand . . . Maybe you weren’t gonna vote in November and suddenly you just got 20 grand,. . . if you can get off the bong for a minute … it could drive up turnout.

So stated Ted Cruz on a videoblog of his own.

Frankly Ted tends to be an asshole.

Being a barista is a job that strikes me as being hard.  All jobs like that, waitresses, bar maids, bar tenders, servers, are hard jobs.  Usually insulting one or making life difficult for one is a sign that you've never had to do a job like that.

Indeed, people who have done jobs like that are usually very polite to others who have done jobs of that type.  My father, who hardly drank at all, had been a bar tender in college and was just such an example.  In contrast, I once worked with somebody who gave wait staff a terrible time quite frequently.  He'd never done such a job.

I wonder if Cruz has?

Anyhow, Cruz's comment is insulting to working people.

It also displays a blistering lack of knowledge on the current state of education in the U.S. A few years ago, I read of a recent law school grad working as a barista. That was during a period in which new law school grads were having a hard time finding work, which has since changed.  People taking those jobs aren't slackers, they need a job.

Cruz also went after the FBI recently.

Ted Cruz says FBI needs 'complete housecleaning' due to its 'horrific' abuse of power

We'll quote again Cicero, "Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra? Quam diu etiam furor iste tuus nos eludet? Quem ad fīnem sesw effrenata iactabit audacia?"

One person whose patience with Cruz has apparently reached its limit is Liz Cheney, or at least she is now liberated from any restraints by the results of the primary election. She tweeted:

Understanding isn’t difficult. He lacks principle and has always been a chameleon who will say anything, anytime. He thinks he’s so smart no one can see through him. Ted, we can. All of us can.
Ms. Cheney's optimism on everyone being able to see through Cruz are no doubt optimistic.  Cruz actually has fans, and he's positioning himself to run against Ron DeSantis in 2024, assuming that Trump, whom Cruz once publically scorned but now supposedly admires, doesn't run.  DeSantis, I suspect, is running no matter what.

I've never liked Cruz and when he ran for President in 2016 I was disgusted by his comments about the Federal land going to the states, "like Texas".

This isn't Texas, and we don't want it to be.

Regarding Cruz, how is it that Barrack Obama's right to run for President was questioned on the myth he was born in Kenya, while nobody seems to be ready to suggest that Cruz, who was born in Canada, isn't qualified?  Granted, I think he is, legally, but given the wacky interpretation things have been getting recently by people who seem prepared to question a normal readying of the Constitution, why not?Anyhow, he's really not qualified to run as a he's a robot.

I bet that is rare.

In Rare Move, Duke Law Professor Leaves Academia to Return to Big Law

Having said that, one of my really good law school professors did the same thing. And one of my not so good ones did as well, although I understand he was very successful in private practice.

Headline Typo

A headline in the Tribune reads:

AG Opposes holding penitentiary hearing in abortion ban case.

Penitentarily hearing?

No, the Attorney General opposed an evidentiarly hearing, not a penitentiarly hearing.

Seriously?

Biden is the most condescending president of my lifetime. He’s done nothing to unite the nation. Nothing to bring healing. Nothing to alleviate the pain millions of Americans feel everyday. He’s been a divider in chief and come November he must hear from all of us.

I don't know who they are, and I don't care.

My Twitter feed constantly suggest that I check on the latest doings of certain celebrities.

One of them is Megan Thee Stallion.  I guess she's a singer.  I'm sure her last name isn't "Stallion"

Up until recently, as I don't know who she really is and my mind was just filling in the blanks, I thought that last name was "Three Stallions".  I only noticed very recently that I was wrong.  Perhaps that shows a mindset inclined towards Native American names.

Another one is Harry Styles.  I don't know who Harry Styles is or why anyone cares what he's doing.  I could probably look that up, but I'm not going to.

Another link noted that Billie Eilish is wearing baggy shorts, having experimented briefly with appearing as an actual adult woman, her having returned to appearing like a toddler.

I don't have a really appropriate song for this topic, so this'll have to do.

Footnotes:

*The opening lines of Cicero's first speech against Cataline.  Translated, they state:

When, Catiline, do you mean to cease abusing our patience? How long is that madness of yours still to mock us? When is there to be an end of that unbridled audacity of yours, swaggering about as it does now?