White House counsel Clark Clifford presented President Truman with a top secret report, authored by George Elsey, stating that the "U.S. must be prepared to wage atomic and biological warfare".
The disturbing report would help lead to the Marshall Plan.
Mrs.Temis Sullivan,coal miners wife, preparing to go to a weekly Daughters of America meeting with other ladies in her community, in the kitchen of her home rented from the Inland Steel Coal Company, Wheelwright,Kentucky 9/24/46.
Cartoon from the Rocky Mountain News that sort of rhymes today.
Back when the Rocky Mountain News was still a thing, they used to run columns by Charley Reese. I didn't always agree with them by any means, Reese was a dyed in wool Confederate Gray Southerner, but they were often quite interesting. I can recall his final column when he noted he was going to retire. On the timing he said something like "when you know, you know".
I'm at that point.
My wife, however, definitely isn't at that point for me, an ongoing source of conflict.
In Wyoming, and maybe in most places, lawyers are admitted to the bar in August for the most part. A second, smaller crops, is admitted in March or so. I was admitted in August, 36 years ago.
Back in September 2025 I started a thread about having passed the 35 year mark but never published it. I was angry about something at the time, pretty clearly, and it was a very bitter posts. I thought better of it and didn't post it, but I didn't wipe it out until recently. I reread it and then did so, even though much of what I wrote in it is still true.
All careers are individual, of course which is what makes career advice so dangerous. I've known people, for instance, who served in the military and absolutely hated it. The entire film M*A*S*H and the television series is, in no small part, based on a hatred of military service, although the book's author, a conservative, ironically did not hate his. The same is true, for what it's worth, of Catch 22. Heller actually admired the military he lampooned. Both books were hugely successful, however, as they not only tapped into the oddities of military life, but also into a hatred of it in some quarters.
In contrast, I've known people who loved it, and I myself liked it.
I note that as I suppose that the law is the same way, maybe all careers are.
That aside, the law is unique and is well known for being so.
The law has an alcoholism and alcohol abuse rate that's far higher than other professions. That isn't the only abusive trait in it, however. It's estimated that something like 60% of lawyers have had in the office sexual infidelities and while I haven't tried to add up percentages, and that percentage seems high, there are indeed a lot of them. The law also has some really screwball personalities in it, although I'm at the point where I now wonder if those personalities became that way due to the law, or entered the law because of it. In my current Gen. Jones stage of life, I'm amazed by the number of burnt out husks of people who won't retire from the law as that's all they have.
I'm not the only one who's noticed that, and a recent conversation is part of what brought me back to this thread. In speaking to an opposing lawyer I've known a long time by phone, on a holiday, he brought up the very things I've noted, this included. Indeed, he noted that for a lot of people, they'd become lawyers, that's what they now were as part of their personality. That's all that's left.
That should never happen, but the law is an all consuming job.
He was actually a bit angry about it. I'm not angry, but I don't want to become one of those people. My friend noted that what he "is", is a hunter and mountain climber. What he "does" is be a lawyer. That's pretty much true for me as well, although I'd substitute outdoorsmen for climber.
He also had the observation that after working years at the law, late nights, early days, weekends, that he and his wife did things together rarely. The pressure of work brought that about. That's pretty much the same story in my own life. Another lawyer I know just had his wife of about 30 years just up and leave him, leaving him wondering why. It seems a "therapist" suggested that, and frankly I have a dim view of most therapist or counsellors, but what I suspect is that the same thing was at work. That fellow had told me not all that long, before the disaster came, that he was never going to retire, because he enjoyed the fellowship of the lawyers.
Well, nothing that we do at work is something "enjoyed" by our spouses, except for perhaps the money. If the lawyer is really one of those ones who enjoys the courtroom combat, or the intellectual challenge, the spouses don't participate in that at all.
Money can matter, however. Yet another lawyer I know, about my same age, is trying to retire but is upset as his wife just can't grasp that the funding burn rate has to stop. I think a lot of lawyers who keep on keeping on face that with a family member or perhaps themselves. From the outside, you know they'd be fine. But to them, or a loved one, the fear of no further income will just drive them into the grave, working. Fears of that type, and not my own, have kept me working for the past four years.
The law is not only an all consuming occupation, it's one that's soul destroying. Many "plaintiffs' lawyers" have really lost their humanity. Not all by any means, but quite a few. They really don't care about the people they represent in many instances. It's one of the thing that makes practicing law so dispiriting and damaging to your own soul. Most of the propaganda that lawyers and law firms of a certain type being there to help people is pure crap. They don't mean it, and everyone inside the law knows that. Simply practicing law, at some point, or perhaps more accurately being in litigation, is participating on a fraud on the public.
I'm told I'm really good at the law. If that's true it's proof you can be good at something that you really don't love. I'm beyond the point of not loving it anymore.
I entered the profession for the same reasons a lot of people do. My earlier career had not worked out and I didn't seem to have any other place to go. I had started off obtaining a very difficult science degree only to graduate into an economy where I was unemployable. This is, I'd note, more common than a person might suppose. There was no family business to step into. What I really wanted to do, and still do, wasn't open to me. Even at that, I hesitated and I chose not to enter the law school class I was admitted into. I waited a year hoping to find work, and didn't. Soldiering was the work that year. I guess I could have chosen to make that a career, and in some ways I"m surprised I didn't.
The last year of my undergraduate degree I tried switch to a different field:
I'd be offered a summer position with them, but not until years later, at which point I was already practicing law and engaged. I've posted on that before.
If 'd had my druthers, which hardly anyone does, I would have have been a rancher. I have been around agriculture which is to say that I would have ranched full time. I came close it without really realizing it after law school right as my father was looking at retiring. We came close to the two of us starting a place, and then he died. I abandoned that particular effort in order to help my mother, who had no such interest. Laster I found she was baffled why I hadn't let her know.
My wife and I have always had cattle, but it's never been a full time thing. Sometimes it's promised to almost be that, but it never has. Now I'm 63 and time has moved on. It's something I'll never recover from. It was one of the goals that kept me at my desk job, and now the goal can't be met.
Time and effort wasted.
There are some things that are quite scary about time moving on, I'll note. Fear of death is not one of them. I constantly hear that people are supposed to be afraid of death, but I've lived pretty close to death my entire life and I'm not. If death arrives before my plans play out, well, so be it. Nobody knows the day nor the hour. Momento mori.
But what has moved on is the opportunity to complete a bunch of things I used to do and be engaged in before I started practicing law. That must show something about my own character, as other lawyers take long vacations and the like, but I don't really seem capable of devoting time to vocations and avocations. I'll leave it to the reader to decide which is which. The interest in those pursuits remains, however.
Gone is interest in the law itself. I'm not interested nor fascinated in it. I never loved it in the first place, but I have had over the years a reputation as being a legal scholar. I still get calls from various lawyers about legal situations which are rare or difficult. The difference is that I no longer find them interesting at all.
At one time, seeing as I was a lawyer, I really wanted to be a judge, which is a position for legal scholars, and I've applied within our system a bunch of times, and been encouraged to do so by judges. Now I'm too old, as mandatory retirement is at age 70 and the committee isn't going to appoint somebody at age 63 for a single term. Or I suppose not. To my surprise, they recently almost in fact did that in a district in which very few people were applying for the position. The past two Governors and the Judicial Nominating Committee have pretty much wrecked the process for successful lawyers, so applications are way down.
Indeed, one of my frustrations with the practice of law has been watching the decline of the judicial nominating system, which has grown much more political over the last few decades. When I started out you could really see why various judges got appointed to their positions. When Matt Mead became Governor, however, he had an agenda of appointing women and that's what he was going to do. That was a politically motivated bias and it meant if there was a man up for the same position, he wasn't getting it.
Governor Gordon has had a very strong bias towards prosecutors, although there are some exceptions.
The oncoming Governor, Barlow, will be interesting to watch in this regard. He's a professional himself (veterinarian) and perhaps he'll take a more informed and balanced view.
Anyhow, after 36 years of this, it's time to move on, so I'm moving on. I'll complete this year, but I'm not starting another one.
Indeed, on the topic, I'm capable of reading the signs. The American dream is that you live to age 100 and die in your sleep. You probably aren't going to.
Over the last couple of years I've watched some of the lawyers who are older than me decline pretty seriously in some ways. And I'm declining too. I had colon surgery out of the blue, something that probably could have been averted if I'd had regular colon checkups like you are supposed to. Going through that process I ended up having an odd thing on my thyroid discovered. Half my thyroid ended up coming out, although I probably could have avoided that if I was willing to risk it being nothing, which didn't seem to be a solid risk at the time. Now I have to take pills every day for the first time in my life.
A year ago the eye doctor noted something peculiar in my eye. Last week, on my follow up exam, it was clear it was a tiny cataract It's not a problem yet, but it probably will be in "ten years". I'm young for a cataract, but it's due to an injury.
I've endured a lot of injuries over the years.
I'm considerably more tired than I used to be, and my physical stamina, still pretty good, has declined. I could probably address this as people ought to at my age by exercise, but my schedule is incredibly burdened.
I don't handle stress anywhere near as good as I used to, however, and stress is a killer.
So, in four months, I'm done.
The big challenge now is letting everyone know, and getting my wife to accept it. That part isn't going to be easy at all.
It's not going to be easy as at least my long suffering spouse doesn't want to believe I'm at this point. I've been mentioning it, but when retirement comes up, it's always "you can't". Retirement is, she suggests, a year further in the future than I imagine it.
A year isn't much, but it's a year. I hear all the time that somebody retired and then died, as if retirement killed them. Really, they just hang on too long.
And again, that hanging on is a funny thing. I've watched one lawyer who has no family (divorced) and who has no faith keep on going to work. I guess it's his identify . I mentioned retiring to him once and he scoffed, saying "good luck". Of course, I don't have to pay alimony and I don't take expensive trips.
I've also watched a couple of very ill lawyers hang on after their illness set in. It provided a distraction I guess. Indeed, on the very odd occasion I mention this to anyone people always suggest a law job I could take in retirement, which isn't what I have in mind at all.
In contrast, one lawyer who experienced a health care scare recently, one year younger than me told me that next year was definitely the date. When I expressed doubt, the reply was "watch me".
What you are supposed to say, like Edith Piaf, is that you have no regrets about your career as a lawyer.
I can't say that.
I probably should feel that way. Just yesterday, once again, thinking over the past 36 years I came to the conclusion that with the box I was in, I did the only thing I could do. True or not, and it's probably true, hindsight being 20/20, I'd have avoided the law like the plague if I'd known what it was like. As noted above, I'm sure there are people who look back and say they loved every second of it.
I'm not one of them.
To compound things, I've been in litigation the entire time. That was a mistake, as I'm not well suited for it internally. I'm an introvert and I don't like being in extroverted situations. I just couldn't find a way out of it.
Well, anyhow, page one of the concluding chapter.
So now, I have to start informing people. This isn't going to be fun at all, but knowing myself, if I don't, it won't become real.
I've never liked doing trials. Some lawyers claim to love them, and I suppose they do. There's something in their personalities, a defect really, which requires them to test their wits against other people. Most lawyers don't like doing them, and most of the lawyers who say they do, are lying.
Like baseball players before a game, most lawyers have some sort of ritual before they try a case. At one time, as late as the early 90s, that ritual for quite a few involved heavy drinking. I don't think that's the case so much anymore. Frankly, while conservatives are all worked up about it in some quarters, I think that's one of the things that the massive introduction of women into the law changed, and for the better.
When I get close to trials, I usually rewatch The Wild Bunch. I know that's odd, but I love that movie and I find it very engaging. Part of the reason that I watch it in this context is that the protagonists in the move are basically all mercenaries of a sort. Yes, I know that they're criminals, but still. And there's not one redeeming person in their whole contest.
Everyone who likes movies is familiar with the famous concluding gunbattle of the movie. But that's not the last scene. Former gang member turned bounty hunter Deke Thornton is waiting outside the town gate as evening arrives, having sent the dead bodies of the gang back with the other bounty hunters. Elderly gang member Skyes rides up with Mexican Indians and the following exchange occurs.
Sykes: I didn't expect to find you here.
Deke Thornton: Why not? I sent them back. That's all I said I'd do.
Sykes: They didn't get very far.
Deke Thornton: I figured.
Sykes: What are your plans, now?
Deke Thornton: Drift around down here. Try to stay out of jail.
Sykes: Well, me and the boys got some work to do. You want to come with us? It ain't like it used to be, but it'll do.
That's how I feel about things. I intend to hunt, fish, work cattle, write and put in a garden.
But even if I only do a faction of that stuff, it'll be okay.
I had no idea whatsoever that electric dishwashers existed in 1926. It really surprises me.
It's another example, however, on how domestic machinery was entering the home at this point in time, the impact of which was about to revolutionize economics and how people simply lived.
We've discussed this in the context of the introduction of domestic machinery into the home in the 40s and 50s. We've also noted before that this process, which had started early in the 20th Century, was delayed by the Great Depression. This is a good example of that.
I took a look at this topic, which I've never even considered before, and it appears that one American socialite, Josephine Cochrane, was instrumental in the invention of machine dishwashers and was working on it in the late 19th Century. She went into commercial manufacturing of them in 1898.
Cochrane was a widow at the time, and she passed away in 1913 at age 74. In the 1920s a new type of design was introduced by William Howard Livens, a British professional soldier of an inventive mind who is known for his military inventions related to chemical warfare and flame throwers.
His front loading dishwasher introduced the modern form of the device. Introduced in 1924, he continued to work on it and by 1940 had introduced the drying element to the machine. A man of independent means, he served in both World Wars and died in 1964 at the age of 74.
On the same day that this advertisement appeared, December 12, 1941, this was the headline in the same paper:
If Romeo hadn't bought his dishwasher by that time, he was waiting at least four more years to get one.
In 1926 Cochrane's company, which still existed, was sold to the Hobart Manufacturing Company. Using the name KitchenAid, it introduced the first house specific dishwasher in 1949, reflecting a period during which the introduction of domestic machinery, much of it improved by the advances of technology during the Second World War, were rushing into households. Still, dishwashers were still regarded as a luxury item well into the 1970s, and as a kid not only did we not have one, none of the people whose houses I'd visit as a child had them either. They were regarded as really bougie
Indeed, my parents never had a dishwasher, and it would never have occured to me to actually buy one myself. However, the first house we lived in, that is rented, when we were first married had one, which was my introduction to them. When we bought our house (we've only ever had the one), it had one, and when it broke, we bought a new one. Everyone has one now.
Which gets back to the point I made in the Maytag entry noted below. It's not like washing dishes ever seemed like a huge chore to me, but we were a small family. I'm sure for the homes of my parents, which featured large families, they were, particularly when combined with all of the other domestic chores that had to be done in a less automated world.
We had no winter to speak of, and now we're starting off a summer than isn't one. What causes the latter I have no idea, but it is not hot. It's not even warm.
This may in part be part of the difference between men and women. Women have more body fat naturally. My wife is far from fat, but she carriers more fat than do as she's female. I'm carrying more fat that I should as I have an office job where I don't get any exercise. But I'm not fat either.
What this means is that the house is now bitter cold.
The air conditioning system is thankfully out of order. I have no desire to replace it, although I was presented with some options to do that yesterday. If it were up to me, I'd not have one. It never gets that hot here, but then it probably doesn't get that hot anywhere in my view. But now we have freezing indoor weather on a natural basis.
It's 52F outside right now. The back screen door is wide open. It's freezing in the house.
I saw a comment from a blog I've sort of followed where the poster fairly frequently remarks that he's a fallen away Catholic, although at the same time his world outlook is obviously Catholic. Today he chose to explain why he fell away.
What's struck me over the years is that an awful lot of people who take that path fall away as they're self centered. The post made that really clear. Supposedly he couldn't reconcile the message of the Church and the direction of society. That's not a reason to fall away, that's the very reason we need to be saved. Without Christ, we're just a bunch of self centered whiners out to destroy ourselves.
Religion is not magic, which some people seem to think it is. Christians discuss the problem of evil, but part of the reason that evil is in the world as we have free will and we like it. I saw a comment from a Monk once reflecting, and he meant it, that he asked the question "God, why do you law injustice in the world?" and actually got a reply, that being "Why do you?"
We know what's wrong and right and frequently just choose what's wrong. The big Mega Churches will be packed today with "Christians" who are on multiple divorces and remarriages, or just living in sin, even though we all know that's wrong. For that matter, Catholic churches will be packed today with those who only make it to Mass twice a year.
That's not to be lamented. It's a sign of hope. We know what's wrong. We're often just to lazy and accommodating to do what's right.
Today is a good day to start doing what's right, including comporting our actual conduct to God and the the nature God created.
Straying from this a bit, I'd note how overarching this really is. While I can't get into details very much, recently I've been dealing with a massive inter personal fight between two people I've known for a long time. Both are flat out wrong.
One of them is now upset with somebody that he once deeply loved as that person harshly criticized him. Frankly, the nature of the criticism was brutal. I've been criticized by the same person brutally myself, but I haven't lived a particularly sheltered life so I learned to just disregard it and the person eventually wondered on. This person, however, hero worshipped the person who turned on him.
Additionally, there's an element of financial stress going on in there somewhere and while the person in question regards themselves as a very devout Christian, it's really clear that their concept of Christianity involves a deep love of the Church and its sacraments, but not so much some of its lessons, including the one that holds love of money is the root of all sin.
It's a classic failing.
The other person is an archetypical Baby Boomer. For some reason a lot of Boomers just can't let go. Handed everything early on, they really became the "Me" generation of the 70s. This person really only has their work left, as his marriage fell apart and for the classic reasons, and, well, I won't go into it. At some point if you were the center of all of your major life choices, however, all you have left, is you, and that isn't much.
Our current President, and indeed our last, both epitomized that Boomer view in some ways. Trump has lived the Playboy lifestyle and his soul is imperiled. He's also endangering us all, and all because to him, it's all about him.
Christ came to save humanity, but we're supposed to participate in that. The road is fairly clear. We're to try to take the narrow one. Americans seemingly think that doesn't apply to them, and wonder why they're miserable.
This does have some interesting details, even though in some ways it would nearly appear contemporary in some ways.
For one thing, he's wearing a red shirt of some sort under his plat shirt. T-shirt, or red woolen shirt? Probably the latter, as there's glimpses of the same red under his socks. There also appears to be a button on the shirt/longhandles near the neck.
Note the snowshoes on the floor. It's still winter, as it should be as the rubber overshoes also demonstrate. We still routinely wore those to school on snowy days in the 60s and early 70s.
Newspaper ads soliciting potential spouses. Somewhat amusing, I suppose, is the German working girl "anxious" to meet a mechanic, followed by an advertisement from a 36 year old mechanic looking for a "working girl". The typesetter had to have arranged that order intentionally.
This is a topic that tends to fascinate people as a relic of the past:
This, from a Thai in the AFA Reddit threads probably explains a lot of it currently:
If you want to get out of Thailand, you marry a foreigner. It's a better life for me, and my family as I bring them over. So my parents, my sisters and I are all here in the US now.
I met Paul online through a mail order bride agency when I was 16. We talked, and he flew here when I was 17 to meet me, and he met my family. He got the approval from my parents, and when I turned 18 we got married and he brought me to the US.
I have a nice house, a man who cares and takes care of me, and a good job. I don't think I would have this back in our home country. I'm glad for Paul, and everything he's done for us. So, I am happy.
Icky aspect of this aside. . . well maybe the whole thing is icky, this probably defines things in a way, then and now, for mail order brides. Economic desperation. Perhaps more then, a bit, than now, but both.
Men meeting their "mail order" spouse to be at Ellis Island. These women were from Armenia, Turkey, Greece and Romania, and likely were all Eastern Orthodox.
This is a popular story for things like romance novels. It's the topic of at least one movie, 1974's Zandy's Bride, which was based on a 1942 novel called The Stranger. I suspect it was way less common than generally supposed, but I don't know. Added to that, some of what we regard as "mail order" were actually very long distance courtships by correspondence. I.e, they knew each other that way, which is apparently at least somewhat the case for modern mail order brides as well.
Gree, women entering the country to marry correspondent fiances.
The photos that were put up here, and the advertisement, show an aspect of this that was really significant at the time, and seems to be forgotten (including by current mail orders) that being religion and culture. The Greek women, at least three of whom appear to be very young, were escaping poverty, but they were marrying into their own culture. Pretty rough, but they were at least marrying somebody who spoke Greek and who was Greek Orthodox. Likely all the women in the first photograph were marrying somebody from their own culture as well. The advertisement, however, provides less of that, but some of it. Some men were just looking for somebody to marry. The Jewish man was looking for a Jewish woman, however. The German working girl, on the other hand, wanted a "mechanic" (somebody who worked with machinery) and a comfortable small home. Two men wanted widows for some reason, which would probably make sense if I knew the context (perhaps they wanted somebody who was used to be married and whom they didn't have to romance). Even where culture wasn't referenced, chances are they would likely be ofose cultures.
Of course, if you go further back, you can find more peculiar examples, such as the French "King's Daughters" who were sent to Quebec. Up to 1,000 of them were sent between 1663 and 1673, which followed prior private efforts starting in the 1640s. The King's Daughters were actually vetted for their future role, and were held to scrupulous standards based on their "moral calibre" and physically fitness. Authorities in Quebec actually sent some back that were found not to be vigorous enough, which presumably was disappointing for them.
What all of this says we could debate. Contrary to what some people like to assert, it's never been the case, ever, that regular people didn't marry for love. They always have. The thing is that modern people often have a hard time recognizing that in the conditions of earlier times.
Catholicism brought in the requirement that there be consent on the part of both parties in order for their to be a valid marriage, and after that marriage ages jumped to the current norms. Chances are pretty good that the way most couples relationships developed looked a lot more like what's depicted in Flipped, set in the 1950s, than Dirty Dancing or something. I.e, the ultimately married couple knew each other from childhood. That still occurs, of course, particularly in some communities. Doug Crowe's ribald A Growing Season references that being the case in ranching communities of the 1950s, and I'd seen the same thing as late as the 1990s. But where women were in short supply, desperate times always called for desperate measures.
Photograph from Montana, 1901. Clearly the man with the cat was the most eligible Batchelor.
Something that should be noted is that there was a pretty high incentive for women to marry prior to the 1920s, or even prior to the 1940s, in comparison to currently. Obviously marriage remains, but to be a "spinster" prior to the mid 20th Century came with a massive set of problems for the woman and her family. The classic Pride and Prejudice deals with this repeatedly as the failure of the Bennet sister to marry is creating an impending financial disaster for the family and Charlotte Lucas accepts a less than desirable proposal because, in part, she's a burden on her parents. Those concerns are subtle in the film, but they were real. The "German working girl" in the advertisement above was likely looking at serving out a life's sentence as a domestic servant if she couldn't find somebody to marry. Most women who weren't married lived at home, and when they aged into their 30s they were looking at taking on that role for increasingly elderly parents.
All of which raises the question, do you have a couple that met in your background this way? It'd be almost impossible to know, I'd think. Having said that, in thinking of it, my chances of being descended from a King's Daughter are fairly high and, while not really the same thing, one of my aunts who did a family genealogy claimed that one married couple we descend from did not speak the same language when they married, although her information was notoriously unreliable (the husband was Scottish, the wife Irish. . . I think they both clearly would have spoken English). On my wife's side, my father in law told me once that one set of his grandparents were both from Ohio originally, but that they had not met there. Somehow the bride was sent out to marry the groom, and they married.
Cosmetic surgery, save for genuine restorative purposes, or genuine medical reasons, ought to be banned.
People who claim to be "Constitutional Lawyers" are no such thing, unless they are public defenders. Anyone claiming that title, who isn't, should be sentenced to a term of being a public defender in Dayton, Ohio for their natural lives, plus twenty years.
Seriously, that's a flaming bullshit claim. Ain't no such thing.
If you look like you are 30, when you are 60, due to cosmetic surgery, you are a deeply insecure weenie.
If you are male, and live in a rural area, and don't hunt or fish seriously, you are an insecure weenie and should move to Greenwich Village.
Boxing is a brutal sport, but it's beautiful.
Fleetwood Mac seriously sucks. Of their songs that suck, Landslide sucks the most.
A twenty something single man giving a lecture on "the fertility crisis" is a freakin' joke. Geez man, get married and get a real job.
If you have to think about the hairstyle a man is evidencing, he's a weenie.
If a man has perfectly combed hair at all times (think Mike Johnson), he's a weenie.
No surprise, had I been at the Olympics, I'd have booed Vance, and I'm an American. Trump has brought the U.S. into universal contempt, so that a symbol of it gets jeered is no surprise.
Vance must go home and cry seeing his chances of being President decline below 0 every day. His only hope in the first place was the application of the 25th Amendment and so far, in spite of my expectations, no luck there.
Trump was asked about the event.
REPORTER: “The vice president got booed during the opening ceremony. What do you make of that frosty reception?”
PRESIDENT TRUMP: “That's surprising because people like him. Well, I mean, he is in a foreign country, you know, in all fairness. He doesn't get booed in this country.”
Truly, Trump is clueless.
Ignoramus at National Prayer Breakfast
I don't see the point of this anymore.
Truth be known, I probably never did. I appreciate prayer, obviously, but this, at least in my memory, has been sort of a lukewarm American Civil Religion event in which the sitting President makes a nod towards religion The same guy could have been chasing skirts all week and then sound like he was really sincere at the breakfast.
Here's JFK's 1963 speech there.
February 07, 1963
Senator Carlson, Mr. Vice President, Reverend Billy Graham, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Chief Justice, gentlemen:
I am honored to be with you here again this morning. These breakfasts are dedicated to prayer and all of us believe in and need prayer. Of all the thousands of letters that are received in the office of the President of the United States, letters of good will and wishes, none, I am sure, have moved any of the incumbents half so much as those that write that those of us who work here in behalf of the country are remembered in their prayers.
You and I are charged with obligations to serve the Great Republic in years of great crisis. The problems we face are complex; the pressures are immense, and both the perils and the opportunities are greater than any nation ever faced. In such a time, the limits of mere human endeavor become more apparent than ever. We cannot depend solely on our material wealth, on our military might, or on our intellectual skill or physical courage to see us safely through the seas that we must sail in the months and years to come.
Along with all of these we need faith. We need the faith with which our first settlers crossed the sea to carve out a state in the wilderness, a mission they said in the Pilgrims' Compact, the Mayflower Compact, undertaken for the glory of God. We need the faith with which our Founding Fathers proudly proclaimed the independence of this country to what seemed at that time an almost hopeless struggle, pledging their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence. We need the faith which has sustained and guided this Nation for 175 long and short years. We are all builders of the future, and whether we build as public servants or private citizens, whether we build at the national or the local level, whether we build in foreign or domestic affairs, we know the truth of the ancient Psalm, "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it."
This morning we pray together; this evening apart. But each morning and each evening, let us remember the advice of my fellow Bostonian, the Reverend Phillips Brooks: "Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men! Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks."
[The President spoke first to the gentlemen in the hotel's main ballroom and then to the ladies in the east room.]
Ladies:
I'm glad to be with you again this morning with the Vice President, Reverend Billy Graham, Dr. Vereide, Senator Carlson, the same quartet that was here last year and the year before.
I think these breakfasts serve a most useful cause in uniting us all on an occasion when we look not to ourselves but to above for assistance. On our way from the last meeting to this, we met two members of Parliament who carried with them a message from Lord Home to this breakfast, in which Lord Home quoted the Bible and said that perhaps the wisest thing that was said in the Bible was the words, "Peace, be still."
I think it's appropriate that we should on occasion be still and consider where we are, where we've been, what we believe in, what we are trying to work for, what we want for our country, what we want our country to be, what our individual responsibilities are, and what our national responsibilities are. This country has carried great responsibilities, particularly in the years since the end of the Second War, and I think that willingness to assume those responsibilities has come in part from the strong religious conviction which must carry with it a sense of responsibility to others if it is genuine, which has marked our country from its earliest beginnings, when the recognition of our obligation to God was stated in nearly every public document, down to the present day.
This is not an occasion for feeling pleased with ourselves, but, rather, it is an occasion for asking for help to continue our work and to do more. This is a country which has this feeling strongly. I mentioned in the other room the letters which I receive, which the Members of Congress receive, which the Governors receive, which carry with them by the hundreds the strong commitment to the good life and also the strong feeling of communication which so many of our citizens have with God, and the feeling that we are under His protection. This is, I think, a source of strength to us all.
I want to commend all that you do, not merely for gathering together this morning, but for all the work and works that make up part of your Christian commitment. I am very proud to be with you.
Kennedy, who was a (bad) Catholic, was only able to get elected by promising not to be really Catholic, an act of betrayal to his faith that has hurt Catholics ever since. At least with Trump we don't have that, as he's some sort of undeclared Protestant, he says. Crediting that claim, which I don't think deserves much credit, he's a really bad Christian.
None of which stops people like Franklin Graham and Paula White-Cain from praising him.
White Cain was pretty restrained in her opening remarks there. She isn't always so restrained. Trump wasn't restrained in his babbling remarks, which departed greatly from Christianity.
I'm pretty skeptical about any real attachment, or perhaps understanding, of Trump to religion. Indeed, I'm firmly convinced the damage he's doing to Evangelical Christianity is deep.
Trump announced a May 17, 2026 national prayer gathering on the National Mall as part of the White House's 'America Prays' initiative, which encourages one million people to dedicate weekly prayer time. Such prayer would be beneficial no doubt, but a big gathering on the National Mall is a mistake. It's going to gather a counter prayer demonstration for sure by Christians who see through Trump, and it'll likely generate a mass protest. It'll be difficult to keep it from getting out of hand.
That's a Sunday. Maybe J.D. can note that he has to go to Mass and skip out.
Drip
For the 2026 US Olympic drip, the teams has white duffle coats and a sort of winter themed sweater with the flag on it. It looks nice, but Norway has accused the US of stealing the star motif on the sweater.
I have a duffle coat I wear as a winter overcoat. I really like it. I've had it for years and year, but oddly suddenly I'm getting compliments while wearing it. It always catches me off guard as it is getting long in the tooth, but still I get a fair number of them.
The same is true with a Hanna Hats panel cap I've been wearing for about 25 years or so. I've always received some compliments on it, but I"m getting a lot all of a sudden. A guy actually interrupted a conversation he was having with a woman at a store just to ask me "what's that sort of cap called"?
In other somewhat surreal conversations, I picked up pizza on my way home from an unsuccessful goose hunt the other day and went into the joint in a heavy surplus European camouflaged coat. I'm too cheap to buy the designer camo that other people do. Anyhow, I parked my Jeep right in front of the place and when I went in the girl waiting the counter said "What kind of a car is that?"
It was a Jeep.
That was a surprising question as Jeeps look like Jeeps and they have since the very first Jeep.
Probably because of my coat she then asked, after getting my pizza, "where you in the military"? I affirmed and she thanked me for my service.
I note this as this sort of somewhat awkward but ready engagement seems common for people in Generation Alpha. Indeed, back to the hat, I've had some young women, probably 20 years old or less, just look at me and say "I like your hat" in passing. It's a little awkward and surprising.
When I was 20 myself, young women never told me that, darn it.
I"m putting up this interesting Out Our Way cartoon from this day in 1946 as it refers to something we've discussed here before, and its a bit surprising.
What we've discussed here before is hunting during World War Two.
I've always thought this was one of the more interesting threads on this blog, and it's one of the many ones I post and wonder why there's never any comments on it. But that's common for blogs. Usually, they don't get posts.
Anyhow, this cartoon by J. R. Williams sort of confirms what I'd suspected. Some people supplemented their table fare during the war by hunting.
Williams was, as we've discussed before, a Canadian cartoonist who moved to the U.S. with his family at age 15, locating in Detroit. He soon dropped out of school and became an apprentice machinist, providing topics for his cartoons which frequently depicted machine shops. He drifted after that, something not uncommon in that era, and worked as a cowboy in the West, as well as serving a three year stint on the U.S. Army as a cavalryman. All of that experience likewise reflected itself in his cartoons. Family life, in spite of his being a bit short (again, not all that uncommon for the time) also featured frequently.
He became a professional cartoonist in 1922 and remained one until his death in 1957 at age 69. He'd used the proceeds of his cartoons to buy a ranch in Arizona, before relocating later on to Pasadena, California. His cartoons carried on to some extent after his death in the hands of other artists.
Anyhow, one of the things about his cartoons is that depict fairly accurate slices of life, and this running gag from 1945-46 no doubt did. The father has taken an elk and a deer, and the family is keeping it in the ice box. The part that surprises me is that I really like venison, and these cartoons suggest that this venison was bad, which may be explained in an earlier cartoon I'm not familiar with.
Eighteen nations entered into an Agreement on Reparation from Germany.
