Showing posts with label George Washington. Show all posts
Showing posts with label George Washington. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 13, 2026

Ascendant Ignorance in the Age of Donald Trump. Ignoramus Watch Part 4. Dr. Hegseth countermands George Washington edition.

 


April 22, 2026

During the Revolutionary War, George Washington ordered his troops inoculated against Small Pox.

This week Pete Hegseth lifted the requirement that troops be inoculated for influenza for "religious" reasons.

The current GOP is heavily anti scientific.

Opposition to vaccinations has been in American history largely a thing of smaller Christian and non Christian sects which are fairly anti scientific, as opposed to the majority of Christians who have no objection to vaccination.  However, when the far right of the country started to turn weird, listening to such medical lights as boob model Jenny McCarthy, that began to change a bit. Covid really made it worse as a significant portion of the country turned anti vax under the leadership of Donald Trump, who got the vaccine, but who recommended some really lethal approaches to the crisis as well.

Troops who don't get inoculated ought to just be given dishonorable or less than honorable discharges.  That's what should have occurred to those who refused the Covid vaccine.

April 24, 2026

The war department stands ready for what comes next. Locked and loaded. May God continue to breast—bless our warriors each and every day and on each and every mission.

Hegseth. 

Breast?

Okay, I get that it's a slip of the tongue, um, well, but it's an odd one.

May 12, 2026

The Aryan Nation, the Nazis, and the KKK are not far-right organizations.  Those are far-left organizations, and they always have been. The KKK was created and started by the Democrats in the United States to prevent blacks from being able to participate in the political arena, if you will. So, I'm going to say they've never been associated with the right, they've always been associated with the left.

Harriet Hageman.

Hageman's no dummy and she knows this is crap, or has drank so much of the Kool Aide she'll spout stuff that's absurd.

Every one of these organizations is from the far right and any claim to the contrary is patently absurd.  The claim about the Nazis, which I've seen before, comes from the party's very early, and frankly pre Hitler, days  and its name, the National Socialist Party.  The absurdity of that claim fails to realize that "socialism" in the context of nationalist parties doesn't necessarily mean Marxism, but "for society".  In the case of the Nazis, way early on their did espouse Socialism but by the time they'd come to power they'd abandoned it in favor of autarky and the early socialist in the party were sidelined or expelled.

And the claim about the KKK being founded by the Democrats and therefore left wing completely ignores that originally the Republican Party was the left wing party, and the Democrats were a right wing party.  The Democrats didn't evolve into the political left until the 20th Century and in the American South remained the conservative party into the 1980s.  Hageman herself is old enough to have voted in Reagan's first run for the Oval Office and therefore should be well aware of that.

This is totally reprehensible.

Cont:

Reporter: What extent are Americans’ financial situation motivating you to make a deal?

Trump: Not even a little bit. I don't think about Americans’ financial situation.

May 13, 2026


So it turns out that Trump's advisors uniformly told him not to launch the war against Iran, but he did anyway, and the advisors, not wanting to be blamed for his stupidity, leaked.  He wants them prosecuted for treason, and sycophant Todd Blanche is looking to to it.

The real crime here is Trump's, who launched an illegal war.  With no declaration of war, every single Iranian killed in it has been the victim of some sort of crime, and every American who has died has been the victim of some sort of crime ultimately attributable to Trump as well.

Blanche is pathetic.  When this is over, and it will be, his careers should be flushed down the toilet.

And then there's this:

PabloReports: Ted Cruz called you a parasite and disparaged your work as a bartender.

AOC: I think it’s funny that he’s been taking a government paycheck for 23 years but has the audacity to criticize someone who has come from a family that had to work their way up and earn their place here.

This is really becoming a Republican specialty around here.  We get retired servicemen who come in after sucking on the government tit for 30 years, retire, and then start sucking on the other government tit, and then run for office on the "I hate the government" ticket.

In that sense, the Democrat running against Collins in Maine is really refreshing.  He's given a speech about his combat service and then noted how he can't figure out how that's relevant to being a Senator.  It isn't.  

Recently I saw somebody post something in favor of Brent Bien here in Wyoming, noting that he's served in combat or dangerous conditions all over the world, and how that will make him ready to lead.  Yeah, lead troops, not a state government. 

We have a whole host of candidates from the He Man Government Haters Club running locally.  They have a right to run, but while they're doing it, they shouldn't be draining their mommy.  It's hypcritical.

Last edition:

Ascendant Ignorance in the Age of Donald Trump. Ignoramus Watch Part 3. The Quack Edition.

Wednesday, November 19, 2025

Waste Deep in the Big Muddy.

George Washington:   “[I}t is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliance with any portion of the foreign world.”

Lyndon Johnson:  "But we are not about to send American boys 9 or 10,000 miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves."

Donald Trump: "Tonight, I'm pleased to announce that we're taking our military cooperation to even greater heights by formally designating Saudi Arabia as a major non-NATO ally."

What was that, MAGA, about forever wars? 

And why on earth would we want to designate a monarchy that will have a regime changing revolution within the next fifteen years as an formal "ally".

Friend of convenience, that's in the ICU, yes. Ally?

Monday, September 23, 2024

Wednesday, September 24, 1924. Sculptor Gutzon Borglum arrived in South Dakota

Sculptor Gutzon Borglum arrived in South Dakota at the invitation of historian Doane Robinson to carry out plans to carve an epic statue of four Presidents, Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt in the state's Black Hills.

Last edition:

Thursday, September 18, 1924. Leaving the Dominican Republic.

Thursday, September 5, 2024

Monday, September 5, 1774. The first Continental Congress Convenes.

President Peyton Randolph.

The first Continental Congress convened at Carpenters Hall in Philadelphia.  Twelve of the Fourteen (not thirteen) colonies sent delegates. Georgia, which was fearful of war with native tribes, did not participate as it hoped for British assistance in the impending war with those earlier denizens.  Quebec had no interest in participating.

Peyton Randolph of Virginia was named President of the First Continental Congress. 

Randolph. . . not Washington.  

Randolph, not Washington, was the first President of the United States by some measures (and Washington is not the first President under any properly considered measure).  He was an American born lawyer who had studied law at the Middle Temple at the Inns of Court in London, becoming a member of the bar in 1743, showing just how unlike the current populist "don't tread on me" crowd these men were.

He died of some sort of seizure in 1775 while dining with Thomas Jefferson.  He was 54 years of age.

Signatory page of the three-page Continental Association signed by 53 of the 56 delegates

Last edition:

Sunday, September 4, 1774. Explorers.

Friday, February 16, 2001

Saturday, February 16, 1901. Tariff wars.

Russia retaliated on a tariff raise imposed on Russian sugar with a 30% increase on the tariff on American ferric goods.

Hmm. . . seems like I've heard this tune before. . . 

We don't think of Russia as a player in sugar today, in no small part due to the Russian Revolution.  Before that, however, Russia was a major sugar exporter, being a beneficiary of the German process for refining sugar beets.  The U.S. sugar industry is based on the same process.

The U.S. sugar industry was heavily impacted by the Spanish American War, oddly enough, as the U.S. became a major market for Cuban sugar and tobacco.  When Cuba went communist in the 1950s, Russia in turn became the market for both of those things.  Today, Cuba really doesn't have a market for either.  A logical trade policy would open trade back up with Cuba, which is far more likely to liberalize its government than attempting to starve it to death before Marco Rubio convinces Mad King Donny to invade it.

Also in Russia, Russian Foreign Minister Vladimir Lamsdorf presented a revised treaty proposal to China's Ambassador to the Russian Empire, Prince Yang-ju. Under the 12-article treaty, China would retain ownership of Manchuria, but Russian troops would be allowed to occupy the territory to guard the railways there, and China would be forbidden from granting rail or mining privileges to anyone without Russian consent. China wasn't impressed and leaked the details to the Japanese and British.

Most of  Alabama's Legislature arrived in Pensacola, Florida, at the invitation of the West Florida Annexation Association, to discuss the possibility of the annexing western Florida.

Macedonian demonstrators in Sofia demanded independence for Bulgaria from the Ottoman Empire.

Today In Wyoming's History: February 16: 1901  Governor Richards signed an act that required county commissions to raise taxes for the purpose of building a residence for the governor.  Attribution:  On This Day.

Wyoming's Sixth State Legislature concluded.

It was a Saturday.


The British journal The Sphere reported on a recent visit by Kaiser Wilhelm II, pictured here wearing a completely absurd helmet, to the UK.


In sharp contrast, The Saturday Evening POst had an illustration of George Washington, no doubt in commemoration of his birthday, on the cover. The attempt at illustrating a bit and bradoon was seriously flawed, however.

I'd be interested in what the article on millionaires not being able to stop making money held.  Millionaires at that time  would be like billionaires now.\

The progressive movement at the time was attempting to rein millionaires in.  The Great Depression, a good thirty years away, would accomplish it. . . for a time.

Last edition: