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Last edition:
Friday, September 18, 2015
Thursday, September 17, 2015
Friday, September 17, 1915. The Swastika Store.
The news was becoming routine. . .bandit activity on the border:
But it was the advertisement on this page which caught our eye.
Wrong in so many ways.In Mexico, Villa reported that he wasn't dead.
At one time Albany County had quite a few things named "swastika", which of course wasn't associated with the Nazis until, well, the Nazis. The last remaining thing named that was Swastika Lake.
Commission approves new name for Swastika Lake
The store advertised locally all the time, and was originally called Campbells Swastika Store when new owners bought it in 1914. It was on Thornburg Street, which doesn't exist today. It seems to have sold everything, but it went bankrupt in February 1916 and went out of business.
Last edition:
Wednesday, September 15, 1915. Counsels leave Northern Mexico, Syrians okay for citizenship.
Blog Mirror: Unplugging My Way to Recovery
Esther J. Cepeda writes on Unplugging as a way to recovery, and somewhat ironically she means unplugging electronic media.
There's a lot to be said for this, and not just from a health perspective, but also from a mental health and philosophic prospective.
There's a lot to be said for this, and not just from a health perspective, but also from a mental health and philosophic prospective.
Sounds Of The Past
Jenny, of the 1870 to 1917 blog, before her tragic passing, observed on M. L. Wright's blog:
Right she was.The difference between sound of a jet and the sound of any kind of prop plane, let alone the differences between various kinds of prop planes, is striking. It dawned on me at some point that the world we live in now has completely different sound effects than the worlds of the past. To take a trivial example, the cash registers of the past had a very distinctive “ka-ching!” when the transaction had been punched in and the cash drawer shot out. A lot of this difference in sounds has to do with the change from mechanical to electronic. Mechanisms gave us the distinctive rhythms and pulses of objects made of metal moving in some fashion. Even where the item in question remains essentially mechanical—say the diesel locomotive that replaced the steam locomotive—the sounds are different. The sounds of steam—that is a whole other story.
Wednesday, September 16, 2015
Is it smokey in here?
I ran this item last week, at the time that the Casper City Council reinstated a complete ban on smoking in public buildings, following the victory of an initiative movement in the Wyoming Supreme Court. That movement, backed by former city council woman Kim Holloway, achieved the Court's declaration that some signatures had been improperly rejected.
Lex Anteinternet: Today In Wyoming's History: September 8: Today In Wyoming's History: September 8 : 2015 In a controversial move, the Casper City Counsel reinstated a tavern and restau...
Subsequent events have brought to light the truth of Otto Von Bismarck's comment that "Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made."
Last night, making the first of three required votes on three readings, the City Council went on to officially repeal the amendment to the City's smoking law which had exempted bars. The thought was that by doing that, and restoring the original ordinance's complete ban, the need to hold the special election the initiative would have required would evaporate, as the goal of the petition was therefore met. So, we must note, there was a degree of cynicism in the vote, as the councilmen, as shown by their next vote, did not wish to genuinely reinstate a complete ban, as the petitioners did. Having said that, a couple genuinely supported the restoration of a complete ban.
Next the council voted to completely repeal the ban, thereby allowing smoking everywhere once again. Only two councilmen voted against that.
The debate heavily focused on property rights and on the plight of tavern owners whose patrons have fled to Mills, Evansville and Bar Nunn, neighboring towns which those from outside of Casper no doubt generally regard as part of Casper, but which have separate legal status and governments. The arguments against repealing a ban were weighted heavily on public health issues. I saw the council meeting on television, and the sides were well behaved and presented their views quite well.
The instinctively sympathetic view, around here anyway, is that a business owner should be allowed to do what they will, and the patrons can vote with their feet. There's some logic to that, but it does miss the point, raised but often not really well developed, that employees of any one workplace often are in a position where they have to work where there's work. I know that there's people who really like and aspire to be bar servers and tenders, but there's also a lot of people who find there way into those jobs, often temporarily, but sometimes long term, and have to stick with them for one reason or another. The "you can always quit" argument doesn't work for most other occupations anymore in recognition of that, but it's a common one for these occupations, which are often occupied by the workplace demographic that's least able to switch employments readily.
It also somewhat applied to patrons of restaurants and bars, although people rarely recognize that. If you are in business and everyone breaks for lunch and the nearest establishment is Smokey Joe's Bar Grill and Smokapalooza, you're gong there with everyone else working on that big project, as you'll have little other choice. No matter what your health situation may be. I well remember, for instance, being on breaks in trials for lunch where the only nearby restaurant, or the one the client recommended, featured smoke and being very conscious that I was now heading back to court smelling like cigarette smoke, something that non smokers are extremely conscious of but which smokers seem not to notice at all. This doesn't touch on the numerous people who are allergic or have reactions to cigarette smoke in one form or another. These folks don't really have the option of making a big deal out of their situation in a lot of instances.
I guess that makes it obvious that I wish they keep the smoke ban in place, but then I also feel that they shouldn't have voted to eliminate their compromise position that allowed smoking in bars, not because I want to smoke in a bar (obviously I don't smoke), but because it seemed to be a compromise that was working.
Which brings to mind the Italian proverb "Le meglio è l'inimico del bene", or "the perfect is the enemy of the good". It really is.
Passing a smoking ban was difficult in Casper in the first place. When it first came up around 2002 it was voted down, but then a decade later the full ban (oddly called the "fully leaded ban" in the debate) was passed, but thereafter shortly amended to exempt bars. That law was no doubt not perfect from anyone's perspective, but then the perspectives are so radically different that no law could satisfy that. For those who take the "property rights" position, no ban, perhaps on anything, would be ideal. For those who a radically opposed to cigarettes, I suppose banning cigarettes entirely would be ideal. No compromise is going to make everyone happy.
Which brings us to a likely ironic result of all of this. When Kim Holloway, a former city councilwoman, took to the streets with her petition to take this to the voters, the goal was to restore a full ban. But what now appears likely is that her actions have killed off the partial ban, or soon will. No doubt a new petition drive will start, and I'd guess Holloway will be leading the charge, but just listening to the city council and those who came to speak, I suspect that the tide has turned on this issue and the voters will side with the property rights argument. That will likely have less of an impact than supposed, as smoking is slowly declining in the population anyhow, and my guess (and hope) is that most of the restaurants aren't going to restore smoking, indeed a lot didn't allow it before the ban, and more than a few busy bars aren't going to allow it again either, now that they know that they can survive without smoking in the premises. So the hard feeling that we must ban smoking to have an impact is likely gone, and as our local economy declines, the feeling that we shouldn't mess with business owners will increase. But some bars that did allow smoking recently will go back to it, and I'd guess a few small cafes in town will also. The petition backers who sought to fully ban smoking, may have in fact restored it.
Lex Anteinternet: A few Labor Day observations. But wait. . . .
I recently ran this item:
This sort of touched on the decline in labor, and the reduction of blue collar labor as a demographic in the US.
But is that really true?
Perhaps, or almost certainly, it is, but as the Labor Day article by George S. Will pointed out, there's a lot of labor in the US, and a lot of it in the traditional categories. Lots of car manufacturing, and not just by the big three, for example. Indeed, a quiet story has been the re-industrialization of the US, often by foreign companies, coming in to take advantage of a skilled labor pool and shorter distance to their markets. All sorts of "European" and "Japanese" cars, for example, are made here in the US.
What is different about that, however, is that the workers aren't nearly as heavily unionized as they once were. Indeed, to some extent, heavy industry went overseas, shook off the unions, and came back. But in coming back, they largely were careful to preserve the gains the unions had made in many instances. It's been an interesting evolution over time.
Lex Anteinternet: A few Labor Day observations.: World War Two vintage Labor Day poster, produced by the Office of War Information. Labor Day was made a Federal holiday in 1886, when ...
This sort of touched on the decline in labor, and the reduction of blue collar labor as a demographic in the US.
But is that really true?
Perhaps, or almost certainly, it is, but as the Labor Day article by George S. Will pointed out, there's a lot of labor in the US, and a lot of it in the traditional categories. Lots of car manufacturing, and not just by the big three, for example. Indeed, a quiet story has been the re-industrialization of the US, often by foreign companies, coming in to take advantage of a skilled labor pool and shorter distance to their markets. All sorts of "European" and "Japanese" cars, for example, are made here in the US.
What is different about that, however, is that the workers aren't nearly as heavily unionized as they once were. Indeed, to some extent, heavy industry went overseas, shook off the unions, and came back. But in coming back, they largely were careful to preserve the gains the unions had made in many instances. It's been an interesting evolution over time.
Blog Mirror, for MId Week at Work: Quit Hating on Your Job
Esther J. Cepeda on Quit Hating On Your Job.
Definitely not the sort of career advice you commonly hear in the modern economy, but more realistic? And interestingly sort of a throw back to an earlier era.
Definitely not the sort of career advice you commonly hear in the modern economy, but more realistic? And interestingly sort of a throw back to an earlier era.
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
Evidence of changes in technology and transportation in geography.
The photograph above depicts a United Methodist Church in Hillsdale, Wyoming. Hillsdale is a really tiny town, with a population of under fifty people. It's on the Union Pacific.
By rail, it's less than 15 miles from Cheyenne. It's less than five miles from Burns, another little town, albeit one that's bigger than Hillsdale. Another five miles down the Union Pacific is the town of Egbert. And a few more, maybe eight or so, is the town of Pine Bluff. In Pine Bluff, I know, there's a Catholic Church.
I've been in Hillsdale (as of yesterday) and Pine Bluff, but I've never been in Burns.
Of these towns, only Pine Bluff and Cheyenne on are the Interstate Highway. Hillsdale is probably four miles or so off the Interstate Highway, effective marooned out there in the rolling hills of Laramie County, Wyoming.
I was actually amazed that this United Methodist Church is active. The Catholic church in Pine Bluff also is. So these communities are obviously keeping on keeping on, but what a change this evidences.
All of these towns were built on the Union Pacific Railroad. Only Pine Bluff and Cheyenne are on the Interstate. Coming in from Nebraska, I'm sure that well over 90% of all travelers go right by Pine Bluff. Leaving Cheyenne (and no, not the song, that takes you to Montana), probably nearly 100% of travelers go right by Pine Bluff.
All of these towns, save for Cheyenne, must have been built as farming towns along the Union Pacific. They're not far from each other today, but when founded they would have been just far enough to travel to each other, by wagon, and get back home, which is how they served the area farmers. That is, towns in this area where just far enough from towns so that you could get into one, conduct your business, and go back home. Saturday was traditionally the big "into town" day for farmers and these towns were probably pretty big on Saturdays. I'd guess that their populations swelled during Sundays as well, but how farmers got to services I don't know. In some regions of the country the population prior to World War Two heavily reflected a single faith or perhaps only a couple of faiths (and this is still the case in some regions), and perhaps that was the case in this region of Wyoming, but it wouldn't be the case for Wyoming in general at any single point.
These towns remained viable in the early automobile era, but clear by the 1950s the handwriting must have been pretty visible on the wall. Cheyenne is the dominant city in the area, and it always has been, but for all practical purposes its the only one that is truly fully viable now. That wouldn't have been true at one time.
If I could eliminate one thing from the planet for all time. . .
it would be the cell phone.
I hate them.
It's not that I don't use them, I do, a lot, but I really dislike them.
I dislike them for more than one reason, but my principal reason is that everyone under 25 years of age, and increasingly more people in older age brackets as time goes on, are glued to their little screens actually missing life. It's amazing.
People can't avoid checking Facebook or Instagram at the drop of a hat, on their little screens. They sit in restaurants and meetings with other people, looking at artificial electronic life over real life. They've grown unable to enjoy passing scenery from a car or airplane window. It's a sickness.
I also hate the degree of connectivity they have caused, although I enjoy that too. Now, people are tied to their apron stings to each other as never before, even while they also are able to preserve bonds that our highly mobile lifestyle would otherwise strain. There's a balance of considerations there, and I don't know how it comes out, but which ever way it comes out, it doesn't save this technology, which "improves" darned near every day, from being an overall bad development.
I hate them.
It's not that I don't use them, I do, a lot, but I really dislike them.
I dislike them for more than one reason, but my principal reason is that everyone under 25 years of age, and increasingly more people in older age brackets as time goes on, are glued to their little screens actually missing life. It's amazing.
People can't avoid checking Facebook or Instagram at the drop of a hat, on their little screens. They sit in restaurants and meetings with other people, looking at artificial electronic life over real life. They've grown unable to enjoy passing scenery from a car or airplane window. It's a sickness.
I also hate the degree of connectivity they have caused, although I enjoy that too. Now, people are tied to their apron stings to each other as never before, even while they also are able to preserve bonds that our highly mobile lifestyle would otherwise strain. There's a balance of considerations there, and I don't know how it comes out, but which ever way it comes out, it doesn't save this technology, which "improves" darned near every day, from being an overall bad development.
Wednesday, September 15, 1915. Counsels leave Northern Mexico, Syrians okay for citizenship.
Additional border strife was occuring, and U.S. diplomatic missions were pulling out of northern Mexico.
The U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that people from the Middle East were white, and therefore had the right to become U.S.citizens. The opinion read:
DOW v. UNITED STATES
Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, Case No. 1345
140 C.C.A. 549226 F. 1451915 U.S. App. LEXIS 2183
Filed: September 14, 1915 | Knapp, Pritchard, Woods | Author: WOODS, Circuit Judge.
Summary
Appeal from the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of South Carolina, at Charleston; Henry A. M. Smith, Judge.
Application by George Dow for naturalization was denied (211 Fed. 486), and on rehearing was again denied (213 Fed. 355), and applicant appeals.
[1] The appellant, George Dow, a Syrian, was denied naturalization on the sole ground that a Syrian of Asiatic birth is not a free white person within the meaning of the naturalization statute. After the first decision of the matter a rehearing was granted at the instance of other Syrians interested. In his two opinions the District Judge reached the conclusion, which he supported with remarkable force and learning, that the "free white persons" made eligible to naturalization by the statute included aliens of European nativity or descent, and no others.
The statute of 1790, with which legislation on the subject began, *146provided "that any alien being a free white person may be admitted to become a citizen," etc. The subject of naturalization was before Congress on propositions for amendment or repeal and re-enactment of existing .laws in 1795, 1798, 1802, 1813, 1814, 1816, 1824, 1828, 1848, 1862, 1867, 1868, 1873, 1874, 1875, 1876, 1882, 1894, 1898, and 1903. The section with which we are concerned now stands in these words:
"Sec. 2169. The provisions of this title shall apply to aliens being free white persons and to aliens of African nativity and to persons of African descent."
In 1790, when the first act was passed, immigration to this country was almost altogether from Europe; and doubtless the act of 1790 was intended mainly to provide for naturalization of aliens from Europe, and to deny naturalization to negroes. With other peoples this country had little intercourse and little concern. Accordingly the records of Congress indicate that the debates on tire bill of 1790 related to European immigration. It is reasonably certain that congressmen had no knowledge of Blumenbach's classification of the races of men published in 1781, in which he makes one of the divisions the white or Caucasian race and includes in it "the western Asiatics on this side of the Caspian Sea and the Ganges"; for his work was not translated from the.German and published in English until 1807. The science of ethnology had made little advance in 1790, and the notion of racial division and the meaning of the term "white" in a comprehensive sense as applied to men were probably quite vague and indefinite in the minds of legislators. Yet in not mentioning the people of Europe, and in extending the privilege of naturalization to any "free white person," it seems reasonable to think that the Congress must have believed that there were white persons natives of countries outside of Europe. The writers on the subject of that day, to say the least, were not agreed in the view that Europeans were the only white people.
If it be assumed, however, that the preponderance of the argument is strongly in favor of the conclusion that in 1790 the popular understanding was that people of European nativity or descent -were white, and that all others were colored, and that legislators had not in definite view any persons as white, except those of European nativity or descent, that would not be conclusive of the construction to be given to the present statute. The popular conception of race division became more distinct as time went on. Blumenbach's work probably became known in this country soon after 1807, when it was published in English; and his division, though the basis of it is now discarded, seems to have been that generally accepted. The opinions of later writers are in accord with Blumenbach's that Syrians are to be classed as white people. Pritchard, Natural History of Man, 1848; Pickering, Races of Man, 1851; Eiguier, The Human Race, 1872; Jeffries, Natural History of the Human Race, 1869; Brinton, Races and Peoples, 1901; Keane, World's Peoples, 1908. In the Dictionary of Races, contained in the Reports of the Immigration Commission, 1911, it is said:
*147"I'li.vüieall.v tko modern Syrians are of mixed Syrian, Arabian, and even Jewish blood. They belong to the Semitic branch of the Caucasian race, thus widely differing from their rulers, the Turks, who are in origin Mongolian."
We have, then, this condition: That in the numerous reconsiderations of the statute, when it was amended or repealed and re-enacted, the Congress must have been aware that certain Asiatics, near the Mediterranean Sea, including Syrians, were generally classed as white people. It seems to follow that, even if the Congress of 1790 considered that the law of that year would be understood to allow the naturalization of persons of European nativity or descent only, the legislators of later years could not have supposed that the term "free white persons" would carry that restricted meaning. This growth of popular and legislative conception of the meaning of "free white persons" from 1790 to 1875, the date of the last enactment on the subject, is the controlling factor in ascertaining the meaning legislators intended should be given to the words as they stand in the present law.
In addition to amendments at various times on other points, there was a repeal and a new statute in 1802, and partial repeals and new statutes in 1824 and 1828. In 1870 there was a vigorous debate on the proposition to amend the law by striking out altogether the limitation to "free white persons," so that all aliens without regard to race could be naturalized. This proposed amendment was defeated, but it resulted in the extension of the privilege of naturalization to "aliens of African nativity and African descent." In 1873 the report of the committee on revision of the laws omitted the limiting words, "free white persons." This report was adopted, and the limitation was thus removed, with the result that an alien of any race could obtain naturalization. Upon discovery of the omission in 1874, the Congress amended the law in 1875 by inserting the limiting words, "being free white persons and aliens."
Certainly it cannot be said that, after all this legislative discussion and reconsideration and enactment, the present statute must be construed in the light of the knowledge and conception of the legislators who passed the original statute in 1790, without respect to the more definite and general knowledge and conception which must be attributed to the legislators who, upon reconsideration of the whole subject, enacted subsequent statutes including that now in force.
[2,3] A, repealed statute has no force, and in arriving at the meaning of words used in a new statute the court must look to the meaning which the words had at the time of the new enactment. It is true that, if the words used in the old statute had received authoritative interpretation at the time they were used in the new statute, that meaning would be held to be carried into the new statute. But in this instance there had been no authoritative construction before the repeals and new enactments above set forth. In the absence of such prior construction, the court must take into account the history of legislation, and be controlled by the generally accepted meaning of the words used at the time of the passage of the new statute. Bate Refrigerating Co. *148v. Sulzberger, 157 U. S. 1, 15 Sup. Ct. 508, 39 L. Ed. 601; Cambria Iron Co. v. Ashburn, 118 U. S. 54, 6 Sup. Ct 929, 30 L. Ed. 60.
At the date of the new acts and amendments, especially the act of 1873, with its amendment of 1875, it seems to.be true beyond question that the generally received opinion was that tire inhabitants of a portion of Asia, including Syria, were to be classed as white persons. It is true that Syria and the contiguous countries of Asia near the Mediterranean have been subjected to many changes in their inhabitants through conquest and other causes, and that the present inhabitants have racial descent from many different sources. Yet, as the consensus of opinion at the time of the enactment of the statute now in force was that they were so closely related to their neighbors on the European side of the Mediterranean that they should he classed as white, they must be held to fall within the term "white persons" used in the statute. The statute has been given this more liberal construction, so as to include within the term "white persons" Syrians, Armenians, and Parsees. In re Halladjian (C. C.) 174 Fed. 834; In re Najour (C. C.) 174 Fed. 735; In re Mudarri (C. C.) 176 Fed. 465; In re Ellis (D. C.) 179 Fed. 1002; In re Balsara, 180 Fed. 694, 103 C. C. A. 660. And it seems that in accordance with this construction of the statute a large number of Syrians have been naturalized without question. It is significant that, in view of these decisions and this practice of the courts, the Congress has not seen fit to change the law.
Reversed.
The British troopship Patagonia was sunk in the Black Sea off of Odessa by the UB-7. The U-6 was sunk in the North Sea off of Stavanger by the submarine HMS E16.
The pro democracy Chinese journal New Youth commenced publication.
Last edition:
Tuesday, September 14, 1915. The German Navy restricts Zeppelin raids.
Monday, September 14, 2015
Judge Posner writes on the Federal bench
The legendary Judge Richard Posner, whom I'm not really a fan of, has just released a book on the state of the law in the United States.
For those not familiar with Posner, he is a well regarded Federal judge who writes a great deal. Once mentioned as a possible candidate for the Supreme Court every time a Democratic President was in office, that no longer seems to be the case, but his output has not diminished. Nor has it become less accute in tone.
Now, I'm not really a fan of Posner, quite frankly. He's heavily associated with the economic school of thought in law, and I'm not a fan of that type of reasoning. He's generally left of center, and at least his recent critique of the Scalia was regarded as sufficiently unfair that one of his admirers on the Federal bench took after him on his own blawg.
But at least in his current book, if the Wall Street Journal comments on it are any guide, he may be spot on. Indeed his comments sound a lot like, well, mine.
Consider his comment that relates to the aging on the bench, a topic that's been discussed here more than once.
Not being subject to compulsory retirement and able to delegate much of their work to staff, federal judges sometimes fail to retire even when old age and its related ills have greatly impaired their judicial performance. To be blunt, there is a problem of judicial senility and it is growing with the general increase in the longevity of the American population.
Hmmm. . . Posner sounds like, well. . . . me when I worried about the Wyoming Legislature taking out the state mandatory retirement age for judges.
Or his comment on lack of diversity at the Supreme Court:
I believe that the average quality of justices back then was slightly higher than that of the current justices, that the current justices are overstaffed, talk too much at oral argument, and devote excessive time to extrajudicial activities, but that what made the earlier Court better despite its meager resources by current standards was mainly the diversity in the Justices’ professional backgrounds. Today. judged by educational and professional backgrounds, and despite pronounced ideological differences, the Justices are peas in a pod.
Interesting comment, and I can't disagree.
Here's one where I suspect that Posner must be following me around and reading my blog:
The increase in the number of law schools has caused a reduction in the average quality of law school graduates and a concomitant reduction in the average quality of lawyers who practice in the federal courts. And the increased size of laws school faculties has resulted in an increased number of the faculty members whom I’ve term “refugees” from more competitive or less lucrative fields and who have little interest in the actual judicial process and little ability to contribute to that process.
Law professors as "refugees", well in my entire quarter century of work as a lawyer I've heard one, and only one, lawyer use that term this way, that being. . . me. Judge Posner, is that you there in the shawdow? Hey, wait. . . . Well, good observation.
I may have to buy his book.
Tuesday, September 14, 1915. The German Navy restricts Zeppelin raids.
Admiral Henning von Holtzendorff, Chief of the German Naval Staff, following the orders of the German General Staff, ordered German naval airships raiding London to restrict their bombing targets to the banks of the River Thames.
Border strife made the headlines:
Last edition:
Labels: 1910s, 1915, Equine Transportation, Mexican Border War, Public Land, Sedicionistas, Texas, World War One, Wyoming
Monday at the Bar: Courthouses of the West: Tulsa Municipal Building, Tulsa Oklahoma
Courthouses of the West: Tulsa Municipal Building, Tulsa Oklahoma:
This is the Tulsa, Oklahoma Municipal Building which housed Tulsa's government between 1917 and 1960. While I'm not certain that it housed a courthouse, it has that appearance, and I strongly suspect that the city's municipal courthouse was located here. This building no longer houses Tulsa's city offices.
Sunday, September 13, 2015
What's with the all the hugely overblown football movies?
My long suffering spouse loves football.
I don't hate it, I just can't develop an interest in it.
But my patience with football movies is strained to the extreme.
One of the things that I don't get is the plethora of simply over the top football movies. As my spouse likes the games, she likes the movies, so when they are on television, they're on here, even if we have seen them a million times.
The age of melodrama may be over in all other forms of movies, but not in football movies. Villains no longer tie damsels to tracks, women don't faint at the sight of violence, war films are cynical even when patriotic, but football movies are the exception.
The coaches are so noble that the films encroach on being hagiographies. In an era when we've seen real coaches reputations tainted by icky scandals, they aren't in football movies. The players are noble in the extreme, and rise above adversity in a way that used to be the case for boxing movies.
Sigh.
What happened to The North Dallas Forty?
I don't hate it, I just can't develop an interest in it.
But my patience with football movies is strained to the extreme.
One of the things that I don't get is the plethora of simply over the top football movies. As my spouse likes the games, she likes the movies, so when they are on television, they're on here, even if we have seen them a million times.
The age of melodrama may be over in all other forms of movies, but not in football movies. Villains no longer tie damsels to tracks, women don't faint at the sight of violence, war films are cynical even when patriotic, but football movies are the exception.
The coaches are so noble that the films encroach on being hagiographies. In an era when we've seen real coaches reputations tainted by icky scandals, they aren't in football movies. The players are noble in the extreme, and rise above adversity in a way that used to be the case for boxing movies.
Sigh.
What happened to The North Dallas Forty?
That annual reminder you just don't get it on the great American national past time.
Conversation with a lawyer down in Oklahoma.
He: "So, who do you guys follow up there this time of year?"
Me: "Huh? Um. . . ."
He: I suppose you all follow UW, eh? Are there any other teams?
Me (now realizing that we're probably talking about university football): "Oh, yeah. . we follow UW, it's the state's only four year university and the only one up here with a team. . . ."
He: "Are they still coached by that coach. . . oh you'll know the name, who coached in Iowa (or some such place)?"
Me (now realizing the game is up): "Um, well I don't know. . . I don't really follow football so I'm not sure who the coach is or where he's from. . . "
Embarrassment.
I wish I did follow football, as I'm always odd man out this time of year. But try as I might, I just can't develop an interest in it, and I've given up trying. I did use to try nearly every year, but I conceded. It's hopeless. I don't know what teams are good or bad, and I don't even know how UW is doing or going to do. Oh well.
He: "So, who do you guys follow up there this time of year?"
Me: "Huh? Um. . . ."
He: I suppose you all follow UW, eh? Are there any other teams?
Me (now realizing that we're probably talking about university football): "Oh, yeah. . we follow UW, it's the state's only four year university and the only one up here with a team. . . ."
He: "Are they still coached by that coach. . . oh you'll know the name, who coached in Iowa (or some such place)?"
Me (now realizing the game is up): "Um, well I don't know. . . I don't really follow football so I'm not sure who the coach is or where he's from. . . "
Embarrassment.
I wish I did follow football, as I'm always odd man out this time of year. But try as I might, I just can't develop an interest in it, and I've given up trying. I did use to try nearly every year, but I conceded. It's hopeless. I don't know what teams are good or bad, and I don't even know how UW is doing or going to do. Oh well.
Defeated People: The Old Believers
Church of St. Nicholas, Old Believer (with clergy) church in Nikolaevsk Alaska.
As the very few readers of this blog know, I was recently in the Homer Alaska area, and I happened to enter one of the small communities there made up of Old Believers. That there even were Old Believers in the area came as a surprise to me, so being curious of mind I looked some stuff up about them.
Not that I wasn't previously aware of them, or unaware that there were some in Alaska. They fit this category nicely.
So, who are the Old Believers?
To understand this story requires some familiarity with Russian Orthodoxy. Given as this isn't a theological article, and as even it were it would have to be written by somebody other than me, I won't discuss that at length, but what I will simply note is that Russia was Christianized by the Eastern Christianity. That isn't, I'll note, the same thing as saying that it was Christianized by the Orthodox, as that was prior to the Great Schism. The Russian branch of the Eastern Church became autocephalus in 1589, however, which was after the Great Schism had occurred, and after the periodic efforts to repair it ultimately failed. It's a complicated story, and it wouldn't be true that all Russian bishops have always been outside of communion with Rome, but most have been and that is all a separate story.
Anyhow, between 1652 and 1658, the Russian Orthodox Church made a number of reforms, most of which, quite frankly, seem quite valid as they corrected errors between Greek and Russian translations, and the like. Some of the differences in practices changed were so slight, that modern readers can hardly believe that they would have caused a schism, but they did, and the Old Believers were having none of it. They were fairly immediately repressed with their refusal to go along declared an anathema.
Now, to many in the western world today this story would seemingly play out with this group causing a splinter, but that being principally the end of the story, except of course to them. But, in 17th Century Imperial Russia, this could not have been the case, so they were accordingly repressed.
"Vasily Surikov - Боярыня Морозова - Google Art Project" by Vasily Surikov - ogHGQgd1Ws9Htg at Google Cultural Institute. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons. Created on 31 December 1886. Published before 1923 and public domain in the US. T his work depicts noblewoman Boyaryna Morozova at the time of her arrest, depicting in her hand the old way of giving the sign of the cross, rather than the new way, one of the sticking points of the Old Believers.
So there were arrests and repression.
But they kept on keeping on, and in fact, although a minority of Russian Orthodox, they kept on keeping on all the way up to the Russian Revolution. And this in spite of the fact that no bishops went with them, which meant that what clergy that did go with them died off within a relatively close time to the schism, leaving them it what would seemingly be a true crisis for a member of any of the apostolic churches.
They even kept on after the Russian Revolution during which time the Russian Orthodox Church was enormously suppressed. At that point, some fled, going to China, and ultimately from there to South America. While some remain in South America, many later relocated to the United States, with some subsequently relocating to Alaska.
Cafe in Nikolaevsk, Alaska, an Old Believers village.
They're still around, although this story has evolved a bit in the last forty years. Some groups around the world have reincorporated clergy, being satisfied, in their view, with the orthodoxy of at least some bishops. The Russian Orthodox Church has, for its part, issued an apology for the early repressions of them, although that has not served to bring them back into the Russian Orthodox fold. But the modern world has been a challenge for them, in retaining their ongoing viability. Some villages remain extremely isolated and exclusive, while others do not. It'll be interesting to see what becomes of them.
Be that as it may, if the much more numerous Amish have managed to remain a distinct group, one would suppose the Old Believers will as well, unless the solvent of modern western life, combined with a reproachment with Orthodoxy, causes things to slowly break down, and perhaps even provide redress, for their complaints.
Saturday, September 12, 2015
Sunday, September 12, 1915. Musa Dagh.
The German General Staff restricted German airships to bombing London's docks and harbor works.
The Battle of Musa Dagh concluded as a rare Armenian victory over the Ottomans, after a prolonged defensive battle. The Armenians were evacuated by the French Navy to Port Said.
Last edition:
Saturday, September 11, 1915. Bulgaria mobilizes.
Irritated With Infrastructure
One of Casper's many closed roads, due to construction.
You can't get there from here.
Or at least it seems that way.
I realize that a person is not supposed to complain about improvements or repairs to infrastructure. Indeed, a person is supposed to be worried about how little of this occurs in the United States.
But you wouldn't realize that from around here.
Due to a really weird fluke in budgeting all sort of heavy construction that normally takes place in the summer commenced just before Fall. This isn't the fault of the contractors, I'm sure they'd rather work in summer, when they have more help and better weather, but due to some budgeting oddity, it didn't happen that way.
And I should really be glad for all this work being done, particularly when state revenues are declining and there's a real danger now that such work might not be as well funded in the future.
But it's easy to forget that on the way to work. I now can no longer easily get anywhere in town as there's so much road and sewer construction going on. I should grit my teeth and bare it, but it's easier to whine.
Much of the sewer work being done is being funded by Natrona County's .01 Cent sales tax, which generates a lot of revenue at next to no pain for local residents. Signs have been put up reminding us of where the money came from, but early in the morning, before the coffee kicks in, that might not send the best message.
And in regards to signs, the School District put up a nice sign down by one of the high school construction projects about how that was budgeted. That, however, irritates me as I can't help but continue to feel the pain over the loss of the pool at NCHS as it undergoes massive reconstruction. It's not the only high school undergoing that, however, as KWHS is also undergoing reconstruction, and the third new campus that will serve them both is undergoing reconstruction. Would that the strategy had been just to put in a new high school, and then perhaps necessary repairs and preservation of the pool could have been undertaken at the other schools, a more modest goal.
The reconstruction at the high schools themselves is slated to take years. That also amazes me, as construction projects on public works that take years to complete baffle me. They likely baffle me as I'm not an engineer and I have no knowledge of the real practicalities of heavy construction. I looked it up, however, and I note the Pentagon only took 18 months to build. But, in fairness, it would have taken years to build under normal circumstances, and World War Two was not normal.
So I have no real complaint there either, but I do wish the construction was complete. Probably everyone does. But I also wish it was complete with a pool at NC.
I also wish the highway construction just getting up and rolling (that fall thing again) west and east of town was complete. There's construction now going in either direction.
Here, on one project, I really have to wonder. The state is building another bypass around the city, way out, under the concept that this relieves traffic that otherwise goes right into the city. But does it? It seems to me that the main impact of bypasses is to direct development into a new area, so the plan never really works.
If they are going to do it, however, and I wish in that case they were not, I do with they'd get it done. The one project, complete with a highway bridge, has been lingering in a state of incompletion for some time, and it's odd to now see it recommence. Again, it's a budgeting thing.
The state is also doing something out by the area we call Government Bridge, but which maps like to call Trappers Route. That rural area has undergone a slow development in recent years, but the project doesn't seem related to that. It looks like a huge turnout for trucks is being built. I hope that's all the more it is.
So, I guess I overall have no complaints here, but it's sure odd to experience all of this is the Fall of the year.
I guess, in context, Casper of the late teens and early 20s must have been a lot like this, as a huge amount of construction all over town was going on.
Friday, September 11, 2015
Rabbits
According to the BBC, the British location Ness on Lewis, an island, is enduring a plague of rabbits and is going to have to dramatically cull them or suffer environmental consequences.
The odd thing is that, this year, the rabbits are at crazy numbers as well.
The whole northern hemisphere perhaps?
The odd thing is that, this year, the rabbits are at crazy numbers as well.
The whole northern hemisphere perhaps?
1915
I was on a ranch earlier this week, where the rancher pointed out the house that his grandfather had built (a very small one), when he homesteaded the place in 1915.
Interesting to think of, and they were working the place they'd owned for a century. And interesting to think of what that location, quite accessible today, must have been like in 1915. The tiny town that was nearby no longer is there, but a somewhat larger small town that's not far off today, and a going concern, would have been a fairly long trip at the time.
So, less isolated. Less viable? And have things really improved?
Interesting to think of, and they were working the place they'd owned for a century. And interesting to think of what that location, quite accessible today, must have been like in 1915. The tiny town that was nearby no longer is there, but a somewhat larger small town that's not far off today, and a going concern, would have been a fairly long trip at the time.
So, less isolated. Less viable? And have things really improved?
Blog Mirror: Why do people believe myths about the Confederacy? Because our textbooks and monuments are wrong.
A friend drew my attention to this item in the Washington Post, "Why do people believe myths about the Confederacy? Because our textbooks and monuments are wrong."
Well worth reading.
Saturday, September 11, 1915. Bulgaria mobilizes.
Bulgara, now in the Central Powers, began the mobilization of its forces.
Last edition:
Thursday, September 9, 1915. Duma seeks resignations.
Thursday, September 10, 2015
Energy preview of coming attractions.
According to the most recent issue of the AAPG explorer, Iran has the capacity to add 500,000 bbls/day to its production capacity relatively easily. Beyond that, however, a decline in its petroleum infrastructure requires investment and building.
If that's done, it can add up to 900,000 bbls/day. That's small, compared to Saudi Arabia, or the United States, but it's not insignificant. The decline in US production due to the fall in prices has been about 130,000 bbls/day.
The long and the short of this is that the recent glut of petroleum on the market is likely to increase after the recent agreement with Iran is finalized. This will take months to have an impact, but the overall impact is to keep petroleum prices low, and perhaps drive them lower. Oil at lower than $40/bbl for the foreseeable future seems likely.
On other news, contrary to some Internet myths, generation of electricity by wind power is now cheaper than any other market alternative, and the expansion of the same is retarded only by access to transmission lines. This means that the argument on wind's viability is over, in spite of there being a local debate on the same with some insisting that it's dirtier in absolute terms than coal, and not viable but for government assistance. It's gotten over its initial economic teething stage and locally it's only held up by regulation and a lack of transmission lines.
None of this will be really popular news locally, as it would appear nearly certain that we've entered a stage where oil exploration will really stall out and coal will continue to decline. But stating those apparent facts, particularly for somebody whose lived through it before, doesn't mean a person is wishing the results, only noting what the facts seem to lead to.
Wednesday, September 9, 2015
Today In Wyoming's History: September 8
Today In Wyoming's History: September 8:
2015 In a controversial move, the Casper City Counsel reinstated a tavern and restaurant smoking ban following the decision of the Wyoming Supreme Court that signatures on an earlier referendum petition had been, in some cases, improperly discarded from counting. The vote was not unanimous and it certainly set the stage for further debate.
My, what a huge change this has been over a couple of decades ago.
Even a couple of decades ago a person going into a bar simply expected to come back out smelling like cigarettes. Restaurants were the same way.
Now this is an exceptional occurrence, and you don't expect it.
Actress, smoking a cigar, in a photo that was probably intended to be shocking at the time as women didn't smoke until the 1920s, for the most part.
Indeed, now smokers are often banished to outdoors. Just yesterday, in walking a short distance early in the day downtown, I came around a corner and found some woman office worker smoking in the early morning cold. Looking rather forlorn and even guilty.
In regards to smoking, times have rally changed.
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Related threads:
Smoking It Up.
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Related threads:
Smoking It Up.
Thursday, September 9, 1915. Duma seeks resignations.
Elected members of the Duma pushed for the resignation of all of the government's ministers.
Last edition:
Wednesday, September 8, 1915. Air raids over London. Bumper crop.
Tuesday, September 8, 2015
Op Ed on the Y Cross Sale, Oil City News
The Oil City News has an Op Ed by a member of the University of Wyoming Foundation Board of Directors regarding the recent sale of the Y Cross ranch. That article can be found here.
The gist of the article is that the ranch was losing money and there was little other choice but to sell.
Perhaps, but I still remain unconvinced. Could they have leased the ground out for a time, for instance? Could they simply have run it as an agricultural campus? What else was explored?
The gist of the article is that the ranch was losing money and there was little other choice but to sell.
Perhaps, but I still remain unconvinced. Could they have leased the ground out for a time, for instance? Could they simply have run it as an agricultural campus? What else was explored?
Lex Anteinternet: NCSD Board Policy 5375. Dress Code.
I suppose it was predictable, but none the less I'm surprised that this story:
That's fine, and to their credit the schools are using this as a "teachable moment" in terms of encouraging students to think and voice their opinions. But among those opinion is one set that is, quite frankly, amazingly dense.
That set of opinions is one, now frequently heard, that the dress code objectifies women and encourages violence against them, whereas if they were allowed to show more skin it would teach men to suppress their baser motives and treat women as equals.
Yeah, right.
1,000,000+ years of evolution has made the male of this species a visual animal in this area. A lack of clothing doesn't go towards the higher centers of male reasoning, and isn't going to. But the amazing thing is that there are people who have apparently bought off on that nonsense, which has been in circulation for about 40 years. There's a reason that advertisers use women wearing little in the way of clothing if they can, and why there's an entire industry devoted to selling photographs of women who have lost their clothing.
A dose reality here is in order. And would benefit young women here to learn that fact. Treating women like objects is never excusable, but encouraging it through ignorance or intent is not either.
Lex Anteinternet: NCSD Board Policy 5375. Dress Code.: The current NCSD dress code. Usually with something like this, the poster, if he's been out of school over 20 years (and I have. ....has had the legs that it has. It's still getting a little press, and one of the "student organizers" was even featured on MTV recently.
That's fine, and to their credit the schools are using this as a "teachable moment" in terms of encouraging students to think and voice their opinions. But among those opinion is one set that is, quite frankly, amazingly dense.
That set of opinions is one, now frequently heard, that the dress code objectifies women and encourages violence against them, whereas if they were allowed to show more skin it would teach men to suppress their baser motives and treat women as equals.
Yeah, right.
1,000,000+ years of evolution has made the male of this species a visual animal in this area. A lack of clothing doesn't go towards the higher centers of male reasoning, and isn't going to. But the amazing thing is that there are people who have apparently bought off on that nonsense, which has been in circulation for about 40 years. There's a reason that advertisers use women wearing little in the way of clothing if they can, and why there's an entire industry devoted to selling photographs of women who have lost their clothing.
A dose reality here is in order. And would benefit young women here to learn that fact. Treating women like objects is never excusable, but encouraging it through ignorance or intent is not either.
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