The Minuteman and a question.

From 1909

But, raising a point worth considering.

That minute man was likely a yeoman farmer.  A freeholder in a country most made up of freeholders, in the town and country (but which also featured slavery and indentured servitude everywhere).

How much of the country that he caused to come into being would he recognize today?

And for how long could he have recognized it, if we assume that it would be unrecognizable today (which perhaps we should not assume).

The Big Speech: A Nation of Cowards

A link to the famous essay 

A NATION OF COWARDS

Jeffrey R. Snyder

OUR SOCIETY has reached a pinnacle of self-expression and respect for individuality rare or unmatched in history. Our entire popular culture --from fashion magazines to the cinema -- positively screams the matchless worth of the individual, and glories in eccentricity, nonconformity,independent judgment, and self-determination. This enthusiasm is reflected in the prevalent notion that helping someone entails increasing that person's "self-esteem"; that if a person properly values himself, he will naturally be a happy, productive, and, in some inexplicable fashion,responsible member of society.. .

"The peoples who allow the natural bases of society to be destroyed by the artificial conditions of the new urban civilisation"

A long time ago, in this site, I created a topic called Random Snippets. These are quotes I just think are interesting, and they tend to speak for themselves.  I pick them up in all sort of places.

Everyone once and awhile, however, I'll run across something that, while short, is so significant, that it deserves more than a a "random snippet" comment, maybe.  The risk in commenting on something like this is that a person, in trying to unpack the comment, can actually do it damage.  I hope that I don't do that.

I'll also note that one of the real risks of having a blog like this is that sooner or later people really begin to get a clue on how you think. . . which can be dangerous.  But then, maybe people have a duty to be honest.

Anyhow, this is a quote from English historian Christopher Dawson, form the blog-site dedicated to him.  His writing are always interesting, but this one is really prophetic.

The peoples who allow the natural bases of society to be destroyed by the artificial conditions of the new urban civilisation will gradually disappear and their place will be taken by those populations which live under simpler conditions and preserve the traditional forms of the family.

Christoper Dawson, from his History of Religion and Culture.

This is somewhat related, I'll note, to a quote from Belloc from a blog run by the same fellow, that being:

Cultures spring from religions; ultimately the vital force which maintains any culture is its philosophy, its attitude toward the universe; the decay of religion involves the decay of the culture corresponding to it—we see that most clearly in the breakdown of Christendom today.

Belloc, Dawson and Chesterton, who all had statements of this type, are all now dead.  It's easy, therefore, for the critics of this line of thinking to dismiss there statements.  "We haven't collapsed yet" is the pat reply.

Well, maybe not so fast on that.

Indeed, these statements are downright prophetic.

I've long worried that in our struggle with Islamic extremism we were missing certain points that they have, and as we miss them, we can't, and we won't, address them.  Indeed, in a battle of ideas and philosophies, you can't win, if you don't have any ideas and your philosophy is that any philosophy is as good as another. I think a lot of people, frankly, realize that to some extent, but because the prevailing small "l" liberal elites truly believe the opposite and shout down anyone who maintains this, we aren't hearing much about it.  Chesterton, Belloc and Dawson, when they were writing, saw the manifestations of it, at a time at which it was already very highly developed amongst the elite classes but at a time at which it had not yet seeped down to the middle classes and lower classes.  Now it has.  They weren't wrong, they were just early and still had an audience that understood what they were saying.  Now that audience is very small, and the bulk of the population may have a difficult time grasping the argument.  And as the argument is, in some ways, as essential feature of an argument we are having with Islam, that really matters.

In other words, we may be loosing the war.  Not on the front. But on the battlefield of ideas. As we don't really have any.  Or not many.  Or maybe many, and many good ones, but we lack an understanding of what they are pinned on, and if without a solid foundation, they're on pretty shaky ground.

I know that we say we have deep ideals.  We say we're for "freedom" or maybe "democracy", but those words don't mean much if they aren't formed in a rational context.  Freedom doesn't actually mean absolute license. That's anarchy, which isn't free, as everyone is then slave to everyone else's personal whims.  Nor does freedom mean that everyone is free to define their own values as that would attempt a freedom so radical that it would free a person from nature itself, which is impossible, exceedingly narcissistic, and warped.  But that's actually the definition of freedom and "values" which our highly liberal society has basically adopted.  And it's pretty darned shallow.   Values have to be absolutes or aim at absolutes, if they are to mean anything.

That our currently prevailing concept of values is exceedingly shallow is pretty obvious to other cultures, whether they are grounded in Western values or not.  African cultures which were once colonized by the West and which adopted Western values now legitimately look askance at us as having become rather debased.  Middle Eastern cultures, which are not Westernized, often view us as wholly corrupt.

And that's' the problem. We can hardly argue for free will, a cultural aspect that is Western, if we do not also acknowledge that free will means that a person can freely opt to yield to their own imperfections, or at least that imperfections exist. That is, without acknowledging that can and and does exist as a state of nature, we appear to be lying to ourselves and everyone else.  The fellow in the gutter can claim to be sitting on a thrown, but at the point at which we all must pretend he's on a thrown, we all look pretty messed up. A genius can opt to work as a convenience clerk, or not at all, but the point at which we must pretend that lives up to his potential we are all living below ours.  A person can live with their own imperfections, struggle to overcome them, or simply yield to them, but a person can't argue that imperfections which are contrary to obvious nature are to be celebrated or that others have a moral duty to pretend that no imperfections exist.

But that's pretty much the point we are at right now.

This past week, as an example, the Federal government declared that those who are in one gender and switch by surgical means to another must be accepted in the Army in that condition. This isn't tolerance, its in contravention to nature.  Indeed, even the DSM still defines people in this condition as having a mental illness, although it no doubt will take that out once the people who define what is and isn't an illness operate to take this out, as they undoubtedly will, demonstrating how little science goes into psychology.  A person can't change genders any more than they can change species.  It's impossible.  There are only two.  That's nature.  Surgery to change that is deeply debased and indeed one of the pioneering US operations that did that has stopped due to the high risks of suicide it was found to entail. That society would now pretend its okay shows that we have a pretty debased society.

We didn't get here all at once, to be sure.  And it is not as if we have not always had our problems. But the pace of this descent is accelerating markedly.  At some point after the Second World War we lost track of a concept that the dignity of work was largely in providing for a person's family, and not an exercise in self accumulation.   That really turned the focus on ourselves over anyone else.  In the 1960s this grew more pronounced, to be aided by a pharmaceutical development in the early 1970s, so that even those acts that were personal to couples and associated with keeping the species around became mere entertainment for the self.  That naturally developed to what we have now, where entire bodies of law are actually devoted to nothing other than a person's basest biological urges and how they can manipulate it for temporary satisfaction.  The concept that a person would even be defined, or self define, based on that is a stunning decline in seriousness.  When Justice Kennedy gave voice to a judicial coup this past year, trampling on any legal and sane reading of the U.S. Constitution, it ushered in the full era of obsession with gender being defined by the self as being , essentially, the defining characteristic of the Western World as viewed from the outside.

It isn't as it hasn't been notice, and reacted to.  Early in our struggle with Al Queda analysis into what drove western born Muslims into the arms of extremists found that they were generally horrified by the personal conduct of westerners in this area, which in their view demonstrated that the west was corrupt and meant that the expression of high ideals by the west was largely a sham.  And indeed cultures that can think of nothing better to stand for than absolute license in the bedroom really don't stand for anything worth standing for.

Some remnant of the earlier standards do exist, although there is little to thank some of the supposed standard bearers for in regards to that.  And indeed its oddly been noticed by some of the same demographic.  In Europe it's been recently noted that there's an increasing waive of conversion to the old Christian churches by Muslim immigrants, and in the Middle East itself its apparently a huge underground movement as well. The irony of this is that these people, who have been exposed to the  horror of the Islamic sanction of violence and have lost their faith in Islam, do indeed recognized what it was that made the West a decent society with strong ideals in the first place, Christianity.

It wasn't the Socialist theorist like Marx, or the supposedly enlightened figures of late 18th Century France, who brought into Europe, an thence to the Western Hemisphere, and thence around the globe, high minded concepts like democracy, rights for women, respect for the poor, equality of the races, and the like. That was Christianity.  Nearly anything decent and honorable in European and European influenced cultures originates there. And nearly anything that stands in contrast with traditional Christian moral concepts tends to have a disturbing origin in our society.

Where all of this leads in the end nobody can be sure. But in a giant struggle of the "West" v Islamic extremism, Islam, right now, has an advantage in that they it at least credits a standard of nature, even if it looks at through warped lenses from our prospective.  We stand, right now, mostly for mush.  It will be hard to beat a determined enemy with a concrete concept of theology and metaphysics if we stand nothing more for how far we can push the envelope in an area which used to mostly be the deep property of married persons.  If we don't reform that, we likely won't win.  Perhaps hopefully, while we self obsess on what makes us "personally fulfilled", and while Justice Kennedy and his fellow travelers reduce the Constitution to the song lyrics from an episode of Ren and Stimpy,  those who have come in more recently sometimes understand our old ideals, and what they stem from, better than we seemingly do.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: Our Lady of the Woods Catholic Church, Dubois Wyoming

Churches of the West: Our Lady of the Woods Catholic Church, Dubois Wyoming

This is Our Lady of the Woods Catholic Church in Dubois, Wyoming, which is a mission church in the Catholic Diocese of Cheyenne served by the Parish in Riverton, Wyoming.

It's disturbing when you find yourself agreeing with one of those statements somebody's printed on money.

One of those things that makes you want to reconsider some of your own views. . .

Sheridan Enterprise, July 2, 1916. Mexico and the Somme

Border tensions shared front space with the British offensive on the Somme on July 2, one day after the British offensive had commenced.

The sunny side of the street

The first day of the Somme

Gordan Highlanders advancing, July 1, 1916.

By this time on July 1, 1916, the British had sustained over 57,000 casualties, of which a little over 19,000 had been killed, at the Somme.  The French sustained a comparatively light number of about 1,500 losses while the Germans had sustained between 10,000 to 12,000.

Roads to the Great War: Ten Almost Random Thoughts on the 100th Anniversary of the Battle of the Somme

Roads to the Great War: Ten Almost Random Thoughts on the 100th Anniversar...: 100 Years Ago Today, the Battle of the Somme Began Last Sunday, I had a wonderful time in Sacramento, CA making a presentation on th...

Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower, married on this date in 1916

The Eisenhower's at his duty station in San Antonio, 1916.

On this date, in 1916, Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower wed in Denver Colorado, her hometown.  She was 19 years old, and he was 25. The wedding took place at her parents home and was presided over by a Presbyterian minister.  The couple met in San Antonio where she was attending finishing school, and where the family also wintered.  Her father was a meat packing executive for Doud & Montgomery and had retired at age 36.  Dwight Eisenhower was, of course, a serving office in the U.S. Army.  An excellent training officer, Eisenhower was not assigned a role that lead in his entering Mexico during the Punitive Expedition, and indeed he remained in the United States in a training role during World War One.

Battle of the Somme commences: July 1, 1916

 British troops marching to the front, June 28, 1916, just before the offensive.

The battle of the Somme commences at this time in 1916.

And with it, a true horror.

 French woman made homeless by the Battle of the Somme.

The Somme: the Hawthorne Ridge Mine

The Hawthorne Ridge Mine, which went off at 07:20 on this day in 1916, shortly before the commencement of the offensive on the Somme.

Garden Progress

Taking a farmer's look at Elisha's annointing.

The LORD said to Elijah:

“You shall anoint Elisha, son of Shaphat of Abelmeholah,

as prophet to succeed you.”

Elijah set out and came upon Elisha, son of Shaphat,

as he was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen;

he was following the twelfth.

Elijah went over to him and threw his cloak over him.

Elisha left the oxen, ran after Elijah, and said,

“Please, let me kiss my father and mother goodbye,

and I will follow you.”

Elijah answered, “Go back!

Have I done anything to you?”

Elisha left him, and taking the yoke of oxen, slaughtered them;

he used the plowing equipment for fuel to boil their flesh,

and gave it to his people to eat.

Then Elisha left and followed Elijah as his attendant.

1 Kgs 19:16b, 19-21

From this past Sunday's readings in the Catholic lectionary, and therefore probably also in quite a few Protestant churches as well. And a very interesting one as well, and in particular for people who know a little about animal agriculture.  Particularly the references to oxen.

First of all, what was Elisha doing at the time Elijah found him.  Plowing, we are informed.  More specifically:

Elijah set out and came upon Elisha, son of Shaphat,
as he was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen;
he was following the twelfth.

We learn a little later the following:

. . .and taking the yoke of oxen, slaughtered them;
he used the plowing equipment for fuel to boil their flesh,
and gave it to his people to eat.

These passages tell us a lot about what Elisha was doing, how he was doing it, and how many people were with him.

First of all, we know he was plowing, and "twelve yoke of oxen" were being used.  Now, that doesn't say that he was using all twelve yokes.  Rather, "he was following the twelfth".  In other words, the field was being plowed with twelve plows.

Does that mean twelve teams of oxen?  Not necessarily, it might actually mean twelve oxen. While we commonly imagine yokes to be for teams of two, they aren't necessarily, and oxen can be singly yoked.  I attempted to learn what would have been the case in the Middle East at this time, but that attempt failed. There's surprisingly (I guess) little information on that topic.  So we know that at least twelve oxen were being used, and maybe twenty four.

That also means that he had at least eleven men working with him, one for each yoke.  But he likely also had a lot more people with him than that.

We are given a clue here in that after he determined that he would in fact follow Elijah, Elisha slaughtered the oxen and boiled their meat, distributing it to his "people to eat".  Twelve oxen would be a lot of food for just twelve people, but its a little odd, if we think he was just outside the farmhouse, for him to be doing that.  But he no doubt was not.

Indeed, the custom everywhere for people using oxen was to keep them at the field where you were using them, and sleep there.  Oxen are slow. And you are using up their energy if you are driving them around just to get somewhere.  Moreover, you can hardly take your plowing equipment out in the field and leave it there and expect to find it all in the morning. So, chances are very high that Elisha and his crew were staying where they were plowing. And chances are also very high that the men who were plowing had families that came along, and preformed domestic chores for them while they were there in the field. When the oxen were slaughtered and boiled, they were probably feeding at least thirty people, but probably something more like forty, or even fifty.

It should also be noted that the oxen probably weren't the giant steer type oxen depicted above.  Indeed, as I don't know the original word, I don't know if it has a gender context.  "Oxen", as a word, did not originally have a gender context in English actually, but merely referred to a bovine used as a beast of burden.  As a word, it descends from the word "aurochs", which was a type of European wold cow.  Aurochs became a world like "ochs", which became "ox".  Only over time did ox come to mean a steer used as a beast of burden. At first, it meant bovine.  Anyhow, beyond that, the really big cattle we have today haven't always been like that.  They weren't tiny by any means, but modern cattle are quite a bit bigger than some (but not all) of their predecessors.  Indeed, I have a packed longhorn in the freezer right now, and while longhorns aren't tiny, their steaks are itty bitty.  They're a skinny steer.

The more surprising thing is that the plowing equipment was sufficient to provide the fuel, although the text does not really say that.  It says he used the plowing equipment for fuel, not that it was all the fuel. And here the reference is probably to more than the yokes, but also the plows, as plows were made of wood at the time.  All in all, it would have been a fair amount of wood.

And it would have been an expensive feast.  Indeed, Elisha was truly committing himself in an irreversible way.

I suppose details like this don't fascinate everyone. But they do me.  A glimpse into the agriculture of the past.

Studebaker 4x4 truck

Studbaker's were converted to 4x4 by NAPCO.  Whether this is an original conversion, or one done later, I couldn't say, although the wheels clearly aren't original.  Nice Studebaker, however.

NAPCO conversions, which manufacturers other than Chrysler to compete in this market with Dodge, have been covered earlier in this blog. The Studebaker NAPCO conversion actually increased the cost of the truck by 1/3d.

There's just something about these old four wheel drives.

The threat of war recedes. June 29, 1916

By June 29, the imminent threat of war was passing.

Note the action by an Austrian submarine. We don't often think of Austria in this context during the Great War.

The easing of the crisis hadn't caught up with the Douglas Budget yet, but it did note that Theodore Roosevelt had declared his political career over, and in sort of a sad way.

I have to say that I find A. R. Merrit's advertisements creepy.  Today, you'll note that they were also inaccurate.  We hadn't declared war on Mexico.  Merritt was jumping the gun.

Lex Anteinternet: Brexit Comment Panic

After I posted this;

Lex Anteinternet: Brexit Comment Panic:   As an American, I feel disinclined to get too worked up over the British deciding to leave the EC.  Actually, although this view (or ...

I read two op ed posts making very similar points, the best of which is George F. Will's.  His essay on the topic is excellent and calm.

Brexit Comment Panic

 

As an American, I feel disinclined to get too worked up over the British deciding to leave the EC.  Actually, although this view (or the admission of this view) is rare, I actually understand it.  I'd likely have voted to leave myself, if I were a British voter, but it's not my country and its not my decision.

Anyhow, its been interesting to watch the reaction by those opposing the departure. Some is very well reasoned, if a bit late, but some is really overblown, panicky, and snobby.  Indeed, I wonder if some of the wounded "stay" folks realize that their attitude might contribute to the view why others wanted to leave.  I've read some of the most amazing commentary, from those blaming it on an "older" (boomer) generation, when that generation in fact voted to get in, in the first place, to one snobbish voter who condemned his entire middle class home town.  Some of it reads very childishly.

Well, folks, keep calm (and carry on).  The UK has been around for a long time and the economy isn't going to collapse, Europe isn't going to spin off the globe, and things will be okay.

Maybe the EC, which has strongly anti democratic statist tendencies, will actually reform and realize that it has to let the residents of the various European states actually have a bit of a voice.  And while I'm sure that the EC will survive, if the entire creaking edifice cracked and the European states had to go back to being fully independent nations without the EC, I'm sure they're quite capable of getting along with each other in 2016 and they will in fact do so quite nicely.

For the history minded, I amazed to note that nobody has seemingly noticed that this story is not a new one. Not even close to being one. The first "EC", if you will, was the Roman Empire, which of course fell apart.  And then there was the attempt at the Holy Roman Empire, which never really got rolling.  For that matter, Charles the Great's domain (Charlemagne, Carolus Magnus) wasn't a minor matter.  Well after that, Napoleon's invasion of everything European was an attempt at getting everyone in Europe together in the name of liberal ideals of a sort, even if a pretty badly flawed one.  I'll omit other such attempts.  In the long history of Europe, it's come together and flown apart, showing I suppose that people who assume that history has one obvious direction are often pretty far off the mark, and showing that a concept of nationhood is a pretty strong one.  But we can take comfort in the fact that no major European power is going to start shooting at another, and therefore perhaps the real foundational thesis of the EC itself is now obsolete.

And the crisis continues. . . news for June 28, 1916.

Today we have an example of a less dramatic Cheyenne newspaper, the Cheyenne State Leader. The crisis with Mexico still dominated the news, however.  

And the news of  the crisis also dominated the Laramie Republican, although political news, that of Theodore Roosevelt drooping out of the race, also made the front page.

Roads to the Great War: Shaving, Disposability and the First World War

Interesting look at the role of World War One impacted shaving:

Roads to the Great War: Shaving, Disposability and the First World War: A Doughboy Shaving in Camp with a Gillette Razor For much of human history, men were stuck with facial hair. Beards were mandatory ...

Another example of Holscher's Fourth Law of History at work?

Hachita, New Mexico raided, June 27, 1916

In spite of the ongoing presence of U.S. troops in Mexico, and a large border presence, a raid by Mexicans of some sort near Hachita, New Mexico, resulted in the deaths of at least two Americans and perhaps more (the details are hard to come by).  The raid was a nighttime raid.

Hachita was used as a staging point for troops entering Mexico during the Punitive Expedition, so a raid in this location is surprising.  The town, like Columbus, is a border town, although a very tiny one.

Tracking the Presidential Election Part VII

Yes, a new one already.  The last one was rather obviously very long, and the GOP now appears to have a candidate with a sufficient number of delegates so as to be able to take the nomination on the first ballot.

The current results:

Democrats:  Needed to win, 2,383.

Clinton: 2,305 (537 of which are Superdelegates)
Sanders:  1,539 (42 of which are Superdelegates)

Republicans:  Needed to win, 1,237.

Trump:  1,238 (of which 88 are unpledged delegates).  Absent unpledged delegates bolting, Trump is the GOP nominee.
Cruz:  560   Cruz has suspended his campaign. (of which 9 are unpledged delegates)
Rubio:  167.  Rubio has suspended his campaign.
Kasich:  161.  Kasich has suspended his campaign
Carson:  8  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Bush:  4  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Fiorina:  1  Fiorina has dropped out of the race.
Paul:  1  Paul has dropped out of the race.

Commentary 

Washington's May 24 results, Republican only, have pushed Trump barely over the top to the required number, although 88 of his delegates are unpledged and therefore could change.  Nine unpledged delegates that had been pledged for Cruz switched over to Trump recently.  Surprisingly, Kasich picked up one delegate since our last tally while Rubio lost one.

The GOP race is therefore more or less over, although a large amount of dissent remains.  As recently as last weekend one of the conservative pundits was still urging an independent or third party run.

The Democratic race, amazingly, remains in contest.  Clinton is very close at this point, but only due to Superdelegates.  There's every reason to believe that Sanders will continue to contest the election all the way to the convention.  This has to be frustrating to Clinton who now clearly faces Trump in the fall but who cannot ignore Sanders.  At the same time, the email issue has revived.

___________________________________________________________________________________

May 30, 2016 

Presumably reflecting changes in pledged delegates the tallies have changed a little; adding a few delegates for the front runners.


Democrats:  Needed to win, 2,383.

Clinton: 2,309 (540 of which are Superdelegates)
Sanders:  1,539 (42 of which are Superdelegates)

Republicans:  Needed to win, 1,237.

Trump:  1,239 (of which 95 are unpledged delegates).  Absent unpledged delegates bolting, Trump is the GOP nominee.
Cruz:  560   Cruz has suspended his campaign. (of which 9 are unpledged delegates)
Rubio:  167.  Rubio has suspended his campaign.
Kasich:  161.  Kasich has suspended his campaign
Carson:  8  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Bush:  4  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Fiorina:  1  Fiorina has dropped out of the race.
Paul:  1  Paul has dropped out of the race.

Commentary 

The only actual reason I bumped this up today is to note that the Wyoming Democratic Party has indicated its going to protest the DNC's allocation of Wyoming's delegates.  Sanders won the Wyoming primary, but the delegates were equally split between Sanders and Clinton. The Wyoming party feel that rather than a 7/7 split, it should be 8/6.


That would make no difference, unless it really comes down to the last vote, in the Democratic contest, but it does demonstrate why the Sanders campaign has been frustrated.  In spite of winning some late primaries, and picking up delegates as a result, the Democrat's process operates such that Clinton picks up nearly the same number, or in the case of Wyoming, she actually did pick up the same number.

___________________________________________________________________________________

June 6, 2016

 After a couple of weekend Democratic territorial races, the tallies are now as follows:

Democrats:  Needed to win, 2,383.

Clinton: 2,383 (571 of which are Superdelegates)  Absent unpledged delegates bolting, Clinton is the Democratic nominee
Sanders:  1,569 (48 of which are Superdelegates)

Republicans:  Needed to win, 1,237.

Trump:  1,239 (of which 95 are unpledged delegates).  Absent unpledged delegates bolting, Trump is the GOP nominee.
Cruz:  560   Cruz has suspended his campaign. (of which 9 are unpledged delegates)
Rubio:  167.  Rubio has suspended his campaign.
Kasich:  161.  Kasich has suspended his campaign
Carson:  8  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Bush:  4  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Fiorina:  1  Fiorina has dropped out of the race.
Paul:  1  Paul has dropped out of the race.

Commentary

So Clinton is now the unofficial Democratic nominee.  With these results she achieves, but only just achieves, obtaining enough delegates to secure the Democratic nomination, assuming the 571 Superdelegates that are pledged to her remain pledged to her.

Depending upon tomorrow's votes, the question of the loyalty of the Superdelegates may become moot, as over 800 Democratic delegates are to be chosen tomorrow.   The amazing thing, of course, is by this point both parties have chosen very unpopular candidates.  Having said that, the  Democrats chose the highly unpopular candidate they were anticipated to have chosen right from the onset, while the Republicans chose one that they were not anticipated to choose.

__________________________________________________________________________________

June 8, 2016 

The primaries, except for Washington D.C.'s Democratic primary, are now over.  Indeed, while this has been an odd election season to be sure, the election itself is effectively over as well.

The standings.

Democrats:  Needed to win, 2,383.

Clinton: 2,755 (571 of which are Superdelegates)  Absent unpledged delegates bolting, Clinton is the Democratic nominee
Sanders:  1,852 (48 of which are Superdelegates)

Republicans:  Needed to win, 1,237.

Trump:  1,536 (of which 95 are unpledged delegates).  Absent unpledged delegates bolting, Trump is the GOP nominee.
Cruz:  560   Cruz has suspended his campaign. (of which 9 are unpledged delegates)
Rubio:  167.  Rubio has suspended his campaign.
Kasich:  161.  Kasich has suspended his campaign
Carson:  8  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Bush:  4  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Fiorina:  1  Fiorina has dropped out of the race.
Paul:  1  Paul has dropped out of the race.

Commentary

Sanders took North Dakota and Montana, and South Dakota was a tie.  He did not take, however, California which was really his last hope.

Clinton is only the nominee right now, of course, due to the Superdelegates.  But Sanders would need nearly 500 Superdelegates to bolt Clinton and join him in order to reverse these results and that won't be occurring. Trump, for his part, received all the late delegates in spite of his earlier competitors largely remaining on the ballots of those states choosing yesterday.

The candidates now go on to their conventions in late July.  The campaign of the two main candidates against each other, however, started a couple of weeks ago.

There remains some items up in the air, most significantly a lingering threat that the Never Trump wing of the GOP will bolt for a third party candidate or give their support to the Libertarian candidate in protest.  Likewise, there's a small threat that the Green Party will appeal to Sanders supporters, and even the Libertarian Party might a bit.  This might, therefore, turn out to be a surprisingly good year for both those parties, even though neither has any serious chance of winning.  A good showing, however, might propel those parties into serious parties that have to be contended with.

The fact that Trump continues to face internal opposition is, moreover, significant.  The thought was that the Republicans would pull together after Trump secured the necessary number of delegates but that isn't occurring to the extent it was predicted to.  Indeed, the Never Trump movement, even this late, is hinting that it will back an alternative and it clearly would have run one but for the fact that those that it approached declined to run. That fact is hugely significant for the Democrats as its heavily symbolic of this election cycle.  By choosing Trump the Republicans have chosen a candidate that even the massively unpopular Hillary Clinton is likely to easily beat and even a fair number of Republicans can't support.

This thread will continue on, unless it grows to big, until at least the Convention.  Or until something surprising happens and a new one is needed.  In a year of surprised, who knows, that could happen.

Followup

Following Tuesday's primaries, I thought there was a chance that Bernie Sanders might concede.

Nothing doing, apparently.

Indeed, he's taking a lot of heat for it, but he's contesting for the Washington DC primary, the only one left, which occurs next week.

It's a bit difficult to see what Sanders end game is at this point, and there's a lot of speculation about it.  Indeed, Democratic commentators are getting a bit spastic about it, demanding that he concede. Some are speculating that he is now campaigning for concessions from the platform, or to impact the direction that the Democrats are going in.  Maybe. But there's also speculation that he intends to angle for the Superdelegates, perhaps to drop Clinton below the assured number and cause a brokered convention.  That would seem odd, as he wouldn't win that, but who knows.  His campaign has been a difficult one to accurately predict.

In any event, the irony of it is that Sanders is doing what everyone thought the Never Trump Republicans would do, campaign to the bitter end. They basically dropped out, however, before the matter was really decided.  The hard to predict Sanders hasn't.

June 28, 2016

I never did put the final count in here, and I've been well aware of that, but I've figured everyone was so sick of this that they'd want a break.

Anyhow, after the D.C. primary, which went to Clinton, this stand as follows:

The standings.

Democrats:  Needed to win, 2,383.

Clinton: 2,811 (591 of which are Superdelegates) 
Sanders:  1,879 (48 of which are Superdelegates)

Republicans:  Needed to win, 1,237.

Trump:  1,542 (of which 95 are unpledged delegates). 
Cruz:  560   Cruz has suspended his campaign. (of which 9 are unpledged delegates)
Rubio:  167.  Rubio has suspended his campaign.
Kasich:  161.  Kasich has suspended his campaign
Carson:  8  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Bush:  4  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Fiorina:  1  Fiorina has dropped out of the race.
Paul:  1  Paul has dropped out of the race.

Commentary

Not surprisingly, there was a time after everyone had dropped out that Trump's poll standings surged and he appeared to be more likely to win that Clinton, but that only lasted for a week and he's been on the rocks ever since.  Now experienced observers have wondered what he's been doing the past month, and he has been in the news a lot less.  Today finds him, oddly, in Scotland where he commented following the Brexit vote. Things frankly don't look good for him at all, and in a race in which he only has Clinton to take on, he's not taking her on effectively at all.

The conventions, which will cause new entries or at least a new entry in this series, will spike each candidates numbers following the respective conventions, but this now appears to be on a fairly certain trajectory.  The GOP establishment does not appear to be rallying to Trump, which pundits said it would.  The terrorist attack in Florida does not appear to have made him look like a better option, as some predicated a terrorist attack would, and mostly he seems sort of stuck. Clinton, on the other hand, doesn't appear stuck at all, even if she doesn't appear to be popular either.

I wasn't going to update this thread until the conventions, but I've done so now due to all the other political races gong on and it would have accordingly been odd not to.  Internationally we have the Brexit vote, of course, and the following resignation of David Cameron.  Locally we have a U.S. House race heating up in which one campaign manager went so far as to claim he didn't know that one of his opponents "was still running".     And around the state we did have some Democrats that were looking good, but the national party effectively murdered them this week with their childish sit in on the floor of Congress and, moreover, true to form local Democrats, or at least one, couldn't shut up long enough not to suddenly come out looking like a radical proponent of gun control, which ends that campaign even if the candidate doesn't seemingly know that.

Followup

I thought it unlikely that I'd have anything to update in this thread prior to the conventions, at which time I'd start new ones, but a surprising event did occur.

Longtime Republican columnist and intellectual figure George F. Will officially announced that he is leaving the GOP.   This is not minor news.  Will is actively opposed to Trump and Republicans themselves seem to be wavering.  Some dismiss this as the discontent Republican elite simply pouting, but its' more than that.  Trump is not gaining the support that many assumed he would after he became the presumptive nominee, and there is no indication that his support in traditional Republican quarters is going to grow.

At the same time, there's some curious speculation now amongst pundits that Trump may actually quit the race prior to the election.  This has been commented upon in more than one columnist's writings, although the writers may be feeding off of themselves in this speculation.

Recent polls show Trump behind Clinton, which is not surprising, but one now shows him far behind.  His campaign appears to have become somewhat lost and with Republican figures now actively opposed to him the campaign is in serious trouble.

____________________________________________________________________________________

Tracking the Presidential Election, 2016

Tracking the Presidential Election, 2016, Part II

Tracking the Presidential Election, 2016, Part III Sic Transit Gloria Mundi.

Tracking the Presidential Election Part IV

Tracking the Presidential Election Part V

Tracking the Presidential Election Part VI. The wobbly Democratic Party.

The News Around the State for June 27, 1916

Tuesday June 27, 1916, saw a variety of approaches to the news of the ongoing crisis with Mexico.

The Wyoming Tribune, a Cheyenne paper that tended to be dramatic in its headlines, was dramatic for June 27.

Quite the dramatic cartoon about "civilization following the flag" as well, presenting a colonial view that a person can't imagine seeing in a paper today. Indeed, its hard not to imagine the cartoon offering offense, and frankly even viewing it now, it offers it.

The Sheridan Record, however, was less so, if still pretty presenting some pretty worrisome news.

The Laramie Republican was the least dramatic of the examples we have here, but presented the same set of news stories, more ore less.

The Big Picture: New York Yankees v. Colorado Rockies, Coors Field....

 

Monday at the Bar: Courthouses of the West: Old Anchorage City Hall, Anchorage Alaska

Courthouses of the West: Old Anchorage City Hall, Anchorage Alaska:

Once the largest building in Anchorage, albeit only very briefly, this city hall held all the municipal offices from 1936 until some date in the 1970s. 

A fairly substantial building, it provides additional evidence of how surprisingly busy Anchorage was during the 1930s.

The death of the a bad idea. . . at least for awhile

I've spent a fair amount of time this political season commenting on how odd the season has been, and how it seems we have two candidates that people are less than thrilled to have, so its a relief to be able to report something positive about both candidates and  the death of a bad political idea.

 

That bad idea is the concept of transferring land from the Federal government to the states.  As I've repeatedly warned here, that transfer would not stop there, it'd ultimately go to the rich, and it wouldn't take very long.

Well, it turns out that at least three of the rich agree with me, and those three are Donald Trump, Donald Trump, Jr., and Hillary Clinton. 

So, this bad idea is dead, or at least it will not being going anywhere for the next eight years. 

The Trump campaign's statements came from Donald Trump Jr. (the elder Trump has mentioned them before, in an interview with one of the outdoor journals) in a statement delivered to the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Alliance, a conservation organization that's fighting these terrible ideas. The news couldn't be more welcome, and Trump put it in the correct context.  He frankly stated that the land would end up in the hands of private land owners and the states couldn't be trusted not to do that.  That's an amazing statement from a campaign that's been running as a conservative one, whether it is or not.  The Clinton campaign immediately endorsed the same view. So the two campaigns have come out in full agreement with each other on this issue, one that matters hugely to sportsmen and rural residents.

Indeed a survey of Wyoming's residents found that they are overwhelmingly opposed to transferring the land away from the Federal government.  Only the local GOP is in favor of this, which means that the GOP  here openly acts in contempt of the majority view of Wyoming residents and of its own members.  This should provide a huge avenue for Democrats in the state, but the fact that our Democratic party can't help but commit suicide (one Democrat running locally has slowly been increasing her comments in favor of gun control and legalization of marijuana, an act so delusional here she might as well be hunting her fellow Democrats down and beating them with sticks).  But that doesn't mean that the GOP can afford to ignore this.

Nor can the national party.  If the GOP doesn't want to slide into irrelevance contempt for the rights of common people, such as rural residents and less than wealthy public land users, can't continue to go on.  This would be a good place for them to pull off the road and consult the road map.

Roads to the Great War: Father Duffy: Why Was He Beloved?

Roads to the Great War: Father Duffy: Why Was He Beloved?: At Times Square New York Father Francis Duffy was the chaplain of New York's 69th Infantry, which fought in France as the 165t...

The Wyoming Tribune for June 26, 1916. On the verge of war

The Wyoming Tribune could always be counted on to be the most dramatic of Wyoming's newspapers at the time.  This June 26 edition was no exception.

Of interest, Little Big Horn was being reenacted, with only forty years having passed since that event.

Also of interest, while the mobilization of the Guard, the raising of the Wyoming National Guard, and the crisis with Mexico remained important news, these events once again were no longer of the front page of nearly every local paper after this date.  They didn't disappear, they just weren't there every day.  The fear that the US would go to war with Mexico started to subside, even if remained a very real fear.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: St. Thomas Episcopal Church, Dubois Wyoming

Churches of the West: St. Thomas Episcopal Church, Dubois Wyoming:

This is St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Dubois, Wyoming. The church was constructed in 1910, and has been added on to since that time.

Randon Snippets: Who you are.

In the world to come they will not ask me, "Why were you not Moses?" They will ask me, "Why were you not Zusya?"

Rabbi Zusya

The Sunday State Leader for June 25, 1916: The prisoners of Carrizal

More news of the defeat at Carrizal, but happy news for Miss Ellen Smith.

The war in Europe was pushed completely off of the front page of this Sunday morning Cheyenne paper due to events in Mexico.

Words and work

It is an odd thing, I'd note, to learn that a person who publishes on the dangers of big government was employed by government.

I suppose there can be explanations for that, and people can change their views of course.  But, as is so often the case, people's words don't always match their histories.  Critics of government working for the government at one point. . . super patriots who didn't answer the call to serve when it was available. . . proponents of gun control who carry guns themselves.

Hm.

Welcome Home PFC Harold Schultz, USMC

All these years, PFC Schultz, who is one of the flag raisers on the iconic Rosenthall photograph and the USMC Ogg film of the raising of the second flag at Iwo Jima, was misidentified as Corpsman Jack Bradley.

Bradley did in fact participate in the first raising.

First flag raising at Iwo Jima.

The mistake is a natural one.  The events happened rapidly, under still hostile conditions, and the area looks much different from different angles.

Discovery of the error is a tribute to close photographic analysis.  When a description of how it was done is read, it's quite obvious that the error was made, although it is surprising that it took so long.

Schultz apparently knew he was in the photograph, but never said a thing.  He went on to a career in the Post Office, and like all of these men, has passed on.

The British vote to leave the European Union

 From another era, but seemingly the way a little over half the population of the United Kingdom viewed events to some exent.

Fueled at least in part by a feeling that the membership in the EU had subjected the island nation to a level of immigration from the Middle East that it could not absorb, and further stoked by long discontent with statist European EU administration that clashed with the more democratic British tradition, the British voting population voted to get out of the EU.  This was only the fourth referendum in the UK's history, one of the other four, ironically, being one in the 1970s on whether or not the UK should join.  

Opposition to leaving the European Union was the stated policy of both the Labour and the Conservative parties and so the success of the Brexit position came against the influence of Britain's oldest most established parties, showing perhaps how deep the resentment against the EU had become.  Much of the opposition platform was focused on the unknown economic impact of leaving, showing what we stated in a post yesterday is in fact, a fact; people don't focus that much on economics on these sorts of decisions, which are more about a sense of nationhood and emotion than currency.  The British basically voted to try to make sure their island nation, or nations, remained theirs rather than moving into a less certain national future.  While this seems to have come to a surprise to many, and indeed I'm surprised that Brexit won, it may reflect a rising tide of such sentiment across Europe, which now has more countries, albeit within the EU, than it did in 1990 when the Soviet Union fell. 

This has caused some speculation that Scotch seperatists might now succeed in taking Scotland out of the UK so it can get back into the EU, and even if Northern Ireland might now reunite with Ireland.  I doubt that very much and think the speculation about nationalistic Ulster particularly misplaced.  Indeed, by far the more likely, if still not likely, national implications is that forces wanting to take Germany, France or Ireland out of the EU will now have some success with their movements.  Again, I don't think that likely to occur, but then I didn't think this was likely either.

You really can't fault an independent nation for wanting to go on its own. So wise or not, a raise of the beer glass to the UK and best wishes to it.

On the implication, nobody knows what they will be other than some short term financial ups and downs which may come to nothing.  More likely is that the UK will simply quietly exist over the next several years and resume independent relations with a somewhat spiteful European Union thereafter. That will likely cause a downturn in the European economy in the short term but a rise in it in the long term as it will free the UK from some of the EU's less rational economic policies. And this might cause the EU to reconsider some of its approach to how it does things which have been heavily bureaucratic and not very democratic.

One immediate impact has been political fallout, and as part of  that Conservative British Prime Minister David Cameron, who successfully shepherded the nation through the recent referendum in Scotland about whether that nation would stay or leave the United Kingdom, resigned, or rather indicated that he will be stepping down.  Cameron has been quite unpopular recently and not all of his "conservative" position have really been that and to some extent his unpopularity may have been a partial source of the Brexit vote.  He'll be leaving in October, and indicated in his departing speech:  "A negotiation with the European Union will need to begin under a new prime minister and I think it's right that this new prime minister takes the decision about when to trigger Article 50 and start the formal and legal process of leaving the EU".  He was gracious in his departure and understandably is leaving this for the next administration to handle.  It'll be interesting to see how in fact it is handled, as the Brexit vote did not succeed by a huge margin and Parliament is not technically bound to follow it, although it seems like it will.

In regard to politicians, perhaps the oddest commentary came from Donald Trump, who is oddly enough in Scotland right now.  Most American politicians would be wise enough to shut up on events of this type, but some have seen the hard right political movements in  Europe, and this is sort of (and sort of not) in that category, as part of the same general societal movement that brought Trump into the position of GOP nominee. Trump congratulated the  Brexit vote and then noted that if the pound fell it would be good for one of his golf courses in Scotland.

Friday Farming: Women's Land Army, California

The Cheyenne Leader for June 24, 1916: News of Carrizal hits the press.

The U.S. Army set back at Carrizal hit the press in full force by June 24.  On the same day the press reported that the Germans had one another victory at Verdun, while stopping the "Slavs", when in fact the Russian offensive had terminated the German's hopes at Verdun.

Railhead: Fantasy worlds and rail transportation. . . limiting conveyance by rail

Fantasy worlds and rail transportation. . . limiting conveyance by rail.

Of our various blogs, this one has been, by far, the least likely to see a commentary post.  Indeed, this appears to be the very first one.  But as this one involves rail transportation, I'm going to post it here.

Readers of the blog where I typically post commentary, Lex Anteinternet, know that I've posted a lot of comments on the hard times in the petroleum and coal industries, particularly in Wyoming.  As part of those, I've categorically rejected the popular thesis in Wyoming that the Federal government is engaged in a "war" on the energy industry, or that there's some gigantic conspiracy to do the energy industries in.  In this post, however, I will comment on a type of "not in my backyard" effort that's really shortsighted, and which give credence to those who feel ignored and oppressed in this area.

Recently there was a big derailment in Mosier, Oregon. That occurrence has lead to an effort, centered in the Pacific Northwest but focused nationally, to ban the transportation of petroleum oil by rail.

Sometimes, things go wrong.  Derailed train, Minnesota, 1986.

That's just flat out absurd.

I guess its obvious that I'm a railroad fan, why else, after all, would a person have a blog dedicated to railroad features, so perhaps I'm partisan.  But campaigns of this type strike me as very ill informed in some ways. The concept seems to be that, because all of the cars are on a single train, a train purposes a unique danger that other  means of transportation do not.  That's simply not correct.  The other means are truck and pipeline.  The hundreds of trucks that replace a single train pose a danger as well, and arguably a much greater one as the risk would have be assessed for each single truck, not just one as if it were a train.  Pipelines are probably safer, although pipeline spills do occur, and the are basically permanent. Rail lines have other uses for other types of trains.

I suspect that much of this movement doesn't even directly relate to safety, but rather is part of an environmental movement on the Pacific Coast that has been pretty successful in shutting down the loading of coal by sea.  Given the current economics of coal, I'm not nearly as convinced, however, that this has been that detrimental to coal.  It's the low price and declining use that has been.  But I suspect there's a poorly thought out concept that if the shipping of oil by rail is stopped, people quit using it.

Not hardly.

This view, I'd note, is supported by some comments from a Pacific Coast environmental activists, who is quoted as saying in a newspaper as follows:

On the evening of June 6, more than a hundred climate activists met at the First Unitarian Church in downtown Portland to discuss their response to the oil train derailment in the Columbia River Gorge three days earlier, said 350PDX director Adriana Voss-Andreae. 

“The call for a temporary moratorium on oil trains is a call for a shred of decency for the Mosier community, but it does nothing to meet the magnitude of the problem,” she said. “If the government won’t stop the bomb trains, then we must do so ourselves. There will be a mass direct action in the coming two weeks. We encourage all to join.”

Climate activists claiming its a "bomb train"?  Well, I'm skeptical. Either they simply oppose the shipping of all fossil fuels by any means, or their activism is unfocused.

Well, whatever a person might think about climate change, pretending that preventing shipping by rail is going to have some impact on the use of fossil fuels is just fooling yourself.  And, ironically, trains are by far the most efficient, and hence the most "green", of any means of transportation we have.  Putting the same oil on the road in trucks is at least as dangerous and a lot dirtier.  And that's probably what would happen if the oil wasn't shipped by rail.

Not everything is about the money. . .

in fact a lot of things aren't.

Maybe most of them aren't.

Which is why I'm sick to death of reading "How Brexit may effect your portfolio".

Yes, a lot of the British are voting to leave the EC. And yes it'll have some effect (probably a lot less dramatic than claimed) if they do on their economy, on Europe's economy, and on our economy.

And they know that.

But so what?

That's not what the vote is about, and the analysts who seem to think it is are out to lunch.

Questions of sovereignty have little to do with economics.  Ireland would have been better off staying in the UK right after World War One. Yugoslavia made better economic sense than Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia.  Czechoslovakia was certainly a better economic unit than the two countries it ended up being.

And Switzerland, in terms of its economy, ought to join the EC.  Canada, if its thinking only of money, should become part of the US.

But that's now how people think, nor do we want them to think that way.  It's sad that so many do think that way. 

Whether the UK should get out, or stay in, the EC, isn't a question solely based on pounds and euros.

The point at which American democracy childishly died by sitting down and pouting on the floor.

U.S. House Democrats, a minority in the House, have decided to sit on the floor until they get their way on voting for several gun control bills that would, if voted upon, fail.

A persons view on this story, admittedly, tends to vary based on their view on the topic of gun control.  Opponents of gun control view this as a silly thing.  Some proponents view it as a heroic one.

Well, I submit, it's childish and disturbing no matter what your view is.

Now, I'll further state that if I ran the House of Representatives I'd let votes proceed.  But then I'd let there be a vote on every bill without them going through committee, and without their being wrapped up in other bills.  There is in fact a legislative body that does basically that, and its the oldest deliberative body in the world, the House of Commons in the English Parliament.  

The Parliament lets every bill be voted on.  Introduce them, and they get voted on. And that's the way it should be.  The U.S. Congress has, instead, developed this Byzantine process where bills have to go through committees, etc., before they can get anywhere.  That's anti-democratic by its very nature, and I'm opposed to it.  But it is the system that's been used in Congress for eons, and the Democrats and the Republicans have used it without complaint for a very long time.

Essentially, therefore, what the minority Democrats are complaining about is that they aren't getting their way.  They're trying to dictate what the majority party does.  That's not the way the system works.  No party out of party can legitimately sit down in protest and implicitly say "the majority won't let the minority have an exception to the rules".  

And they know that.

What they also know and hope is that this makes this issue, which is a popular one in urban areas, but a very unpopular one in rural areas (the Democrats in the House are effectively slitting the throats of the Wyoming Democratic Party which was beginning to show signs of life again), an issue in the fall.  Democrats like to claim that the GOP blocks "common sense gun control" due to  the "gun lobby", which translates as GOP voters not liking gun control and using the NRA to support its view (it'd be interesting to see how Democrats would react to being accused of blocking "common sense protection for the unborn" by serving the "death lobby", probably not well).

And what they also ought to know is that by taking this approach, and tying it to memories of the Civil Rights movement, they're going to see it used again, against them, on things that are legitimately closer in spirit to the Civil Rights movement.  While Pelosi and crew sit there they ought to realize, when they return to power, and sooner or later they will, they're going to hear "Madam Speaker, if you won't bring my bill to the floor to protect the living at all ages, while I'll just sit down right here . . . "

But, whatever a person's view, this symbolizes the ongoing demise of democracy in this country.

Not that it suddenly arrived.  Both parties are to blame and this has been going on ever since the GOP decided to attempt to remove President Clinton for having an affair with an aid. That was reprehensible on his part, but it had nothing to do with legitimate politics and frankly it didn't impact the country in any fashion.   Following that both parties have increasingly criminalized bad economic choices and bad political choices, which is appalling.  This election cycle we're seeing a primary process in which the Democratic Party has put in an entire class of delegates that the party gets to choose in case the people do the wrong thing, and a system which confuses party membership with voting rights has helped nominate a Republican candidate that has very little chance of winning.

Many have speculated this year on whether a third party might have a chance at gaining the presidency this year.  I doubt it, but one certainly has a better chance than in prior years.  Would that one would have a chance getting into Congress on the platform of acting like adults, not penalizing economic and business decisions, and actually performing those acts required of it in the Constitution. 

But that's not going to happen.

The Casper Weekly Press for June 23, 1916

Some of the news of June 23, 1916, is freakishly familiar a century later.

The Big Speech: G. K. Chesterton on the rich, the poor and anarchy.

You've got that eternal idiotic idea that if anarchy came it would come from the poor. Why should it? The poor have been rebels, but they have never been anarchists; they have more interest than anyone else in there being some decent government. The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were always anarchist.
G.K. Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare