Today In Wyoming's History: May 16: 1918 The Sedition Act of 1918 passed by the U.S. Congress making criticism of the government an imprisonable offense of 20 years or fined $20,000. Attribution: Western History Center.
New York Herald's pro Sedition Act cartoon. Included in the treasonous pack was the IWW and Sein Fein.
It provided, amongst other things:
SECTION 3. Whoever, when the United States is at war, shall willfully make or convey false reports or false statements with intent to interfere with the operation or success of the military or naval forces of the United States, or to promote the success of its enemies, or shall willfully make or convey false reports, or false statements, . . . or incite insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny, or refusal of duty, in the military or naval forces of the United States, or shall willfully obstruct . . . the recruiting or enlistment service of the United States, or . . . shall willfully utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the form of government of the United States, or the Constitution of the United States, or the military or naval forces of the United States . . . or shall willfully display the flag of any foreign enemy, or shall willfully . . . urge, incite, or advocate any curtailment of production . . . or advocate, teach, defend, or suggest the doing of any of the acts or things in this section enumerated and whoever shall by word or act support or favor the cause of any country with which the United States is at war or by word or act oppose the cause of the United States therein, shall be punished by a fine of not more than $10,000 or imprisonment for not more than twenty years, or both....
Not one of the U.S. prouder moments in World War One. Of note, Theodore Roosevelt had editorialized against it. It would in fact be abused as during wartime its easy to imagine a traitor behind every negative statement.
Lt. Torrey Webb on the day of the inauguration of air mail between New York City and Philadelphia. They gave him a Hamilton watch. Dignitaries showed up. . . including ones from France.
The plane was a Curtis JN-4, a "Jenny". The Jenny had, fwiw, just been commemorated by way of a postage stamp a few days prior.
Torrey Webb was was in the Army 's air service during the war, but he was studying engineering prior to it and would return to it. He ended up the vice president of Texas Oil Company (Texaco).
Meanwhile, on the Western Front, these two RAF crewmen were were taking off in their RE8.
All of these air missions, we would note, were incredibly dangerous.
On this day in 1918 the brief but violent Finnish Civil War ended.
German soldiers in Helsinki following the surrender of the Reds there.
Finnish Reds and Finnish Anarchists were already defeated in the field. No peace treaty was concluded, nor could there have really been one. The end of the war came with Finnish Whites taking over Fort Ino from the Russians.
The war had been very violent, to say the least, with executions on both sides. The Whites had been substantially assisted by German intervention, and the Germans remained in the country and would indeed find themselves fighting in the Balkans post World War One.
This film, or actually German television series, was recommended to me by my son whom, like me, has the same taste in films and the same interest in history. We'd started off watching Foyle's War last year and there was really nothing to replace it. He watched Generation War, which I haven't, and then picked up this German television series set in the very late 1920s. I wasn't too sure but I do like film noire type films and historical dramas, so I went and head and watched it. Indeed, while I wouldn't call it binge watching, I did watch the two series pretty much straight through.
I'm still not too sure.
Indeed, I'm not going on to Season 3.
This television series is sort of a neo film noire detective series, as noted. It's set in Berlin, at least in seasons 1 and 2, in 1929. The main protagonist is a young German First World War veteran who is a detective from Cologne, sent to Berlin by his police official father, to investigate some unknown blackmail scandal.
In the course of investigating the hidden scandal, the detective encounters every single thing going on in a city that's steeped in vice and license, all while the Communists, Nazis and fifth columns from within and without seek to overthrow the government. It's a lot. It's too much in fact, although it is oddly compelling which is why I can say that I've watched both of the first two seasons.
It also stretches over the boundaries of decency in quite a few places as the vice investigated tends towards being sexual vice and there's a lot of gratuitous female nudity. Indeed, at some point it edge up on being pornographic. If it didn't quite get there, and that's questionable, it's because it was depicting the moral sewer that Weimar Germany had become.
Which is more than a little disturbing. Almost nobody in the series is who they seem to be and all sense of decency has been lost or cripplingly impaired. Even the characters you hope to like are pretty damages and often in a really icky way. Of course, late 1920s Germany was cripplingly impaired and perhaps that's the point. But if it is, you can almost grasp the logic of the people I used to hear when I was very young who smaintained that the moral sewer nature of Weimar Germany gave rise to the Nazis when average people got disgusted and wanted to clean things up. That thesis is addressed in Nazi Germany; A New History and there's a little truth to it but its far too simplistic, and inaccurate, explanation of actually occurred.
In terms of historical details, this drama isn't a pure history and so it leans, rather purely relies, upon the history of the age. On major themes they are set generally correctly if not necessarily purely portraying actual events. Material details are well done. Fairly wide liberties are taken with cultural details.
The series fails, in my view, for really stretching the bounds of credibility with its plots. The concluding episode lacks credibility. As a drama, it relies entirely too much on the female nudity of its female characters and really takes enormous liberties to explain it. I'd give this one a pass and will do so on future episodes.
Like a lot of the running topics that I supposedly update, I've gotten really bad about updating my move reviews, if that's what they are, here. Not sure why.
Anyhow, this is the move that I've most recently seen at the actual theater. There were a couple of others I intended to go see but didn't, so I've not only gotten bad about my reviews, but even about seeing the films. So, other than work, it seems, I'm not getting out much.
Gary Oldman does an amazing job of portraying Churchill in the tense weeks in which he can legitimately be credited with saving the Allies from a complete collapse and surrender to Nazi Germany. The movie accurately portrays Churchill's peculiar character, something that would be more than a little difficult to do. It also very nicely shows the central role in the decision making process that lead to the British staying in the war when it was far from certain that they would.
All in all, this is an excellent historical drama that takes very few liberties with the facts. In terms of material details it has things right, but it's mostly an indoor drama (which nonetheless must pay attention to details to be correct). It's an excellent portrayal. Interestingly, it's also one of two British World War Two dramas that were big budget major films this year that did well in the United States and which are completely focused on British, not American, topics. Something that is very much the exception to the rule. Highly recommended.
French labor unions called a general strike in support of the students of the Sorbonne. Of course, French labor unions will call a strike on about any occasion, but this was a serious matter. . . even if it did have the effect of making the weekend a three day one.
It wasn't a day off for diplomats. The peace talks between North and South Vietnam, and the United States, commenced in Paris.
The Germans really were using up their reserves and had passed the point of diminishing returns by this date in 1918, but they were still messing around in the East which made the story about the Czar and his family credible, if erroneous. They would have been lucky if the Germans had taken them into custody.
At the same time, reports of Wyoming men getting killed in action were starting to appear on the front page.
This striking church ruin is located in West Laramie, Wyoming
The structure is clearly that of a classic Gothic style church, which was constructed out of stone and cement. The structure of the church itself would tend to indicate that it was likely built in a classic
Catholic church manner, which would indicate here that the church was likely built with a Catholic or Episcopalian congregation in mind, although its location might possibly indicate that it was built as a chapel for the Territorial Prison in Laramie. The structure is very old, and its been in ruins for as long as I personally can recall. It's now located on the grounds of a farm, but at the time it was built it would have been actually several miles outside of Laramie, and indeed it would have been at least three miles from the territorial prison.
This church is a mystery to me, and if anyone knows what it was, I'd appreciate knowing.
This particular Eastern battle after the peace between Russia, or rather the soon to be Soviet Union, and Germany is really confusing and perhaps the German action is somewhat understandable, although it once again demonstrates how the Germans managed to keep on fighting in the East after the Russians. .. or rather the Soviets, had surrendered.
Poland was mostly a Russian province prior to World War One but parts of it were in Germany. During the war both the Central Powers and Imperial Russia formed Polish units, the Imperial Russian ones mostly by default but some with the goal of achieving some sort of Polish independence. The Central Powers formed them with the same ostensible purpose, a safer bet for them as Polands vague borders put most of it in the East. One of those units was the Polish Legions, which was a unit in the Austro Hungarian Army.
The II Brigade of the Polish Legion, lead by Polish patriot Jozef Haller von Hallenburg, had defected across the front lines to join the Russian Polish II Corps. Haller, an eclectic Pole who had served before the war as an Austrian officer, viewed the terms of the Brest Litovsk Treaty as creating poor chances for Poland and lead that effort. The Germans, for their part, viewed the Polish II Corps as a violation of the treaty and a threat to the Germans, which may have been a correct view. On the night of May 10 they attacked the unit achieving a complete surprise but without the effect they hoped for. Their casualties were heavy in the day long battle. They did achieve a Polish surrender but only after a bloody fight.
Haller went on to become a Polish hero, surviving the battle and fleeing first to Moscow and subsequently ending up as a major campaigner for recruits for the Poles to serve on the Western Front. He lead the Polish Blue Army in France.
He was a significant military figure in post war Poland, commanding troops in the Polish war on its eastern borders that occurred in 1919 and again in the Russo Polish War (peace didn't really come to Poland in 1918). He became a politician following the Russo Polish War and was living abroad when World War Two started, during which he became part of the Polish Government in Exile. He did not return to Poland following World War Two and died in old age in London in 1960.
A Joint Statement from
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
and
The Boy Scouts of America
May 8, 2018
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Boy Scouts of America have been partners for more than 100 years. The Scouting program has benefited hundreds of thousands of Latter-day Saint boys and young men, and BSA has also been greatly benefited in the process. We jointly express our gratitude to the thousands of Scout leaders and volunteers who have selflessly served over the years in Church-sponsored Scouting units, including local BSA districts and councils.
In this century of shared experience, the Church has grown from a U.S.-centered institution to a worldwide organization, with a majority of its membership living outside the United States. That trend is accelerating. The Church has increasingly felt the need to create and implement a uniform youth leadership and development program that serves its members globally. In so doing, it will be necessary for the Church to discontinue its role as a chartered partner with BSA.
We have jointly determined that, effective on December 31, 2019, the Church will conclude its relationship as a chartered organization with all Scouting programs around the world. Until that date, to allow for an orderly transition, the intention of the Church is to remain a fully engaged partner in Scouting for boys and young men ages 8–13 and encourages all youth, families, and leaders to continue their active participation and financial support.
While the Church will no longer be a chartered partner of BSA or sponsor Scouting units after December 31, 2019, it continues to support the goals and values reflected in the Scout Oath and Scout Law and expresses its profound desire for Scouting’s continuing and growing success in the years ahead.
While the severance of relations, effective on December 31, 2019, more than one year away at the time it was announced, was issued as a "joint statement", it was a slam to the the BSA in more ways than one. For one thing the Mormons had been traditionally huge supporters of Scouting,
continuing on a relationship with churches that in some ways reflected an earlier era when Scouting was heavily invested in churches. The line "While the Church will no longer be a chartered partner of BSA or sponsor Scouting units after December 31, 2019, it continues to support the goals and values reflected in the Scout Oath and Scout Law" is a shot right under the water line at the Scouts at that, as by severing its relationship with the BSA it implicitly is indicating that it feels that the BSA itself is no longer really true to its original mission and that the LDS church must accordingly break its ties to it.
Where this will go is far from clear, but the public severance by the Mormons nearly closes out an era of close association of various religions with the BSA and reflects a wider societal split on what some very basic values in our society are going to be. It's also a brave move for the LDS as its takes them very decidedly out into the currently prevailing winds, while at the same time it may be one more move that indicates that Scouting itself is basically coming to an end as it tries to accommodate social trends which run contrary to its original existential purpose.
This is posted here on this site, of course, as the Mormon church is widely represented in some areas of Wyoming as are Scout troops associated with it.
I could have gone on from here. It was clear that the Mormons were having trouble with their association with the BSA the last few years in general. With the latest BSA move the Mormons simply could no longer, apparently, accommodate themselves to the socially "progressive" direction the BSA seems to be determined to accommodate, or at least knuckle under to. In its statement it notes that the LDS church has more members overseas than it does in the US, and that too is telling as the Mormons may have correctly picked up on something that some other churches in the US and Europe have failed to grasp, which is that not only is the majority of the globe not following the western world in certain "progressive" developments, the opposite is in fact the case. Most of the world, including those parts that have adopted western liberal democratic ideas, are increasingly socially conservative, not socially liberal. Organizations with a global reach should be at least somewhat aware of that.
It'll be interested to see how this develops. It would seem likely that the Mormons will form their own Scouting type organization based on the original Scouting concepts. If they do, they won't be forming the first such organization. I'll be curious if, assuming they do that, they limit that organization to an all Mormon one or unite it with other severing groups. I'd guess they'd do the latter.
Rust above the wheel well. And it's only eleven years old.
This is my Dodge 3500. I've had it since it was new and it was (and is) my confirmed plan never to trade it in and to never buy a new truck.
Never.
But the engine on starts now runs sort of weirdly out of time occasionally. I can hear the turbocharger seemingly coming in and out at prolonged highway speed. And now rust.
It was rust that took out my black 1996 Ford F250. . . poor thing. That and the engine having a lot of miles on it and having a really hard time on cold winter mornings.
Note: Theodore Roosevelt wrote regularly for the Kansas City Star during World War One. And by regularly, I'm mean regularly. He often had an editorial that was published every few days, showing a blistering output of writing (not that this was atypical for Roosevelt.).
So this article wasn't unusual, but it did contribute to the American political discourse a lasting quote about criticizing the President. I've highlighted that below. Interestingly, a very similar quote had appeared just a year ago from Robert LaFollette whom we would not normally put in the same political ballpark with Roosevelt.
Theodore Roosevelt in 1918, showing a much aged and aging TR.
SEDITION, A FREE PRESS, AND
PERSONAL RULE
MAY 7, 1918
THE legislation now being enacted by Congress
should deal drastically with sedition. It should also
guarantee the right of the press and people to speak
the truth freely of all their public servants, including
the President, and to criticize them in the severest
terms of truth whenever they come short in their
public duty. Finally, Congress should grant the
Executive the amplest powers to act as an executive
and should hold him to stern accountability for
failure so to act, but it should itself do the actual
lawmaking and should clearly define the lines and
limits of action and should retain and use the fullest
powers of investigation into and supervision over
such action. Sedition is a form of treason. It is an
offense against the country, not against the President. At this time to oppose the draft or sending
our armies to Europe, to uphold Germany, to attack
our allies, to oppose raising the money necessary to
carry on the war are at least forms of sedition, while
to act as a German spy or to encourage German
spies to use money or intrigue in the corrupt service
of Germany, to tamper with our war manufactures
and to encourage our soldiers to desert or to fail in
their duty, and all similar actions are forms of undoubtedly illegal sedition. For some of these offenses
death should be summarily inflicted. For all the
punishment should be severe.
The Administration has been gravely remiss in
dealing with such acts.
Free speech, exercised both individually and
through a free press, is a necessity in any country
where the people are themselves free. Our Government is the servant of the people, whereas in Ger
many it is the master of the people. This is because
the American people are free and the German are
not free. The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants.
He should be supported or opposed exactly to the
degree which is warranted by his good conduct or
bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary
that there should be full liberty to tell the truth
about his acts, and this means that it is exactly
necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to
praise him when he does right. Any other attitude
in an American citizen is both base and servile. To
announce that there must be no criticism of the
President, or that we are to stand by the President,
right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile,
but is morally treasonable to the American public.
Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him
or any one else. But it is even more important to
tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him
than about any one else.
During the last year the Administration has
shown itself anxious to punish the newspapers which
uphold the war, but which told the truth about the
Administration s failure to conduct the war efficiently, whereas it has failed to proceed against
various powerful newspapers which opposed the war
or attacked our allies or directly or indirectly aided
Germany against this country, as these papers up
held the Administration and defended the inefficiency. Therefore, no additional power should be given the Administration to deal with papers for
criticizing the Administration. And, moreover, Congress should closely scrutinize the way the Post
master-General and Attorney-General have already
exercised discrimination between the papers they
prosecuted and the papers they failed to prosecute.
Congress should give the President full power for
efficient executive action. It should not abrogate
its own power. It should define how he is to reorganize the Administration. It should say how large an
army we are to have and not leave the decision to
the amiable Secretary of War, who has for two years
shown such inefficiency. It should declare for an
army of five million men and inform the Secretary
that it would give him more the minute he asks for
more.
The Romanians reached an accord with the Central Powers on this day in 1918.
Maybe the Germans were winning?
The treaty had some odd results. Romania was left as a nation, but only a satellite nation of the Germans, giving up territory that it claimed, but gaining some too, resulting in a bigger Romania than there had been prior to its disastrous entry into the war, but one in which the Germans called the shots.
Romania's king refused to sign the treat it it was repudiated at the end of World War One.
Significant points were Romania returned Southern Dobruja and ceded part of the same territory in the north to Bulgaria with the remainder of the territory in Central Power's control. It ceded to Austria Hungaria passes in the Carpathians. I leased its oil to Germany for ninety years (oh, the Germans and that Romanian oil). The Central Powers recognized the union of Bessarabia with Romania, no skin off the Central Powers nose there however. Finally, German civil servants had veto power over all decisions by Romanian cabinet ministers and to even fire Romanian civil servants.
On this day in 1968 the Union Nationale des Étudiants de France, France's largest student union and the union of university teachers marched against police actions at the Sorbonne in numbers that were around 20,000 strong. At the Sorbonne the French police charged with batons. Some protestersbarricadedthemselves in defense at that point, and the police made use of tear gas. There were numerous arrests. But what was it all about?
Don Cossacks under Cossack leader Pyotr Nikolayevich Krasnov took Rostov on the Don with German assistance.
In the now hopelessly topsy turvy situation in Russia the Imperial Russian Lt. General through in with his former enemies, the German Empire, against the Reds, opening up the area to the Germans and to the declaration of a white independent government. When the Germans lost the Great War, he had to recognize the leadership of Allied aligned Whites, but of course he was on the losing side of the Russian Civil War and became an emigre to Europe.
And so the Germans occupied more ground in the fractured East, while their offensive in the West ground to a halt.
He threw in with the Germans again in World War Two and, after surrendering to the British at the end of the war, was handed over to the Soviets and executed on January 17, 1947.
Elsewhere, Nicaragua declared war on the Central Powers.
Boy Scouts in more muscular days. Examining a Browning M2 .50 BMG machinegun during World War Two.
In some circles, it's popular to speak about there being a "Masculinity Crisis" in our society, by which is meant Western Society. And I've started such threads a couple of times, and then determined not to post them or even complete them.
Although I have posted one on the decline and fall of the Boy Scouts before. Indeed, fairly recently, here:
or at least no officially sanctioned ones, anyway. There will still be
groups of boys organized without girls, probably largely self organized,
and that's a problem.
The Third Liberty Load was a World War One era liberty loan drive.
Nearly every single thing about this poster would be regarded as
abhorrent by our social guardians today.*
When I wrote that, it turned out I was actually a bit premature. But only a bit. Now the "Boy Scouts" have gone so far as to make sure there's no "boy" in scouting. . . at least not in the name. Now the organization is officially neutered. . . and I meant that just the way it sounds.
Lord General Baden Powell, once the British Army's Chief of Cavalry, reviewing the Boy Scouts in November 1918. These scouts look pretty young, so they'd be, I'd guess, the equivalent of Cub Scouts. He'd be pretty appalled by the modern Boy Scouts of America. . or rather Scouting BSA.
Before I go any further, I should note, I have no real personal connection with Scouting. I may have noted that earlier, but I was only very briefly a Boy Scout. So briefly that I usually just say I was never a Scout, which isn't quite true. I was a Cub Scout when I was a kid, as was probably every boy in my grade school. I can't say that experience left much of an impression on me. It made even less of one on my son who was a Cub Scout for a little over a year and then gave it up, the second year truly being a lame experience. I was never a Webelo, that intermediate mysterious stage in scouting. I joined the Boy Scouts at some point in late grade school and was only in it for a few months. I think I did as a good friend of mine who is still a good friend of mine did the same. It showed some promise but for some reason, perhaps a family trait of being non joiners, I didn't retain interest in it very long. Just, if I recall correctly, one late spring, the following summer, and a little bit of the fall. I obtained a couple of merit badges in that time and still have my red BSA beret around somewhere. Soon after that I was into junior high and joined the Civil Air Patrol, which I was in a little over three years, which I liked much better.
Badge of Better Boyhood or not, my stint in the BSA was short. Not as short as my father and his brother, however. They were never in the Scouts which was unusual for their time.
I'd note that this is oddly emblematic for some reason of my immediate family. Neither my father nor his brother were Scouts of any type. My father went to his final year in high school here when JrROTC was a requirement, but as he transferred into the school in his last year he was only required to take it for one semester, rather than three years. He later served in the USAF. His brother wasn't a Scout either, but did do three years in JrROTC as he had no choice. He later served in the Army. I didn't do JrROTC but did do CAP, as noted. I later served in the National Guard. Nobody has ever been successful in getting any of us to stay in any fraternal organization for long either. My father was only Knight of Columbus very briefly and probably because he didn't have much of a choice. His brother was, but probably not for a real long time. I never have been.
Guess we're not joiners unless it involves heavy weapons somehow.
Anyhow, I note this as I'm not in the personal nostalgia camp on the Scouts, having never really had much association with them.
Nonetheless, I think the decline of the Scouts from a Boys Organization into whatever it is now is pathetic and a reflection of a culture that's increasingly pathetic. So, yes, there is a bit of a masculinity crisis in Western Society.
And increasingly there's no legitimate place for boys and men.
Now, I didn't say there's no place. There always well be. Men will form such associations one way or another. The founders of organizations like the Scouts knew that and sought to direct it. And that's something that's important.
Like it or not, there are real differences between male and female in our society. Right now, the "progressives" amongst us really don't like that, and for that matter they don't even like the concept of gender much or the simple fact that gender is biologically determined.
Elsewhere, earlier in this blog, I went into the "muscular Christianity" movement of the early 20th Century and how that gave rise to Scouting. While I'll note that I'm pretty pessimistic about Scouting here, one thing I did there was to somewhat question whether youth organizations have declined as much as supposed. What can't be doubted, however, is that their character has significantly changed and to a degree, over time, and to a great degree in some organizations, they've become feminized in the dual sense of the word. I.e., they've become more feminine and they've become feministic to a degree.
Now this would vary by organization, but anyone who has looked at them much can't really dispute that and that's been part of a process that has also been a dual one. One part has been the fully legitimate expansion of the role of women in society in the modern age, a byproduct I've argued was largely due to the mechanization of the household. That development, while so often focused on, was much more natural in the organic sense than people are willing to even begin to acknowledge, and therefore much less radical no matter how it might appear to social historians. The other part has been, however, something truly radical in the form of the more radical feminist movement. Always a minority of women, it's been a progressive cause that's not so much sought to advance opportunities for women as to ultimately argue that men and women don't even exist.
Always a factor of the extreme left, that movement has combined with other social goals of the extreme left for an odd progressive stew. Indeed an interesting book, based on the author's interview (I haven't read it and am not going to) has been written by a former writer from Cosmopolitan who detailed how in that magazines radical heyday she and others in the magazines simply made stuff up to support the concept of the cause, with that concept being a radically libertine one. Indeed, she maintains that the magazine was even successful in co-opting some of the original feminist who were much more feminine than their followers and who were more in the category of the "Me Too" movement of today, and who even originally opposed abortion.
Such views, interestingly enough, have always been a feature of the really extreme left, which again makes it surprising to see how successful they've become in modern Western Society in our own day. The early Socialist radicals who would become Marxists took Marx very seriously and argued that "all wives should be held in common" as Marx had, by which they meant that they were opposed to marriage and any kind of sexual restraint at all. What Mrs. Marx thought of that I don't know, but if you look at the lives of their children it would seem that the concepts of the father of various types brought personal disaster upon the psychological well being of the children. Lenin, of course, had a wife and a mistress. Stalin had the the pre marriage moral behavior of an alley cat and is suspected in the death of his wife, but perhaps here is where the interesting aspect of the Marxist view starts. She wanted to work and Stalin, who had a string of paramours before he married her, wasn't keen on that at all.
Indeed, while Communist revolutionaries in the early days discouraged marriage and encouraged abortion and basically lived lives of pretty amoral abandon in this area (the life and writings of Whitaker Chambers provide some interesting insights into that) generally once they started to be successful they took the opposite approach to a radical degree, showing perhaps that the test of that area of Marxist thought failed pretty quickly. The Soviets in power were downright puritanical in Soviet culture and not tolerant at all of what they'd previously espoused and engaged in. That spread to the later Communist movements which likewise held that view. So much so, in fact, that the British were able to use that as propoganda against Malaysian Communist who had to live lives of strict conduct in these regards including obtaining permission to marry from their superiors. When it could be shown by the British that the superiors privately didn't behave that way, a door was open to disillusion the rank and file who naturally reacted with "hey?"
All of which is pointed out only because concepts put to the test in this area uniformly fail, none the less we're deep in the midst of them.
And one of the things we're deep in the midst of is an outright attack on masculinity and things male.
Now, that may seem like an exaggeration and it can indeed be grossly exaggerated. And it might not really be fully understood. But what can be fairly easily determined is that even a pool of average guys today, selected at random, contains a lot more effeminate men than a similar pool would have two or three decades ago.
Not that this hasn't happened before. It has. It's seemingly a cyclical sort of thing.
That takes me back to citing the Strauss Howe Generational Theory which always causes me to note that I'm not a proponent of it. I've cited it enough however to note that I do feel there's something to it, and here what I think there is to it is that feminization of men does seemingly occur on a repeated basis and I'd tend to agree that in part men tend to be what women want them to be. In eras when the wolf is at the door men tend to be, if you will, more manly.
But I also think that in our own era there's been a real attack on the basic nature, and the ingrained organic nature at that, of being male. And its an area where those who attack the media have some traction. I've heard some really sbsurd analysis, for example, on how Donald Trump is emblematic of old maleness that's passing, and this on one of the news shows.
Oh, bull.
But when you are in an era in which the most feminine of men are celebrated, and indeed men who are so confused on their gender that they wish to become women, are celebrated, you know things have become more than a little confused in terms of comporting with nature and biology.
Well, all things straighten out in the end. It's often said that nature abhors a vacuum but more than that nature simply squashes, on her own time, things that can't exist naturally. Nature will get you one way or another. And as such views are uniquely those of a narrow sector of the wealthy, European (which would include European American) Western Society, and not the globe at large, it's pretty arrogant to think that they views will last long
But while they do, some ridiculous and harmful things are made to occur. And the squashing of boys organizations are one of those things.
The Scouts, as detailed before in our earlier threads, were formed because Lord Baden Powell was distressed that British youth had lost its more rugged values. Coming up in the Protestant Muscular Christianity era and part of it, it sought to combine the lessons and virtues of the outdoor life with Christian values. It was not a religious organization per se, but it was a Christian one and that really cannot be doubted. For years and years, and even now, Scout Troops were primarily associated with churches. Nearly ever major church had one and that meant that Scouting Troops were all Christian as a rule and they were beyond that, sectarian by default if not by design. Lord Baden Powell himself noted in a book actually entitled Scouting & Christianity that;"Scouting is nothing less than applied Christianity". Upon the foundation of the movement he had stated:
You can't get much clearer that that. Scouting was specifically designed to instill manly virtues in boys in hopes that they'd retain Christian manly virtues as adults.**
This may seem odd to us benighted moderns, but one of the things that has often and periodically been complained about in regards to Christianity is that can become highly feminized. The reasons for this are often debated but it can be said that one of the reasons is that many of values of Christianity that are associated with compassion seem to lend themselves more naturally to women rather than men. This is so much the case with some that it is easy to forget that not all Christian virtues by a long-shot can be defined by compassion and reducing Christianity to that is grossly in error.
Anyhow, what this has done is to cause cycles in which women predominate in churches. These are cycle, not permanent evolutions, and they don't happen uniformly by any means. The expression of this in the Orthodox churches, for example has been in a different fashion than it has been other churches. This is true in the Catholic Churches as well, which as is often noted have all male clergy, which doesn't mean that they've been immune to it.*** It's most pronounced in the Protestant churches, some of which have reduced their theology nearly to the "it's nice to be nice to the nice" level.
The Muscular Christianity movement came as a reaction to that in the Protestant Churches in the late 19th Century. This phenomenon skipped the Orthodox and Catholic Churches, and the Jewish synagogues, at the time, so it was really a Protestant movement. It was a pretty successful movement however and at least some elements of it, including the Boy Scouts, spread into at least all aspects of the Christian churches in the West. And it was such a successful movement it proved to be a problem for anti Christian movements in various places. Nazi Germany, for example, banned the Boy Scouts.
In the spirit of dumping on the Baby Boomers once again, the decline and now the fall of the Scouts is yet another part of their legacy to a degree. Scouting started to take a hit in the 60s and 70s when the Boomers, who are now the same demographic that wants you to join the Rotarian's, the Elks or one of the two big political parties, didn't want to join anything that featured a uniform.
And the more radical edge of the Boomer movement of the time attacked standards in general and the Boy Scouts were an organization that had them. Indeed, this was so much the case that to call somebody a "Boy Scout" as a slander is well known. It's the same as calling somebody a Goody Two Shoes, a slander that absentmindedly recalls the story of an impossibly good maiden whose virtue is rewarded by foot-gear and a happy marriage.
The story upon which a diss is based, although few people probably realize the origin of the phrase.
That in and of itself is interesting as to slam somebody for their virtue is essentially to confess being enraptured by the "glamour of evil". Nonetheless, the Boy Scouts have slowly succumbed to the pressure of a decline of values and standards. Even by the 1970s the organization wasn't what it was in the 1950s and certainly wasn't what it was in the 1930s. Hit by some scandals in the late 20th Century and early 21st Century it failed to really urge for a societal examination of the source of those scandals as has every other organization that was hit by the same set of them (and it should be noted that schools, uniquely, continue to be beset by the same phenomenon unabated and were always were they were most expressed, and yet this remains unaddressed and unnoticed). As homosexual advocates gained ground in their advocacy for the normalization of their attractions in the early 21st Century the Boy Scouts prohibition on homosexual leaders and openly homosexual members came under attack and while the Scouts initially leaned back on the organizations Christian underpinnings it soon yielded. Whether it should have or not can be debated, but the fact that the organization basically first relied upon its Christian underpinnings and then rapidly changed course signaled pretty clearly that it was drifting rapidly away from its original organic purpose.
This is an older church located in West Laramie, Wyoming. The sign on the church identifies it as the Emmanuel Apostolic Temple. Given the appearance of the church, and its location, it was almost certainly built for some other Protestant congregation many years ago, but I otherwise know nothing about it.
Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Awareness Day
CHEYENNE, Wyo. –A proclamation
recognizing May 5, 2018 as Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls
Awareness Day was signed by Chairman Clint Wagon of the Eastern Shoshone
Business Council and Roy Brown of the Northern Arapaho Business Council. The
proclamation was distributed across the State. Governor Matt Mead joins the
Chairmen of the Tribes recognizing the importance of raising public awareness
of this critical issue.
BNSF rail tunnels on left, Wyoming Highway Department tunnels on the right.
Wind River Canyon, Wyoming.
What I didn't note is how emblematic of modern local transportation this is. The rail line on the left, running from Thermopolis to Riverton Wyoming, is spectacular in this stretch, but it carries only freight, like every other Wyoming rail line. At one time, that wasn't true. It carried passengers as well. But that was decades ago.
The highway on the right is also spectacular, one of Wyoming's best in my views. The replacement for the means of conveyance on the left, although in fairness I'm sure the road is quite old. I don't know when the highway tunnels were put in.
1918, the anniversary of a the Battle of Peubla, an event which has become widely celebrated in the US under the mistaken belief that it's Mexico's independence day, the Cheyenne State Leader was reporting that Germans were "flocking to Mexico" to "stir up population".
So even in the midst of the Spring Offensive of 1918, concerns over Mexico managed to get back on the front page.
The sign reads "Community Hall, Restored 1976, Gillette FFA".
Between Wright and Edgerton.
There are a fair number of these.
Little halls for isolated rural communities. Communities that were really too far from town to go to town's regularly. Even as late as the 1970s, when this one was restored, I can recall one in northern rural Carbon County that received a fair amount of use.
I don't point these papers out today for the war news, although there was plenty of it. No, I'm pointing them out for the local goings on in Cheyenne and Casper.
Let's look at Cheyenne:
This issue is remarkably similar to an issue of this Cheyenne paper that ran a year ago. We learn here that, once again, a bevy of Cheyenne high school beauties were the "sponsors" of the Annual Cadet Show, an even that no doubt took on more meaning in 1917 and 1918 than it ever had before.
And once again, oil prospects near Cheyenne were in the news. Those prospects were real, but it wasn't until the 2010s that they'd be developed. New technology made that possible.
A school nurse was recommending something that was fairly radical at the time. . . but as this came at the tail end of the Progressive Era, it was a somewhat radical age.
Around the state 167 men were called to the colors. Elsewhere, a terrible military balloon tragedy had occurred.
And in Casper:
Casper's newspapers, now larger with a larger reading audience, continued to improve and at least this issue of the Casper Daily Press was real news. . . not all optimistic petroleum boosterism.
A real city improvement, sanitary and storm sewers were being put in. And that was big news.
William Ross, who would become governor. . . as would his wife, was rising in the Democratic ranks.
And the balloon tragedy also made the front page news in Casper.
I've put up posts on the Presidential election before, but I've never put one up on the national mid terms. I just tend to focus on the local races on the off terms.
This year I'm not at the point where I can't ignore the mid terms however, as they have the real chance of being a politically seismic event. The announcement of Paul Ryan that he's calling it quits is just too big to ignore.
There is, quite frankly, a tidal wave of GOP Congressional retirements going on right now that threatens to become a resignation tsunami. It's amazing. Something is very clearly going on, and that something is Donald Trump.
Depending upon where a person is in the GOP, a member of the GOP could be crying or rejoicing, but for one thing. Democrats clearly are moving into position and whether or not a person is a Tea Party rebel or an "Establishment" Republican, the Democrats who appear to be positioning are mostly, but not exclusively, at least moderate "Progressives".
But for the Democrats, those on the hardhat end of the GOP would feel that at last they had an America First President that was going to remold the country in a political fashion that recalls the GOP rhetoric of a much earlier era, and in fact it might actually occur. In contrast to that, an Establishment GOP, which was only moderately conservative in reality in spit of its rhetoric, would feel itself grasping to hold on. But, faced with a big Democratic reaction, and frankly a traditional moderate GOP reaction, to a President who comes across as vulgar and perhaps even aimless and slightly unhinged, what both branches risk is a massive revival of Democratic fortunes this Fall. Establishment Republicans are jumping ship in anticipation or discouragement.
We should make no mistake in our analysis. If the Democrats take the House, they'll impeach Donald Trump. Probably not successfully, but it'll be Constitutional Crisis. Republicans who will lament it should, at the same time, lament having made this same foolish choice with Bill Clinton, and thereby having set the stage for the use of the Impeachment clause for attempted coups.
It's unlikely that attempt will be successful, but it will mean that the government will effectively quit doing anything until at least 2020.
Having said that, some careful analysis says that even with all the Republican resignations over the past few weeks the Democrats actually taking the House is unlikely. It's possible, but not likely. Yet.
What would operate in part to hold that off would be the Presidency appearing to be competent. Perhaps all the recent firings are an attempt to do that, as people speculate that Trump is now surrounding himself with individuals whom he actually can trust, but the method by which he's accomplishing it is crude at best. It does appear that he is going back to his base, which at this point may be as good of strategy as any.
At any rate, after a really wild 2016 Presidential Election we now appear set for a really wild 2018 mid term.
May 2, 2018
One of the weekend news shows had a panel interviewed by a pollster this past weekend which served to demonstrate how extremely polarized the nation has become. That it is unusually polarized right now isn't really news, and it isn't getting any better.
One of the things everyone agreed with was a comment that the nation "needed to consider replacing the two party system".
We don't have a "two party system" in that fashion. It's amazing that people think we do.
The system isn't systemic, it's habitual, although in fairness, it's gone on so long that there are elements of it that have in fact become institutionalized.
All that really needs to occur to shake this system up is for people to join parties that actually reflect their beliefs, to the extent they can find them. If that was the case, chances are very high that the Democratic Party and the Republican Party would split into about four or five parties very shortly, and be joined by at least three more that already actually exist.
And that would be a good thing.
There's no earthly way that the two parties we have represent the views of most people in the United States, or even who are members of the parties themselves. No wonder there are so many independents. And yet people won't go for third parties.
Well, consider this. In many instances there's nothing that prevents a person from registering as a Republican or Democrat and still actually being a member of another party.
And if people are serious about that complaint. . . well they ought to do something about it.
A Utah girl is receiving criticism for wearing a traditional Chinese style dress to prom. Self appointed guardians of Chinese culture have found that in appropriate.
Which is absurd.
I'd go further, but I'll simply note instead that a society that debates a topic such as this seriously has either solved all of its real problems, or is so far beyond even attempting to solve them that it chooses instead to deal with the trivial.
The headline was correct, actually. The Germans were stalling out massively in the second stage of the 1918 spring offensive. And they were making a massive effort, commencing on May 1, to move large numbers of troops to the West.
Not that this didn't pose its challenges. Only yesterday the Germans had help Ukraine take Sevastopol from the putative Crimean soviet republic. This was accompanied by the Ukrainian navy moving its ships out of harms way for the time being, although the Germans occupied those that were left. Lenin ordered their commander to scuttle them, and he refused, showing a Ukrainian navy that proved more loyal to Ukraine in 1918 than it did a couple of years back when it basically defected to Russia. And the Germans were fighting in Finland against the Red Finns for the White Finns.
Nonetheless, they were moving troops west now, which they should have done months ago. Having taken massive casualties in the spring offensive, they had little choice.
Eddie Rickenbacker, who really was a race car driver, made his appearance in the paper as a fighter pilot on this day, at least in the local paper, for the first time, thereby achieving the role for which he is remembered.
