Saturday, April 1, 2023
Friday, March 31, 2023
Wednesday, March 31, 1943. Oklahoma!
Oklahoma! opened on Broadway.
Having a very long initial run, and having been revived from time to time, I have to admit, I've never seen it.
I have been, however, to Oklahoma on numerous occasions.
The Afrika Korps withdrew from Cap Serrat, the Tunisian city that's about as far north in Tunisia as you can go.
The British took El Aouana, Algeria. The ancient city is famous for the French discovery for four dolman there. Dating back to Roman times, the city was named Cavallo, "horse", by the Romans.
A photographer was apparently touring the Port of San Francisco, which I've also been to.
Cavalryman, Gen. Frederick Gilbreath, Commander of the San Francisco Port of Embarkation, on this day in 1943.
Actor Christopher (Ronald) Walken born on this day in 1943 in New York.
Russian writer and politician Pavel Nikolayevich Milyukov (Па́вел Никола́евич Милюко́в) died in exile in France on this day in 1943. He had been a member of the Provisional Russian Government after the fall of the monarchy. While an opponent of the Communists in his native land, he supported Stalin's efforts to expand Soviet territory and was an ardent supporter of the Soviet war effort against the Germans.
Railhead: Railhead: The not so great train robbery.
Railhead: Railhead: The not so great train robbery.:
We know that Miner didn't do this one, as he died in 1913 at age 65 from gastritis due to drinking brackish water.
Railhead: The not so great train robbery.
Railhead: The not so great train robbery.: CN police, RCMP investigating Monday train robbery in Brocklehurst Mar 28, 2023 | 1:36 PM KAMLOOPS — Kamloops RCMP are assisting CN Rail pol...
So, two days later, what do we now know?
Not much more, perhaps showing the difference in media access in Canada vs. the US.
The RCMP is asking for help. but the details so far have been very limited. It was an armed robbery, conducted by a man who felt in a white sedan, and who was wearing a hoodie.
That's it.
It's also the first train robbery in British Columbia since 1906. That train was robbed near Kamloops as well, by Bill Miner the Gentleman Bandit.
We know that Miner didn't do this one, as he died in 1913 at age 65 from gastritis due to drinking brackish water.
Lex Anteinternet: Down the rabbit hole.
Lex Anteinternet: Down the rabbit hole.: Down the Rabbit Hole And so, we find, a contemporary warped Zeitgeist, virtue signaling, cowardice, and bad reporting, have taken the state ...
Well, nothing here is a surprise, we must say. And therefore, we should not be surprised that the Saga is headed, as it seems it needs to, to Court, while the sorority members themselves, head out the door.
On the latter, only ten of the fifty actual you women who are members are reupping. The alleged details, and of course they are merely alleged, explain why.
Complaints, we should note, initiate lawsuits, and they are allegations, not proofs. That's important to keep in mind.
Be that as it may, the complaint is illuminating. Among other things, it described the "transgendered" wanna be woman pestering the real women about sexual topics of a person nature, watching them, and getting an erection while doing so. He hasn't left on "pajama" night on a timely basis.
Next year, he's moving in.
In short, he's, and he is a he, is sitting around on occasion in the sorority house getting a hard on watching the girls his own age.
The latter is a natural reaction. What isn't natural is the situation itself.
And what isn't sane is a society that allows a young man to claim he's a girl so that can place him in a girls residence in a manner which sexually excites him, and threatens them.
Which brings me back to this point which was made in our last entry on this story:
Assuming he is intact, and to put it honestly which therefore will come across as indelicate and crass, he's got a dick and balls and male DNA, and he's with a group of young women. His currently claimed psychological situation may be telling him he's a woman, but his testosterone and biology tells him he's a man, which he is. And if we know anything about the biology of our species, the mammal with the highest sexual dimorphism and sex drive of any mammal that ever lived, it can override a lot. Indeed, claimed homosexual men fathering children is not exactly unusual.
So, there's a man, perhaps intact, living in a sorority, simply because he claims to be a woman and has been dressing as one.
I'm not saying that he's going to do something improper. Chances are he won't. But I'm saying that, at a bare minimum, it's a bad precedent, as at some point, somebody will.
Let's be blunt. It very well might not be this guy, and it might very well not be in Laramie, but some young woman is going to get raped in a situation such as this. I'm not saying might, I'm saying she will.
We already know, of course, that putting young men and young women in close proximity in barracks like situations, or actually in barracks, leads to rape. The U.S. Army has being dealing with this ever since it started off on its attempt to insert women in what is a traditional male role of combat soldier. It's been working on it since day one, and it continues to, as the situation carriers on, as it does in the Navy, Air Force and Marines.
And everywhere it's tried. Just this past week, the Irish Defense Forces, existing in a land with a nearly homogenous culture with a much stronger religious nature in all levels of society, reported that over 80% of its female members have experienced some sort of sexual harassment, up to and including rape.
We also know, no matter how much some may wish to pretend, that men wishing to be women, and vice versa, is not psychologically normal. It's also, it should be noted, not really the same thing as homosexuality. Indeed, homosexuals by and large function in all other aspects of their life according to the mean. Transgenderism is such a radical departure from reality, however, that it does not. Something is deeply amiss in a person exhibiting it.
Chances are high that, at a high altitude level, men and women exhibiting are not really exhibiting the same thing. One thing they are exhibiting, however, is a deep cry for help.
They aren't getting it, in no small part as liberal sociology is sabotaging it. Instead, what they are getting if "affirmation". That's not what they're seeking.
I've known, as has everyone, people who are exhibiting really destructive traits. We've all known drug addicts, alcoholics, and massive over eaters. All of those things are external traits exhibiting something amiss internally. The answer to their problems isn't another joint, another drink, and a third serving of short ribs, along with affirmation that it's okay to be a doper, an alcoholic, or massively overweight. That's going to kill them, and they probably know that. The kind thing to do is to try to help.
People are going down the transgendered path are asking for help. They're fleeing from something.
With women, probably what they think it means to be a woman, which probably isn't what it actually means.
For men, in some cases, they're fleeing from what it means to be a man, or perhaps screaming for attention which they feel they've been denied.
Indeed, no sane many would want to be a woman simply due to the hormonal nightmare and cyclical exsanguination they endure, let alone the second class status they put up with and will continue to for the foreseeable future, not the least of which is that women, far more than men, are judged by their appearance and those crossing over rarely make a good one.
All things insane make it to our courts, at which point the insanity is expelled or ratified. We may be at the start of a return to reality, or about to abandon it full scale.
Abandoned with it will be the sorority system, we might note, which may have already received a fatal blow. Be that as it may, those who were too cowardly to arrest this trip before it started ought to pay, at least with shame, for having allowed this to occur.
Foothill Agrarian: Once a Sheepman...
Foothill Agrarian: Once a Sheepman...: Photo by Marie Malloy - taken during lambing 2022! Last week, I completed a survey about sheep production that asked, "how long have yo...
Thursday, March 30, 2023
Tuesday, March 30, 1943. The Martyrdom of Sister Maria Restituta. Patton and his B-3. UW wins the NCAA. The 505th Jumps.
Sister Maria Restituta, age 48, was beheaded under orders of Martin Bormann. An absolute vocal critic of Hitler and Nazism, she refused to be quiet about her opinions, no matter the cost.
Sister Restituta.
Sister Restituta had been born in Austria, and was of Czech desecent. Her full name, after becoming a nun, was Maria Restituta Kafka. She had been born Helene Kafka and had joined the order in her 20s, having first been a nurse. She was a member of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity.
She was beatified in 1998.
One of the most iconic photographs of George S. Patton to be taken, was taken on this day in Tunisia.
This photo is justifiably famous, but it's sometimes a bit misinterpreted. It really doesn't show anything that unusual for a senior officer of the period.
Patton is wearing a B-3 flight jacket, the heavy sheepskin jacket that was issued to aviators who flew at altitude until synthetics and electrically heated flight suits started to replace it mid-war. It would not be fully replaced during the war. Both the heavy B-3 and the light A-2 saw widespread use beyond airmen, however.
A-2s were issued as a semi dress item to airborne officers (and perhaps enlisted men, although I'm not completely certain on that), signifying that 1) they were an airborne service and 2) there were a lot of them. A-2s made their way into the Navy in some roles as well. They were also widely worn by officers.
B-3s were issued not only to air crewmen, but to ground crews as well, as there were a lot of them. They were a private purchase item with officers, and senior officers sometimes favored them as they were warm.
Patton's B-3 here has had some alterations made to it, including at least one front pocket. You can see his reading glasses held in the visible pocket. You'll frequently see it claimed on websites that Patton had epaulets added to this coat, but that's completely incorrect, at least at the time this photograph was taken. His general's stars are visible, but they are neither pinned nor sewed on epaulets. Indeed, the seam that's visible is simply a coat seam. Other, sometimes later, photos do show Patton wearing a B-3 with epaulets, but that probably actually depicts a different coat, or that this one was subsequently altered as he was promoted.
Patton, perhaps with same B-3 as it has reinforced upper sleeves, but now featuring also epaulets, with the coat featuring the 1st Armored Corps patch. The other figure is Major General Geoffrey Keyes, whose coat features II Corps insignia. This photograph was taken in January, 1944.
The odd things about those photographs are that they show that Patton had that coat at the time that he was the commander of the 1st Armored Corps, which he had relinquished prior to March 1943 when he took over II Corps. Patton was a bit of a stickler about uniforms being correct, but at least in that case his having had the 1st Armored Corps patch put on an expensive coat probably proved to be a mistake, as it couldn't be removed, so he therefore kept wearing it.
The stars on this one, or this coat at this time, are probably painted on.
This coat does have a reinforced upper arm, which is also an alteration, but not one that's as uncommon as might be supposed. I've seen at least one photograph of a conventional aviator with the same alteration. Alterations, often done at the local level, were very common. The location of the unit patch on the reinforcement probably explains why the patch was never replaced. Subsequent promotion probably explains why epaulets were later added.
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Sailors in 1950.
Today In Wyoming's History: March 30: 1943 Led by legendary UW basketball player Kenny Sailors, UW beat Georgetown 46 to 34 in Madison Square Gardens. Sailors would enter the Marine Corps as an officer at the conclusion of that year. UW would suspend basketball due to the war after that year. Sailors eventually became a hunting guide in Alaska, but returned to Wyoming in his old age, where he still lives, following the death of his wife.
Note: that item was originally penned, Sailors was in fact alive. However, he subsequently passed on January 30, 2016, in Laramie, Wyoming. Sailors remains a Wyoming basketball legend.
The 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment made a 2,000 trooper jump, the first such mass jump in US history.
The 505th had been formed in July 1942 and was originally under the command of James Gavin. It had been assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division only a month prior to its first mass jump.
The jump took place near Camden, South Carolina.
Friday, March 30, 1942. The Laconia comes home, Mussolini ponders Italian emigration.
The SS Laconia completed its circumnavigation of the globe, becoming the ship to complete an around the world pleasure cruise.
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It had departed in November 1930 and, before returning to New York, would be at sea for 130 days and call on 22 ports.
She'd be sunk on September 12, 1942, by a U-boat.
Mussolini addressed emigration from Italy in a famous speech, which stated:
The Sig. Director has compromised me, because he has announced my speech. Now almost all Italians know that I do not like speeches, but I accept with joy and resign myself this morning to this exception. He was also moved because he recalled with a warm voice of passion the history of the school—a superb history which all of Milan knows and admires. Also in this area, which could be defined as related to the problem of emigration—without prejudice to the question of whether migration is good or bad—is the "Carlo Tenca" School, and it has done very well, since when discussing the thesis you can argue endlessly regarding a conclusion.
For better or for worse, emigration is a physiological necessity of the Italian people. We are forty million squeezed into our narrow but adorable peninsula, with its too many mountains, and its soil which cannot feed everyone. There are around Italy countries that have a population smaller than ours and a territory double the size of ours. Hence it is obvious that the problem of Italian expansion in the world is a problem of life or death for the Italian race. I say expansion: expansion in every sense: moral, political, economic, demographic. I declare that the Government intends to protect Italian emigration: it cannot be indifferent to those who cross the mountains and travel beyond the Ocean, it cannot be indifferent because they are men, workers, and above all Italians. And wherever there is an Italian there is the tricolour, there is the Fatherland, there is the Government's defense of these Italians.
I feel all the excitement of life that stirs this new powerful generation of the Italian race. You certainly have meditated a few times on what you might call a miracle in the history of mankind; it is not rhetoric, it is said that the Italian people are the immortal people who always find a spring for their hopes, for their passion, for their greatness. Some two thousand years ago Rome was the center of an empire that had no boundaries except in the extreme limits of the desert; the civilization that Rome had given, its great legal tradition, as solid as the monuments, to the world—Rome had built a huge miracle that still moves us even to our most intimate fibers.
Then the empire decayed and crumbled. But it is not true that all the centuries which followed the collapse of the Roman world were centuries of darkness and barbarism. However, after a few centuries the Italian spirit suffered from an eclipse, but during that period of rest it was powerfully reinforced by new achievements, and so here the Italian spirit blossomed again through the creation of the immortal Dante Alighieri.
We were great in 1300 when other people were ill or were not yet born to history. Here followed the superb centuries, the Renaissance; Italy was once again the bearer of civilization to all races, all peoples. Then followed another political eclipse of division and discord, but it was barely a century and the Italian people recover, regaining consciousness of their historical unity. Rome returned, still playing its fanfare of glory for all Italians, it recovered the use of weapons that are necessary when it comes to saving its freedom, its greatness and its future. Then followed small wars, one state, conspiracies, the revolution of a people, martyrs, tortures, jails, exile. And just a century after the last war we made our political unity. However, alongside this political unity and geographical unity, the Italian people lacked the moral consciousness of themselves and their own destinies, even though after a victorious war this formation of conscience was in place. Under our eyes Italy will gradually become indestructible in its unity.
My Government will abolish bell towers so that Italians may see the august image of the Fatherland. This is the work to which my Government intends all its passion and a sense of religious faith. I am confident, gentlemen, of the destinies of Italy! I am optimistic for a simple act of will, because the will is a great force in people's lives and the lives of peoples.
We must will, strongly will! We must want, strongly want! Only with this power of the will we can overcome any obstacle. We must be ready for all sacrifices.
Recollect, then, in a moment of meditation after this rapid advance into the past. We love our willingness to project proudly of our time into the future. This young Italian people—fierce, fearless, restless, but strong. I am most certain that Italy will march towards a future of freedom, prosperity and greatness. Recollect in this vision, we tend all our nerves and all our passion towards this future that awaits us and we cry with a religious fervor.
Viva l'Italia!
It's hard to know what to make of this speech, but the vague references to past empire offer a clue of future fascist actions.
Before it becomes hopelessly buried . . .
and it will, some things that should be considered, but won't be.
The Tennessee school shooter was a young woman "identifying" as a male.
The number of young women doing the same has increased enormously in just a few years.
She was also undergoing treatment for mental illness.
Frankly, her identifying as a male is a mental illness.
It's time to stop pretending otherwise.
I'm not saying that all girls identifying as men are shooting dangers. That would be absurd. But I am saying that this society has been on a forty-year spree of pretending that mental illness doesn't exist, while it has in fact been increasing. We oddly acknowledge the latter while not the former.
The impacts of this, from extreme politics, to extreme violence, are inevitable. Turning a blind eye to that, inexcusable, but that's exactly what will occur.
I'm not one to accuse the media of conspiracies, but the fact of the matter is that generally the media is left of center. Given that, this story will largely ignore that 1) this act was perpetrated by a mentally ill young woman whose mental illness manifested itself in joining the transgender craze, and 2) she lashed out against a Christian institution.
Now, that doesn't explain all of this, society wide.
But shouldn't be ignored.
Wednesday, March 29, 2023
Thursday, March 29, 1973. Collapse.
Today In Wyoming's History: March 29: 1973 The United States completes it's withdrawal from Vietnam.
U.S. Army General Frederick C. Weyand, for the U.S. forces, stated: "Our mission has been accomplished,"
General Cao Văn Viên, for South Vietnam, stated to the departing U.S. troops: "We are going to do everything we can to see that your great sacrifices were not in vain."
The sentiments were no doubt sincere, but the mission had not really been accomplished and the sacrifices would have to be qualified. We took a look at the war in that fashion here:
General Cao would go into exile in 1975 with the fall of South Vietnam, and died in 2008 at age 86 in the United States. Gen. Weyland died in 2010 at age 93.
The war effectively destroyed the combat capabilities through moral decay of the U.S. Army and the U.S. Navy. The Marines and the Air Force came through it much less impaired. The lessons learned caused the post Vietnam War military to abandon conscription, something it had relied upon since 1940, and a wholesale return to the pre World War Two volunteer/National Guard based force, something that has been a success. It would take several years for the Army and Navy to return to combat effective, but it happened much quicker, with the volunteer force, than might have been guessed. By the early 1980s, the service had been effectively restored and the damaging impacts of the Vietnam War largely put behind it.
The war would have a lingering effect on the military in other ways, of course, perhaps one of the most visual being the adoption of the M16 to such an extent that it has obtained record longevity, in spite of being a widely hated weapon by troops of the era.
Blog mirror item:
On the same day:
Today In Wyoming's History: March 29 By odd coincidence, this is also the day that Lt. William Calley was sentenced in 1971 in a courts-martial for his role in the My Lai Massacre, although his prison sentence ended up not being a long one.
Also on that day, the second to last group of US POWs left Vietnam. The last POW to board the aircraft out of North Vietnam was U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander Alfred H. Agnew.
Somehow oddly emphasizing the spirit of defeat at the time, the well regarded television drama Pueblo, about the North Korean capture of the USS Pueblo, aired on television. Only tangentially related to the war, it was impossible not to notice that North Korea of that era felt that the US was so impaired that it could get away with this, which it did.
It would not, now.
And making the day all the worse, President Nixon set a maximum for prices that could be charged for beef, pork and lamb. This was in reaction to a consumer revolt in which consumers, mostly housewives charged with home economics, to boycott the same in reaction to rising prices.
Oddly, of course, this is the day that rationing had commenced on the same items in 1943.
You'd think that I'd remember some of this, but I don't on a personal level.
Monday, March 29, 1943 Meat and fat rationing commences in the U.S.
On this day in 1943, rationing in the US of meats, fat and cheese commenced, with Americans limited to two pounds per week of meat.
Poultry was not affected by the order.
This must have been a matter of interest in my family, engaged in the meat packing industry as they then were.
Contrary to popular memory, not everything the US did during the war met with universal approval back home, and this was one such example. Cheating and black marketing was pretty common, and there were very widespread efforts to avoid rationing. Farmers and ranchers helped people to avoid the system by direct sales to consumers, something the government intervened to stop and only recently has seen a large-scale return.
While wholesale inclusion of a prior item in a new one is bad form, here's something we earlier ran which is a topic that needs repeating here:
Lex Anteinternet: So you're living in Wyoming (or the West in genera...So what about World War Two?
Some time ago I looked at this in the context of World War One, but what about World War Two?
Indeed, a person's reasons to go hunting during World War Two, besides all the regular reasons (a connection with our primal, and truer, selves, being out in nature, doing something real) were perhaps stronger during the Second World War than they were in the First. During WWII the government rationed meat. During World War One it did not, although it sure put the social pressure on to conserve meat.
Indeed, the first appeals of any kind to conserve food in the United States came from the British in 1941, at which time the United States was not yet in the war. The British specifically appealed to Americans to conserve meat so that it could go to English fighting men. In the spring of 1942 rationing of all sorts of things began to come in as the Federal government worried about shortages developing in various areas. Meat and cheese was added to the ration list on March 29, 1943. As Sarah Sundin reports on her blog:
But World War Two was distinctly different in all sorts of ways from World War One, so hunting by that time was also different in many ways, and it was frankly impacted by the war in different ways.
For one thing, by 1941 automobiles had become a staple of American life. It's amazing to think of the degree to which this is true, as it happened so rapidly. By the late 1930s almost every American family had a car. Added to that, pickup trucks had come in between the wars in the early versions of what we have today, and they were obviously a vehicle that was highly suited to hunting, although early cars, because of the way they were configured and because they were often more utilitarian than current ones, were well suited as a rule. What was absent were 4x4s, which we've discussed earlier.
This meant that it was much, much easier for hunters to go hunting in a fashion that was less of an expedition. It became possible to pack up a car or pickup truck and travel early in the morning to a hunting location and be back that night, in other words.
Or at least it had been until World War Two. With the war came not only food rationing, but gasoline rationing as well. And not only gasoline rationing, but rationing that pertained to things related to automobiles as well
Indeed, the first thing to be rationed by the United States Government during World War Two was tires. Tires were rationed on December 11, 1941. This was due to anticipated shortages in rubber, which was a product that had been certainly in use during World War One, but not to the extent it was during World War Two. And tire rationing mattered.
People today are used to modern radial tires which are infinitely better, and longer lasting, than old bias ply tires were. People who drove before the 1980s and even on into the 80s were used to constantly having flat tires. I hear occasionally people lament the passing of bias ply tires for trucks, but I do not. Modern tires are much better and longer lasting. Back when we used bias ply tires it seemed like we were constantly buying tires and constantly having flat tires. Those tires would have been pretty similar to the tires of World War Two. Except by all accounts tires for civilians declined remarkably in quality during the war due to material shortages.
Gasoline rationing followed, and it was so strict that all forms of automobile racing, which had carried on unabated during World War One, were banned during World War Two. Sight seeing was also banned. So, rather obviously, the use of automobiles was fairly curtailed during the Second World War.
So, where as cars and trucks had brought mobility to all sorts of folks between the wars in a brand new way, rationing cut back on it, including for hunters, during the war.
Which doesn't mean that you couldn't go out, but it did mean that you had to save your gasoline ration if you were going far and generally plan wisely.
Ammunition was also hard to come by during the war.
It wasn't due to rationing, but something else that was simply a common fact of life during World War Two. Industry turned to fulfilling contracts for the war effort and stopped making things for civilians consumption.
Indeed, I've hit on this a bit before in a different fashion, that being how technology advanced considerably between the wars but that the Great Depression followed by the Second World War kept that technology, more specifically domestic technology, from getting to a lot of homes. Automobiles, in spite of the Depression, where the exception really. While I haven't dealt with it specifically, the material demands of the Second World War were so vast that industries simply could not make things for the service and the civilian market.
Some whole classes of products, such as automobiles, simply stopped being available for civilians. Ammunition was like that. With the services consuming vast quantities of small arms ammunition, ammunition for civilians became very hard to come by. People who might expect to get by with a box of shotgun shells for a day's hunt and to often make due with half of that. Brass cases were substituted for steel before that was common in the U.S., which was a problem for reloaders.
Lex Anteinternet: So you're living in Wyoming (or the West in genera...: what would that have been like? Advertisement for the Remington Model 8 semi automatic rifle, introduced by Remington from the John Bro...
Wisconsin deer camp, 1943, the year meat rationing began.
Indeed, the first appeals of any kind to conserve food in the United States came from the British in 1941, at which time the United States was not yet in the war. The British specifically appealed to Americans to conserve meat so that it could go to English fighting men. In the spring of 1942 rationing of all sorts of things began to come in as the Federal government worried about shortages developing in various areas. Meat and cheese was added to the ration list on March 29, 1943. As Sarah Sundin reports on her blog:
On March 29, 1943, meats and cheeses were added to rationing. Rationed meats included beef, pork, veal, lamb, and tinned meats and fish. Poultry, eggs, fresh milk—and Spam—were not rationed. Cheese rationing started with hard cheeses, since they were more easily shipped overseas. However, on June 2, 1943, rationing was expanded to cream and cottage cheeses, and to canned evaporated and condensed milk.So in 1943 Americans found themselves subject to rationing on meat. As noted, poultry was exempt, so a Sunday chicken dinner was presumably not in danger, but almost every other kind of common meat was rationed. So, a good reason to go out in the field.
But World War Two was distinctly different in all sorts of ways from World War One, so hunting by that time was also different in many ways, and it was frankly impacted by the war in different ways.
For one thing, by 1941 automobiles had become a staple of American life. It's amazing to think of the degree to which this is true, as it happened so rapidly. By the late 1930s almost every American family had a car. Added to that, pickup trucks had come in between the wars in the early versions of what we have today, and they were obviously a vehicle that was highly suited to hunting, although early cars, because of the way they were configured and because they were often more utilitarian than current ones, were well suited as a rule. What was absent were 4x4s, which we've discussed earlier.
This meant that it was much, much easier for hunters to go hunting in a fashion that was less of an expedition. It became possible to pack up a car or pickup truck and travel early in the morning to a hunting location and be back that night, in other words.
Or at least it had been until World War Two. With the war came not only food rationing, but gasoline rationing as well. And not only gasoline rationing, but rationing that pertained to things related to automobiles as well
Indeed, the first thing to be rationed by the United States Government during World War Two was tires. Tires were rationed on December 11, 1941. This was due to anticipated shortages in rubber, which was a product that had been certainly in use during World War One, but not to the extent it was during World War Two. And tire rationing mattered.
People today are used to modern radial tires which are infinitely better, and longer lasting, than old bias ply tires were. People who drove before the 1980s and even on into the 80s were used to constantly having flat tires. I hear occasionally people lament the passing of bias ply tires for trucks, but I do not. Modern tires are much better and longer lasting. Back when we used bias ply tires it seemed like we were constantly buying tires and constantly having flat tires. Those tires would have been pretty similar to the tires of World War Two. Except by all accounts tires for civilians declined remarkably in quality during the war due to material shortages.
Gasoline rationing followed, and it was so strict that all forms of automobile racing, which had carried on unabated during World War One, were banned during World War Two. Sight seeing was also banned. So, rather obviously, the use of automobiles was fairly curtailed during the Second World War.
So, where as cars and trucks had brought mobility to all sorts of folks between the wars in a brand new way, rationing cut back on it, including for hunters, during the war.
Which doesn't mean that you couldn't go out, but it did mean that you had to save your gasoline ration if you were going far and generally plan wisely.
Ammunition was also hard to come by during the war.
It wasn't due to rationing, but something else that was simply a common fact of life during World War Two. Industry turned to fulfilling contracts for the war effort and stopped making things for civilians consumption.
Indeed, I've hit on this a bit before in a different fashion, that being how technology advanced considerably between the wars but that the Great Depression followed by the Second World War kept that technology, more specifically domestic technology, from getting to a lot of homes. Automobiles, in spite of the Depression, where the exception really. While I haven't dealt with it specifically, the material demands of the Second World War were so vast that industries simply could not make things for the service and the civilian market.
Some whole classes of products, such as automobiles, simply stopped being available for civilians. Ammunition was like that. With the services consuming vast quantities of small arms ammunition, ammunition for civilians became very hard to come by. People who might expect to get by with a box of shotgun shells for a day's hunt and to often make due with half of that. Brass cases were substituted for steel before that was common in the U.S., which was a problem for reloaders.
So, in short, the need and desire was likely there, but getting components were more difficult. And being able to get out was as well, which impacted a person to a greater or lesser extent depending where they were.
And, as previously noted, game populations are considerably higher today than they were then.
New Zealanders entered the Tunisian city of Gabès.
Hitler rejected the recommendations of the German Army to place V-2 rockets on mobile launchers and opted instead for them to have permanent launching installations at Peenemünde.
Life issued a special issue on the USSR.
Nevada joined those states, such as Wyoming, which would no longer recognize Common Law Marriage.
Chapter 122 - Marriage
NRS 122.010 - What constitutes marriage; no common-law marriages after March 29, 1943.
1. Marriage, so far as its validity in law is concerned, is a civil contract, to which the consent of the parties capable in law of contracting is essential. Consent alone will not constitute marriage; it must be followed by solemnization as authorized and provided by this chapter.
2. The provisions of subsection 1 requiring solemnization shall not invalidate any marriage contract in effect prior to March 29, 1943, to which the consent only of the parties capable in law of contracting the contract was essential.
John Major, British Prime Minister from 1990 to 1997, was born, as was English comedian Eric Idle.
Railhead: The not so great train robbery.
Railhead: The not so great train robbery.:
The not so great train robbery.
CN police, RCMP investigating Monday train robbery in Brocklehurst
Mar 28, 2023 | 1:36 PM
KAMLOOPS — Kamloops RCMP are assisting CN Rail police as they investigate a train robbery.
Spokesperson Cpl. Crystal Evelyn says RCMP were called just after 7:00 a.m. Monday (March 27). The incident took place at the junction of Tranquille Road and Ord Road in Brocklehurst.
It’s not known what was taken.
CFJC Today.
It’s not known what was taken.
Eh?
Tuesday, March 28, 2023
Violence and Simple Minded Analysis
To a certain category of intellectual, left and right, everything is always explained by money.
Well, not everything is explained by money.
On this occasion, we focus on Robert Reich, who tends to be focused mostly on money, and while we sometimes enjoy his analysis, and whose columns we have linked in at this site, we find to be often acting with blinders on.
Here's Bob's latest after the recent Tennessee shooting:
The lives of our children or the greed of gun manufacturers?
This concept, that it's firearms manufacturer's greed that causes US violence, is a common one, but it's bunk.
Christmas Card of a Tennessee Representative. It wasn't marketing by the firearms manufacturers that made this somehow seem cute or acceptable. It was something in society that did it.
I've written about the AR15 Effect here before, and I'll be frank that the firearms' industry, which has played along with the glorification of combat arms, shares in a big portion of the blame for causing American gun culture to evolve from hunting and the field to imagined combat. It's definitely happened. But the firearms' industry mostly followed the development, not caused it. Indeed, some major manufacturers, Sturm Ruger being one such example, resisted the urge to make rifles with an AR15 appearance until market forces were so far down the path that continuing on in that direction was simply pointless.
To an extent, manufacturers deserve some blame for popularizing weapons that have a combat aura to them, but perhaps the NRA, which went from focusing on hunting rifles and target rifles to frequently featuring combat sort of firearms, in an effort to boost the fear of its members deserves some too. Indeed, blaming manufacturers puts the cart before the horse. The AR15 has been around since the 60s and served in military hands for many years before it obtained its current reputation. The gun didn't create its own specialized market, but the market somehow evolved around the gun.
But it's not just that. It's something deeper. Bob's fellows have cried for years about how killing infants in the wombs is A-OK, as women get to go to work, their bodies flushed of infant, and that's kid, while indoctrinating a culture that killing a perceived problem somehow remains wrong. You can't really have both. The culture at large has gone from one in which many individuals had experienced military service and left it behind, to one in which men in uniform, nearly any uniform, are absolutely worshiped. Presently the political left is busy ripping down what few standards remain, if they can, proclaiming such nonsensical monikers as LGBTQIAP2S+? real, when clearly they're delusional.
And we're surprised our politics have become extreme, and some violently unhinged?
Does that mean that we aren't at the point where legislation regulating semi-automatic rifles, of some sort, remains beyond being considered? Politically, that probably is where we are at.
But make no mistake, even if legislation passed tomorrow placing semi-automatic rifles into the same category as fully automatic ones, it wouldn't address having dumped the mentally ill out on to the street and treating them as normal, flooding the streets with drugs, some legal and illegal, and continuing to have policies that treat the labor pool as if its 1953 rather than 1923.
That's going to take a lot of work, and neither political party has the slightest intent of engaging in it.
Related Threads:
Vietnam and the Law of Unintended Consequences: The AR15
Sunday, March 28, 1943. 8th Army takes Mareth
Today in World War II History—March 28, 1943: Montgomery’s British Eighth Army takes Mareth, Tunisia. Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff dies in Beverly Hills, CA, of melanoma, age 69, a new US citizen.
From Sarah Sundin's blog.
The Afrika Korps was clearly coming to an end. The 8th Army also took Tougane and Matmata.
The Caterina Costa exploded in Naples' harbor, killing 600 or more people and injuring 1,179 or more.
A fire had broken out on the vessel, but government approval could not be obtained to fight it or tow the vessel to sea.
USS Iowa.
Monday, March 27, 2023
Confusing politics with religion.
I could barely read the Trib on Sunday morning. Not because I was disgusted by the news, but because I was so sick, for the first time in years, that it was a struggle to make it through it. I did note that on the editorial page lawmakers are clocking in, with veterans lamenting this session as pathetic, and freshman claiming it was more of a success.
The veterans are more on target.
One of the more controversial freshmen, Jeanette Ward, had a rebuttal editorial to one run on the 10th by the local director of American Atheists. I saw that editorial but didn't read it as I'm frankly not that interested in what the leader of an entity of a group of people who would have to practically lack leadership by definition has to say really. Moreover, there aren't actually atheist, as denying the existence of God doesn't mean not knowing he exists. All humans know the latter, while some maintain the former. More and more we live in a world where certain segments of our society deny that something that obviously exists, does not, so that's really not that interesting.
I read Ward, however, in part simply because she baffles, and somewhat irritates, me.
I also read it as Ward is writing, she claims, from a Christian prospective.
Now, that's a dangerous thing to claim in the first place as most of the world's Christians belong to Apostolic Christianity, with most of them being Catholic. If you aren't writing from a Catholic prospective, or at least an Apostolic Christian prospective, you have some groundwork to do as you are, by definition, part of a dissenting body that has some sort of major problem with the main body of Christians who date back to day one in the Faith. Maybe this doesn't matter if you are writing on something very general that all Christians agree on, but if it's down to the specifics, maybe not so much.
On general moral principles, as long as they're really general, that shouldn't matter too much, however.
Anyhow, I read her article. It started noting this:
In a famous October 1798 letter to the Massachusetts Militia, John Adams wrote, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
Well, I agree with that. And what she next noted, which was:
Adams was clearly referring to the newly ratified Constitution of 1787, the one we still use and cherish today. Rather than seeking to create a religious theocracy, Adams correctly observed what once was obvious: our republic, as structured by the 1787 document, depends upon a moral, grounded society. Adams believed that a society defined by vices would destroy the mechanisms for self government as created by the Constitution, resulting in despotism.
She went on to note from there that the founders presumed a system in which people shared a set of "relatively similar, classical morals" and that, "Today, there appears to be a widespread misunderstanding of what those morals are."
Well, while I hate to admit it, I agree once again.
So, what from there.
Well, from there Rep. Ward went on to complain about how the Legislature failed to pass HB0066 banning vaccine and mask mandates, looping this back into her understanding of a shared set of "relatively similar, classical morals".
Eh? How do you get there?
The founders lived in an era when quarantines, it might be noted, were common.
She noted that the Atheist group was in favor of vaccine mandates.
And hence we find a clear example of something failing due to the Self Centered Razor. Ms. Ward, in her editorial, proclaims herself a Christian, and I'm sure she's some sort of Christian. From there, she proclaims, in essence, that radial self-determination, within the limits that she conceives of it, or radial personal liberty, within the confines that she accepts it, are Christian principles. They are, to the extent that most Christians hold that man has free will and is therefore free to choose good over evil, or vice versa, but the assumption that the Freedom Caucus "me and mine" view of personal liberty is a Christian one is erroneous.
A lot of what that quarter, which flirts, in an unclear way that it doesn't really understand, with Christian Nationalism, suffers from that. And much of it has the appearance of determining what personal rights and liberties we value first, and then attaching them to a religious faith. People have gone so far in this direction to be able to blind themselves to the gigantic moral failings of some of their leaders. That moral failings would exist is not surprising, but to simply ignore them or excuse them does violence to the principals themselves.
And this gets back to the plank in the eye problems. A person worried, for example, about masks mandates being a matter of law might ponder divorce, which is clearly contrary to the teachings of Christ, being allowed first, but we're too acclimated to that. For that matter, in a society in which people seriously post paintings of Donald Trump in prayer, when he's about to be indited for having paid, in effectively, a pornographic actress to shut up about an affair. . . well.
Anyhow, the Founders were a variety of Christian faiths, with the Church of England being the most predominant. The Church of Scotland was represented and then the more "Protestant" faiths that had been dissenting faiths, from the Church of England, in England itself. A handful of Catholics were in the group.
They didn't have a problem with quarantines, which served the general welfare of everyone.
The concept that it's somehow anti-Christian, or immoral, to require the wearing of masks is simply wrong.
This is the second time Ward has made such a serious error in Christian understanding. In the legislature, she opposed extending Medicaid benefits to mothers who had recently given birth, as she felt the answer to the question "Am I my brothers' keeper" was "No". It's yes.
Saturday, March 27, 1943. News of the bazooka.
Demonstration photograph of M1A1 Rocket Launcher.
The War Department officially released news of a new weapon, the M1A1 Rocket Launcher; the first "bazooka".
The first of a series of weapons, it would prove to be an enormously successful series which continues on in the form of various other rocket launchers, particularly those with an anti armor role.
U.S. Marine with a FGM-148 Javelin, a modern descendant of the first bazooka.
The British engaged in frontal attack on the Mareth Line, inflicting heavy losses on the Afrika Korps. At El Hamma the Afrika Korps is forced to retire to new positions.
The heaviest RAF raid on Berlin to date took place.
Sunday, March 26, 2023
Friday, March 26, 1943. The Battle of Komandorski.
_in_action_during_the_Battle_of_the_Komandorski_Islands_on_26_March_1943_(80-G-73827).jpg)
The USS Salt Lake City damaged due to Japanese fire.
The Battle of Komandorski, a battle with a deceptively Russian name, took place between the U.S. Navy and Japan. The Navy intercepted a convoy of Japanese ships attempting to reach Kiska and engaged in a pitched surface action. No ships were sunk during the battle, but the Japanese ultimately withdrew.
The Best Posts of the Week of March 19, 2023.
Best post of the week of March 19, 2023
Wednesday, March 19, 2003. The Second Gulf War Commences
Monday, March 20, the date on which I began to feel very mildly ill.
March 24, the date on which I started to feel very sick.
March 25, the date on which I started to feel extremely sick.
Saturday, March 25, 2023
Thursday, March 25, 1943. Axis allies looking for the door.
Germany warned Finland, through Joachim von Ribbentrop, that German would not tolerate Finland making a separate peace.
Sarah Sundin reports that Spain closed its border with Nazi occupied France.
She also notes:
Today in World War II History—March 25, 1943: Battle for convoy HX-231 begins (through April 8), the first time an Allied Atlantic convoy beats off German U-boats without loss.
Only a Fool Would Say That
Only a Fool Would Say That was Steely Dan's song in reaction to John Lennon's Marxist anthem Imagine.
I'm glad some other musicians reacted. Imagine is a horrible song, espousing an ideology that, while he claimed it would result in "nothing to kill or die for", killed more in the 20th Century than any other ideology going.
Lawrence Reed has an article on Lennon himself in The American Spectator. It catalogs Lennon's real character, including his physical abuse of his first wife and his multiple extramarital affairs. He's not a guy to be admired for any reason, but for some reason, perhaps his late physical appearance, and a decades long Libby Custer like effort to boost his image has created a false one for him.
I don't really get why people idolize performers anyway, except for their work. I love the music of Jimi Hendrix, but he wasn't example a model of clean and effective living.
And interestingly, people will recite music and sing it without really pondering what the lyrics actually mean. In our "Me Too" era, this is astounding. Imagine is a Communist anthem. Sweet Home Alabama excuses ongoing racial segregation in the South. Brand New Key really does have sort of a creepy set of double meanings quality to it.
And in spite of my self, I like those last two songs.
But at the same time, I guess, I don't idolize the Leonard Skynard or Melanie Safka
Friday, March 24, 2023
Blog Mirror: These German soldiers and their mules have achieved all my relationship goals
These German soldiers and their mules have achieved all my relationship goals
I have to admit, if I'd grown up in a country that was fielding mules in their army in the Alps, I'd now be a retired soldier.
That's cool.
Health care, abortion and the Law of Unintended Consequences. How becoming obsessed with a political fantasy sabotaged, maybe, the effort to ban abortion in Wyoming
A headline on Vox:
Thanks, Obama! The hilarious reason why a judge just blocked Wyoming’s abortion ban.
Republicans just got a painful reminder that political stunts can backfire.
The article concludes:
For the moment, however, the Obama-era amendments writing anti-Obamacare talking points into two state constitutions have proved to be a thorn in the side of Republicans who hope to ban abortions. Let that be a lesson that a state constitution is a foolish thing to change for the sake of a political stunt.
Vox is more or less correct in its thesis as to how we got here, even if it's absurdly optimistic about anyone "learning a lesson". Where it isn't fully correct is in the assumption it was a stunt. Fired up by conspiracy theories and propaganda, a fair number of those voting for the amendment and the bill that took it to the electorate believed that they were operating against almost certain Obamacare "Death Panels". One Natrona County former legislator has stated:
I’ll be very grieved if they actually use that as an instrument of death, That wasn’t our intent at all.
Of course that wasn't the intent, but did you read the constitutional amendment? There were concerns at the time.
The Equality State Policy Center, for one, was worried about the bill, with its lobbyist, Dan Neal, stating:
I’ll bet that even the original supporters of this amendment can’t tell you exactly what it will do, given the vague language and all the changes made to it during the Legislature’s deliberations in 2011.
Yup.
And as for grieved? Bereaved would be a better term. By yielding to paranoid propaganda, those who sponsored this, and then voted for it, have blood on their hands.
And there's a lesson in there.
In the rules that govern logical thinking, Chesterton's Fence, which should be the first rule of Conservatism, holds:
There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: “If you don’t see the use of it, I certainly won’t let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it.”
A corollary to that might be called Yeoman's Gate, which holds:
Before you go through a gate to get to the other side of a fence, completely figure out. to the extent you can, where the path goes.
Which brings up the topic of the Gatekeeper:
If somebody is holding a fence open, urging you to go through, or keeping it closed, trying to bar you from doing so, ask what interest he has in either action.
None of these principles were applied. If they had been, it should have been clear that a certain sector of the Obamacare fearmongers were people who were using it for their own political self-interest, not out of any real concern. Those people were among the gatekeepers. "Run through", they yelled, "the big scary blood Marxist bear of Obama is right behind you!. . .And by the way, vote for me next election, here's my flyer full of BS . . ."
And the pathway lead right to here.
A person should likely ask the same questions about the more radical bills that floated in the last legislature, and most particularly about the Crossover Voting bill that just passed.
Why did we allow crossover voting? Nobody really asked, did they?
Where does the path lead, now that we've crossed it?
And why was the gatekeeper so eager to for us to go through?
Thursday, March 23, 2023
Friday, March 23, 1973. Unraveling.
Watergate burglar James W. McCord Jr. wrote Judge John Sirica that the Watergate defendants had been pressured to remain silent, naming U.S. Attorney John Mitchell as the "overall boss" of the Watergate operation.
McCord had been a CIA officer before becoming a private security contractor. He passed away at age 93 in 2017.
Mori Chack (森チャック) designer of Gloomy Bear, a Japanese pink stuffed bear that eats people, born.
Monday, March 23, 1943. Last sighting of the Xerces Blue.
The last spotting of the Xerces Blue butterfly was made. The species is believed to have gone extinct due to the expansion of San Francisco into its habitat.
Sarah Sundin's blog has a number of interesting items:
Today in World War II History—March 23, 1943: RAF drops 2000 tons of bombs on Dortmund, Germany. At El Guettar in Tunisia, US 1st Infantry Division manages to defeat German armor (10th Panzer Division).
She also discusses the Danish parliamentary elections, which took place in spite of Nazi occupation. The German occupation of Denmark, it might be noted, was quite odd in that Denmark retained its government and even retained its army while occupied.
The Social Democrats took 66 out of 148 seats. The Danish Nazi Party received a mere 3.3% of the vote.
The British troopship RMS Windsor Castle was sunk by an HE 111 off of Algiers. All on board save one of 2,700 were rescued by the Royal Navy.
The multinational commando raid styled Operation Roundabout, made up of two enlisted members of No. 12 Commando, four enlisted men of the 29th Ranger Battalion, and four Norwegian soldiers, commanded by a British officer and with an American officer in support, failed in its mission to destroy a bridge over a fjord when a Norwegian soldier dropped his machine gun magazine. The sound altered the Germans.
The 29th Ranger Battalion was short lived, existing only in 1943. It was made up of volunteers from the 29th Infantry Division and was trained by the British. The unit was successful but it did not have the supporter of higher headquarters and therefore was disbanded in October 1943 with its men sent back to their units.
29th in training.
The combination of hydrocodone and acetaminophen marketed as Vicodin was approved by the FDA.
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