O'ahu's Western Shore
Saturday, January 13, 2024
Thursday, January 13, 1944. Chinese hold at Tarung.
A patrol from the Wiltshire Regt., British X Corps, tries to draw fire from a German MG nest. 13 January, 1944. The soldier in front is carrying an Italian Model 38 submachine gun, the one in the rear a Thompson submachine gun. This is the second photo I've seen of a British soldier carrying a captured Model 38.
Today in World War II History—January 13, 1944: Germans make large-scale arrests of Danish resistance members. Chinese gain control of Tarung River line, driving back the Japanese in the Hukawng Valley .
Sarah Sundin's blog.
The Red Army took Korets. Part of pre-war Poland, it had been a small Jewish city. It is now in Ukraine.
The director of the United States Typhus Commission warned that Naples and southern Italy were seriously threatened by the disease.
The U-231 was sunk by a Vickers Wellington off of the Azores.
Involvement.
Q: “You had argued, after voting to acquit the former president that presidents are not immune from prosecution is that still your view?”
McConnell: “I choose not to get involved...and comment about any of the people running for the Republican nomination.”
That is getting involved.
Turning a blind eye to evil is, well, evil.
Blog Mirror: From Sex To Gender
An essay well worth reading:
From Sex To Gender:
The Modern Dismissal of Biology
The conclusion.
The push for a biologically sexless society is an arrogant utopian vision that cuts us off from our evolutionary history, promotes the delusion that humans are not animals, and undercuts respecting each individual for their unique individuality. Sex is neither simply a matter of socialization, nor a personal choice. Making such assertions without understanding the profound role that an initial biological asymmetry in gamete size plays in sexual selection is neither scientific nor sensible.
Secrets.
If you have to keep a secret it's because you shouldn't be doing it in the first place.
David Nicholls, One Day
I've come to despise secrets.
Southern Rockies Nature Blog: Colorado Wolves: Faux "Paws" on the Ground
Southern Rockies Nature Blog: Colorado Wolves: Faux "Paws" on the Ground: Gov. Jared Polis was on hand Dec, 18, 20203 to release Oregon wolves in Colorado, but some Coloradans deeply involved with the project never...
Friday, January 12, 2024
Stupid Headlines: In Yemen’s Houthis, U.S. and Britain face a ready, war-tested foe
In Yemen’s Houthis, U.S. and Britain face a ready, war-tested foe
Washington Post.
Ummm. . . yeah. . . one that's ready for a war fought 30 years ago, and against a foe that's an Iranian lackie.
Democratic leaders in uniform during wartime (Zylenskyy's M65)
President Zylenskyy visits Lithuania, sporting a M65 Field Jacket.. Ukrainian Press Office. www.president.gov.ua
When Ukrainian President Zylenskyy visited Congress awhile back, there was criticism of his attire, which is somewhat ironic given that recently the Congressional dress standards have sunk pretty low. He wore what he's been wearing, which is a quasi military olive set of clothing. He's dressed in this fashion since the war commenced.
At first, I considered that this just looked odd to Americans, but in reflecting on this, this is a bit more common for democratic leaders than we might suppose. And in his case, probably fairly practical. He spent the early part of the war in a bunker in Kyiv, probably expecting to be killed by Russian troops. His attire, which has never featured insignia, does show he's the leader of a nation at war. I'd council him to dress in the regular Edwardian suit when he's not in country, but he's not doing so.
His wearing of the iconic olive drab M65 Field Jacket while in the Baltics really made this plain. It was really at that point where it made it obvious that his dress is calculated, and not inappropriate.
As noted, a civilian leader wearing military attire strikes Americans as odd, but its not as uncommon as we might suppose. The best example is, of course, Winston Churchill.
Churchill loved uniforms and had started off his adult life as a British cavalry officer. He never got over his love of uniform and used World War Two as an excuse to done them, wearing a variety of them during the war. The one depicted above, from the British National Portrait Gallery, shows him wearing a Royal Air Force uniform following his being made an honorary commander in the RAF. You can find photos of him in this uniform, and others, throughout World War Two.
Churchill in a quasi Royal Navy uniform. Both Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt had occupied similar roles in their nation's navies, although not identical ones, during World War One.
This was not, however, as unique as might be supposed. King George VI, the British monarch during the war, did the same thing.
It's easy to suppose that this was a British thing at the time, and for democratic nations, it seems to have been. You won't find Franklin Roosevelt or Harry Truman doing this, for example. Indeed, the thought that they might is shocking.
Maybe.
Dwight Eisenhower, while he was President, used his love of short jackets to cause there to be an Air Force One windbreaker, although I can't find a photo of it. During the Cold War the crews of Air Force One wore a distinct MA-1 flght jacket, and I wonder if its the same thing.
John F. Kennedy, who had been in the Navy, wore a special version of the Navy G1 flight jacket, an item that managed to hang on in the Navy well after modern flight suits came in, and which the Navy still allows pilots to wear as a non flight item.
I don't see any evidence that Lyndon Johnson, or Richard Nixon, both of whom had been in the Navy, like Kennedy, during World War Two kept this up, but I really don't know either.
Ronald Reagan, who had been in the Army during World War Two, did wear a G1, however.
Donald Trump, who was of draft age during the Vietnam War but who famously was found unfit for service due to shin splints, seems to have had both a A2 and a CWU-45P, the latter being the current sage green USAF flight jacket. President Biden, who was also of military age during the Vietnam War and who also didn't serve in the military, has a Presidential A2. It's interesting that since the A2 came back into semi dress use, it's been the A2 that Presidents have favored.
All this is just a single item in US Presidential use, of course. It's unlikely that we're going to see a President in a M65, and indeed we can hope we never do, as Zylenskyy has adopted that due to living in conditions in which a Russian paratrooper could appear at the door any day.
Clothes, however, send a message. No US President appeared wearing uniform items at all until the Cold War, which also changed the Executive's relationship with the military. The flight jackets send just as much of a message as the M65 does.
Related Threads:
Blog Mirror: 6 Must Have Winter Car Accessories to Stay Safe and Comfy
6 Must Have Winter Car Accessories to Stay Safe and Comfy
All good advice.
I'd add, here in Wyoming, a winter coat for sure.
And a blanket that will suffice for cold weather without electricity, as you might not have your car electricity all that long.
And some food for a few days is a good idea, also.
I'd also add, for at least off roady and over the road vehicles, a two-way radio. I have GMRS radios in both of my regular 4x4s, which are also my regular daily drivers. Personally, I much prefer GMRS over CB, which has a more limited range.
Saturday, January 12, 1974. How revolutions begin.
The Ethiopian Revolution began with the mutiny of the Negele Borana garrison over bad food and a lack of water.
They sized Lt. Gen. Deresse Dubale, Emperor Haile Selassie's envoy, and forced him to survive on the same fare they had for a week.
Gasoline rationing commenced in the Netherlands.
Television started operation in Tanzania.
Wednesday, January 12, 1944. Churchill and De Gaulle meet.
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Bombing of Japanese merchant ships at Kwajalein Atoll, Marshall Islands by VB-108, January 12, 1944.
De Gaulle and Churchill met in Marrakesh.
The US Army's 34th Infantry Division took Cervaro.
The Red Army's 13th Army took Sarny, then properly a part of Poland.
Seventy-four members of the Solf Circle, a group of anti-Nazi intellectuals, were arrested.
Saturday, January 12, 1924. Taking Oaxaca.
Mexican mountaineer irregulars loyal to the government took Oaxaca.
France rejected a British proposal in the League of Nations to investigate separatism in the Rhineland.
The Economist: "Western values are steadily diverging from the rest of the world’s." Geez, with "Western Values" being no values at all, given as we've dumped our values, should we be surprised?
From the Economist:
Western values are steadily diverging from the rest of the world’s
With the Western World's values increasingly being valueless, if not downright goofball, who can blame the rest of the world?
It is, however, something worth remembering. Or at least noting.
Thursday, January 11, 2024
Friday, January 11, 1974. Births.
Long Suffering Wife was born.
The first surviving sextuplets in human history, David, Elizabeth, Emma, Grant, Jason and Nicolette Rosenkowitz, were also born in South Africa to Susan and Colin Rosenkowitz. The couple already had two children.
There have been, of course, massive changes in South Africa since 1974 and the history of these siblings demonstrates that, as they later moved, respectively to locations around the English-speaking world, with three remaining in Cape Town.
Their father, Colin, was raised in an orphanage, although he was not an orphan. He'd been placed there, as would occur in those days, due to the financial distress of his parents. In 1989 Colin and Susan divorced with Colin obtaining custody of all of their children. Susan, who was from the UK, seems to have returned to the UK. The children were teens at the time, but the large family obviously put Colin in financial distress, and he worked until he was 83 years old. He died in 2021.
Tunisia's President Habib Bourguiba and Libya's President Muammar Gaddafi signed the Djerba Declaration, committing Tunisia and Libya to a merge as the Arab Islamic Republic, one of many various effort of Arabic nations to merge, all of which have failed.
Tad Szulc broke the news that the CIA had attempted to finance the assassination of Fidel Castro in 1964 and 1965, to be followed by an invasion of Cuba.
Bootmaker Tony Lama passed away at age 86.
Levantines
I've used the term "Coastal Arabs" here recently to describe the culture that stretches from teh Sinai to Turkey and which includes a lot of Syria.
Distribution of Levantine Arab dialect. By A455bcd9 - Own work based on: Levantine Arabic 2022.svgReferences:Brustad, Kristen; Zuniga, Emilie (2019) "Chapter 16: Levantine Arabic" in Huehnergard, John , ed. The Semitic Languages (2nd ed.), Routledge, pp. 403–432 DOI: 10.4324/9780429025563. ISBN: 978-0-415-73195-9. OCLC: 1103311755.Eberhard, David M.; Simons, Gary F.; Fennig, Charles D. (2022). Jordan and Syria. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. SIL International., CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=128220068
It turns out, the word that I should have used is Levantines.
The region has its own dialect of Arabic, its own (really good) cuisine, and those who genetic history from the region can be identified by their DNA.
Yes, they are Arabs, but they are not Bedouin.
The 2024 Election in Wyoming. Will anyone rise to the challenge, and is there even a point?
Lex Anteinternet: The 2024 Election, Part XI. The Winter of Disconte...: January 4, 2023
Harriet Hageman announced her bid to be reelected with the release of a video:
Harriet Hageman is running for reelection. This is not a surprise.
John Barrasso is as well. This is also not a surprise.
The difference between the two races, so far, is that Barrasso has drawn a challenger. . . from his own party, in the primary.
Hageman is unlikely to.
Neither candidate, so far, faces a Democrat.
Roncalio, a lawyer from Rock Springs, and a veteran of D-Day, was a Democrat.
Nearly everyone in Rock Springs was.
At that time, one of our two Senators, Gale McGee, a former University of Wyoming professor, was also a Democrat.
Now, to use the term "Democrat", even in street speech, is slanderous in the state. It's like calling somebody a wife beater or something. Republicans vying to be as extreme as possible accuse their fellow Republicans of being Democrats (even though many of those who do that routinely are imports from the South or elsewhere and are really, even if they don't know it, Dixiecrats or Rust Belt Democrats).
Gale McGee was our Senator until 1977, when he was replaced by Malcolm Wallop, a very conservative Wyomingite of English peerage, in a race in which it appeared that McGee didn't really have any interest in running. McGee was our last Democratic Senator, and he simply gave the race to Wallop.
Roncalio served in the House in 1978. He didn't run for reelection. He was replaced by Dick Cheney in a race that pitted Cheney, fresh out of the Ford Administration, against Cheyenne attorney Bill Bagley. Cheney won with about 60% of the vote against a lawyer who is now forgotten, but who held on in practice too long. Interestingly, showing part of how we got to where we are now, one of his county chairs was a then Democrat who would later be in the legislature as a very conservative Republican.
That's telling, as a whole herd of Democrats who were later conservative Republicans share that history in the state.
No Democrat has gone to Washington from Wyoming since 1978, but the party remained significant and a power well after that. It twice took the Governor's office and twice reelected Democratic Governors, with the last Democrat leaving Cheyenne in that role as recently as 2011. Either one of the Democratic Governor's could have had a House, and maybe a Senate, seat if they had wanted one. The Democrats routinely took the Secretary of State's office for much of the 20th Century, with the last Democratic Secretary of State, Kathy Karpan, leaving office in 1995. Karpan went on to become the director of the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement in 1997, being the first woman to hold that position, and being unanimously confirmed back when Congress still did its job. Like Governors Sullivan and Freudenthal, Karpan could have stepped into the House or perhaps the Senate if she had wanted to.
Freudenthal remains a significant figure in Wyoming politics.
The last really significant Wyomingite to make a serious run for office with a serious chance of success was Mary Thorne, a lawyer who ran against Governor Gordon in 2018. There have been other real Democrats who have run for office, with Sergio Maldonado for State Superintendent of Education coming to mind, but since the mid 1990s It's become increasingly difficult and many of the Sullivan/Freudenthal Democrats have dropped out of the party, in part because of the Democratic leftward (and anti-democratic) drift, and in part because at some point being a Democrat was pointless and the Republican primary race became the real election.
2022 really demonstrated the direction that the cancer of Donald Trump had brought about.
In 2022 the Republican Primary became a referendum on Donald Trump, with the Wyoming electorate, influenced by the import of Rust Belt and Dixie immigrants into the state, basically giving the insurrectionist a big wet kiss on the mouth by tossing out Liz Cheney. The whole thing was more than a little ironic, as Cheney, who had risen to her office late in her occupation of it, really was never a Wyomingite in the first place, but the party dearly loved her, in no small part because it had embraced Dick Cheney, after having elected him cynically originally. The Cheney's aren't Wyomingites and Dick Cheney had only won as the voters in 1978 were given a choice between somebody who seemed to have influence in Washington, Cheney had been Ford's Chief of Staff, and a Cheyenne lawyer who had, if I recall correctly, held off a challenge from a younger Casper lawyer who later became a Federal judge. Wyomingites of that era were pretty practical and cynical, and they never developed a love for their politicians like occured later. Cheney seemed to do a good job, so he held office. Liz Cheney won as the primary split the vote three ways. Chance are high had that not occured, Tim Stubson would have been our Congressman, and have gone on to suffer the same fate as Cheney by not searing allegiance to the Dear Leader for life.
Hageman was a Cheney acolyte but was good at reading the wind and beat out her former friend. Her competition was Lynette Grey Bull, a really interesting Democrat who had run twice and who drew 24.4% of the vote in spite of the times, in spite of being a Democrat, and in spite of being a Native American.
Who will run now.
Since 2020 the State's GOP has gone into a civil war, with the old party at war with the "Freedom Caucus", one of whose (California migrant) members wrote an op ed in the Tribune which clearly indicates their intent to wage a second Stalingrad in the 2022 Legislature. Two county organizations, Natrona and Laramie Counties, are in revolt against the GOP Central Committee who has fully adopted the Meine Ehre heißt Treue ethos. Hageman hasn't been as noisy as might be expected, in part because she probably correctly read the tea leaves over the trouble that Trump ass-kisser Kevin McCarthy was in for not kissing even more private parts before he fell to a quiet and scary Johnson. The House of Representatives had done nothing this term, and is on the edge of losing power due to attrition. Pundits claim that the GOP will gain House seats in 2022, but they claimed that about 2020 as well. The stench of Trump kept that from happening.
And so we have a non-functioning democracy, locally.
No Democrat can win any office in 2022. The House and one Senate seat will be up, and both of the Republicans contending for those positions will pledge their true honor to the Leader without question. Some in the race to come this year will go further with a full-blown Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer appeal. The Senate primary will see a GOP opportunistic upstart attempting to claim that John Barrasso is a "RINO", which really means that he's not a Dixiecrat or Rust Belt Democrat. While I've discounted that campaign, I don't really put it past it that it has a chance of success.
Will any Democrats run?
I sure hope so. And I mean a real Democrat, not the Left Wing Flavor Of The Month Democrats that the party has been fielding in some races locally. Putting up somebody who self declares to be a homosexual polyamorus trangendered drag queen Pacific Islander is not going to win any hearts at all, and really isn't believeable (the same people would decarel themselves to be cocker spaniels if that was edgy, or Orthodox starets if that was edgy). Soembody like Sullivan, Fruendenthal, Karpen, Thorne, or, once again, Grey Bull.
But who can be asked to be a sacrificial lamb.
Well, somebody had to be.
The state's honor, and the preservation of democracy, require it. With no choices now, we get further down the road to there being no choices, ever.
The Democrats are faced with that burden. What little there is the way of third parties here do as well.
Tuesday, January 11, 1944. The State of the Union, a Second Bill of Rights.
Roosevelt delivering a Fireside Chat on his 1944 State of the Union address, January 11, 1944.
Franklin Roosevelt gave his State of the Union Address for 1944. The speech was wide-ranging, but is remembered for his call for a "Second Bill of Rights", which were:
- The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;
- The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
- The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
- The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
- The right of every family to a decent home;
- The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
- The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
- The right to a good education.
The full speech stated:
To the Congress:
This Nation in the past two years has become an active partner in the world's greatest war against human slavery.
We have joined with like-minded people in order to defend ourselves in a world that has been gravely threatened with gangster rule.
But I do not think that any of us Americans can be content with mere survival. Sacrifices that we and our allies are making impose upon us all a sacred obligation to see to it that out of this war we and our children will gain something better than mere survival.
We are united in determination that this war shall not be followed by another interim which leads to new disaster- that we shall not repeat the tragic errors of ostrich isolationism—that we shall not repeat the excesses of the wild twenties when this Nation went for a joy ride on a roller coaster which ended in a tragic crash.
When Mr. Hull went to Moscow in October, and when I went to Cairo and Teheran in November, we knew that we were in agreement with our allies in our common determination to fight and win this war. But there were many vital questions concerning the future peace, and they were discussed in an atmosphere of complete candor and harmony.
In the last war such discussions, such meetings, did not even begin until the shooting had stopped and the delegates began to assemble at the peace table. There had been no previous opportunities for man-to-man discussions which lead to meetings of minds. The result was a peace which was not a peace. That was a mistake which we are not repeating in this war.
And right here I want to address a word or two to some suspicious souls who are fearful that Mr. Hull or I have made "commitments" for the future which might pledge this Nation to secret treaties, or to enacting the role of Santa Claus.
To such suspicious souls—using a polite terminology—I wish to say that Mr. Churchill, and Marshal Stalin, and Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek are all thoroughly conversant with the provisions of our Constitution. And so is Mr. Hull. And so am I.
Of course we made some commitments. We most certainly committed ourselves to very large and very specific military plans which require the use of all Allied forces to bring about the defeat of our enemies at the earliest possible time.
But there were no secret treaties or political or financial commitments.
The one supreme objective for the future, which we discussed for each Nation individually, and for all the United Nations, can be summed up in one word: Security.
And that means not only physical security which provides safety from attacks by aggressors. It means also economic security, social security, moral security—in a family of Nations.
In the plain down-to-earth talks that I had with the Generalissimo and Marshal Stalin and Prime Minister Churchill, it was abundantly clear that they are all most deeply interested in the resumption of peaceful progress by their own peoples—progress toward a better life. All our allies want freedom to develop their lands and resources, to build up industry, to increase education and individual opportunity, and to raise standards of living.
All our allies have learned by bitter experience that real development will not be possible if they are to be diverted from their purpose by repeated wars—or even threats of war.
China and Russia are truly united with Britain and America in recognition of this essential fact:
The best interests of each Nation, large and small, demand that all freedom-loving Nations shall join together in a just and durable system of peace. In the present world situation, evidenced by the actions of Germany, Italy, and Japan, unquestioned military control over disturbers of the peace is as necessary among Nations as it is among citizens in a community. And an equally basic essential to peace is a decent standard of living for all individual men and women and children in all Nations. Freedom from fear is eternally linked with freedom from want.
There are people who burrow through our Nation like unseeing moles, and attempt to spread the suspicion that if other Nations are encouraged to raise their standards of living, our own American standard of living must of necessity be depressed.
The fact is the very contrary. It has been shown time and again that if the standard of living of any country goes up, so does its purchasing power- and that such a rise encourages a better standard of living in neighboring countries with whom it trades. That is just plain common sense—and it is the kind of plain common sense that provided the basis for our discussions at Moscow, Cairo, and Teheran.
Returning from my journeyings, I must confess to a sense of "let-down" when I found many evidences of faulty perspective here in Washington. The faulty perspective consists in overemphasizing lesser problems and thereby underemphasizing the first and greatest problem.
The overwhelming majority of our people have met the demands of this war with magnificent courage and understanding. They have accepted inconveniences; they have accepted hardships; they have accepted tragic sacrifices. And they are ready and eager to make whatever further contributions are needed to win the war as quickly as possible- if only they are given the chance to know what is required of them.
However, while the majority goes on about its great work without complaint, a noisy minority maintains an uproar of demands for special favors for special groups. There are pests who swarm through the lobbies of the Congress and the cocktail bars of Washington, representing these special groups as opposed to the basic interests of the Nation as a whole. They have come to look upon the war primarily as a chance to make profits for themselves at the expense of their neighbors- profits in money or in terms of political or social preferment.
Such selfish agitation can be highly dangerous in wartime. It creates confusion. It damages morale. It hampers our national effort. It muddies the waters and therefore prolongs the war.
If we analyze American history impartially, we cannot escape the fact that in our past we have not always forgotten individual and selfish and partisan interests in time of war—we have not always been united in purpose and direction. We cannot overlook the serious dissensions and the lack of unity in our war of the Revolution, in our War of 1812, or in our War Between the States, when the survival of the Union itself was at stake.
In the first World War we came closer to national unity than in any previous war. But that war lasted only a year and a half, and increasing signs of disunity began to appear during the final months of the conflict.
In this war, we have been compelled to learn how interdependent upon each other are all groups and sections of the population of America.
Increased food costs, for example, will bring new demands for wage increases from all war workers, which will in turn raise all prices of all things including those things which the farmers themselves have to buy. Increased wages or prices will each in turn produce the same results. They all have a particularly disastrous result on all fixed income groups.
And I hope you will remember that all of us in this Government represent the fixed income group just as much as we represent business owners, workers, and farmers. This group of fixed income people includes: teachers, clergy, policemen, firemen, widows and minors on fixed incomes, wives and dependents of our soldiers and sailors, and old-age pensioners. They and their families add up to one-quarter of our one hundred and thirty million people. They have few or no high pressure representatives at the Capitol. In a period of gross inflation they would be the worst sufferers.
If ever there was a time to subordinate individual or group selfishness to the national good, that time is now. Disunity at home—bickerings, self-seeking partisanship, stoppages of work, inflation, business as usual, politics as usual, luxury as usual these are the influences which can undermine the morale of the brave men ready to die at the front for us here.
Those who are doing most of the complaining are not deliberately striving to sabotage the national war effort. They are laboring under the delusion that the time is past when we must make prodigious sacrifices- that the war is already won and we can begin to slacken off. But the dangerous folly of that point of view can be measured by the distance that separates our troops from their ultimate objectives in Berlin and Tokyo—and by the sum of all the perils that lie along the way.
Overconfidence and complacency are among our deadliest enemies. Last spring—after notable victories at Stalingrad and in Tunisia and against the U-boats on the high seas—overconfidence became so pronounced that war production fell off. In two months, June and July, 1943, more than a thousand airplanes that could have been made and should have been made were not made. Those who failed to make them were not on strike. They were merely saying, "The war's in the bag- so let's relax."
That attitude on the part of anyone—Government or management or labor—can lengthen this war. It can kill American boys.
Let us remember the lessons of 1918. In the summer of that year the tide turned in favor of the allies. But this Government did not relax. In fact, our national effort was stepped up. In August, 1918, the draft age limits were broadened from 21-31 to 18-45. The President called for "force to the utmost," and his call was heeded. And in November, only three months later, Germany surrendered.
That is the way to fight and win a war—all out—and not with half-an-eye on the battlefronts abroad and the other eye-and-a-half on personal, selfish, or political interests here at home.
Therefore, in order to concentrate all our energies and resources on winning the war, and to maintain a fair and stable economy at home, I recommend that the Congress adopt:
(1) A realistic tax law—which will tax all unreasonable profits, both individual and corporate, and reduce the ultimate cost of the war to our sons and daughters. The tax bill now under consideration by the Congress does not begin to meet this test.
(2) A continuation of the law for the renegotiation of war contracts—which will prevent exorbitant profits and assure fair prices to the Government. For two long years I have pleaded with the Congress to take undue profits out of war.
(3) A cost of food law—which will enable the Government (a) to place a reasonable floor under the prices the farmer may expect for his production; and (b) to place a ceiling on the prices a consumer will have to pay for the food he buys. This should apply to necessities only; and will require public funds to carry out. It will cost in appropriations about one percent of the present annual cost of the war.
(4) Early reenactment of. the stabilization statute of October, 1942. This expires June 30, 1944, and if it is not extended well in advance, the country might just as well expect price chaos by summer.
(5) A national service law- which, for the duration of the war, will prevent strikes, and, with certain appropriate exceptions, will make available for war production or for any other essential services every able-bodied adult in this Nation.
These five measures together form a just and equitable whole. I would not recommend a national service law unless the other laws were passed to keep down the cost of living, to share equitably the burdens of taxation, to hold the stabilization line, and to prevent undue profits.
The Federal Government already has the basic power to draft capital and property of all kinds for war purposes on a basis of just compensation.
As you know, I have for three years hesitated to recommend a national service act. Today, however, I am convinced of its necessity. Although I believe that we and our allies can win the war without such a measure, I am certain that nothing less than total mobilization of all our resources of manpower and capital will guarantee an earlier victory, and reduce the toll of suffering and sorrow and blood.
I have received a joint recommendation for this law from the heads of the War Department, the Navy Department, and the Maritime Commission. These are the men who bear responsibility for the procurement of the necessary arms and equipment, and for the successful prosecution of the war in the field. They say:
"When the very life of the Nation is in peril the responsibility for service is common to all men and women. In such a time there can be no discrimination between the men and women who are assigned by the Government to its defense at the battlefront and the men and women assigned to producing the vital materials essential to successful military operations. A prompt enactment of a National Service Law would be merely an expression of the universality of this responsibility."
I believe the country will agree that those statements are the solemn truth.
National service is the most democratic way to wage a war. Like selective service for the armed forces, it rests on the obligation of each citizen to serve his Nation to his utmost where he is best qualified.
It does not mean reduction in wages. It does not mean loss of retirement and seniority rights and benefits. It does not mean that any substantial numbers of war workers will be disturbed in their present jobs. Let these facts be wholly clear.
Experience in other democratic Nations at war—Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand- has shown that the very existence of national service makes unnecessary the widespread use of compulsory power. National service has proven to be a unifying moral force based on an equal and comprehensive legal obligation of all people in a Nation at war.
There are millions of American men and women who are not in this war at all. It is not because they do not want to be in it. But they want to know where they can best do their share. National service provides that direction. It will be a means by which every man and woman can find that inner satisfaction which comes from making the fullest possible contribution to victory.
I know that all civilian war workers will be glad to be able to say many years hence to their grandchildren: "Yes, I, too, was in service in the great war. I was on duty in an airplane factory, and I helped make hundreds of fighting planes. The Government told me that in doing that I was performing my most useful work in the service of my country."
It is argued that we have passed the stage in the war where national service is necessary. But our soldiers and sailors know that this is not true. We are going forward on a long, rough road- and, in all journeys, the last miles are the hardest. And it is for that final effort—for the total defeat of our enemies-that we must mobilize our total resources. The national war program calls for the employment of more people in 1944 than in 1943.
It is my conviction that the American people will welcome this win-the-war measure which is based on the eternally just principle of "fair for one, fair for all."
It will give our people at home the assurance that they are standing four-square behind our soldiers and sailors. And it will give our enemies demoralizing assurance that we mean business -that we, 130,000,000 Americans, are on the march to Rome, Berlin, and Tokyo.
I hope that the Congress will recognize that, although this is a political year, national service is an issue which transcends politics. Great power must be used for great purposes.
As to the machinery for this measure, the Congress itself should determine its nature—but it should be wholly nonpartisan in its make-up.
Our armed forces are valiantly fulfilling their responsibilities to our country and our people. Now the Congress faces the responsibility for taking those measures which are essential to national security in this the most decisive phase of the Nation's greatest war.
Several alleged reasons have prevented the enactment of legislation which would preserve for our soldiers and sailors and marines the fundamental prerogative of citizenship—the right to vote. No amount of legalistic argument can becloud this issue in the eyes of these ten million American citizens. Surely the signers of the Constitution did not intend a document which, even in wartime, would be construed to take away the franchise of any of those who are fighting to preserve the Constitution itself.
Our soldiers and sailors and marines know that the overwhelming majority of them will be deprived of the opportunity to vote, if the voting machinery is left exclusively to the States under existing State laws—and that there is no likelihood of these laws being changed in time to enable them to vote at the next election. The Army and Navy have reported that it will be impossible effectively to administer forty-eight different soldier voting laws. It is the duty of the Congress to remove this unjustifiable discrimination against the men and women in our armed forces- and to do it as quickly as possible.
It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people—whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth- is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill housed, and insecure.
This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights—among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty.
As our Nation has grown in size and stature, however—as our industrial economy expanded—these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.
We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. "Necessitous men are not free men." People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.
In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all regardless of station, race, or creed.
Among these are:
The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the Nation;
The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
The right of every family to a decent home;
The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
The right to a good education.
All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.
America's own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens. For unless there is security here at home there cannot be lasting peace in the world.
One of the great American industrialists of our day—a man who has rendered yeoman service to his country in this crisis-recently emphasized the grave dangers of "rightist reaction" in this Nation. All clear-thinking businessmen share his concern. Indeed, if such reaction should develop—if history were to repeat itself and we were to return to the so-called "normalcy" of the 1920's—then it is certain that even though we shall have conquered our enemies on the battlefields abroad, we shall have yielded to the spirit of Fascism here at home.
I ask the Congress to explore the means for implementing this economic bill of rights- for it is definitely the responsibility of the Congress so to do. Many of these problems are already before committees of the Congress in the form of proposed legislation. I shall from time to time communicate with the Congress with respect to these and further proposals. In the event that no adequate program of progress is evolved, I am certain that the Nation will be conscious of the fact.
Our fighting men abroad- and their families at home- expect such a program and have the right to insist upon it. It is to their demands that this Government should pay heed rather than to the whining demands of selfish pressure groups who seek to feather their nests while young Americans are dying.
The foreign policy that we have been following—the policy that guided us at Moscow, Cairo, and Teheran—is based on the common sense principle which was best expressed by Benjamin Franklin on July 4, 1776: "We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately."
I have often said that there are no two fronts for America in this war. There is only one front. There is one line of unity which extends from the hearts of the people at home to the men of our attacking forces in our farthest outposts. When we speak of our total effort, we speak of the factory and the field, and the mine as well as of the battleground -- we speak of the soldier and the civilian, the citizen and his Government.
Each and every one of us has a solemn obligation under God to serve this Nation in its most critical hour—to keep this Nation great -- to make this Nation greater in a better world.
TBFs from the USS Block Island (CVE-21) made the first aircraft rocket attack on a German (Type VIIC) U-boat, U-758.
The Japanese cruiser Kuma was sunk by the British submarine Tall7-Ho off of Penang, Malaya.
The Soviet government issued a statement through TASS disputing Polish territorial claims and insisting that the Soviet-Polish border had been determined through a democratic 1939 plebiscite. It also declared that the Polish Government in Exile was "incapable of establishing friendly relations with the USSR, and has also shown itself incapable of organizing active resistance against German invaders inside Poland. Moreover, by its erroneous policy it has often played into the hands of German invaders."
So, quite clearly, a war that had been started as an attempt to protect Polish integrity didn't look likely to end that way.
P-51s started escorting US bombing missions over Germany, joining P-47s and P-38s which already had that role.
From Sarah Sundin's Blog:
Today in World War II History—January 11, 1944: In a US Eighth Air Force raid on Brunswick, the 94th Bomb Group makes a rare second run on the target and receives the Distinguished Unit Citation.
The Moroccan Nationalist Movement issued its Proclamation of Independence demanding a united Morocco independent of France and Spain.
The Hitchcock movie Lifeboat was released.
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The members of the Fascist Grand Council sentenced to death by the rump Italian puppet Italian Social Republic were executed. They included Mussolini's son-in-law, Galeazzo Ciano.
Friday, January 11, 1924. Federals Advance, Coolidge speaks.
Mexican Federals retook Pachuca and advanced on Tuxpan.
President Coolidge held a press conference:
Mr. President, is it your plan to have similar conferences with other Boards?
We might speculate on that, Mr. President.
I don’t need to stimulate you.
Mr. President, would you care to say what the Cabinet discussed today?
Wednesday, January 10, 2024
Blog Mirror. Tom Lubnau: Like It Or Not, Wyoming Depends On Federal Money
As always, excellent commentary from Tom Lubnau:
Tom Lubnau: Like It Or Not, Wyoming Depends On Federal Money
And the blistering truth:
Wyoming is a very unique state because it figured out a long time ago how to make people from out of state pay our essential taxes. In other words, we mooch off of other taxpayers to pay our bills.
The dying West.
I'm afraid that the West will die. There are plenty of signs. No more childbearing. You are invaded, still, by other cultures, other peoples, who will progressively dominate you by their numbers and completely change your culture, your convictions, your morality.
Cardinal Sarah
Base Ten. 40 is a big round number, I guess.
40
I walked out of the courthouse with a lawyer I know, as that lawyer was in the same law school class as I was. We're not close friends, but his circle of law school friends intersects with mine, mostly due to a common interest in the outdoors. Other than that, I guess because our backgrounds are quite different, we never developed a close friendship. I guess friends of friends are sort of friends, however.
Anyhow, as we were walking out at the same time, having just argued motions against each other, I asked about a partner of his that I had been told was stepping into part-time. He laughed and noted that it was true, but they guy was busier than ever, which I'm sure he is.
At that point, he asked me, "what about you, what are your plans?", meaning not am I about to retire, but as we're law school colleagues, and therefore the same approximate age, do I have retirement on my horizon.
I begged off on the topic. I'm very private by nature and as this recent post indicates, I've had a lot going on recently. In the end, I stated "oh I'll probably die before I retire", which always come across as a joke, and I guess it is, but it's a half-hearted one. Given family history on my father's side, I probably will, and probably well before 65, which basically means, could be any time.
But then actually that's true for a lot of men over 30.
Anyhow, I'm not near retirement. My wife is a decade younger than me, I've had a year of health concerns commencing in October, 2022, and I need the insurance, and I don't want to run out of cash in retirement. And that's not what people really mean when they bring this up. What they mean, is that once you are 60, how far out are you looking?
I dunno. .. .I'll probably die before I retire.
And even if I don't, given my nature, I'll probably keep on keeping on until I'm full retirement age, which according to the IRS is 67 for people born in 1963. Of course, it's important to note that statistically a significant majority of men do not make it to the "full age". Women don't either.
Quite a few lawyers do, however, and beyond that.
Anyhow, he expressed that he intends to work until he's 68. He's presently 61. The reason is that at that point he will have been practicing law "for 40 years".
Shoot, if I make it to 67, that'd be true of me as well.
And I can't imagine a lamer reason to work beyond full retirement age than that. So you'll have been a working member of the bar for 40 years, so what? Is that actually something to be proud of, and if so, why? Or is it an achievement worth aiming for?
And what''s the magic of 40? That its' divisible by ten?
As silly as that question is, I think that is actually it. As we have a Base Ten numerical system, we tend to think of events that way. Military (and much other service) retirements start when a person reaches 20 years of service, which went down at the start of World War Two from 30 years of service. When I was a National Guardsman, the Guard issued Ten, Twenty, and Thirty years of service ribbons.The Wyoming State Bar used to confer honorifics on lawyers who had reached 30, 40 and 50 years of practice, although it doesn't seem to anymore. I can recall being at a County Bar banquet, which we also do not have anymore, when the County Bar acknowledged some lawyers who had just reached 30, 40 and 50 years of service, the first of which I've surpassed but which seemed like a long, long time, at the time.
A good friend of mine in the law just retired at age 67, sort of. Like a lot of retiring lawyers, indeed all the of the retiring lawyers that I've known recently, he's going to work "part-time". This is super common in law.
I don't get it, and I don't get going for the big round number either.
Law, if you really work it, is all consuming and hard on you. I've never seen one of the lawyers aiming for "part-time" succeed at it yet. Litigation certainly isn't a part-time thing and the schedule is set by the Court, not by individuals, so there's no part-time to it.
Beyond that, however, how can a person become so dull that they hang on for an artificial number?
I know, I know, people will say "I love the law" and that's why they're doing it. Well, bullshit.
Maybe they do love the law, but most lawyers in reality are in it because; 1) they're polymaths (and probably autodidacts) and it was the only thing that suited them, or 2) their undergraduate majors were a bust, and it was the only door open for a career, or 3) they were greedy and thought they could make a lot of money, or 4) they were delusional and mistook a career path that more properly involved a seminary for one that involved law school, or #5) they were the children of professionals that didn't want to become physicians, or #6) they were the children of blue collar workers whose parents held a gigantic outsized admiration for the law as they knew nothing about it.
None of that precludes a love of the law, although #1 suits it the best. #3 and #4 are paths to utter misery.
But that's the point.
Going back to the misty dawn of time when I was a law student, and looking at my collection of friends and associated, they were an interesting group. So were my undergraduate major geology fellows, I'd note. The geology students were all major outdoorsmen and outdoorswomen. Every single one without exception. We didn't sit around and talk about geology, we talked about mountains and fields and wolves and hunting and hiking and fishing.*
Law school was sort of like that, but with a group of people with very divergent interests. There were really dedicated outdoorsmen, but also people who had really pronounced intellectual interests. Law students I was aware of hunted, fished, hiked, climbed mountains in the Himalayas, worked on cars, followed sports, and the like.
I don't recall a single one, not one, who had an interest in the law, actually.
Not one.
And that's how practitioners start out. And to some extent remain. I'm down to a handful of genuine close friends who are lawyers, and then a little broader out than that, friends who are lawyers. Of my close friends, one is an avid outdoors man and gearhead, one is an intellectual and a historian, and one is an autodidactic polymath. Casting the net a little wider, I'd find outdoorsmen again.
Even today, in really thinking about it, I can't think of a single lawyer I know who is just a fanatic about legal topics. We'll discuss them, but its our line of country. I've never once been in a group of lawyers who said, "guess what I saw, a motion for an order to show cause on an injunction that . . . " like I've heard people say, "guess what I saw, otters in the river!".
Which brings me to this.
People acquire their identify from their occupations over time. Or maybe that's just true of some occupations. I have heard people, well, no, men, identified as soldiers, policemen, firemen, and the like long after they retired.
I think that's why somebody is interested in being able to say "I was a lawyer for 40 years". It seems like an accomplishment. . . if there's not much else left to be proud of, or anything else left.
Thing is, nobody really care about that.
It's quite literally, completely pointless.
There's also nothing intrinsically wrong with it, assuming that you didn't make half of that last decade leaning heavily on other lawyers, and that you were capable the entire time, but as an achievement, it isn't one.
Indeed, the much more interesting people are those who can start a conversation with "I was a lawyer for ten years, and then. . . "
At any rate, most people don't start off being some sort of AI image for their profession. We shouldn't see, to end up like that. Surely, a well-rounded person, from a profession of many topics, has other interests.
If they don't, they should.
Footnotes:
*The irony of geology is that so many people who are "granolas" end up being employed by industry. Geology students were the most environmentally minded people I've ever been around, but then they end up working for extractive industries. Among practicing geologist, I rarely meet one you'd call an environmentalist, unless they're employed in the environmental field. As the practicing geologists are drawn from the same pool as the students, it has to be their employment that impacts thier later expressed views.
Monday, January 10, 1944. The Verona Executions.
WACs march down the gangplank of transport at a North African port. Army trucks wait to take them to a nearby transit camp. 10 January, 1944.
The Verona Trial ended with the conviction of all six present defendants, with five sentenced to death. Tullio Cianetti was spared that penalty, and instead received a 30-year sentence, after writing a letter of apology to Mussolini.
Following the war, he went into exile in Portuguese Mozambique. He died in Mozambique, which became independent in 1975, in 1976.
The Red Army took Lyudvipol which had been within pre-war Poland.
The British took Maungdaw in Burma.
Thursday, January 10, 1924. Soaring oil prices.
The sort of headlines that Wyomingites love to read, at least until they go to buy gasoline at the pump.
Wyoming, as we've explored here before, crossed over from being primarily an agricultural economy to an oil one due to World War One, with 1917 really being the demarcation point. From that point forward the state drank so deeply of petroleum that it has never been able to see itself as anything but a petro state, even while keeping Steamboat as its symbol. A century later, to suggest that the evolution of technology and other factors mean that this industry will decline is nearly regarded as treasonous. Perhaps as a result, the state has neglected its other industries.
The Cohn-Brandt-Cohn film company (CBC) changed its name to Columbia Pictures.
France imposed a curfew on the Rhineland and closed its borders, save for railroads and food transportation. The move was due to the murder of Franz Josef Heinz the prior day. The French were so strict on the matter that they refused to let British officials in to investigate separatist movements connected with the incident.
Related Threads:
1917 The Year that made Casper what it is. Or maybe it didn't. Or maybe it did.
Sigh . . .
And depicted with a horse too. . .
Kroger retires after 35 years of service
CODY - Worland Wildlife Biologist Bart Kroger retired last month, bringing his 35-year career with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department to a close.
“Bart has been referred to as the ‘core of the agency’, meaning through his dedication and continuous hard work, he has significantly and meaningfully impacted wildlife management within his district and throughout the state,” said Corey Class, Cody region wildlife management coordinator. “Throughout his career, he has been a solid, steady and dependable wildlife biologist, providing a foundation for wildlife conservation and management in the Bighorn Basin.”
Through his quiet and thoughtful approach, Bart has gained the respect of both his peers and the public. Bart is best known for his commitment to spending time in the field gaining first-hand knowledge of the wildlife and the habitat that supports them, as well as the people he serves in his district.
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