Friday Farming: Holscher's Hub: Prism

Prism

Today In Wyoming's History: Clearing scandal, eh?

Clearing scandal, eh?

In the news today was that DNA confirms that President Warren G. Harding had an illegitimate child by Nan Britton, with whom he apparently had a long running affair. The rumor had long existed, in no small part because Ms. Britton, after his death (and likely in need of income) wrote a book about their affair, which various Harding adherents discredited.  Now it seems to be proven that she was telling the truth.

Harding has long been at best forgotten and at worst not viewed as a particularly good President.  Knowledge of at least one other infidelity seems established, so how much this changes our view of Harding I don't know.  In Wyoming, Harding might be best remembered for the Teapot Dome Scandal.

Harding was actually a really popular President while he was President, but his reputation sank thereafter, with Teapot Dome playing a prominent part in that.  News of his infidelity, of course, came after his death, and was ultimately widely contested.  Up until the news of the DNA test results, it still was contested.

Anyhow, it's not so much this news that causes me to post this item about Harding, as this odd statement that appeared in one of the news reports on this item:

And, secondly, he hopes the discovery will begin to clear the air around Harding’s scandalized reputation in history.

“This book really ruined Warren Harding’s reputation, and as a result the important lessons of his presidency have been lost,” Robenalt said, who points out that Harding argued for non-interventionist policies before World War I that continue to be relevant following the lessons of the war in Iraq.

Hmmm. . . .

It's true that Harding had some things to his credit, but it's hard to see how confirmation of his marital infidelity in this instance will serve to "clear the air around" his "scandalized reputation in history".

This is not to say that this wasn't worth investigating for the family, or worth reporting in the news.  Just the concept of this repairing a "scandalized reputation" is odd.

Lex Anteinternet: NCSD Board Policy 5375. Dress Code.

Predictably, when this story ran on one of the local television channels; 

Lex Anteinternet: NCSD Board Policy 5375. Dress Code.: The current NCSD dress code. Usually with something like this, the poster, if he's been out of school over 20 years (and I have. ....

the inevitable teenager commenting about how "we're supposed to show our individuality" and how this is squashing it, ran on the news.

Shoot, this has been the dress code for at least 30  years, probably longer. If it was going squash something, it likely would have by now.

NCSD Board Policy 5375. Dress Code.

The current NCSD dress code.

Usually with something like this, the poster, if he's been out of school over 20 years (and I have. . . shoot, I've been out of grad school for over 20 years.. . . hard to imagine), makes some comment about how things have changed and how back in the day. . .

Well, in actuality I think this is the same dress code, more or less, that they had back when I was in junior high.  It might actually be a little more restrictive than the applied code when I was in high school.  I think the same rules applied, but they weren't enforcing them all that much.  I know weweren't supposed to wear t-shirts with beer advertisements on them, but they weren't all that common at that time anyhow, and I don't think they bothered with enforcing that rule.  We were not to wear hats in class, I do recall that.

Which isn't to say that things never changed in the district. There were real rules at one time, but I don't really know when they ended.  I suspect, however, it was the 1970s.  Up until some point just after the Vietnam War every male student at NCHS (but not KWHS) had to take JrROTC and that did create a male dress code for at least one day per week. Earlier in the school's history I think that applied for more than one day per week.

 

 NCHS students in 1940s.

Girls at that time wore a school uniform, or at least for part of that time they did.  I don't really know when it ceased.

Whenever it did, the dress code that is the topic of the NCSD video, has pretty much been in place for at least 40 years.

Help Support NCHS's Welsh Auditorium Project (and my commentary on the lack of a pool).

The NCHS Welsh Auditorium is a of course a classic, but it stings a bit to see how much support the old auditorium is getting while the pool didn't manage it, and the new massive construction will lack a pool.

After this campaign came out, I contacted one of the board members about whether supporting the auditorium might mean we could still get support for the pool.  His reply noted that the auditorium had the support of a community organization that was backing it, where was ours.

I have to say, he was right.  We have no community organization boosting for a pool.  And I know that I don't have the time to try to start one, and I doubt after the defeat in the bond election, it would do much good. Still, this is disappointing.  Which may say something (perhaps not all that complimentary) about me. A pool matters to me. Any high school will have an auditorium, but having spent a lot of time at NC I nonetheless didn't manage to develop warming feelings for the auditorium, which is probably because I didn't take any sort of performance type classes.  Not that I begrudge the whole thing, but something just seems amiss.

Mid Week At Work: Testing an airplane

Posted in honor of my day in the airport  yesterday, in which delays prevented me from reaching my destination, and every plane after the first one was delayed for one reason or another.

Oh well, I'm not really complaining about that.  I want them to fly safely.

I am, however, complaining about the grandmother who spent the first 1/4 of the last flight berating her teenage grandson in a very loud voice. Not cool.

Perceptions and the Land and Water Conservation Fund

An article in today's Casper Star Tribune starts off as follows:

Think of your favorite park, ballfield or city swimming pool. Chances are it was paid for in part by the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

The federal grant gave $121,000 to help build Casper's Highland Park in 1974, for example. It supplied $64,000 at Curt Gowdy State Park in 1976. In 2007, it provided $66,930 to build a playground in Edness Kimball Wilkins State Park. 

The Land and Water Conservation Fund has doled out about $17 billion in 50 years, creating outdoor recreation opportunities across the country. But that run may be coming to an end.

Unless reauthorized in Congress, the fund will sunset Sept. 30.

“I don’t know how those projects would get off the ground without it,” said Dominic Bravo, administrator of Wyoming State Parks, Historic Sites and Trails.

The article goes on to explain how the Land and Water Conservation Fund started off with modest funding during the Eisenhower Administration, but it greatly expanded during the 1970s.  It provides money to local government for recreational facilities of all types, and the categories are very broad, and its funded by revenues generated from off shore mineral exploration.  The original concept, according to the Tribune, was to use those off shore proceeds to fund recreational activities for the entire nation and its (then and now) growing population.

The law was built with a 25 year sunset, and it was extended once, meaning its set to sunset again on September 30.

Now, I'll make it clear that I hope its extended, but something like this says a lot about a whole host of interesting things.  It makes it clear how inaccurate our recollection of the past is, and how little we understand about the relationship between the states, people and the Federal government is today.

Starting off with the present, our own state is amongst the most libertarian of them all, and generally has a fairly hostile few of the role of the Federal government locally. But that doesn't keep us from taking Land and Water Conservation Fund money or Federal highway funds.  Indeed, we complain if we don't get the highway funds we  think we're entitled to.

With the recreation funds, we have no shoreline at all, so we can't really say that we have an immediate right to any of the money.  It isn't like local oil money.  If we feel that we deserve part of it, as we're part of the whole, well. . . that says something about the local arguments on the Federal domain as well, doesn't it?

Regarding our recollections of the past, and soon to be a subject of another post, there's come to be a belief for some reason that the 1950s were politically "conservative".  I'm not sure of the origin of that belief, but it's widely held, and I suspect it's widely held because of the concept that the entire boomer generation that came of age in the 1960s rebelled against their upbringing during the 1950s.   There's a lot of reason to question that assumption or at least to nuance it, but it isn't really accurate to claim that the 1950s were a Happy Days like era of conservatism.  In fact, the GOP was largely middle to middle left in the era, and the Democrats crowded them for that position.  There were exceptions, but what we really see is that the GOP moved towards the Democrats after World War Two, and the Democrats moved towards the Republicans.  Neither party had any problem with large Federal projects and Federal funding of any kind, reflecting the views that had come up during World War Two.  So, we got stuff like the Land and Water Conservation Fund during a Republican Administration, and again during the 1970s we find that the GOP held the White House except for four years.

I'm not really making a point about the fund, or indeed any of this.  It's just a comment regarding our perceptions.

The Big Picture: Holscher's Hub: Anchor Point, Alaska

Anchor Point, Alaska

Hurt feelings?

There's a case pending, apparently, in the Federal District Court of Wyoming in which environmentalist have sued the Peabody Coal Company.  I don't know what the suit is about.

Apparently the plaintiffs included lyrics of the chorus from John Prine's classic "New" Grass folk song, Paradise, in their complaint.  For those not familiar with the song, those lyrics are:

And daddy won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County
Down by the Green River where Paradise lay
Well, I'm sorry my son, but you're too late in asking
Mister Peabody's coal train has hauled it away.

The defendant apparently moved to strike that part of the complaint, and now that motion is pending.

Well, I suppose it isn't proper pleading, but Peabody has been around a long time and its survived okay since 1971 when the song was released.  Apparently, according to an article in the Tribune, they've never liked the fact that they were the target of the song, and it is pretty pointed, but still, seems like moving to strike is fairly pointless.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: St. Francis de Sales Roman Catholic Church, Denver...

Churches of the West: St. Francis de Sales Roman Catholic Church, Denver...:

Yet another photograph taken from a car window, this is St. Francis de Sales Roman Catholic Church in south Denver. This church, named after the Patron Saint of Writers, is also associated with a Catholic School which is about one block away. The church was built in 1911.

Stalin Central Time?

On August 15, the clocks in North Korea will go back half an hour. The country will officially enter a new time zone which it itself has created – according to the country's official KCNA news agency, it will be dubbed 'Pyongyang Time.' As with much of what the North Korean state does, the new time zone is being framed as a triumph over imperial history. Pointedly, Pyongyang Time will begin on 70th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japanese occupation.

"The wicked Japanese imperialists committed such unpardonable crimes as depriving Korea of even its standard time while mercilessly trampling down its land," KCNA says.

From a press report.

Painted Bricks: What is it? Granger Wyoming

Painted Bricks: What is it? Granger Wyoming:

This is a fairly substantial structure in the small town of Granger, Wyoming.

 

Granger is an old locality for Wyoming.  It was a Pony Express stage stop, and the stage building is still there (which unfortunately I didn't realize until after I'd driven out of town).  The town is small, and the population of about 140 has stayed constant for the entire 20th Century and into the 21st.

Which makes a building like this a peculiarity.   When I took this photo, because of some of the features of the building, I thought it was an abandoned church, and I had intended to post it on our Churches of the West site.  But later I reconsidered as I'm not so sure of that.  It doesn't really have a steeple, not that all churches do.  It has some very church like features, but this could also have served some other purpose.  I'll note the other side made me, at the time, even more convinced this was a church, but as the house is now apparently used as a private residence, I didn't want to linger while photographing, particularly as a curious dog inside the building was taking note of me on the street.  I should also note, however, that on one side is a branch of the Sweetwater County Library, and on the other side is the Granger town hall.  Maybe this was a government building at one time?  Maybe it was a school?

So, what do we have here?  If you know, post the answer.

Friday Farming: Agriphemera: Planning A Subsistence Homestead(1934)

I was doing some early morning net surfing, having awakened far too early this morning, and ran across this:

Agriphemera: Planning A Subsistence Homestead(1934): There was a time when the U.S. government encouraged families to live on a small section of rural land and provide for their own ...

I'm really amazed that the U.S. Government was publishing an item on subsistence farming in 1934.  I wonder, would this reflect conditions in the Great Depression?

Beauty: Function or Form?

Heavily rusted mid 1970s Chevrolet pickup truck, with Colorado classic vehicle plate and rough trailer, but lifted and with good tires, on Homer Spit, Alaska.

New York Times: In Zimbabwe, We Don't Cry for Lions

Excellent article from the New York Times on how people closer to nature, and closer to lions, actually view them.

The war comes to some doorsteps

This has hit the Denver (although not the local Wyoming) news today. The FBI has issued the following warning, which is being reprinted in various papers and on the net:

Middle-Eastern Males Approaching Family Members of US Military Personnel at their Homes In Colorado and Wyoming, as of June 2015
5 pages
For Official Use Only
July 2, 2015
Download
(U//FOUO) In May 2015, the wife of a US military member was approached in front of her home by two Middle-Eastern males. The men stated that she was the wife of a US interrogator. When she denied their claims, the men laughed. The two men left the area in a dark-colored, four-door sedan with two other Middle-Eastern males in the vehicle. The woman had observed the vehicle in the neighborhood on previous occasions.
(U//FOUO) Similar incidents in Wyoming have been reported to the FBI throughout June 2015. On numerous occasions, family members of military personnel were confronted by Middle-Eastern males in front of their homes. The males have attempted to obtain personal information about the military member and family members through intimidation. The family members have reported feeling scared.
(U//FOUO) To date, the men have not been identified and it is not known if all the incidents involve the same Middle-Eastern males. If you have any information that may assist the FBI in identifying these individuals, or reporting concerning additional incidents; in Colorado please contact the FBI Fort Collins Resident Agency at 970-663-1028, in Wyoming please contact the FBI Cheyenne Resident Agency at 307-632-6224.
(U) This report has been prepared by the DENVER Division of the FBI. Comments and queries may be addressed to the DENVER Division at 303-629-7171.

Lex Anteinternet: Lex Anteinternet: What's with all those dire warn...

 

 World War One era poster, from when coal heated most homes.

Earlier this week I published this:

Lex Anteinternet: Lex Anteinternet: What's with all those dire warn...: I was out of town this past week, so came home to a collection of newspapers. One of them related that Wyoming had lost 3,000+ oilfield jo...

Following that, there was an article in the Tribune about how the residents of the coal producing town of Gillette have continued to try to publicly back coal, against the trend of its decline.  The same day the Chinese came out with an announcement about a plan to combat climate change.

In this morning's paper I read that Alpha, a major coal company, has gone into receivership.  The bigger news, however (although that took top billing in the Star Tribune) is that President Obama released his plan for combating climate change which includes a significant drop in the use of coal in Wyoming, and the U.S., for power generation and a reduction of the use of fossil fuels in general.

The reaction by Wyoming's political leaders was predictable, if perhaps actually somewhat muted in some quarters. Governor Mead issued the following statement:

The Clean Power Plan is scientifically flawed and if implemented will not achieve minimum reductions. It is in fact damaging – not just to Wyoming, but the nation.  I will continue to fight regulations that are fundamentally bad for Wyoming and exceed the regulatory authority of the federal government.

That comment was brief, briefer than we might have expected.  That raises the suspicion that Mead felt obligated to reply, but didn't want to put too much effort into it.  Or perhaps he just issued a brief reply as the Clean Power Plan had just come out and there wasn't time for anything larger.   Maybe both.

I'm sure in the coming months there will be much local opposition to the President's plan, and there's absolutely no certainty that it will go into effect, but at some point, on something like this, I have to wonder if the course of events isn't fairly clear.  Coal has been in decline in regards to the type of use made of it for quite some time.  It hasn't been "King Coal" forever.  Weening the country, and the world, from most coal use would be a lot easier than weening it from petroleum oil.

When I was a geology student, coal was my focus.  Focusing on it today, no matter what we might say here in Wyoming, I think it's future is dim.  Not immediately, but not distantly either.  And as for petroleum and the local economy, with sanctions getting set to be removed from Iran, there's reason not to be too short term optimistic there either.

Defeated People

Some time ago I started an entry here on "defeated people", but because it seemed so negative, which was not my intent, I never published it.

It wasn't intended to be at all. Rather, the thread intended to look into the "post defeat" lives of the defeated.  We so rarely do that, but generally, people pick themselves up and move on.   But rarely does anyone look at that.  One of the reasons I so liked Cornelius Ryan's book is that he always included an appendix in his book listing where the principle individuals he interviewed now were, which was often illuminating.  Even badly defeated people often got back up on their feet and carried on.

This past week, as anyone who might stumble past this blog, I was in Alaska.  And in the course of that, stumbled across a community of Old Believers.  No matter what else a person might think of them, they're champions in this category as they've persevered against the odds, and defeat, for centuries. This caused me to reconsider adding this as a topic, rather than a single thread, so I'm going to add it as an occasionally recurring topical feature.

The lingerings of Russian Alaska

One of the maxims of Holscher's Laws of History is that "Everything last occurred more recently than you suppose".  Given that, I should have realized that there's be lingering aspects of Russian culture in Alaska.  Nonetheless, I was surprised to find this true.

The United States bought Alaska from Imperial Russia in 1867.  Quite a long time ago, by how we generally reckon things, but not all that long, really, in cultural terms.  Russia started penetrating into Alaska in the 1740s and things really got rolling in the 1780s, although their numbers were always limited.  Naturally, they brought with them the Russian Orthodox faith.

I guess I hadn't appreciated the extent to which Russian Orthodox missionaries operated in Alaska, but they certainly did, and they were successful.  And, for no real reason, I would have presumed that the influence of Russian Orthodoxy would have dramatically waned after the US purchase of the territory.  I knew that it remained a bit, but I thought just a bit.

 

Holy Transfiguration of Our Lord Church, Ninilchik Alaska. 

Well, I was wrong.

About 12.5% of the population of Alaska is Orthodox.  80% of the population is Christian.  The Orthodox population rivals that of the Catholic population, which is really amazing as the Catholic Church is by far the largest of the apostolic churches in the United States.  That the percentage is this high is all the more amazing as the demographics of Alaska have undoubtedly changed significantly since 1974, when the oil pipeline brought in a large number of out of state workers, which would have increased the Protestant populations significantly and the Catholic population as well.  Therefore, if we look at the pre 1974 demographics, and the long term resident demographics, the percentage of Russian Orthodox would be even higher.

And this would be strongly reflected amongst Alaskan Native populations, who would make up the bulk of the Orthodox in Alaska.

All this goes to show that culture is indeed resilient, as we also previously noted in one of our laws of history.  In some places the Orthodox parishes have declined, but demographically, they're still strong.  I shouldn't have made the assumption that I did.

I actually found this out, I'd note, in a bit of a roundabout way, and I'd guess many who visit Alaska never realize this.  As I find church architecture interesting, and post photos of them to a blog, when I was in Alaska I ran across a reference to an Old Believer church near Homer and then did a short search and ran into a second Russian Orthodox Church.  The Old Believer church, I should note, does not represent an enduring Alaskan cultural feature, as they moved into the region in 1966 (and there are actually several Old Believer communities near Homer).  In looking up a Russian Orthodox Church I photographed in Ninilchik I was surprised to find that there'd been a church I'd missed in Homer itself, and not only there, but darned near everywhere.  There were a lot of them, as indeed there should be, as there are Catholic churches everywhere and nearly as many Alaskans are Russian Orthodox as are Catholic.

Which shows, I suppose, when observing something, a person must be open to observing the unexpected.

The Big Picture: Turnagain Sound, Alaska

While the world is wringing its hands over a Zimbabwean lion. . .

the horror of Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe goes on largely without notice.

This story broke while I was away from the news for an extended time (which I have come to more and more appreciate).  So, I return to the news with the story in full swing.  Many are in a frothy righteous indignation over the shooting of "Cecil the Lion".

I haven't followed the story that closely, but it does appear that the stalking of this lion was out of bounds.  He appears to have been tagged and if what little I know about the story is correct, it was an illegal hunt.  But the real news broke because the lion was known and so it's a convenient foil for the "animal rights" movement, a deeply unnatural, indeed anti natural, movement that despises people, and animals as they really are.

But the really amazing aspect of this is that people are seriously stating that the alleged law breaker should be extradited to Zimbabwe.  Seriously? People didn't work themselves into a lather about Amanda Knox, who is accused of killing a human being, in such a fashion and demand that she be extradited to democratic Italy, and they're arguing somebody should be extradited to the madness of Zimbabwe?

If anyone should be extradited in association with Zimbabwe, it's the president of that failed pathetic state, Robert Mugabe.  Mugabe took over the leadership of the country when Rhodesia surrendered itself to the inevitable, and the country looked to be full of democratic promise.  He took a prosperous land, with multiple ethnicities, and has presided over a government that has used violence against its political opponents (including his movements former brothers in arms), and which has engaged in the expropriation of land. He's destroyed the economy and made life miserable for its inhabitants, so that a person can truly say that, unlike South Africa, the country was truly better off before the revolution.

Africa has progressed enormously over the past 30 years.  Zimbabwe, however, has regressed and is a joke.  Extradite?  Yes, do so, but extradite Robert Mugabe to the Hague.

How is that people can care so much for one animal, while ignoring so much about their fellow human animals?  And how is it that people can stand, at least in theory, for the bringing of democratic rule to a nation, and then care so pathetically little when it fails to take root?  Africa is full of hope, Zimbabwe full of despair, and we should be full of shame over our misdirected priorities.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: Grant Avenue Methodist Church and Community Center...

Churches of the West: Grant Avenue Methodist Church and Community Center...:

Aviation in Alaska

 

We recently went through the  Alaska Aviation Museum, and posted about that here:

Holscher's Hub: Alaska Aviation Museum:

It wasn't news to me that aviation is far more critical in Alaska than in the lower 48 (is this also true of northern Canada?  I'd guess it would have to be).  But the extent to which this is true, and has been for some time, is something that has to be seen to be believed.  Truly amazing.  Aircraft are a constant feature of any town in a way that simply doesn't occur elsewhere.  And quite clearly, this has been true for some time.

Indeed, we're going to be taking a look at transportation topics in relation to Alaska here in the near future. The treatment wont' be all that in depth, but it's revealing for a variety of reasons.

Anyhow, aviation in Alaska is amazing, and obviously has been for quite awhile.

Lex Anteinternet: What's with all those dire warnings

I was out of town this past week, so came home to a collection of newspapers.

One of them related that Wyoming had lost 3,000+ oilfield jobs.

We've had a variety of posts on this topic.  As we've been doing that, occasionally we'd read the articles that would relate that this down turn wouldn't be that bad.  At one time, we felt compelled to post an item entitled:

Lex Anteinternet: What's with all those dire warnings. . . .: and why are they on a blog that supposedly looks at history around the turn of the prior century? St. Francis Mission, Midwest Wyomin...

Well, the loss was higher than anticipated.

And now that a deal with Iran of some sort has been reached, and we can anticipate that the embargo on Iranian oil will cease, the trend is likely to amplify.

Mid Week At Work: We are all ignorant on some subjects.

Monday at the Bar: Courthouses of the West: Albany County Courthouse, Laramie Wyoming.

Albany County Courthouse, Laramie Wyoming.

The trades and manual labor

Recently we've been posting about the Bond Issue and in that context, the school district's plan to seek to ask the voters to help fund technical and vocational training at the high school level has come up. 

Just prior to my noting that, I had an odd experience in which I woke up really early one morning and couldn't sleep, so I got up and turned on the television.  Good Will Hunting, which I'd never seen, was on, and even though I missed the beginning of it, I started watching and watched it to the end.  I must say it was a good film.  Part of the theme, and the reason I'm noting this here, is that the film argued that the exceptionally mathematically gifted protagonist should pursue a mathmatical career (although he ends up purusing his love first).  Indeed, in one major scence in the film his close friend argues that if he fails to do so and continues to work as a laberor, it would be a tragedy.

Well, would it?

I don't know.  Its easy for me to note what the movie argued but not so easy for me to opine on it.  I don't have laberor's job, and there's no doubt that most laborers do not get well paid.  The film does make an argument, in the form of a scene, to the effect that all labor has dignitiy, but it goes on to essentailly endorse the very widely held concept that jobs that involve no physical labor and all intellect are more worthy of those that do not.

I don't know what to make of that, other than to note that it is an extremely widely held concept. But a person ought to be careful about simply accepting it.  It's a very widely ingraned concept, however.

Unsolicited Career Advice for the Student No. 7. The perils of occupational predictions.

In spite of the title here, I'm not sure that this is really "career advice", so much as it is commentary and the recommendation to be cautious.

This post comes about due to the receent article in the Wyoming Lawyer about the Board of Law Examiners abondoning the Wyoming CLE requirement.  While I agree that the CLE was absurd, the BLE seems to be on the railroad track leading to the oblivion of local practice on this one.  This sort of "we have to do this as we have to do this" sort of process is really common.  People, once committed to a certain course of action, tend to stay that through even if it was never a good idea.  Quitting some things, quite frankly, is a good idea. And if the destionation is lousy, why go there. Get off the train somewhere else.

It's also prompted by having read some of the occasional commentary put out by local economic entites to the effect of "this brings in jobs".  I've also commented on that locally.  It amazes me the extent to which the "jobs" argument is so poorly analyzed.

Both of the factors mentioned above are important if you are starting out planning your career.  A couple of important trends seem to come to light when you do, which are:

1.  Technology is on the brink of premanently wiping out a lot of "good jobs'.

2.  The mega-urbanization of our economy has premanently exported jobs from towns and cities to big cities.

3.  Some professions that formerly had small town expression have permanently moved to mid sized cities where the professionals must have signficant infrastructure investment.

4.  With at least one profession, the law, the operation of technology and short sighted bar admisison policies will kill off the practice in rural areas.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: St. Elizabeth of Hungary Catholic Church, and St. ...

Churches of the West: St. Elizabeth of Hungary Catholic Church, and St. ...:
 

Roosevelt Oklahoma farm goes back to basics

A Roosevelt Oklahoma farm goes back to basics.

C-SPAN Cities Tour - Casper: Teapot Dome Scandal

Mid Week at Work: Federal Adult Schools

The Press and Statute of Limitations Bogusity

I keep hearing press reports connected with one asserted crime or another, that because the allegations happened long ago, they are "past the statute of limitations", as if there's a national criminal statute of limitations that pertains to state criminal cases..

There isn't.

Many states do have statute of limitations for criminal acts.  But not all. Wyoming doesn't.  I'm sure we're not alone in that either.

Most recently, this has come up concerning the various news stories about Bill Cosby.  I won't go into that, but a common report is "the alleged actions are past the statute of limitations".  Maybe they are, but if they are, they're past the statute of limitations in California, presumably.  They wouldn't be past the statute of limitations in other locations, if the alleged acts allegedly occurred there, depending upon the location.

Monday at the Bar: Courthouses of the West: Joseph C. O'Mahoney Federal Courthouse, Cheyenne W...

Joseph C. O'Mahoney Federal Courthouse, Cheyenne Wyoming




Cheyenne's modern Federal courthouse.

I'm sorry, but these newer courthouses (this one must have been built in the 1970s, really just leave a lot to be desired externally.  Inside, it's very nice.  but outside, it looks just like a Federal office building.

Randon Snippets: The Horror of It All.

Putting walnuts in to chocolate chip cookies should be a crime.

Just saying.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: Unknown Church, Riverton Wyoming

Churches of the West: Unknown Church, Riverton Wyoming:

It's All Natural! Except for us.

Just a second ago, on television, there was an advertisement for a dog food that was "natural".  It had no "chicken byproducts".

I wasn't aware that chickens were, ispo facto, unnatural, although I'll concede that they are a rather weird bird, but that's besides the point.  What's so fascinating is that we live in an era, and one that stretches back quite a few decades now, that's obsessed with the natural, even while we ourselves don't apply the same logic to ourselves.  It's really odd.  Either we like nature and accept it, or we don't. You can't really have cafeteria naturalism.

Evidence on our obsession with what's natural is everywhere, and frankly, I'm not criticizing it.  There's is indeed a lot of reason to be focused on the natural. We ourselves are part of nature, and there's better and better evidence that the more we depart from nature, the worst off we are (even as we strive to continue to create a very unnatural world). 

So eating a more natural diet makes a great deal of sense, and we know what the loose parameters of a natural diet are (and it isn't, by the way, vegan or vegetarian, which are highly unnatural diets for people who are uncomfortable with nature).  And getting out in nature, we know, is not only a good idea, it might actually be necessarily for our well being.

 A fellow with an actually natural diet.

So we've developed a lot of "natural foods". Some people have become "locavores", eating only what they can acquire locally, and thereby bypassing the unnatural food distribution system.  "Grass fed" beef is in, and I'm down with that, as I've been eating grass fed beef (and antelope, and deer, etc.) for decades.  Quite a few people insist their clothes be "natural", which means not a petroleum byproduct.  People buy vegetables that are "organic", by which they mean free of unnatural chemical exposure.

The Amish must be looking around thinking; "Ach, was ist das?"

 Amish, who live pretty natural, although that's not usually what non Amish backers of "natural" mean by natural.

Some of us, many of us now, join one or more organizations devoted to natural causes.  The Sierra Club, Ducks Unlimited, the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Initiative, are just a few.  Radicals look towards Green Peace or the Earth Justice League.

But we omit nature from ourselves. That is, our own selves. And the more radically natural we are, the more likely we are to do that. Why is that?

What do I mean?

Well, the most natural thing a person encounters every day is themselves.  No matter how unnatural of environment you live in, you are natural.

For most of us, that probably doesn't impact us in any particular way, but we should consider this.  We are, no matter how a person conceives of it, as certain type of animal.  We may be, and I'd argue we are, a very special animal with an immortal soul, but nonetheless, we're an animal.  More particularly, we're a mammal, and a primate, with very special attributes.

And those attributes are governed to a fairly large extent by our DNA. That is, our genes determine much of what we are.

This has been, of course, argued about for decades.  Is it nature or nurture that determines our personalities, etc.  Both, no doubt. But that our genetic makeup determines much of what we are in some very fundamental ways cannot be doubted.  Included amongst these are our genders, and what that means.

That's a hugely unpopular readily right now, in certain quarters, but it's a reality nonetheless.  There are no "men trapped insides of women's bodies", or vice versa. There are men, and women.  That's biology.

That doesn't mean that some women and some men, in fairly low statistical numbers, don't have inclinations that are contrary to their genetic makeup in terms of gender in varying degrees that cause them to think they want to be the other.  It may very well be the case that they do.  And that doesn't make them inhuman, nor should it subject them to abuse. But it also should be required that such inclinations are part of their natural animal nature.  Pretending that they are is going against nature.  And at the point where society is providing people with "therapies" to achieve a gender transformation (to the extent that can actually occur), it's doing something deeply unnatural.  If it requires chemistry or surgery to achieve (and maintain), it isn't natural.

Indeed, we know that human beings are afflicted in varying numbers with all sorts of unnatural inclinations and impulses, some harmless, and some not.  For example, some people actually seek surgery to remove a limb, seized by the belief, somehow, that they'd be happier without it.  This is a self detructive belief, and unnatural, but they have it.

Of course, it could be argued that medicine itself is unnatural, and some do, but I don't think that's really the case.  Human desires to cure maladies are a human trait, and demonstrably go back to ancient times, indeed far back into our ancient origins.  Ancient humans with knit bones demonstrate that we were setting breaks as far back as we've existed, and occasionally an ancient skeleton will show up with evidence at an attempt for fairly exotic surgery.  That people can develop, and synthesize, medicines is not unnatural.

But it does lead to some oddities in this area.  One is that there's a big business in for "natural remedies". These are all sorts of herbs and whatever that are supposedly natural.  Near my work there's a store that sells such things and some of the impacts of them that are claimed are simply amazing.  One recently claimed to do something at the "cellular" level.  I hope not, that would be scary indeed.  The point here however, is that people will buy something that's only barely less natural than the stuff they're trying to avoid at the doctor's office or the pharmacy.  Lots of medicines are, actually, fairly natural. 

Not all are in impact, however.  That's an interesting thing to.  Modern westerners (Americans and Europeans) spend a lot of money on pharmaceuticals that are designed to frustrate a certain natural cycle.  That's interesting, as that's a medicine that's actually anti-natural.  It's weird to think that there are, undoubtedly, women who eat all natural foods, wear organic cotton, maybe go the "natural remedies store", but take an anti natural pharmaceutical.  Indeed, I have to suspect that the fact such pharmaceuticals are so widely accepted now is that they were introduced in the early 1960s, when there was a huge admiration for anything chemical or medical and people didn't worry much about the impact of anything of that type.  It took Silent Spring and DDT to take us there.

In another area, we've written a lot recently about the "natural law".  Now some would maintain that there's no such thing as a natural law, but the best evidence would certainly be contrary to that. As Chief Justice John Marshall noted in The Antelope, the state can and does create statutes that contravene or stand opposed to the natural law.  But we seem not to even note that, which is interesting.

One of the big ones we live with every day is the institution of the "corporation".  Corporations are legal creatures of the state, and basically they evolve out of the partnership.  Partnerships do comport with nature, ad people combining to act in concert with partners is clearly a natural human activity. But corporations are deemed by law to be "persons" before the law.  I'm not saying that's good, or bad, but it is rather weird, and clearly not natural.

The fact that we've built such big cities that are seperated from nature is unnatural.  Indeed, this entire era in which we are so concerned about living naturally would have had a hard time coming about if this wasn't the case, as people who live more closely to nature, aren't cognizant of that in the same way or to the same extent.  That is not to say that they aren't aware of it, just differently.

It's also not to say that towns and villages aren't natural. They are, and have existed since time immemorial.  But super huge cites, such as we have now, that can only exist with the technological advances we have now, aren't really natural.  They have existed for quite some time, but that doesn't make them natural really.  And certainly the modern cubicle life isn't natural.  Indeed the separation from nature that the city life creates is one of the sources of modern depression and potentially the cause of much that we see in human stress and oddity.

So the point?

To offend everyone in the western world?

No, this is simply one of those observational posts.   I'm afflicted with an analytical mind, by nature, and therefore I'll take an analytical thread where it goes.  And this one amuses me.  We live in an era when people can be really aggressive about being "natural".  But we live in a very unnatural society.  I think it ought to be more natural, truly I do.  But in making that observation, I'm well aware that a lot of the people stomping their feet about being "natural", are hugely unnatural.  A person can be, I suppose, selectively natural.  But you have to be aware of that.  Wearing Birkenstocks while eating a free range yogurt vegan diet makes you anti natural, not natural.  And if you choose going natural, and demand that we go natural as far as possible, you have to separate your politics from your nature, and go where that leads you.  Otherwise, what you have to do is to admit that you feel that accommodations against nature should be made, which is fine, but you should admit that you're doing it so that you are clear and honest about what you are doing, at least to yourself.