Roads to the Great War: Veteran of the Great War and Saint: Padre Pio

Roads to the Great War: Veteran of the Great War and Saint: Padre Pio: Great War veteran Francesco Pio of Pietrelcina (25 May 1887–23 September 1968), a Catholic priest from Italy, was canonized as a saint by ...

Norman Rockwell painting appears on the Saturday Evening Post for the first time: May 20, 1916

A Norman Rockwell paining appeared on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post for the first time on this day in 1916.

The paining was The Baby Carriage and depicted a well dressed boy (even wearing a bowler) unhappily pushing a baby carriage as boys in baseball uniforms walk by and tip their hats.

Friday Farming: Milk for France.

Google's Image of the day. . . not so great.

Today's Google image, repeated here under fair use:

 

This is an image in celebration of the late  Yuri Kochiyama, a Japanese American Marxist (and later Islamic) agitator.  

She shouldn't be celebrated.

It's worth noting that not everyone who demonstrates for a worthy cause, does so with a goal that's worthy of celebrating.

Hitler was adamantly opposed to tobacco use and the Nazis took on smoking big time as a public health hazard.  Should Adolph Hitler be praised as a public health pioneer?  The Nazis were some of the very first to really try to enlighten a public on the danger of smoking.  Should Adolph Hitler get a photo of the day?

The early Communists in the USSR supported the self determination of nations.  They got over it.  They were also in support of all sorts of evil.  Should Lenin appear on a Google image of the day?

No doubt she supported equality, but Yuri Kochiyama was an American Marxist (and later a convert to Islam) in the era when we already knew what Marxism meant.  Millions starved in the Ukraine.  Thousands imprisoned (and at that time) in the Soviet Union and China.  A blood red legacy everywhere the red flag had prevailed.  But it wasn't just Marxist causes she supported, seemingly any radical, as long as they were opposed to the United States, got her approval, including Osama Bin Laden, about which she said:

I consider Osama bin Laden as one of the people that I admire. To me, he is in the category of Malcolm X, Che Guevara, Patrice Lumumba, Fidel Castro, all leaders that I admire ... [who] had severe dislike for the US government and those who held power in the US. I think all of them felt the US government and its spokesmen were all arrogant, racist, hypocritical, self-righteous, and power hungry..... You asked, 'Should freedom fighters support him?' Freedom fighters all over the world, and not just in the Muslim world, don’t just support him; they revere him; they join him in battle. He is no ordinary leader or an ordinary Muslim.

To support Che Guevara and Osama Bin Laden in the same breath is delusional.  They certainly wouldn't have supported each other and neither is worthy of support.  Ironically, this same sort of American leftist support comes in the context that, if the supporting person lived subject to the person they're praising, they'd be shut up.  It's a tribute to the very nation that such unthinking agitators rail against that they're allowed to spout off in support of those who would hardly support them directly if they lived under them.  Was Osama Bin Laden a "freedom fighter"?  Not of the sort of freedom we'd recognize.  That such personalities exist, therefore, is more a tribute to us, than anyone else.

The History of Income Tax Brackets.

 Early cartoon view of the restored income tax.

Federal Individual Income Tax Rates History

Really interesting history of income tax rates.

Americans believe a lot of erroneous things about the Federal Income Tax.  For one thing, we constantly here that we're the most taxed people on earth, which is hardly true. In actuality, Americans pay a relatively low amount of their income compared to quite a few other peoples.  And we tend to actually pay them.  In some other countries tax evasion is the rule, rather than the exception.

This chart runs the rates all the way back, but the most relevant set are those that date from 1913 forward.  In 1913 the Income Tax, which had been declared unconstitutional in 1895, came back.  The tax was graduated, but the rates were pretty marginal, as can be seen.

They really began to increase in 1916, which isn't surprising as the nation was on the road to war, while desperately trying to avoid it.  In 1917 they really jumped, with the top rate being 67%.  Having said that, the number of people making that top rate would have been pretty small.  In 1918, things changed yet again, and really high rates were pretty common.

Rates didn't begin to decline, while remaining high, until 1922.  It took all the way until 1925, however, until they began to decline something recognizable to us today.

Top rates really began to jump again in 1932, which is interesting as we don't tend to think of there being really high tax rates until 1932.  During World War Two the rates were blisteringly high.  There was actually a 91% tax rate for very high earners during World War Two.  91%.  The bottom rate was 20% at that time.

Rates didn't begin to fall until 1964, although they sure didn't drop to the current low rate.  Rates like we have now didn't begin to appear until 1982, during Ronald Reagan's administration.  It wasn't until 1987, however, that there was no longer a 50% rate for high earners.  The following year was the first year in eons that there wasn't a rage of 30% or above.  That changed a few years later with the 30% rates came back in.

Be that as it may, the concept of Americans being heavily burdened by taxation is simply wrong.  And we live in an era in which, save for the period just before World War One, they are at an all time low. 

Thedore Roosevelt in Detroit, May 19, 1916

 Theodore Roosevelt in 1911.

I come here to Michigan because in the primary for the selection of delegates to the republican national convention, Mr. Ford was victorious, and following on his victory here, he showed a marked popular strength in Nebraska and Pennsylvania.

The effect of this showing has been immediately visible upon many of the politicians within and without congress. One of the leading anti-preparedness, or peace-at-any-price papers in New York recently commented with great satisfaction upon the defeat in the lower house of congress of the proposal to increase our regular army to 250,000 men.

This situation makes it advisable to speak with courtesy but with entire frankness of what the success of Mr. Ford means, and is taken to mean. It is in Michigan, Mr. Ford's own state, where the Ford movement began that I wish to say what I have to say on the subject.

For Mr. Ford personally, I feel not merely friendliness, but in many respects a very genuine admiration. There is much in the methods and very much in the purposes, with which he has conducted his business, notably in his relations to his working people that commands my hearty sympathy and respect.

Moreover, there is always something attractive to an American in the career of a man who has raised himself from the industrial ranks until he is one of the captains of industry.

But all that I have thus said, can with truth be said of many, perhaps of most of the tories of the revolutionary war and of many or most of the pacifists of the civil war, the extremists among whom were popularly known as copperheads.

Many of these tories and civil war pacifists were men of fine character and upright purpose, who sincerely believed in the cause they advocated.

These pacifists who formed so large a proportion of the old-time tories and copperheads abhorred and denounced in the militarism of Washington in 1776 and of Lincoln in 1861. They were against all war and all preparedness for war.

In the revolutionary contest they insisted that Washington was the embodiment of anarchic militarism.

Their purpose was to get the 'boys' of Bunker Hill and Valley Forge 'out of the trenches' and bring them back to their homes and make them quit fighting.

In 1864 they denounced Lincoln as a military dictator. They praised peace as the greatest of all earthly blessings. They demanded that the war should cease, and they wished to get the 'boys' of the Army of the Potomac 'out of the trenches' before Christmas and bring them back to the farm, the shop, and the counting house.

If these pacifists of the revolution and the civil war had had their way, they would have put an immediate stop to much suffering and much loss of life.

And unwittingly they would have utterly ruined this nation. They would have prevented its being a nation. They would have made the countrymen of Washington and the countrymen of Lincoln objects of scorn and derision, and they would have made of this great republic a hissing and a byword among the nations of the earth.

This is what these good well-meaning pacifists of those days would have done if they had achieved their purpose. This is what the pacifists of our day, the neo-tories, the neo-copperheads, will do if they achieve their purpose.

Either we must surrender our rights, and at the same time our self-respect, or we else we must be ready to defend our rights with a hand trained to exercise the weapons of free men, and with a heart steeled to that stern courage for the lack of which the possession of the softer virtures can never atone.

Such is the issue. It is as clear cut in this year 1916 as it was in 1861 or 1776. In the history of this country this is the third great crisis and it coincides with a tremendous world crisis.

This issue is: are we prepared with a sane and lofty idealism to fit ourselves to render great service to mankind by rendering ourselves fit for our own service, or are we content to avoid effort and labor in the present by preparing to tread the path that China has trodden?

We must choose one course or the other. We shall gain nothing by making believe that we can avoid choosing either course.

In any serious crisis there are always men who try to carry water on both shoulders. These man try to escape the hard necessity of choice between two necessary opposite alternatives, by trying to work up some compromise.

But there come great crises when compromise is either impossible or fatal. This is one of those crises.

There is no use in saying that we will fit ourselves to defend ourselves a little, but not much. Such a position is equivalent to announcing that, if necessary, we shall hit, but that we shall only hit soft.

The only right principle is to avoid hitting if that is possible to do so, but never under any circumstances to hit soft.

To go to war a little, but not much, is the one absolutely certain way to insure disaster.

To prepare a little but not much stands on a par with a city developing a fire department which, after a fire occurs, can put it out a little, but not much.

We, through our representatives at Washington, have absolutely refused in the smallest degree to prepare during these twenty-two months of world cataclysm.

We first hysterically announced we were afraid that preparedness might make us lose our vantage ground as a peace-loving people.

Then we became frightened and announced loudly that we ought to prepare; that the world was on fire, that our national structure was in danger of catching flame; and that we must immediately make ready.

Then we turned another somersault and abandoned all talk of preparedness; and we never did anything more than talk.

The net result is that there has been no preparation so far, because of what has happened in the great war. Congress is still in the conversational stage on the matter.

The ultra-pacifists, as represented by Mr. Ford, have made their great showing precisely because there has been no real and resolute opposition to them.

There are, at this time, two great lessons before us both inseparably bound together. They are the issue of Americanism and preparedness.

As a people we have to decide whether we are able and ready to take care of ourselves; or whether we doubt our national unity and fear to prepare, and intend instead to trust partly to elocutionary ability in high places.

Those in power at Washington have taken the latter positions.

Mr. Ford's supporters in the primaries seemingly come chiefly from three classes - the workingmen, who believe that he represents the desire to do justice to them; the pacificists who think that a policy of helplessness in the face of other nations will insure our national safety, and the German-Americans, some of them in an honest and sincere mood of protest, and others under the influence of that portion of the professional German-Americans, who have permitted their devotion to Germany finally to make them antagonistic to the welfare of the United States.

As for the wage workers who support Mr. Ford, I understand entirely their desire to support any man who, in their belief, stands for a more substantial measure of social and industrial justice.

But I wish, with all the emphasis in my power, to call their attention to the fact that in order for us to work within our own borders for social and industrial justice, it is necessary to secure to ourselves the power to determine these questions for ourselves.

It is of not the slightest consequence at this moment what the businessmen or the wage workers or the farmers of Belgium think should be done in the way of industrial and agricultural development and justice, because they have to do whatever the Germans tell them to do; and they work and live as they are told by their conquerors.

In the same way it is of no consequence what the native Koreans at the moment think should be done to raise themselves upward toward civilization, because the determining factor in their future is the Japanese attitude.

Riding In The Snow Norwich University (1936)

HMHS Britanic sunk by mine on this day in 1916

The HMHS Britannic, a sister ship of the Titanic, was sunk by a mine in the Aegean.  Thirty lives were lost in the sinking.  She was the largest ship lost during the war.  She was serving in the  Royal Navy as a hospital ship.

Tracking the Presidential Election Part V

Yes, we're already on to part V.

Somehow, the tallies have changed a bit since I last put them up, and I dare not put those up on my last entry as it's already growing rather large.  I think the Guam results may not have been in when I last posted.  Yes, Guam. Let's not forget that most US territories get to participate in selecting a nominee even though they cannot Constitutionally participate in the Presidential election as they were not states.  Or I may simply have missed late adjustments (more likely).

Democrats:  Needed to win, 2,383.

Clinton: 2,240 (524 of which are Superdelegates)
Sanders:  1,473 (40 of which are Superdelegates)

Republicans:  Needed to win, 1,237.

Trump:  1,135 (of which 49 are unpledged delegates).
Cruz:  565   Cruz has suspended his campaign. (of which 19 are unpledged delegates)
Rubio:  168.  Rubio has suspended his campaign.
Kasich:  154.  Kasich has suspended his campaign
Carson:  8  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Bush:  4  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Fiorina:  1  Fiorina has dropped out of the race.
Paul:  1  Paul has dropped out of the race.

Commentary

With these adjusted tallies, both Clinton and Sanders gained, but Sanders gained more.  Clinton only picked up one Superdelegate, but that points out Sanders problem.  Clinton only has 183 left to go before she has the requisite number of delegates, but 524 of these delegates are soft, i.e. unpledged delegates.  Sanders now is asserting he'll go all the way to the convention and assert the's entitled to a percentage of Superdelegates that matched his pledged delegates. 

Trump actually lost a delegate since the last tally.  Kasich gained one.  This comes from an updated analysis by the NYT of the West Virginia primary.  What's interesting there is that names appearing on the Republican ballots, including even Carson and Rubio, keep getting votes even though only  Trump is now running.

The big news of the past week, in the GOP contest, was that Trump and Paul Ryan met and supposedly made peace in a result that was extremely predictable and which has a bit of a stage feel to it.  Be that as it may, not all the of the Republicans are coming together by any means.  Not at all.  A fair number of conservatives are still rejecting Trump and there's every appearance they will throughout the entire race this year.

Indeed a debate has broken out in the GOP if a "not voting for Trump is a vote for Clinton" in the general election.  A lot of Republicans are stating that now.  But is it true?  Like a lot of things, it just isn't that simple.

It would be clear that in states in play, which a lot more than normal will be this year, not voting for Trump probably is voting for Clinton, as a non vote in the American system isn't counted as "none of the above".  If that option existed this year, it's likely "none of the above" would win.  But in states that are going to go GOP anyway, like Wyoming, not voting for Trump isn't going to be a vote for Clinton, particularly if that vote goes to somebody else as a message.  Likewise, where the GOP will go down in defeat anyway, that's also true.  In any event, voting for Trump is voting for a party defined by Trump, which many Republicans are having a hard time reconciling to.

May 18, 2016

Oregon held its primary for both parties yesterday, and Kentucky held it for the Democrats.  The new updated tallies:

Democrats:  Needed to win, 2,383.

Clinton: 2,291 (524 of which are Superdelegates)
Sanders:  1,528 (40 of which are Superdelegates)

Republicans:  Needed to win, 1,237.

Trump:  1,161 (of which 58 are unpledged delegates).
Cruz:  567   Cruz has suspended his campaign. (of which 18 are unpledged delegates)
Rubio:  168.  Rubio has suspended his campaign.
Kasich:  159.  Kasich has suspended his campaign
Carson:  8  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Bush:  4  Carson has suspended his campaign.
Fiorina:  1  Fiorina has dropped out of the race.
Paul:  1  Paul has dropped out of the race.

Commentary

Both of yesterday's primaries are significant for both parties. 

On the Democratic side, even though he is largely treated by the Press as having already lost, Sanders picked up Oregon and Kentucky was basically a tie.  In practical terms, both candidates advanced and because of the Democrats Superdelegate system, Clinton is closing in on the nomination.  As can be seen she's far ahead of Sanders with only about 90 delegates left to go, but that's only because she has 524 superdelegates.  In actual pledged delegates she as 1767 and Sanders has 1488.  She's still ahead, but not nearly as close to the needed 2,383 as the superdelegates would appear to make her.  Its no wonder that Sanders, who continues to beat Clinton time after time, feels the superdelegate system is unfair if the superdelegates do not go the way that the voters have.  The press, however, does not seem to focus on this.  With at least one big western state left to go, Sanders really remains fully in the race, as long as superdelegate tallies are ignored.  Gaining the 300 votes he'd need to exceed Clinton is actually pretty doable as the Democrats have over 900 delegates left to pledge.  It's also no wonder that Sanders supporters are starting to get angry.

On the Republican side, candidates who have dropped out of the race continue to pick up a few delegates nonetheless, which reflects that a lot of Republican voters remain unhappy with what has occurred in their party.  In Oregon Cruz and Kasich each picked up three delegates in spite of not running there.

Commentary followup: 

All of a sudden Bernie Sanders is getting a lot of criticism of the same type that Trump has for some time.  This has spread to some of the pundits.  Once again, while a person hates to assume its press bias, it is odd that now that it's apparent that Sanders is really serious (as if it hasn't been for a long time), and that he doesn't intend to drop out and maybe doesn't intend to go away and make nice, but will in fact keep campaigning for his agenda, he's drawing negative attention.

Some of this is because his supporters are getting very edgy in some instances, just as Trump's did under the same circumstances. But some of it is beyond that.  For instance one column I read today accused him of being a racist.

Whatever else Bernie Sanders may be, I'm confident he's not a racist.  That he'd get accused of that now strikes me as a little odd.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Tracking the Presidential Election, 2016

Tracking the Presidential Election, 2016, Part II

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

Tracking the Presidential Election Part IV

Men without work, basic living wage, free college tuition. Concept vs. reality and habituation

The other day I saw a Facebook post in which a friend of mine was pondering what he'd do if he suddenly came into a large sum of cash so that he didn't need to work.

He determined he'd devote himself to worthwhile causes.

Well, maybe he would, but most people wouldn't, including most who seriously believe that they would.  Indeed, most people would, after a few months, adjust to doing absolutely nothing.

That's right. Nothing.

Which is very well established, and why we should ponder the impact of outside funding in a year in which its getting a lot of traction in one form another another.  This extraordinary political year, which has seen a rich capitalist secure a the largest number of delegates in the Republican race, and an avowed socialist seriously threaten to take the nomination in the Democratic race, has seen a lot of discussion on these sorts of topics, including the suggestion that the US ought (which already is up in the top three or of the world's nations in terms of percentage of population with a college degree) to provide a "free" college education to all of its citizens and the suggestion that the government ought to provide a Guaranteed Minimum Wage to everyone of its citizens.  And of course we recently had a type of national health care pass which some feel should be changed into a more classic European style single payer type system.

Now, each one of these things is a separate idea and has to be considered that way.  But one thing we want might to really ask is what is the impact, if known, of funding folks where they normally fund themselves.

And that's really well established.

Given funding, and no work, what universally occurs is that the suddenly funded person spends a period of weeks working on getting their work back, if they are working.  

But after several weeks pass, they acclimate themselves to the lack of work. After a few more, they habituate themselves to it.  After that, they'll do what they can to remain in that status, no matter what.

Now, a person can't say a thing like that and not spark all sorts of negative reactions. But the data is well established.  It's well established from various welfare systems for one thing, when they have generous benefits, which they often do not.  People have looked at welfare payments that relate to unemployment, when the benefits are generous, and the above is the universal pattern.  The recently out of work desperately seek to re-obtain it, then acclimate themselves to not working, and then habituate themselves to living at whatever level a subsistence payment provides.

There are, additionally, examples of massive social failure caused by prolonged welfare systems.

The other day I read an article from the Canadian Broadcasting System about a First Nation (Indian) area in Canada that's in a massive crisis.  Canada extended subsistence payments to really remote First Nation bands some decades ago.  When exactly this occurred I'm not sure, but First Nation groups that lived in remote areas lived on their own, by their own and through their own efforts at least through World War Two.  After that, the idea of providing them with subsistence to improve their lives came about.

It hasn't.  It's wrecked them.

Now, basically, the situation is that men in particular in these groups simply do nothing.  There's no incentive to do anything.  All of the old skills they once had to live in remote areas has vanished.  They couldn't effectively go back to hunting for subsistence now if they wanted to, the skills are lost. Suicide is rampant.  The bands are in crisis.  Only women, who by nature remained tasked with roles their gender imposes upon them or blesses them with, depending upon how you look at it, keep things together as they retain the basic jobs that women have had since day one.  So, the result?  Women have kept the roles that feminist are always thinking they'll liberate women form, and that's keeping everything together to the extent anything is kept together, while these groups are quite literally being killed with kindness.

Let's take higher education.

Eh?  How does that relate. . .?

Well, maybe it does.

Recently I published this item on a Paul Campos article:

Looking at the hidden reasons for the cost of higher education.

My guess is that Paul Campos doesn't get invitations to the faculty Christmas Party.

Campos is a law professor at the University of Colorado.  That wouldn't keep him from getting an invite. But his book Don't Go To Law School (Unless): A Law Professor's Inside Guide to Maximizing Opportunity and Minimizing Risk was not without controversy.  In it, Campos seriously took on law schools and sparked a huge amount of debate, including debate from law school professors (which both Federal Judge Posner and I have likened to refugees from the practice of law, but I stated that first).  

Now, or actually several months ago, Campos wrote a New York Times Op Ed entitled The Real Reason College Tuition Costs So Much  and the reason, according to Campos, isn't the one that schools like to give out.

According to Campos, public funding of education is causing it.

That's right, public funding.

Now, that's counter intuitive.  In this era of Bernie Sanders inspired "let's make education free" the logic would be that funding education drives the cost down, and makes it more affordable for all. But that logic is pretty thin, and Campos raises some really good points.

Campos first notes what most suspect, but that few are willing to acknowledge.  Following the baby boomer flood into college, public investment in college massively increased.:

In fact, public investment in higher education in America is vastly larger today, in inflation-adjusted dollars, than it was during the supposed golden age of public funding in the 1960s. Such spending has increased at a much faster rate than government spending in general. For example, the military’s budget is about 1.8 times higher today than it was in 1960, while legislative appropriations to higher education are more than 10 times higher.

In that article Campos noted:

In other words, far from being caused by funding cuts, the astonishing rise in college tuition correlates closely with a huge increase in public subsidies for higher education. If over the past three decades car prices had gone up as fast as tuition, the average new car would cost more than $80,000.

And he went on:

As the baby boomers reached college age, state appropriations to higher education skyrocketed, increasing more than fourfold in today’s dollars, from $11.1 billion in 1960 to $48.2 billion in 1975. By 1980, state funding for higher education had increased a mind-boggling 390 percent in real terms over the previous 20 years. This tsunami of public money did not reduce tuition: quite the contrary.

And he went from there:

Interestingly, increased spending has not been going into the pockets of the typical professor. Salaries of full-time faculty members are, on average, barely higher than they were in 1970. Moreover, while 45 years ago 78 percent of college and university professors were full time, today half of postsecondary faculty members are lower-paid part-time employees, meaning that the average salaries of the people who do the teaching in American higher education are actually quite a bit lower than they were in 1970.

By contrast, a major factor driving increasing costs is the constant expansion of university administration. According to the Department of Education data, administrative positions at colleges and universities grew by 60 percent between 1993 and 2009, which Bloomberg reported was 10 times the rate of growth of tenured faculty positions.

Even more strikingly, an analysis by a professor at California Polytechnic University, Pomona, found that, while the total number of full-time faculty members in the C.S.U. system grew from 11,614 to 12,019 between 1975 and 2008, the total number of administrators grew from 3,800 to 12,183 — a 221 percent increase.

Basically, Campos is stated that public funding of education amounted to bureaucratic and institutional social welfare.  Now, I"m not claiming that those who are employed in upper education aren't working, but I will say that it's a pretty common slam by people in any one industry to compare their jobs against academics in the same field.  Lawyers, for example, generally don't think "wow. . . those law school professors are really working hard."

Having said that, I will say that I've often found certain fields to be the exception.  In hard sciences, mathematics and agriculture I think the academics are admired.  In fields like history and languages the fields are considered naturally academic ones. But in other instances, such as where we get weird and fanciful theses being written in rarefied fields that only serve to secure an academic post. . . well things are questioned.

And apparently this happens to the expense of the students.

Thomas Jefferson claimed that:  "Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition."  Jefferson didn't know anything about biological evolution or DNA, but if he had, he might have added that humans being are seemingly programed by our nature both to work (albeit only of some types) and inactivity.  That is, our natures assume we're going to be busy in the wilds and that he we have enough coming in, and don't need to be, we ought to conserve our energy by doing nothing.

But doing nothing was never contemplated by our evolution as a permanent state of affairs.  By winter the wolf would be back at the door and starvation looming. Get back out there man.

And indeed the thing that runs contrary to what I've noted above is the degree to which lifelong, but I do mean lifelong, habituation eventually causes some to so identify with their work that they can't or won't escape it even if they could.  So, in those instances, you see people keep on working when they no longer have to, but then they're so fully habituated to it that they literally cannot stop. That's admirable in some, but not so much in others. And it can be sad.

Acquisition as an instinct also cuts against this, but that's not necessarily a good thing either.  We see that with the very wealthy who keep on acquiring, even though they no longer have to keep the wolf from the door by any means.  Indeed, at some point too much wealth in one person's hands can become destructive simply by accident.  The knowledge of that, in part, fuels the current resentment against the "1%".

So, I suppose, what does all that mean? Well, for one thing, it means we ought to be really careful about the provision of free anything as a society.  There are certainly times when people need help.  And that help ought to be provided.  But it actually isn't very helpful to start providing too many things as a public benefit, as people will nearly always acclimate to it and quit being industrious themselves.  Likewise, it probably isn't a good idea to allow for unrestrained acquisition either.

And it shows, I suppose, how instincts that developed when we were on the veldt are still with us.

 

Living Wage Calculator

Just sort of interesting.  MIT's Living Wage Calculator.

The Wire Agency: News and the telegraph

I went to search for our "recent comments" here, as I was looking for a comment that LeAnn had made, which inspired this post.  I ended up having to find it another way, but I did find it.  Here it is:

Loving these posts on the Punitive Expedition. I'm so curious if you find any articles from the local paper that list the 28th Infantry, the unit my great-grandfather was in. In one of my first grad classes, I wrote a paper about how the events of the Punitive Expedition were reported in the newspapers, both national ones such as New York Times or the like and more local papers such as the Baltimore Sun. I found that the articles were essentially the same as the Associated Press was already in existence. So, there didn't seem to be any huge focuses on the local units in the local papers. Anyway, I'm finding these posts quite interesting. Thanks

The post appeared in the post on technology and the Punitive Expedition.

What LeAnn had noted about locals papers had also surprised me.  I hadn't expected such up to date news, quite frankly, .and I also expected it to have a highly local character.  It doesn't.  And that's for the reason she noted.

Now, having said that, what I will say, and which emphasizes this, is that if I take a step out further in news coverage this isn't true. That is, I was putting mostly up the Casper paper, with the Cheyenne paper on occasion.  But if you start looking at the newspapers of the smaller towns, the Punitive Expedition hardly appeared at all.  In any of them.  Now, why was that true.

Just what LeAnn noted. The wires services.  Those small papers weren't subscribing to the wire services.

Here's the first one we recently ran:

The Raid on Columbus New Mexico: The news hit.

Most towns and cities in 1916 were served by a morning and an evening newspaper, or a paper that published a morning and evening edition.  Therefore, most Americans would have started learning of the Villista raid around 5:00 p.m. or so as the evening newspapers were delivered or started being offered for sale.

Here's the evening edition of the Casper Daily Press, a paper that was in circulation in Casper Wyoming in 1916 and which is the predecessor of one of the current papers.

Here's the Encampment Record, from southern Wyoming, on the same day:

Quite a bit different.

From the Encampment Record, for the same day, we learn that improvements were being made to the city hall.  Registered livestock were being brought into the valley, something that urban sophisticates might make fun of today but real news.  A local road needed improvement.  And, some distance away, the Virginian Hotel in Medicine Bow, named for the 1902 novel by Owen Wister, and which is still there in Medicine Bow, had closed.  It only closed temporarily, of course, as it remains open today.

 

The Virginian Hotel, which has been featured on this blog before, with this photo being from Railhead.  It's interesting to note that Wister's novel was such a hit that it was inspiring the naming of a hotel in Wyoming so close to the date of its publication.

News Agencies got started in Europe as early as the 1830s. When telegraph came about, however, that really opened the door for the wire agency, a type of news agency that depended on the transmission of news by telegraph.  In the United States, the Associated Press was founded in 1846 as a nonprofit organization.  It originally only included five New York newspapers that had founded it, and it conveyed the news of the Mexican War by boat, horse and telegraph.  In 1900 the Illinois Supreme Court held that wire agencies were a public utility and that meant that the Associated Press had to let in any newspaper that would pay for the service.  The United States Supreme Court upheld the Illinois Supreme Court in Inter Ocean Publishing v. Associated Press, a decision that really opened up reporting in the United States (but which I doubt the Supreme Court would have ruled the same way in today.  Soon, any paper that wanted AP wire reports could have them, and soon thereafter competition spring up, including United Press and International News Service.

That brought in the golden age of the news reporter, as we so often imagine it today. Reporters working for the agencies going to the field and wiring in their reports to the agencies, who in turn spread them rapidly throughout the nation.  

News reporters and photographers interviewing Alma Gluck, 1917.  Gluck was a celebrated opera singer and would have been 33 years old at the time of this photograph.  There are a lot of interesting details in it, including a depiction of a fedora by a couple of gentlemen in the photo, sowing their early spread,  as well as a reporter taking his notes by hand.  That reporter, if he was a wire reporter, would then wire his story in. Note also the early large cameras, including at least one motion picture camera.

This was an amazing change in the way that things had been done.  Local newspapers before this, and there were many, simply reported on local news for the most part, until a story became so big it had to be reported in the local paper.  But now, the major news, including in our examples war news from Europe, was appearing the next day in small cities.  The world had become very connected.

Before we close in this amazing change in the transmission of news, let's observe a couple of things.  One is that the news was being wired, but photographs weren't really yet.  Some early news photos were appearing, but wire photography wouldn't come in until the 1920s with the invention of additional technology.  Secondly, lets consider the reporters.

One of the really amazing things about reporters of this era, and well after, is that these were not, as a rule, college educated men.  That says something about the nature of education at the time.  By and large, these were men with high school educations.  People didn't go to college and major in journalism.  If they wanted to be reporters, they took what they'd learned in high school and went out as a cub reporter for a paper.  Some really astounding writers are included in this group.  Francis McCullagh, an Irish born writer who traveled all over the globe writing for English, Japanese and American newspapers is one example. With a Catholic school education, he reported on wars everywhere from the Russo Japanese War all the way to the Spanish Civil War, writing several books along the way.  Robert Leckie is another.  He started writing for a local newspaper while still in high school and then went on to be a wire reporter after World War Two, later writing his famous memoir A Helmet For My Pillow as a reaction to seeing South Pacific.  It'd be hard to get in the door of a newspaper as a writer today without a university education.  Perhaps that says something about education standards of the era, or should, and expectations then and now.

Sykes Picot Agreement Ratified, May 16, 1916

On May 16, 1916, a secret agreement between the British and French was ratified.  It provided:

t is accordingly understood between the French and British governments:

That France and Great Britain are prepared to recognize and protect an independent Arab states or a confederation of Arab states (a) and (b) marked on the annexed map, under the suzerainty of an Arab chief. That in area (a) France, and in area (b) Great Britain, shall have priority of right of enterprise and local loans. That in area (a) France, and in area (b) Great Britain, shall alone supply advisers or foreign functionaries at the request of the Arab state or confederation of Arab states.

That in the blue area France, and in the red area Great Britain, shall be allowed to establish such direct or indirect administration or control as they desire and as they may think fit to arrange with the Arab state or confederation of Arab states.

That in the brown area there shall be established an international administration, the form of which is to be decided upon after consultation with Russia, and subsequently in consultation with the other allies, and the representatives of the Shereef of Mecca.

That Great Britain be accorded (1) the ports of Haifa and Acre, (2) guarantee of a given supply of water from the Tigres and Euphrates in area (a) for area (b). His Majesty's government, on their part, undertake that they will at no time enter into negotiations for the cession of Cyprus to any third power without the previous consent of the French government.

That Alexandretta shall be a free port as regards the trade of the British empire, and that there shall be no discrimination in port charges or facilities as regards British shipping and British goods; that there shall be freedom of transit for British goods through Alexandretta and by railway through the blue area, or (b) area, or area (a); and there shall be no discrimination, direct or indirect, against British goods on any railway or against British goods or ships at any port serving the areas mentioned.

That Haifa shall be a free port as regards the trade of France, her dominions and protectorates, and there shall be no discrimination in port charges or facilities as regards French shipping and French goods. There shall be freedom of transit for French goods through Haifa and by the British railway through the brown area, whether those goods are intended for or originate in the blue area, area (a), or area (b), and there shall be no discrimination, direct or indirect, against French goods on any railway, or against French goods or ships at any port serving the areas mentioned.

That in area (a) the Baghdad railway shall not be extended southwards beyond Mosul, and in area (b) northwards beyond Samarra, until a railway connecting Baghdad and Aleppo via the Euphrates valley has been completed, and then only with the concurrence of the two governments.

That Great Britain has the right to build, administer, and be sole owner of a railway connecting Haifa with area (b), and shall have a perpetual right to transport troops along such a line at all times. It is to be understood by both governments that this railway is to facilitate the connection of Baghdad with Haifa by rail, and it is further understood that, if the engineering difficulties and expense entailed by keeping this connecting line in the brown area only make the project unfeasible, that the French government shall be prepared to consider that the line in question may also traverse the Polgon Banias Keis Marib Salkhad tell Otsda Mesmie before reaching area (b).

For a period of twenty years the existing Turkish customs tariff shall remain in force throughout the whole of the blue and red areas, as well as in areas (a) and (b), and no increase in the rates of duty or conversions from ad valorem to specific rates shall be made except by agreement between the two powers.

There shall be no interior customs barriers between any of the above mentioned areas. The customs duties leviable on goods destined for the interior shall be collected at the port of entry and handed over to the administration of the area of destination.

It shall be agreed that the French government will at no time enter into any negotiations for the cession of their rights and will not cede such rights in the blue area to any third power, except the Arab state or confederation of Arab states, without the previous agreement of his majesty's government, who, on their part, will give a similar undertaking to the French government regarding the red area.

The British and French government, as the protectors of the Arab state, shall agree that they will not themselves acquire and will not consent to a third power acquiring territorial possessions in the Arabian peninsula, nor consent to a third power installing a naval base either on the east coast, or on the islands, of the red sea. This, however, shall not prevent such adjustment of the Aden frontier as may be necessary in consequence of recent Turkish aggression.

The negotiations with the Arabs as to the boundaries of the Arab states shall be continued through the same channel as heretofore on behalf of the two powers.

It is agreed that measures to control the importation of arms into the Arab territories will be considered by the two governments.

I have further the honor to state that, in order to make the agreement complete, his majesty's government are proposing to the Russian government to exchange notes analogous to those exchanged by the latter and your excellency's government on the 26th April last. Copies of these notes will be communicated to your excellency as soon as exchanged.I would also venture to remind your excellency that the conclusion of the present agreement raises, for practical consideration, the question of claims of Italy to a share in any partition or rearrangement of turkey in Asia, as formulated in article 9 of the agreement of the 26th April, 1915, between Italy and the allies.

His Majesty's government further consider that the Japanese government should be informed of the arrangements now concluded.

Public Domain File:MPK1-426 Sykes Picot Agreement Map signed 8 May 1916.jpg, from Wikipedia Commons.    Royal Geographical Society (Map), Mark Sykes & François Georges-Picot.  This is because it is one of the following:

1. It is a photograph created by the United Kingdom Government and taken prior to 1 June 1957; or
2. It was commercially published prior to 1966; or
3. It is an artistic work other than a photograph or engraving (e.g. a painting) which was created by the United Kingdom Government prior to 1966.

HMSO has declared that the expiry of Crown Copyrights applies worldwide

 

The agreement has gone down in history as being an infamous one, leading to the charge that the British and French carved up the Middle East without the consultation of their Arab allies, then in revolt against the Ottoman Empire.

Ah what the crud. . . back to the breakfast of yore

 Lumberjacks on the cutting edge of dietary theory.

Sitting down to breakfast?

NPR reports on breakfast.

And what it reports about breakfast, basically, is this:

And a breakfast of highly refined carbohydrates may leave you feeling hungrier later in the day.

On the other hand, if you eat a protein-rich breakfast (think eggs), you're likely to be satisfied longer. "Non-carbohydrate foods, specifically protein and fat, slow down digestion," says Ludwig.

So, in other words, the exact sort of breakfast that the experts spent about twenty years telling you not to eat, they're not telling you to eat.

The United States commences the occupation of the Dominican Republic: May 16, 1916.

 Period illustration of U.S. Marines landing under fire in the Dominican Republic.

With U.S. troops deep in Mexico, and the war in Europe growing bloodier, you would think that the US had enough on its hands already, but on this day, in 1916, the US landed Marines in the Dominican Republic.

This intervention came about due to a recent coup in the Dominican Republic and it would last until until 1924 during which period the US would make infrastructure improvements to the nation and governmental changes. The occupation was unpopular in both the United States and the Dominican Republic.

 USS Memphis, which was lost that August as part of the occupation when she was badly damaged in a storm while in harbor, costing the lives of forty-three of her crew.

The entire operation says something about the U.S.'s views about the countries to its south in this era.  It also says something about what it must have been like to be in the Marines, and what the Marines themselves must have been like. 

Quick! Avert your eyes. . . nature is happening.

 

 Not a housecat, no matter what some commission may decide.

New York's Commission on Human Rights had determined that its unconstitutional not to serve pregnant women alcohol.

That's stupid.

Nowhere in any constitution, state or Federal, is there a clause that says "When a pregnant boozehound comes into your dram shop, you shall liquor her up".  Nonsense.

But a lot of or cutting edge social law has become quite nonsensical recently.

Truth be known, a lot of the original concepts of rights involve "leave people alone".  They hardly ever involved "you must recognize this".  People had the right to assemble, but you didn't have to credit their assembly as smart, nifty or valuable.  People had the right to be secure in their own homes, which basically meant leaving them alone, at home.  Lots of stuff was that way.

Now, however, there are beginning to be a lot of "you musts".  And the "you musts" are often followed by the social derision of the pop class, who is rarely impacted by anything directly.  And a lot of this is because our country has become almost completely divorced from nature, and seeing a sudden acceleration of "you must" recognize this or that.

Indeed, just yesterday I actually heard a person interviewed who has "changed" their gender (a genetic impossibility) state that he or she should be allowed in a bathroom that comports to his or her gender reassignment, but that those who dressed contrary to their gender were "perverts".  My goodness, how can a person actually make that statement?  Its incredibly biased, and at the same time mind numbingly confusing to the vast majority of people who are comfortable with the gender dictates of their DNA and their clothing.  Can a person actually say that?  I don't think so. They shouldn't say it, and I have to believe that what they meant was actually something else and that htey didn't mean to go after the clothing thing.  After all, how can a person who has had surgery and who is taking chemicals to defeat their DNA say that about somebody who is just wearing a different set of clothes.  Bizarre.

On the bathroom thing, I'm not commenting on where people who have had their genders reassigned should go and I doubt that they or anyone else actually regarded this as a burning issue.  It seems to me that they probably have to go where surgery has now assigned them.  Indeed, I'm amazed that this is now an issue that requires Federal pondering.  I'll say beyond that, however, that at the point at which the Federal government starts issuing guidelines on this, it obviously has too little to actually do. Likewise, when celebrities start spouting on it, it shows how slavish they are to trends.  I don't think any legislature needs to legislate on this at all, and that in the absence of all of the recent legislation, this would never have been an issue, but at the same time what this reflects is a sense in society that something has gone really wrong in what people are being told they must believe.  Gender reassignment is a prime example, as statistically its' a disaster with horrific impacts for a large percentage of the people who undergo it.  In Europe its generally prohibited for minors and its been shown that the majority of minors who claim confusion later resolve it in accordance with their actual DNA.  But here in the US we are actually entering a "you must not question" people who declare that they wish to do this, in spite of the horrible historical track records that actually exist.  We claim to have "freedom of speech", but here we are outright declaring that the speech must be squelched and you must accept this, in spite of the evidence.

This is contributing to the outright revolt in a percentage of the American electorate.  Commenters wonder why a figure like Donald Trump has seized the GOP nomination this year, but stuff like this is why.  When a person can't say "I think this is wrong", about gender reassignment, or "I think this is wrong", about serving a pregnant woman alcohol, they react.  And when they do, it'll be an extreme reaction.

Most of this is, in some way, related to our separation from nature.  We've always been a fallen species, but we now don't seem to know what we are.  As a species, we have the highest degree of morphological and psychological differences between the two genders of any mammal. That's simply a fact.  But in the name if equality we must now pretend that isn't so, and that everything is just the same as everything else. And apparently we must also pretend that a woman who is out to drown her baby in booze before the baby is even born isn't committing child abuse. She is.

No group of people can infinitely ignore nature.  It will not work.  Nature gets even.  And societal movements that don't credit that don't last forever.  Nor should they.

Nature deserves her due.

"Fighting Terrorism Since 1861". Eh? Your bumper sticker makes no sense.

Yesterday I saw a bumper sticker on a truck that had the Confederate stars and bars and the words next to it "Fighting Terrorism Since 1861".

What?

A version of the Stars and Bars used by Nathan Bedford Forrest. Was he a fighter or terrorism or did he participate in a type of it?

That's one darned ignorant bumper sticker.

No matter how  you conceive of the Civil War, the South wasn't combating terrorism.

Neither side was.

The Confederate States were in rebellion against their nation over the issue of slavery. That really is what the war was about, and at the time, Southerners were pretty darned open about it as they headed towards succession.

They weren't fighting terrorism.  They wouldn't have even known what terrorism was.

Now, no matter what you think of a rebellion that was entered into to preserve slavery, neither side fought in a terroristic fashion.  The Union certainly did not.  About the closest you could get to that would be John Brown's 1859 raid on Harper's Ferry, but that would really be pretty far from an act of terrorism.  The Southern forces didn't engage in it either, although I suppose you could claim that Southern privateers and partisan rangers might in some ways have crept up on that.  But then letters of marque and reprisal were accepted as part of war at the time, so that really wouldn't count.

Indeed, the closet you can get is acts by people like Nathan Bedford Forrest after the war designed to try to defeat Reconstruction, which in fact did engage in terrorism and which were illegal.

So, the bumper sticker is not only insulting, but historically inaccurate.  If a person is going to be insulting, they ought to at least be historically accurate.

The same vehicle, I'd note, also had a big sticker stating "Cold War Veteran".  That was a new one as well.  Now, a person can put any veteran sticker on a vehicle they want to, but I also qualify as a Cold War veteran, and I just can't see putting that on a sticker.  It's not like most of us got shot at.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: Catholic Church, Camp Long, Republic of Korea

Churches of the West: Catholic Church, Camp Long, Republic of Korea:

Roads to the Great War: The Chaplains of the AEF

Roads to the Great War: The Chaplains of the AEF: The U.S. Army Chaplaincy was to be an integral part of the great mobilization of the American Expeditionary Force. By the end of the w...

Roads to the Great War: World War I Deaths by Nation As a Percentage of Po...

Roads to the Great War: World War I Deaths by Nation As a Percentage of Po...: Percentages by country as of 1914 borders: Serbia: 24% Ottoman Empire: 14% Romania: 8.3% France: 4.34% Germany: 4.00% Austria-...