Macomb (IL) War Dead ca. 1885

From the Macomb Journal 28 MAY 1885:

       Buried in Oakwood Cemetery:
Col. Carter VanVleck, 78th ILL Inft.: enlisted Sept. 1, 1862;  died Aug. 23, 1864 of wounds received at Atlanta, Ga. a few days before.
Major William L. Broaddus, 78th Ill.;  enlisted Sept. 15, 1862;  killed Sept. 20, 1863 at the battle of Chicamauga.
Capt. David P. Wells, Co. B, 16th Ill.;  enlisted May 24, 1861;  died at home, in service, April 7, 1863.
Lieut. William P. Pearson, Co. C, 84th Ill.;  enlisted June 5, 1862; died since discharged.
Surgeon Wm. A. Huston, 137th Ill.; enlisted June 6, 1864; died in service June 25, 1864.
Henry Bailey, Co. B, 16th Ill.; enlisted May 24, 1861; died since discharged.
Wm. H. Keener, Co. B, 16th Ill.; enlisted April 1861; died since discharged.
A.J. Dillon, Co. B, 16th Ill.; enlisted Feb. 8, 1862; died since discharged.
George Wetherhold, Co. B, 16th Ill.; enlisted May 24, 1861; died since discharged.
Wm. H. Randolph, deputy provost marshal, ninth district; killed while in discharge of duty.
Edward S. Piper, Sergeant, Co. C, 84th Ill; enlisted June 16, 1862; died in service at Manchester, Tenn., June __, 1863.
Wilbur C. Clark, Co. C, 151st Ill.; died since discharged.
J. Grear Morgan, Co. H, 2nd Ill. Cav.;  enlisted Aug 6, 1861; died since discharged.
Parmenium Hamilton, Sergeant, Co. I, 78th Ill.;  enlisted Aug. 1, 1862;  died in service of wounds, Oct. 15, 1863.
Moses A. McCandless, Co. I, 78th Ill.;  enlisted Aug 4, 1862;  killed at Griggsville, Tenn. Nov. 29, 1862.
Josiah Swigart, Co. C, 84th Ill.;  enlisted June 19, 1863;  died since discharged.
John A. Eyre, Sergeant, Co. C, 84th Ill.;  enlisted June 13, 1862;  died in the service.
Samuel Patrick, Co. A., 84th Ill.;  enlisted Aug. 8, 1862;  died of wounds.
B.F. Clark, Co. A, 84th Ill.;  died since discharged.
Robert Barry, Co. C, 151st Ill.;  enlisted Feb. 24, 1865;  died since discharged.
John Farwell, West Point cadet;  died in service, Oct. 17, 1867.
James McClelland, Sergeant Co. B, 10th Mo.;  enlisted Aug. 2, 1861;  killed at Corinth, Miss. Oct. 3, 1862.
David Blazer, 11th Ill. Cav.; died since discharged.
Dallas Wolf, Co. C, 151st Ill.; died since discharged.
Jerry Randolph, Co. B, 10th Mo.;  died since discharged.
James B. Kyle, Surgeon 84th Ill.;  enlisted Aug. 1862;  discharged June 5, 1865;  died June, 1878.
Browning N. Wiles, Captain, New York Volunteers;  died May 1880.
A.N. Harris, Captain Co. K, 10th Mo. Cav.;  died since discharged.
Henry Parker, Co. I, 78th Ill.;  died May 24, 1880.
T. Laughlin, Co. C, 151st Ill.;  died since discharged.
James Clark, 4th United States Regular Cavalry;  died since discharged.
Charles Bennett, Co. I, 78th Ill.;  died in service, 1863.
Garner H. Bane, Surgeon, 50th Ill.;  died since discharged.
Wiley Amos, Ohio Volunteers.
Samuel Fields, War of 1812.
Harry Hampton, Co. A, 16th Ill.;  enlisted April 21, 1861;  died since discharged.
Lewis Wingett, 55th Ill.;  died since discharged.
Alex Jones, Battery H, 2nd Ill. Art.;  died since discharged.
T.S. Clarke, Co. F, 50th Ill.;  died since discharged.
George Iseminger, War of 1812.
R.H. Gordon, Co. A, 16th Ill.;  enlisted April 24, 1861;  died since discharged.
________ Frank, Illinois Volunteers.
B.F. Applegate, 10th Mo. Inft.;  died since discharged.
John Forrest*  Co. C, 78th Ill.;  killed in the charge at the battle of Jonesboro, Ga.  Sept. 1, 1864.
John G. Hammond, 10th Mo. Vols.;  enlisted Aug. 1864;  died Sept. 15, 1880.
J.W. Dilley, Co. B, 1st Mo. Engineers;  died Sept. 30, 1880.
Henry Shetterly, Indiana Volunteers;  died Apr. 2, 1881.
Daniel Byerly, 124th Ill.;  enlisted Aug. 1862;  discharged Aug. 1865;  died Apr. 2, 1881.
Ingram Pace, Co. I, 78th Ill.; died since discharged.
B.F. Lane*, Co. I, 78th Ill.;  killed Sept. 20, 1863, at battle of Chicamauga.
Lieut. A.J. Werden, Ohio Volunteers;  died since discharged.
Amos Gardner, Co. B, 85th Ind.;  died since discharged.
A.L. Booth, Co. B, 9th Ill. Cav.;  died since discharged.
W.R. McKee, War of 1812.
Lieut. M.A. Goodfellow, Ohio Volunteers;  died since discharged.
Thomas J. Martin, Co. C, 84th Ill.;  enlisted Aug 16, 1862;  mustered out at close of war;  died at Macomb, Ill. March 8, 1882.
Thomas Edmonson, Color Bearer 78th Ill.;  enlisted Aug. 1862;  mustered out at close of the war;  murdered at Good Hope, Ill. March 17, 1882.
O.P. Lamphere, Ohio Volunteers;  died October 1882.
George Robinson, Co. B, 10th Mo.;  enlisted Aug. 1861;  died March 11, 1883.
Richard Hillyer, 151st Ill.;  died March 18, 1883.
Lieut. John B. Pearson, Co. D, 28th Ill.;  enlisted July 1861;  discharged at close of war;  died May 26, 1883.
Richard Lawrence, Quartermaster 28th Ill.;  died Nov. 14, 1883.
Peter Clark, Eckdall's Battery, 2nd Ill. Art.;  died Aug. 31, 1883.
Wm. L. Hampton, Co. C, 84th Ill.;  died Feb. 3, 1883.
H.B. Livermore, U.S. Surgeon;  died May 21, 1884.
Levi Penniwitt, Iowa Volunteers;  died since discharged.

Buried in Old Cemetery

Capt. James D. Walker, Co. H, 2nd Ill. Cav.;  enlisted Aug 6, 1861;  died since discharged.
Wm. P. Chase, 98th Ill.;  died in service.
T.B. Lillard, U.S. Volunteers.
James P. Whitten, Co. H, 2nd Ill. Art.
Thomas Smithers, War of 1812.
Samuel Campbell, regiment unknown.
W.S. Stokes, Co. B, 10th Mo.;  killed at the battle of Corinth, Miss., October 1865.
Elias Vancleve, regiment unknown.
Wm. McDonald, soldier in Black Hawk War.
Abram Rowe, Capt. Co. B, 16th Ill. Inft., enlisted Apr. 6, 1861;  discharged December 1864;  died June 26, 1884.

Buried in Catholic Cemetery

Frank Hall, U.S. Army;  died in Bushnell.
George Hendricksmyer, Illinois Volunteers;  died since discharged.
Sergeant Patrick Noonan, Co. C, 98th Ill.
Albert Regner, Missouri Volunteers.
Isadore Walter, 2nd Ill. Art.;  died since discharged.

_______________________________________
*The remains of these soldiers are not buried here, but monuments have been erected to their memory in Oakwood, and the place thus dedicated will be decorated.
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Headstones for Soldiers' Graves 

Two weeks ago the JOURNAL announced the shipment to this place of a number of gravestones, furnished by the government, for the graves of deceased soldiers not having been supplied with stones.  They were delivered free of all expense at this station.  Here the local Grand Army Post took charge of them and paid the expenses of putting them in position at the cemeteries here.  A number of the stones are for soldiers buried at other points in the county:  the names appear in the list below, and the friends of the deceased are requested to call and get the stones and put them up.  The stones are 3 1/2 feet long, 12 inches wide and four thick.  The following is the list:  
Surgeon W.A. Huston 137th Ill.
Henry Nichols, Co. C, 137th Ill.
B.F. Clark, Co. A, 84th Ill.
Robert Barry, Co. C, 151st Ill.
David Blazer, Co. A, 11th Ill. Cav.
Capt. A. N. Harris, Co. K. 10th Mo. Cav.
Harry Hampton, Co. A, 16th Ill.
Lewis Wingett, 55th Ill.
Alex Jones, Co. H, 2nd Ill. Art.
T.S.Clark 50th Ill.
R.H. Gordon, Co. A. 16th Ill.
J.G. Hammond, 10th Mo.
Daniel Byerly, 124th Ill.
Ingram Pace, Co. I, 78th Ill.
Lieut A.J. Werden, Ohio reg't.
A.L. Booth Co. B. 9th Ill. Cav.
Thomas Edmonson, 78th Ill.
George Robinson, Co. B, 10th Mo.
Richard Hillyer, 151st Ill.
Lieut. J.B. Pearson, Co. D. 28th Ill.
Richard Lawrence, Quartermaster, 28th Ill.
Wm. L. Hampton, Co. B, 84th Ill.
Peter Clark, 2nd Ill. Art.
Capt. J.D. Walker Co. H, 2nd Ill. Cav.
Wm. P. Chase Co. A, 86th Ill.
J.P. Whitten, Co. H, 2nd Ill. Art.
Capt J.D. Walker, Co. H., 2nd Ill. Cav.
Wm. P. Chase, Co. A, 89th Ill.
J.P. Whitten Co. H, 2nd Artillery
W.S. Stokes, Co. B, 10th Mo.
Patrick Noonan, Co. C, 96th Ill.
Isadore Walters, 2d Artillery
Ephraim Baker, Co. H, 73rd Ohio
James Jellison Co. B, 16th Ill.
Capt. Abram Rowe, Co. C, 16th Ill.
J.B. Wortman, Co. A, 84th Ill.  Pennington Point Cemetery
J.H. Reymer, Co. I, 124th Ill.  Spring Creek Cemetery
J.B. Toland Co. H, 12th Ill. Eldorado Twp.
Martin V. Scudder, Co. I, 78th Ill. Industry
The following were omitted for want of a company and regiment:  J.W. Dilley,Levi Penn,George Henricksmeyer

You Won't Have Paul Ryan to Kick Around Any More

       The job of restoring the Constitutional importance of Congress is the most daunting task in the American government.  For over a decade, its traditional function of designing the nation's finances has been usurped by the executive, resulting in atrocities like the continuing resolutions and the most recent pork-filled omnibus bill.  (Thank you, Chuck and Nancy).  Paul Ryan fell victim to the same system that ground up John Boehner.  At one point I blamed Boehner for the continuing resolution mess.  Now Estase realizes that the system is so broken that it is a superhuman effort for one man to try to normalize our Constitutional system.
        It would be ideal if we had a President who understood and respected our Constitutional system.  Instead, we have one whose understanding of such is shaky at best.  It is also unfortunate that fixing the system means that the President needs to use his power to reduce his power--a sort of Lord of the Rings situation.  Orange Blatherskite is probably not the man for that job.
        So what you have is a situation that would vex the strongest and wisest of men.  Richard Nixon famously said upon leaving the vice presidency, "You won't have Dick Nixon to kick around any more."  People have been monstrously unfair to Paul Ryan, inferring that the size and expense of the government is something he was comfortable with, or that he is a "liberal."  In reality, the only way to avoid absolute gridlock is to give Chuck and Nancy some of their desires, including the bitter pill of abandoning those whose whole reason for voting Republican was to defund Planned Parenthood.  The GOP base is rightly pissed, and it remains unclear whether the Republican voter will even bother to show up in November, seeing as how Chuck and Nancy seem to win in any event.  
       The constitutional abuses that have existed for the last decade make the Speaker of the House a man with a hopeless, thankless job.  Under the Constitution, as written, he should actually be the most powerful man in government, exceeding even the President.  It is not clear that this is a problem that can be remedied, and Ryan can be excused for wanting the peace of mind that comes from not attempting an impossible job.

The Brick Wall

       At the end of the horror classic Village of the Damned, George Sanders' character has to avoid thinking about his intention to blow up the alien children by thinking of a brick wall.  The children can read minds;  any hint of a thought of his intentions will thwart the entire mission.
      Sci-Fi Bruce Rauner, having alienated most Republicans through sanctuary state policies and publicly funding abortion, is in his death throes.  Yesterday Estase received three glossy pieces of junk mail aimed at stopping the candidacy of primary challenger Jeanne Ives.  Rauner ridiculously tries to claim that Ives is associated with Democratic oberfuehrer Conal Cochran, and that she wants to increase taxes.  This is, I guess, a contrast to Rauner's fiscal conservatism shown by publicly funding abortion when the state is already in arrears.
       

       It won't be necessary to control our thoughts to the extent that we cannot avoid concentrating on a brick wall.  Illinoisans need only remember how Sci-Fi Bruce Rauner betrayed them over and over again, mixing attempts at financial reform with the worst kind of liberal social engineering.  Even if a Democrat is elected next fall, at least that's a monster that comes under its own colors, and doesn't pretend to be something he isn't.

Right-Wing Philistines

       American conservatism at one time held a set of beliefs that included things like anti-Communism, belief in limited government, und so weiter.  These principles were reflected by an intellectual class who made reference to them in their writings.  There were different strains of conservative thought, but common themes united the Barry Goldwaters, Russell Kirks, and William F. Buckleys.
       The past decade has seen a dramatic deevolution in the complexity of conservative thought.  Talk radio, which at one time seemed like a means for bypassing the liberal messages of network news, has encouraged a pettiness that doesn't become any movement.  Conservative thought has become obsessed with the economic.  Right-wing philistines only concern themselves over the economic life of man.  Cutting taxes has gone from being a treatment for symptoms of liberalism to being the entire Republican message!  Limited government and the more philosophical aspects of the message have gone the way of the passenger pigeon. 
       A few years ago, the TEA party movement started this process, in an Ayn Rand reaction to budget-busting Obama policies.  The TEA party was agnostic on social issues, hence one never saw people in colonial garb protesting gay marriage or abortion.  Their simplistic tirades about taxes ended up becoming the dominant strain on talk radio.  It never occurred to the right-wing philistines that Obama was hardly the first president to go to absurd lengths in growing the size and cost of government.  When a New York liberal decided to try to get the Republican Party's nomination, the memories of the right-wing philistines didn't encompass the decades of sex and scandal that he brought with him.  Absurdly, many people who were strongly religious started to compare him to King David, or say that he was God's anointed, meant to bring America back to her roots.  Those of us who were skeptics were decried as liberals.
       The result is a Republican Party that is morally bankrupt.  Having abandoned her principles to a horde of talk-radio dittoheads, she created an Obama-style continuing resolution (weren't we supposed to be done with such things?) that even funded the worshippers of Moloch over at Planned Parenthood!  The obvious question is whether voting Republican has any discernible effect over what kind of government we get.  We may get a tax cut, but the schema of government remains the same.

Deep State, Deep Doo-Doo

       Many of O.B.'s supporters are fond of the term "deep state."  Their conspiratorial leanings incline them to believe that government employees exist primarily to frustrate the goals of the Trump Administration.  Somehow, previous Republican administrations never suffered from career government employees, but this one does.
       Naivete about how government functions seems to be a big problem with the alt-right, "populists," and other assorted Trump acolytes.  Non-military government employees are usually Ivy League graduates.  As a function of their origin, they obviously lean left.  They are career employees, as opposed to the political appointees every administration gets to install.  O.B.'s intention to radically cut the number of State Department employees no doubt incenses people who earned advanced degrees in International Relations with an eye to public service.  It also seems ill-advised in a world where diplomacy beats bloody slug-fests every time.  Even Ronald Reagan realized that the State Department served a vital function in preventing armed hostilities!   So if there's a war with the deep state, it's one that Trump started.
       Just as how O.B.'s supporters enjoy saying nasty things about Republican legislative leaders Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell, they enjoy fantasies about saboteurs in Federal office buildings, plotting against the valiant patriots in the West Wing.  This manichean view of politics suits the uninformed and those who enjoy talk radio careers.  The latter are largely responsible for the simplistic views of most Trump supporters.  One might well say that Republican voters are less informed after 25 years of Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin.  Their impossible standards of right-wing purity would be impossible to meet in a legislature, where compromise is a necessary tool of government.  This is why right wing crackpots say idiotic things like "Paul Ryan is a liberal."  Paul Ryan is a person who has to cobble together governing majorities on every issue.  This means that in order to govern, even subhuman bottom feeders like Bela Pelosi and Chuck Schumer have to have some of their desires met.  It's called democracy--look into it!

Prelude to Carnage

       "A drama as lush and gruesome as {Oscar} Wilde trying hard could make it, Salome was a pursuit of sensation for its own sake, an effort to produce what Baudelaire called 'the phosphorescence of putrescence.'  The original play, written in French in 1891, went into rehearsal in London a year later with Sarah Bernhardt in the title role, but performance was banned by the Lord Chamberlain on the ground that its presentation of St. John the Baptist was sacrilege.  Upon publication (with copies for the author's friends bound in 'Tyrian purple and tired silver'), the play was denounced by The Times as 'an arrangement in blood and ferocity, morbid, bizarre, repulsive and very offensive.'  In 1894 an English translation by Lord Alfred Douglas appeared, illustrated with luscious evil by the truest decadent of them all, Aubrey Beardsley.  Three of his drawings, considered indecent by the publishers, had to be withdrawn.  In 1896, when Wilde was in Reading Gaol, Salome was produced in Paris by the actor-manager Lugne-Poe at his Theatre de l'Oeuvre, with himself as Herod but without Bernhardt.  The quintessence of decadence was overripe and it was not a success.  In Germany, however, Salome matched a craving for the horrendous and found its place.  First produced in Breslau in 1901, its real success came in 1902 with a production by Max Reinhardt at his Kleines Theatre in Berlin, where {Richard} Strauss saw it.
       More a poem than a play, Wilde's Salome was an exercise in purple, an orgy in words, which succeeded on paper but embarrassed on the stage.  It offered the spectacle of Salome pouring out her hot erotic pleas to the eyes, the hair, the limbs, the body and the love of Iokanaan, of King Herod avid for his stepdaughter, of her voluptuous dance to excite his lust and win her ghastly desire, of the black Executioner's huge arm rising from the pit holding the bearded bloody head of the Prophet who had scorned her, of her necrophilic raptures addressed to the head on the platter and her final conquest of its dead lips, of Herod's climactic order of horror and remorse, 'Kill that woman!' and of her death crushed beneath the shields of his soldiers.  Performed in flesh and blood it delighted the Berlin audience.  Wilde's moonlit fantasia, in Germany, came into its own and enjoyed a phenomenal run of two hundred performances.
       The undercurrent of morbidity in Germany, which Rolland had already noticed, grew more apparent in the first decade of the new century.  It increased in proportion as Germany's wealth and strength and arrogance increased, as if the pressure of so much industrial success and military power were creating an inner reaction in the form of a need to negate, to expose the worms and passions writhing within that masterful, prosperous, well-behaved, orderly people.  It was as if Bismarck had perforce produced Krafft-Ebing.  Indeed, Krafft-Ebing's Psychopathia Sexualis which appeared in 1886 provided a well of lurid resource on which the German drama, then the most vigorous form of natural literature, could draw.
       Tragedy was the staple of the German theatre.  Social comedies with happy endings were not a German genre.  German fun was confined to buffoonery, either painful or coarse.  Their tragedies were not so much curative, like Ibsen's, nor compassionate, like Chekov's, but obsessively focused on mankind's cruelty to man, on his bent toward self-destruction and on death.  Death by murder, suicide or some more esoteric form resolved nearly all German drama of the nineties and early 1900s.  In {Gerhart} Hauptmann's Hannele the child heroine dies of neglect and abuse in an almshouse, in his Sunken Bell Heinrich's wife drowns herself in a lake and he drinks a poisoned goblet, in Rose Bernd the title character, seduced and deserted, strangles her newborn child, in Henschel the title character hangs himself after betraying his dead wife by marrying a tart who lets his child die of neglect, in Michael Kramer a sensitive son is driven to suicide by an overbearing father, a popular theme in Germany rich in such fathers.  In {Herrmann} Sudermann's Magda only the father's fatal stroke prevents his shooting himself and his daughter, who needless to say is illegitimately pregnant, the invariable fate of the German heroine.  An endless succession of them were driven in the grip of the circumstance to hysteria, insanity, crime, prison, infanticide and suicide.  In Sudermann's Sodoms Ende, which varies the pattern if not the end, a dissolute young artist, corrupted by the wife of a banker, drives his foster sister to suicide and dies himself of a hemorrhage.  In {Frank} Wedekind's Frühlings Erwachen (Spring's Awakening), first effort of a playwright who was to exceed all the rest, the discovery of sex by adolescents conflicting with the prurience of adults produces total catastrophe:  the fourteen-year-old heroine, being with child, dies, apparently of a mismanaged abortion;  the boy is expelled from school and sent to a reformatory by his parents;  his friend, unable to bear life, commits suicide and reappears in a graveyard with his head under his arm in a closing scene of opaque symbolism.  In the course of the action a third boy, in a scene of explcit auto-eroticism, addresses a passionate love declaration to the picture of a naked Venus which he then drops down the toilet.  First produced in 1891, the play was a sensational success and in book form went into twenty-six editions.
       Born in the same year as Strauss, Wedekind was a writer of satanic talent who had been an actor, journalist, circus publicity agent, singer of grisly ballads for Überbrettl and while on the staff of Simplicissimus served a term in prison for lese majeste.  'I have the imagination of disaster--and see life as ferocious and sinister' exactly described him, though it was Henry James who said it of himself.  Frühlings Erwachen, if taken as a plea for sex education, at least had a social message and a quality of pity, but thereafter Wedekind saw nothing but the ferocious and the sinister.  In the same years in which Freud was carefully arriving at his discovery of the subconscious, Wedekind saw an awful vision of it and stripped off every covering to show it as purely malignant.  From 1895 on, his plays plunged into a debauch of the vicious and perverse which seemed to have no argument but that humanity was vile.  Erdgeist (Earth Spirit) and its sequel, Die Büchse der Pandora (Pandora's Box), take place in a world of pimps, crooks, harlots, blackmailers, murderers and hangmen surrounding the heroine Lulu, who represents sensuality incarnate both heterosexual and lesbian.  Her adventures proceed through brothels and dives, seduction, abortion, sadism, necrophilia and nymphomania in what a contemporary critic called 'a torrent of sex foaming over jagged rocks of insanity and crime.'  It was sex, not creative in its primal function, but destructive, producing not life but death.  Lulu's first husband dies of a stroke, her second, bedeviled by her perfidy, cuts his own throat, her third on discovering her infidelity committed with his son is killed by her.  After prison, degradation and prostitution, she ends, logically, slashed to death by a Jack the Ripper in a final lethal explosion of that erotic power which {George Bernard} Shaw, a very different playwright, was celebrating at the same time as the Life Force.
       Strauss's antennae picked up whatever was in the air and he fixed unerringly on Salome--as the subject of an opera, not a tone poem.  Using more instruments than ever, he composed a score of tremendous difficulty and exaggerated dissonance with the orchestra at times divided against itself, playing in two violently antagonistic keys as if to express the horror of the subject by horrifying the ear.  Instruments were twisted to new demands, cellos made to reach the realm of violins, trombones to cavort like flutes, kettledrums given figures of unprecedented complexity.  The musical fabric was dazzling.  Strauss could write for the voice with no less virtuosity than for orchestra and the singers' parts seemed to grow more eloquent as the drama deepened in depravity.  Salome's final song to the severed head thrilled listeners with a sinister beauty that did justice to Wilde's words:

Ah! wherefore didst thou not look at me, Iokanaan!  If thou hadst seen me thou hadst loved me.  I am athrist for thy beauty;  I am hungry for thy body and neither the floods not the great waters can quench my passion. . . .Ah! I have kissed thy mouth, Iokanaan, I have kissed thy mouth.

       When Berlin and Vienna refused performance, like London, on the ground of sacrilege, Strauss's great admirer, Ernst von Schuch, conductor of the Dresden Royal Opera, presented it there on December 9, 1905.  The production, in a single act lasting an hour and forty minutes without interruption, spared the audience's sensibilities nothing.  Iokanaan's head, made up in realistic pallor of death with appropriate gore, was held in full view;  Salome's seven veils were ritually discarded one by one while Herod leered.  Death under the soldiers' shields supplied a punishing catharsis.  The audience responded with unbounded enthusiasm extending to thirty-eight curtain calls for cast and composer.  In subsequent performances in other German cities Salome went on to huge success and, for Strauss, large financial reward not adversely affected by bans and censorship troubles.  In Vienna owing to the objections of the Archbishop the ban held, but in Berlin over the strenuous objections of the Kaiserin a compromise was reached of the kind applied by the Church to the Song of Solomon.  Performance was allowed on condition that the star of Bethlehem should appear in the sky as Salome died, presumably indicating the posthumous triumph of the Baptist over unnatural passion.
       Outside Germany where taste was more prudish, Salome became 'the storm center of the musical world.'  In New York a tense audience at the Metropolitan Opera on January 22, 1907, awaited the rise of the curtain with 'foreboding,' soon amply fulfilled.  The music, when critics could tear their attention from portrayal of 'a psychopathic condition literally unspeakable in its horror and abnormality.' was acknowledged marvelous but perverted to means that 'sicken the mind and wreck the nerves.'  The opera's theme, not humanly representative as the material of music should be, was considered variously 'monstrous,' 'pestilential,' 'intolerable and abhorrent,' 'mpehetic, poisonous, sinister and obsessing in the extreme.'  Its 'erotic pathology' was unfit for 'conversation between self-respecting men,' and the Dance alone 'ought to make it impossible for an Occidental woman to look at it.'  Rising in 'righteous fury' the press agreed that popularity in Germany settled nothing for America and the Metropolitan bowing to the storm withdrew the production.
       The Eulenburg affair concerned homosexuals in the immediate circle of the Kaiser, but it was less their habits than the layers disclosed of malice, intrigue and private vendetta which shed a lurid glow on Germany.  Three years earlier Fritz Krupp, head of the firm, on being accused by the Socialist paper Vorwärts of homosexual acts with waiters and valets, committed suicide.  This time the central figure was Prince Philipp Eulenburg, former Ambassabor to Vienna from 1894 to 1902, a suave and cultivated aristocrat who was the Kaiser's oldest and closest friend, sang songs to him beautifully at the piano, and gave him intelligent advice.  As the only courtier to exercise of the whole a beneficent influence on the sovereign, he was naturally the object of the jealousy of Bülow and Holstein, who suspected the Kaiser of intention to make him Chancellor.  Initiator of the scandal was Maximilian Harden, the feared and fearless editor of the weekly Die Zukunft, of which it was said that everything rotten and everything good in Germany appeared in its pages.  Cause and motive had to do with Germany's diplomatic defeat at the Algeciras Conference which set off waves of recrimination among ministers, culminating in the removal of the spidery Holstein.  He blamed Eulenburg, although in fact his removal had been secretly engineered by Bülow.  Rabid for revenge, Holstein, who for year had kept secret police files on the private habits of his associates, now joined forces with Harden to ruin Eulenburg, whose influence on the Kaiser, Harden believed, was pacific and therefore malign.  With Holstein's files at his disposal, Harden opened a campaign of innuendo naming three elderly Counts, all A.D.C.s of the Kaiser, as homosexuals and graduallly closing in on the friendship of Eulenburg with Count Kuno Moltke, nicknamed Tutu, 'the most delicate of generals,'  commander of a cavalry brigade and City Commandant of Berlin.  The Kaiser ditched his friends instantly and forced Moltke to sue Harden for libel, which was just what Harden wanted to ruin Eulenburg.  Through four trials lasting over a period of two years, from October, 1907, to July, 1909, evidence of perversion, blackmail, and personal venom was spread before a bewildered public.  Witnesses including thieves, pimps and morons told of 'disgusting orgies' in the Garde du Corps regiment and testified to abnomal acts of Eulenburg and Moltke twenty years in the past.  A celebrated specialist in pathological conditions discoursed on medical details, Moltke's divorced and vindictive wife was called to testify, charges of insubordination and perjury were added, Chancellor Bülow was himself accused of perversion by a half-crazed crusader for the legal rights of homosexuals and forced to sue, the verdict of the first trial in favor of Harden was reversed by a second trial and re-reversed in a third at which Eulenburg, now ill, disgraced and under arrest, was brought to court in a hospital bed.  The public felt uneasily that justice was being tampered with, readers of Die Zukunft were given an impression of perversion everywhere and the prestige of Kaiser and court sank.  At the same time in Vienna the Emperor's brother, Archduke Ludwig-Viktor, known as Luzi-Wuzi, became involved in a scandal with a massuer. "  The Proud Tower by Barbara W. Tuchman Pgs. 319-20;321-22;323-24;324-25;329-30.

 

Killing Edmund Burke a Second Time

    The constellation of factors that are at play with Orange Blatherskite are making him a caricature.  The first is the current standards of political correctness, which are so impossible to not violate that even liberals end up getting accused of racism, sexism, and homophobia (the liberal holy trinity).  Second, O.B. takes pride in flouting even the most basic standards of adult behavior, let alone the rarified pseudomorality of political correctness.  Insults are O.B.'s love language.  Third, O.B. has the maturity of a twelve-year-old girl combined with the aggression of Rambo.  It's no wonder Tex Killerson is on his way out of Foggy Bottom;  imagine the frustration he felt trying to calm down North Korea, and seeing his boss engage in Twitter escalation with the regime.  
        Any things on fronts like abortion or deregulation that O.B. has done the right thing on seem overshadowed by the pettiness and lack of policy sophistication he displays.  O.B.'s favorite subject is the problem of illegal immigration.  At the same time O.B. wants to build a wall to stop illegal immigration, he attacks NAFTA on the basis that it is too favorable to Mexico!  The man who calls himself a genius doesn't seem to appreciate that any economic growth in Mexico will in and of itself reduce illegal immigration.  A poorer Mexico is one which will continue to have an exodus from it.  This "Jacksonian Nationalism" is tribalistic, short-sighted, and makes it easy for liberals to call O.B. racist.  These things don't seem to matter to O.B., and the fact that Fox News seems to consider O.B. the gold standard in conservatism means that millions of Americans are being led to believe that conservatism is race politics for white people.

Codependence Is. . . .

   Codependence is seeing a potted tree in someone else's yard, and feeling the urge to volunteer to plant it for them.

Lepidus on Gary Bauer

    Gary Bauer is a fraud and a con man.  There, I just gave you my conclusion.  Now I will provide my reasoning.  Donald Trump has demonstrated that he stands for nothing, and will say anything to gain the support of his cult followers.  He has no record as a conservative;  on the contrary, his record consists of years of supporting liberal, pro-abortion democrats like Chuck Schumer and Hillary Clinton.  The esteemed, wise social conservative guru Gary Bauer showed his infinite wisdom by declaring that Trump winning the nomination of the Republican party would be acceptable if "social conservatives received ironclad promises" from the reality TV star on gay marriage and abortion.  Ironclad promises?  What the deuce does that mean?  Barack Obama gave ironclad promises to not fund abortion with Obamacare.  Newsflash:  Obamacare funds abortion.  Barack Obama gave an ironclad promise to respect religious beliefs concerning abortion.  Newsflash:  The Little Sisters of the Poor still have to pay for contraceptives for their employees.
       The point I'm trying to make is this:  Rather than electing a liberal who promises not to act like a liberal, wouldn't it be infinitely preferable to elect a conservative?  And Gary Bauer--here's some free advice.  Don't prostitute yourself to a con man like The Donald and still expect people to trust your worthless advice.  You sound like someone suggesting we negotiate with the Daesh.  If anybody still sends you money, they are the same type of person who would buy a swamp in Louisiana thinking it's a real estate investment.

Dr. Draco Faulhaber Speaks

       I have been granted a chance by Frank and Lepidus to contradict their old-fashioned ideas about choice.  
       I, Draco Faulhaber, came into the world in 1948, a far less enlightened time.  In 1948, many states banned abortion entirely.  Providers, such as myself, would have faced prison.  And for what?  Helping women solve their problems!  Preventing extra mouths to feed!
       Frank and Lepidus argue that children are more than just bread-gobblers, that they are a "resource."  If children are such a resource, then why would the far-sighted and progressive Chinese regime dislike their high population so much?  Our Chinese brothers (men currently outnumber women 3 to 1 there) will see a dramatic drop in population in 60 years.  This is the sure route to wealth!  You can see this in families of great wealth.  If parents have $100 million, and only one child, that child will inherit $100 million.  But if there are three heirs, each would only inherit $33 million!  Never was a bigger lie conceived than "The more the merrier!"  The main problem with us humans is that there are just too many of us.
       Not to go too far afield, but people are greatly mistaken in condemning Hitler and Stalin.  Hitler relieved the earth of over nine million mouths to feed!  Stalin was an even greater benefactor, eliminating forty million excess Ukrainians.  Until we appreciate the gifts of Hitler and Stalin, the anti-choice religious fools will dominate us, destroying the planet with more bread-gobblers. 

Breeding Like Rabbits

      You know, I thought I'd like the new Pope.  I'm Frank, he's Francis.  But this guy has been really annoying me.  He started out by saying that the Church had talked too much about abortion.  You know, because killing people isn't important at all.  Then he started talking about poverty constantly.  So he forgot that Jesus said there would always be poor people.  Then there was the claim that global warming was the biggest problem.
       But this crap the Pope said about having too many kids was the last straw.  My parents, Bob and Sharon Charette, had five kids.  My old man, he said that he needed to have plenty of kids because, "the good diffuses itself."  Never went to college, but my friend Lepidus told me that came from somewhere.  The Charettes never had lots of money, but we always knew there were things more important than money.  Dad always thought that being a good proletariat meant that he at least needed to provide society with kids.  Paul VI said contraception was wrong, so my old man felt like he was less of a sucker at that point.  But now the Pope seems to be saying my old man was a sucker after all.
        Frank C. is now to the point where he wonders how weird the crap a Pope says can be without being absolved of the need to listen.

The Obama Double Event

       On 29 SPB 1888, Jack the Ripper claimed his third victim, Elizabeth Stride, and his fourth victim, Catherine Eddowes.  This double event marked the escalation of violence in the ripper's attacks, as well as the first and only time the ripper killed two women in one night.  The ripper, whose first murder had been a simple strangulation, had now progressed to the violent dismemberment of women, which would culminate in his disassembly of Mary Kelly, the fifth and possibly last victim.
       Last week, President Oh Blah Blah followed up his administration's scandal of indefinitely delayed treatment of veterans by the VA with the release of five dangerous Muslim terrorist in exchange for Army deserter Bowe Bergdahl.  This two-pronged slap in the face to America's military was the Obama double event.  Showing on one hand a callous indifference to people who defended the colors in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, while being absurdly self-sacrificing in defense of someone who betrayed his unit by leaving his post shows the schizophrenia of modern liberalism.  Letting people who honorably served go without treatment while letting terrorists go free to get a deserter back shows the ambivalence of liberals towards soldiers.  Good soldiers get crapped on, while bad soldiers have the store given away on their behalf. 

Frederick Schickelgruber Speaks

       Kaitlyn urged me to write something on her father's blog.  Lepidus and his friend Frank are unregenerated neanderthals who never understand what I am saying.  In the interest of helping Frank and Lepidus' readers evolve, I have finally relented.  You see, I teach several sections of my course on existentialism.  It wasn't easy to find the time for this exercise.
      The beauty of existentialism is that it has no constraining element of "truth."  Truth is always the interest of the stronger.  Frank and Lepidus also seem to have a bizarre idea that there is some unchanging standard of right and wrong.  Lastly, they have a bourgeois idea that there are provable facts.
       How do these two know things for certain?  What one person chooses to believe is right or correct is entirely subjective.  One ultimately must accept authority rather than seek out something as being true or right.  This obsession with reason and theory is the basis for capitalist thinkers.  This principle is particularly significant in a world whose magnificent exterior radiates complete unity and order while panic and distress prevail beneath.  Autocrats, cruel colonial governors, and sadistic prison wardens have always wished for visitors with this positivistic mentality.  If science as a whole follows the lead of empiricism and the intellect renounces its insistant and confident probing of the tangled brush of observations in order to unearth more about the world than even our well-meaning daily press, it will be participating passively in the maintenance of universal injustice.  Thinking hard about facts is a right-wing way of life based on fantasy.

Kaitlyn Wagstaff on Choice

        I just read about a cool feminist comedian who said she'd like to rip the uterus out of some boring Republican congresswoman from Washington.  Frederick was having coffee with me and I told him about it.  He said, "I thought we'd gotten all the Republicans out of Washington?"  If only Fred, if only!  I totally agree with the comedian.  I mean, real women, we get pregnant three times a year, and have an abortion.  Keeps your circulation good.  I once had a D and C just because I missed the sound of the vacuum.
         If this anti-choice bitch doesn't get her regular abortions, what does she need with a uterus anyway?  It reminds me of a line from a favorite movie:  "What's blood for, if not for shedding?"  My dad is such a troglodyte he thinks I was a person, like, even before I was born.  I'm like, "Lepidus, if I was really a person before I was born, then wouldn't the government have made it illegal to abort me?"  Totally.

Frank C. on TV

       I just checked out Salon.com, something I do when I want to feel aggrevated.  Some guy named Joe Muta was talking about how egotistical and scripted Bill O'Reilly is.  And this is different from other cable cats in what way?  Gee, I think there is zero. . . zero ego involved with Cenk Ughur, Rachel Maddow, Ed Schultz, or any of the other pod people on Current or MSNBC.  Listen, Frankie doesn't like O'Reilly much.  I don't like being told there's one version of reality.  That's basically what the pod people do that irritates me.  It pisses me off when someone acts like he has my best interests at heart, when he has at least as much BS in his point of view as anyone else.  "Who's looking out for you?"  I'm looking out for me, you tool!  Frank C. doesn't need Bill O'Reilly to think for him anymore than he needs Rachel Maddow to think for him or Cenk Ughur to think for him.  God didn't slop brains in my head so I can tune in to someone else to hear their version of reality.

       Larry King is coming back to TV.  I guess he caught up on his sleep, so he won't fall asleep on air anymore.  The weird thing is, Larry's Jewish, so why a Russian network is putting him on doesn't make much sense to me.  After all, the Czarist government created "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," which is an anti-semetic work up there with "Mein Kampf."

Lepidus on Government Schools

   MSNBC's Melissa Harris-Perry says that all children belong to the government.  Interesting, because I think I already gave them Kaitlyn.  I put my daughter in public school kindergarten at age five.  I sent her to public grade and high schools.  I sent her to a state university.  And now she is a Marxist feminist.  So I appreciate Harris-Perry's point.  The church only had her for a few hours a month.  The government school imparted many of Kaitlyn's attitudes.  She thinks I'm a greedy troglodyte because her schools told her that's what people who believe in free markets or religion are.  So the fuss over the remarks seem out of order.  The old saying was, possession is nine-tenths of the law.  And now my daughter acts like she's possessed.

Creative Minority Report: NRO's Catholic Black Advocates The Pill

Creative Minority Report: NRO's Catholic Black Advocates The Pill

Lepidus on Religious Wars

Still stinging from my daughter's brilliant defense of leftist jurisprudence, I read of Richard Seymour's Unhitched, an attack by Tariq Ali's Marxist publishing house Verso upon their late author Christopher Hitchens.  Wow, do you really mean to tell me that Marxists do not forgive deviation from their comrades?  Hitch was a loathsome athiest, but he did come to realize that his ideological soul mates were making common cause with eighth century religious fanatics, and began to apologize for Islam in a way that it would never tolerate with Christianity.  Religion is a drug, but for modern Marxists, it is one that is utterly satisfying to their ends when administered by Islam.  At least Hitch was consistent enough to hate all religion.  On the other hand, one finds fault with a writer who finds Mother Theresa in the same category as Al-Qaeda.

       The ones who really are in the same category as Al-Qaeda are the Amish.  Don't let the whole thing about their aversion to technology fool you.  What language do the Amish speak?  German.  I'll bet they harbor Nazi sympathizers!  The new Pope has two main defects in Wagstaff's book.  He is a Jesuit, member of the least orthodox order in the Catholic Church.  And he is an Argentinian, part of a nation famous for harboring Nazis.  OK, that's a lame objection, but surely no lamer than the objection that Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger was a deserter from the German Army.  Back to the Amish, I have no doubt that the drone program will start targeting Amish buggies.  If Catholics were identifiable by their vehicles, they would come in for drone strikes, too.

Kaitlyn Wagstaff Endorses Caitlyn Halligan

I have been able to get Dad to let me write in support of an awesome lady.  Her name is Caitlyn Halligan (almost the same as my name!) and she is a nominee for Federal Judge for the District of Columbia.  She is getting a bad rap from fascists like my Dad because she is pro-choice.  My Dad says that she shouldn't get to be a Federal Judge because as New York Attorney General she used RICO to fight anti-choice groups.  RICO is the law that Rudy Guliani wrote to fight the mob.  It stands for Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Groups.  Sounds like the blue haired church ladies to me!  My Dad says that anti-choice groups don't extort money, so it's an abuse of the law to use RICO against them.  Abuse of law, abuse of squaw.  Any port in the storm, I say.  Law is just a cudgel to use against those who act like religious nuts.  Screw 'em!  I think they should charge anti-choicers any crime under the sun.  Theft, for trying to make people raise kids on their money.  Drug laws, for acting like weirdos.  Fraud, for pretending that science is real.  You get the picture.  Medieval assholes.  Truth is whatever you make it, and law is whoever holds the cards.  We get awesome people like Caitlyn Halligan in power, and then we stick it to the religious zealots.  Make them retreat back to the Knights of Columbus Hall, and leave them to sing "Mary Is a Grand Old Name" over their beers. 

Lepidus on Ungrateful Daughters

My daughter wrote a couple of weeks ago about how dumb Frank and I are.  I especially liked her comments about abortion.  Twenty years ago Mrs. Wagstaff gave birth to a healthy baby girl we named Kaitlyn.  It never would have occured to us to "get rid" of Kaitlyn.  But such is life that she now thinks right-to-lifers are gay men.  Kaitlyn's old boyfriend Arthur Schickelgruber could be a homosexual, except gay men are too picky to want a 98 lb.  weakling who wears John Lennon glasses and dresses in black every day.  As for me being gay, I think Kaitlyn's existence proves that at the worst I'm bisexual.  An ungrateful daughter's like the bite of a scorpion, eh?  Perhaps Kaitlyn will wake up to the fact that people don't become successful by sitting in Starbuck's all afternoon.

Poetry Time

(To the tune of Schiller's "Ode to Joy.")

Dickhead with Obama sticker
GNP growth 2%
Socialized the auto business
Thinks his czars are all the best

Kagan and the Puerto Rican
Wise Latina and the dyke
Sue the state of Arizona
Tax the things we really like

Make the Catholics fund abortion
Freedom like the Third Reich
Public schools that are gay-friendly
And you need to ride a bike

Guns to Egypt
Bust to Britain
All that were allied screw off
Now we're all that we resented
Start the second Holocaust

Now Obama's reelected
More flexible he now will be
There is always fair New Zealand
For endangered liberty

Kaitlin Wagstaff Talks Patriarchy

       My dad and his goofy friend Frank usually write this blog's posts, but I got Dad to let me write a post for balance. 
       As a women's studies major, I know all about how guys like Dad and his friend Frank are fighting a war against women.  Every time they listen to an AC/DC song or watch a Dolph Lundgren movie they put another block in their walls of female oppression.  Every time they expect a woman to be pretty or a man to be brave they make women slaves.  The way out of this slavery is existentialism and feminism.
       Lepidus, my Dad, doesn't get it.  He thinks existentialism is just another name for stubbornness. What a neanderthal!  He so doesn't get Professor Schickelgruber, either.  Professor Schickelgruber taught my class on Sartre.  Dad said he was an overgrown teenager who dressed like a beatnik.  But he was the most amazing teacher, and even though we're not sleeping together anymore, we're still good friends.  Older guys are OK, as long as they're hip and liberal.  Guys like Lepidus and Frank think too much about the old bourgeois rules.  Ugh.  Like, they'd have me studying Addison, Coleridge, and Shakespeare. Whatever. I think that all three of those guys were gay.  And not a cool post-modern gay, but a weird old-fashioned kind.
       Like, my friend Christy said something good the other day.  She said, "Kaitlin, all those Republican guys must really be gay, since they're anti-choice.  Like, if you slept with chicks, you'd need abortion, right?  So that's why they're against gay marriage, because they're gay, but they don't want to look gay.  Like, having kids, that's so 1950s."  Totally.

Lepidus Wagstaff on Hillary Clinton

Hillary Clinton is the kind of woman that seems to get adulation for nothing.  Lepidus was watching CNN the other day, and they were commiserating with the Secretary of State over her supposed blood clot in the brain.  This from the same news organization that had a hate-on for Michele Bachmann.  All right, supposing the Ice Queen does have a boo-boo, why does that put her in the position where we are supposed to forgive her many errors?  Her "reset button" for Russia?  Her role in abandoning Chris Stevens to the tender mercies of Libyan terrorists, who sodomized the Ambassador before sending him to the hereafter?  Her decision to make Huma Abadin her advisor?

Back in the nineties, I heard a liberal man talk of his sex fetish for Bubba's wife.  This fool said Hillary was "legs and leftism."  Personally, I've seen better legs on a piano.  And as for leftism, I could get that anywhere, especially at such unlovely sites as Salon.com or Daily Kos.  Becoming sexually aroused by Hillary Clinton seems less likely than getting turned on by a hernia exam.

Wagstaff Speaks

Hello, my name is Lepidus Wagstaff.  I  own the garage where Frank C. works, and this is my first opportunity to blog here.  My, my you are a naughty boy General David Petraeus.  The other woman isn't bad (she looks pretty good for a military woman), but one must wonder if she is, indeed the other woman, or just a convenient excuse for Petraeus not to be able to testify about Bengazigate.  Like I said, this other lady is somewhat attractive, but not exactly the kind of woman one throws away thirty years of marriage over.  Elizabeth Ward Gracen, now that's the kind of woman one cheats with, and particularly when the missus is an icy harridan like Hillary Clinton.  The fat boy struck it lucky that day.  Of course, the fat boy never saw it that way.  He was the high school nerd who thought so well of himself that he thought he should be the one who got to score with the cheerleaders.

Frank C. on Aaron James

Wow, I just looked at that Salon.com.  Guess I wanted to raise my blood pressure.  This Aaron James, he's a piece of work.  Says that Fox News has spawned a whole generation of self-entitled feeling narcissists.  So the Occupy creeps were inspired by Fox?  He points out an incident where an economist called Pugsley an asshole because, according to James, he changed the subject without a metaconversation.  My ex-wife, she didn't know a metaconversation from a carburetor, but fortunately, she never needed that word to be pissed about my changing the conversation.  He insults Bill O'Reilly, which puts him on par with every other wanker on Salon.com.  And then, get this, he starts talking about Kanye West.  What, are you telling me Kanye West takes his behavior from Fox News?  I mean, the guy probably wouldn't be caught dead watching anything that right wing.  Oh brother!  If I was talking to Aaron in my kitchen, I'd say to him, "Buddy, I know that you spent a lot of money on that literary theory degree.  But people ain't assholes because of Fox News.  I'm sure your dad was an asshole years before there was a Fox News.  I get it.  You associate all your personal anger with your political opponents.  It wasn't until the 90s I realized that Jimmy Carter wasn't the reason my life sucked in 1977.  So, someday you'll realize that the guys on Fox don't have much control over their own lives, let alone your's."  Maybe then Aaron could try to take charge over his own life, instead of blaming his problems on Roger Ailes.

Frank C. on Jersey Shore

Hey, how you doin'?  Estase is letting me vent again, so I think I'll talk cable today.  My favorite thing on cable is that Turner Classic Movies.  I never saw a bad movie with Glenn Ford.  Maybe he made one, but if he did, I never saw it.  I don't think Greg Peck made too many bad movies either.  Ever see The Big Country?  That's the schizzle, right there.  It had Berl Ives in it too.  I love that line, where Greg Peck says, "I can't control what people think of me.  I can only control what I am."  Wow, that coulda come outta the Bible or something.  Unfortunately, most people now are worried much more about what people think of them than what they are.  That's pretty effed up, excuse my language.  My son is into that Facebook thing.  I don't know if I understand the point of something where you have 78 friends, only five of which you've seen in the last ten years, and play a game where you pretend you're a farmer.  What do ya pretend your back hurts and you're broke?  I think I'll invent a game called MidasVille.  You pretend to be a mechanic and get virtual torn up knuckles.  But back to TV.  I lost most of my interest in TV around the time Survivor was put on.  Think of it as Gilligan's Island, but without the interesting plot and the jokes.  The guy that won the first season liked to walk around naked.  In my neighborhood, about ten seconds after he pulled that garbage, he'd be tackled to the ground and cops would be on the way.  REALITY TV.  Reality, my ass.  Nobody ever paid me to live in a house with six alcoholic Italians.  Now a bunch of alcoholic anglo-saxons living together had already been done.  It's called a fraternity. 

Frank C. Speaks

Hey, how ya doin'?  Estase named this blog after my ancestor Francois deCharette.  So you can call me Frank C.  Makes me sound a bit like I belong to A.A., which happens to be true.  Estase is letting me come on here and say my piece.  How do you like what's going on in the Middle East, eh?  Reminds me of my ex-wife throwing a tantrum.  Like she'd say she was pissed off about my coming home late.  Really she was just sick of me.  Unfortunatly, the United States can't take the Middle East to Divorce Court, even though that's what Ron Paul seems to want to do.  We have to live with them, which is not looking like an easy thing to do right now.  The thing that gets me is that the reason they say they are rioting is because of some YouTube video, which sounds a lot like people rioting because the Chicago Bulls won a third NBA championship.  I mean, I hate movies with Meryll Streep, but I don't burn down the multiplex over it.  That broad is something else.  She made a movie about a child-molesting priest that takes place before there were child-molesting priests.  Reminds me of that movie about the Roman Empire where the guy wears a wristwatch.  She ought to make a movie about kids getting felt up by their public school teacher, because there are a lot more cases of that than of kids molested by priests.  I bet the NEA would like that, huh?  And Chicago teachers, boy!  If I got paid $70,000 to produce eighth-graders who can't read, I'd think it was a sweet racket too.  I can hear my boss saying, "Frank, I want to pay you $500 to replace the brake shoes on this car.  Oh, and it don't matter if they work when you're finished."  Get outta here.

Bill Clinton Stabs Vets in the Back

Welcome to the all-new quidnunc Francois deCharette!  Francois deCharette intends to be an adventure in counter-revolution, striking at all revolutionaries, whether they call themselves liberals, progressives, communists, fascists, or Jacobins.  Named after the French opponent of the Revolution, this quidnunc firmly believes that facts, and when necessary, humor will be the best weapons against revolutionaries of all stripes.

"By late summer of 1973, Day and Guarino and several other commanders, men who were SROs in Hanoi, were upset that no formal action had been taken against the men in the Fink Release Program.  The commanders asked for a meeting with General John Flynn and Admiral James Stockdale, the highest-ranking POWs.  At the meeting, Day delivered an ultimatum:'If you don't file court-martial charges,we will.'  Stockdale replied by filing court-martial charges against Edison Miller and Walter Eugene Wilber, accusing them of mutiny and attempting to cause insubordination.  Colonel Ted Guy initiated court-martial proceedings against eight enlisted men who, as the so-called Peace Committee, had--he claimed--openly collaborated with the enemy.  He charged them with disobeying the lawful orders of a superior officer, acting in conspiracy with the enemy, and aiding the enemy.  In rapid succession, charges were filed against the eleven officers who had accepted early releases.  But after Abel Kavanaugh, one of the enlisted men, committed suicide on June 27, all charges against all personnel were ordered dropped.  For better or worse, the POWs were all lumped together in the mind of the public, and the White House did not want a series of bitter and highly public courts-martial.  Those charged were allowed to quietly leave the service.  They returned to their homes in far-flung corners of America, civilians beyond the reach of military justice.  Because their experiences remained unknown by the general public, they were revered in their hometowns and in their adopted towns.  The POWs would not go public on an issue their superiors clearly wanted closed.  But their anger toward the early releases was unabated.  Day came up with a solution.  He incorporated a group known as the NAM-POWs and was the first president.  One of the bylaws, subtle enough to be overlooked by most, said membership was open to those who had served honorably in the prison camps of North Vietnam.  'Served honorably' was the operative phrase.  Early releases and members of the Peace Committee--as the controversial enlisted men called themselves--were not eligible for membership.  The NAM-POWs, from the moment of their creation, had more moral authority than any other veteran's group in America.(p269-271)  But one of the names for the {Florida}panhandle is 'LA'--as in 'Lower Alabama'--and the beaches here and to the east often are referred to as the Redneck Riviera.  It was pickup-truck country, predominantly Protestant and then yellow-dog Democrat to the core.  Day had never seen or heard of the sort of politics he found in the First District.  Democrats held every elective city, county, state, and national job.  Bob Sikes, congressman from the First District, was the political boss of the panhandle.  He had more seniority in the district than anyone but God and was almost as omnipotent.  Sikes called himself the 'He Coon,' because the male raccoon knew where the food was and how to get to the water.  Sikes brought in more pork than a meatpacking house, and it seemed that coon tails, signifying the driver's allegiance to Sikes, waved from the antennae of every pickup truck in the First District.  When Day and Doris took Steve to register to vote, they told the registrar they wanted to register as Republicans.  The reaction they got was about the same as if they had said they wanted to register as Catholics.  'Ain't no use in you all registering as no Republicans because there ain't no Republicans to vote for,' the elderly registrar said.  Day was appalled.  Because of Nixon and because of the long conversations he and McCain had in jail about politics, he was a committed and devoted Republican.  He thought there should be Republican candidates running in every race in the district.  Day was then and remains so today a man of elaborate and courtly manners.  But he does have his hot buttons.  And the registrar had punched one.  'When I need advice on how to register to vote, I'll ask for it,' he said.  'Until then, hand me the paper and I'll register as a Republican.'  When he left the registrar's office, he had that same head-up, arm-pumping, determined, and hard-eyed look of defiance that Jack Van Loan had noticed in the yard at the Hanoi Hilton.  Turning to Doris, Day said, 'We're going to have to do something about this(p275-76).'   In 1976 a CBS producer asked McCain and Day if they would return to Vietnam with Cronkite and be the featured part of a documentary--two of America's best-known POWs doing the reconciliation thing.  McCain accepted.  Day refused.  Then one of Cronkite's staffers called Day, tried to schmooze with him, and asked, 'Wouldn't you like to go back to Vietnam?'  Day paused.  He had no respect for the man he still referred to as 'Walter Crankcase,' the weak dick who stood up after Tet and said America was losing the war.  Then he said, 'Yes, I would.  Leading a four-shipper of F-100s carrying wall-to-wall nape.'  'I'm sorry you feel that way.'  'I'm not.'  So McCain went to Vietnam with Cronkite and made the documentary(p284-285).  In 1979, California governor Jerry Brown appointed Edison Miller, half of the Bob and Ed Show in Hanoi, as a supervisor--county commissioner--in the Third District of Orange County.  In 1980, that appointed term was over and Miller had to run for election.  More than two hundred former POWs signed a letter that was sent to some hundred thousand voters in the district.  The letter said that Miller 'cooperated with the enemy to the detriment of his fellow American prisoners of war'  and that he 'wrote articles' for the Communists against the interests of his government.  The letter claimed that Miller violated his oath as a military officer, that he disobeyed the lawful orders of his superiors, and that he 'does not have the dedication to duty, to his country, or to a sense of public service which would qualify him for any public office.'  The letter ended by calling on voters in the district to reject Miller.  They did.  He received only 16 percent of the vote and later filed a defamation suit against the POWs.  Bud Day was one of several lawyers who represented the POWs on a pro bono basis.  The court granted the POWs request for a summary judgment that threw Miller's suit out of court.  Miller appealed, but his appeal was tossed out(p294-95).During the 1992 presidential election, Day volunteered again to campaign for President Bush.  He did not approve of Bush's campaign techniques, but he would work for the president because Bill Clinton was the Democratic candidate.  Years later, on June 12, 2005, Alan Ehrenhalt began a review of The Survivor:  Bill Clinton in the White House on the front page of the New York Times Book Review by saying, 'Millions of Americans despise Bill Clinton.'  He said Clinton haters believe the former president was 'immature, self-absorbed,' and indecisive;  that he lacked discipline and was reluctant to use military force even when needed.  Ehrenhalt's review did not begin to plumb the depths of revulsion that military people felt in 1992 (and still feel) toward Bill Clinton.  From the time he first appeared on the national stage, Clinton's pouting expression, lip biting, and what they considered to be his inveterate womanizing, noninhaling-dope-smoking behavior made him--and this is not too strong a word--loathed by military people.  Everything about 'Slick Willie,' they found repugnant.   For Bud Day, Clinton personified not only the self-indulgence and fuzzy thinking of the Democrats but weakness as well.  He had no self-discipline, no integrity, no patriotism.  He had no principles.  He was a man without honor.  And he had no military background, which was okay, but--as Robert Patterson described in Dereliction of Duty, he was openly contemptuous of the military, which was not okay.  When Clinton won (due in large part to the fact that third-party candidate Ross Perot received 19 percent of the vote), Day believed the republic was in danger.  Making things worse had been an attack Day could not help but take personally.  Perot's running mate was Admiral James Stockdale.  After a stumbling performance during a nationally televised debate, Stockdale was savaged by the media.  Day knew that Stockdale was one of the most brilliant men ever to wear a uniform.  To have reporters ridicule him widened even further the gap between the military and media.  Clinton lifted the economic embargo on Vietnam and appointed Pete Peterson, a former POW, as the first American ambassador to Vietnam.  Day thought Vietnam should remain isolated.  He could not imagine a former POW being a Democrat, much less taking a job in the Clinton administration.  He wrote Peterson a letter in which he all but called the ambassador a traitor.  Clearly, Day had the same tightly focused right-or-wrong view of the world that he always had.  The single-mindedness that enabled him to be a great leader in Hanoi was still there.  It was not always appropriate in the civilian world.  In coming years it would sometimes be even less appropriate.  He would seem rigid and incapable of forgiveness.  About a year after Clinton was elected, Day drove up to Maxwell AFB in Montgomery, where the Air Force operates several schools for young officers.  Part of the curriculum includes bringing in distinguished retired officers to talk to the young officers.  Day was one of several MOH receipients on a panel that appeared before newly minted graduates of the Squadron Officer School.  Doris was sitting in the audience with the brigadier general who was commander of the school.  One of the young graduates asked if each of the old warriors would give his opinion of President Clinton.  The other officers gave the proper answer:  they were loyal to the commander-in-chief, no matter who he might be.  Then it was Day's turn, and he said, 'I wouldn't trust that. . .'  He paused, unwilling to use the profanity on the tip of his tongue.  Then the dam broke.  'I wouldn't trust that son of a bitch as far as I could throw him.'  Doris said the base commander went rigid with shock.  And it would not be until the base commander was transferred and a new commander appeared that Day would be invited back to Maxwell.  In the summer of 1995, Day received in the mail his copy of the Retired Officer Magazine and read a story saying the U.S. government no longer was allowing military retirees over the age of sixty-five into military hospitals.  These old retirees were losing their free medical benefits and were being forced into the Medicare program, which meant they would have to pay for part of their medical coverage.  Medical care was very much on Day's mind.  His physical condition was such that he had been declared 100 percent disabled.  Day figured the article was wrong, another media foul-up.  By now Day believed his major life's work was over.  He had been retired almost two decades.  The 20mm ricochet was just a close shave and not a sign that there remained another mission for him.  Vietnam was why God had saved him from death so many times.  The travel and invitations to speak continued.  His children were living proof of the good job Doris had done during Day's almost six years' absence.  His law practice was thriving.  The awards and honors were and unceasing river.  The health problems caused by the Bug were as under control as they would ever be.  A few days after Day read the article, he drove out to the hospital at Eglin to pick up a supply of medicine.  'Colonel, I'm sorry.  But I can't fill that,' said the pharmacist.  'Why not?'  'This is an active-duty drug.'  'What do you mean?'  'We don't give it to retirees.'  'What's the basis for that?'  'It costs too much.  These pills are three dollars each.'  Day nodded tightly, spun away, and went looking for the highest-ranking hospital official he could find, the deputy hospital commander, and said, 'I have a real bitch.'  'What is that, Colonel?'  When he explained what happened, the deputy commander nodded and said, 'That's a dollar decision.  We get allocated so much money, and our job is to take care of the active-duty force.'  'I think your job goes quite a bit further than the active-duty force.  We were included in that allocation.'  'Sir, you're going to have to talk to the hospital commander about that.'  By now Day had up a full head of steam.  Added to his natural combativeness was a sense of outrage and indignation.  When he went into the Marine Corps in 1942, the recruiter told him that if he served twenty years, he would have free lifetime medical benefits.  He was told the same thing when he joined the Air Force.  In the years since he retired, his medical benefits and his medical care had been free.  The people affected by this new ruling--and he was one of them--were World War II and Korean-era veterans, what TV anchorman Tom Brokaw would call in his book 'the greatest generation.'  More than a million of these men were still alive, and they had been receiving free medical benefits for years.  Those benefits were as much a part of military culture as saluting the flag or saying 'sir' to superiors.  Day went down the hall, eyes hard and right arm pumping.  He found the flight surgeon, a man who had treated him in the past, told him what happened, and said, 'This is a lot of bullshit.'  The major agreed.  'I can't believe the government is sniping away at you old guys.'  'Where did this come from?'  'The White House.  President Clinton did this.'  Day's face hardened(p301-304 American Patriot:  The Life and Wars of Colonel Bud Day by Robert Coram)

Singularity of Government, Part Two

"Can the folly be paralled, to adore and be the slaves of a single person for doing that which it is ten thousand to one whether he can or will do, and we without him might do more easily, more effectually, more laudably ourselves?"
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Limitations of Parliament

"For it is only the king's right, he will say, to call a parliament; and this he will do most commonly about his own affairs rather than the kingdom's, as will appear plainly so soon as they are called. For what will their business then be, and the chief expense of their time, but an endless tugging between petition of right and royal prerogative, especially about the negative voice, militia, or subsidies, demanded and ofttimes extorted without reasonable cause appearing to the commons, who are the only true representatives of the people and their liberty, but will be then mingled with a court faction."
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Intermediation of Elections

"Another way will be to well qualify and refine elections, not committing all to the noise and shouting of a rude multitude, but permitting only those of them who are rightly qualified to nominate as many as they will; and out of that number others of a better breeding to choose a less number judiciously, till after a third or fourth sifting and refining of exactest choice, they only be left chosen who are the due number and seem by most voices the worthiest."
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Popular Assemblies

"So that the main reason urged why popular assemblies are to be trusted with the people's liberty, rather than a senate of principal men, because great men will be still endeavoring to enlarge their power, but the common sort will be contented to maintain their own liberty, is by experience found false, none being more ambitious to amplify their power than such popularities; which was seen in the people of Rome, who, at first contented to have their tribunes, at length contended with the senate that one consul, then both--soon after, that the censors and praetors also--should be created plebian, and the whole empire put into their hands; adoring lastly those who were most averse to the senate; till Marius, by fulfilling all their inordinate desires, quite lost them all the power for which they had so long been striving, and left them under the tyranny of Sulla."
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Singular Government

"And what madness is it for them who might manage nobly their own affairs themselves, sluggishly and weakly to devolve all on a single person; and, more like boys under age than men, to commit all to his patronage and disposal who neither can perform what he undertakes, and yet for undertaking it, though royally paid, will not be their servant, but their lord!"
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Accountability of Governors

"Nay, it is well and happy for the people if their king be but a cipher, being ofttimes a mischief, a pest, a scourge of the nation, and, which is worse, not to be removed, not to be controlled (much less accused or brought to punishment) without the danger of a common ruin, without the shaking and almost subversion of the whole land: whereas in a free commonwealth, any governor or chief counsellor offending may be removed and punished without the least commotion."
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Punishment of Kings

"God in much displeasure gave a king to the Israelites, and imputed it a sin to them that they sought one, but Christ apparently forbids his disciples to admit of any such heathenish government. 'The kings of the Gentiles,'saith he,'exercise lordship over them,' and they that 'exercise authority upon them are called benefactors: but ye shall not be so; but he that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he that is chief, as he that serveth.'"
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Education and Talent

"If others hence will pretend to disturb all counsels, what is that to them who pretend not, but are in real danger--not they only so judging, but a great, though not the greatest, number of their chosen patriots, who might be more in weight than the others in number: there being in number little virtue, but by weight and measure wisdom working all things, and the dangers on either side they seriously thus weighed. . ."
John Milton
The Ready and Easy Way
1660

Unfit for Government

"It is also sanctioned by the dictates of justice and by the constitution of nature that he, who from the imbecility or derangement of his intellect is incapable of governing himself, should, like a minor, be committed to the government of another, and least of all should he be appointed to superintend the affairs of others or the interest of the state."
John Milton
Second Defense of the English People
1654

Worthy Officials

"Are they fit to be the legislators of a whole people who themselves know not what law, what reason, what right and wrong, what crooked and straight, what licit and illicit means? who think that all power consists in outrage, all dignity in the parade of insolence? who neglect every other consideration for the corrupt gratification of their friendships or the prosecution of their resentments? who disperse their own relations and creatures through the provinces for the sake of levying taxes and confiscating goods--men, for the greater part the most profligate and vile, who buy up for themselves what they pretend to expose to sale, who thence collect and exorbitant mass of wealth, which they fraudulently divert from the public service, who thus spread their pillage through the country and in a moment emerge from penury and rags to a state of splendor and wealth?"
John Milton
Second Defense of the English People
1654

Venality

"For who would vindicate your right of unrestrained sufferage or of choosing what representatives you liked best, merely that you might elect the creatures of your own faction, whoever they might be, or him, however small might be his worth, who would give you the most lavish feasts and enable you to drink to the greatest excess?"
John Milton
Second Defense of the English People
1654