Poetry: “Noel”
I received from Robert Peters this Christmas gift: a newly discovered Christmas poem by J.R.R. Tolkien, which I am sharing with our readers.
The Fleming Foundation Cultural Commentary
Blessed are the Courteous by Vince Cornell
For they shall get a gold star on their forehead from the CDC.
Poetry: Deck Us All in Boston Charlie
How many remember this nonsensical masterpiece by Walt Kelley?
Poetry: A Cheering Winter Poem from the Frozen North
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
Cruel to Be Kind
Wisdom comes from knowledge which comes from painfully acquired information about reality—facts. Since, as you say, you have little knowledge of the current political scene and even less of history, your concerns do not really involve rational thought but are a reflection of depression, and unfortunately, this is a mental condition that leads the sufferer to be happy to see, as the French say, “tout en noir”, all in black.
The Trump Legacy
That so many Americans are interested in Presidential “legacies” and are personally and emotionally involved with “my President” and “my “leader” is unhealthy. After all, the President was supposed to be a Constitutional public official.
Clearing the Air….
The End-of-the Worlders are going from handwringing over a possibly stolen election–please don’t tell me you know it is stolen in fact because you don’t know anything of the kind–to declaring the death of the American republic. It’s the worst sort of ditto-head approach to politics. It begins by saying, “Say, this is about the best damn country that has ever existed” and go on in the vein of Babbit’s speech to the Zenith Booster Club.
Sophocles’ Ajax: The Struggle Over the Corpse
The end of the Ajax is a rhetorical battle over the corpse of Ajax, and, though it is a war of words, it is no less serious than the Homeric conflicts over the battle and armour of a fallen hero. The basic antagonists are three: Teucer, the two Atridae (who make much the same argument, though Agamemnon is more reasonable, perhaps because he is dealing with Odysseus), and Odysseus. Rather than summarize the scene, I’d like to leave it up to the readers to give their response to the following questions: First, what is the nub of each set of...
Wednesday’s Child: The Political Transvestite
Like the word’s Italian variant, coprifuoco, “curfew”–which is now in effect in several European countries–comes from Old French cuevrefeu, “cover fire,” advice to citizens to extinguish fires at a certain hour of the evening. My wife thinks it’s sweet. “It shows concern,” she says. “Just compare it to what we say in Russian.” In Russian the equivalent is “commandant’s hour,” meaning do what you’re told or be brought before the commandant and get the regulation nine grams of lead in the back of your head. Language gives nations away.
Revenge of the MIC
If BidenHarris make it into the White House, we’ll see the full restoration of the MIC: the Military Industrial Complex, as Ike called it. The latest appointment is Gen. Lloyd Austin, who aced out the expected pick, Michele Flournoy. Not surprisingly, the Woke Media are turning this into an “intersectional” battle: If confirmed, Austin would become the first black SecDef, while Flourney would have been the first woman to hold the post. But both are tied into the MIC
