BALTIMORE, Maryland September 11, 2015 - It was 14 years ago this morning that a group of profoundly evil Islamic Men under the stylized command of the since-assasinated Osama bin Laden, massacred over 3000 Americans by flying hijacked jetliners into Manhattan's World Trade Center twin skyscrapers and the Pentagon. A fourth jetliner, said to be heading for the United States Capital Building, crashed instead in a Pennsylvania farm field after a group of American passengers rebelled against the hijackers and staged a counter-attack. During the ensuing life or death struggle, the jet went down. You would think that anyone who became the Mayor of a large East Coast City in the wake of 9/11/2001 atrocities would have spent some time preparing for disasters. Stephanie Rawlings Blake didn't think such preparation was necessary and learned nothing from history, however recent, so when disaster did strike Baltimore in the guise of a blood-curdling racial uprising, she was totally ill-prepared. Even as the riots and arsons took place at various locations throughout one of the Northeast's southern-most urban areas, there were rumors that Blake had fled the City for the protection of a friend's suburban home. Some old timers - this writer included - pined yet again, as these events unfolded, for the sure and moral leadership of the late William Donald Schaefer, a man seemingly born to be Mayor. Blake, meanwhile, ordered the Baltimore City Police Department to "stand down;" i.e., not confront, rioters, looters, pilagers and plunderers, in the face of the large scale rioting, even ordering lines of officers deployed in the path of the carnage and not wearing protective gear, to not react when being pelted with bricks, stones and other potentially lethal projectiles. She later denied giving these orders, but that order didn't appear out of nowhere, and she had hand-picked a completely unvetted West Coaster to be Police Chief (she subsequently fired him after saying many times that he had acted appropriately). Today, Ms. Rawlings-Blake will announce - according to any number of sources - that she will not seek re-election. To that, most Baltimoreans say, "thank God!"
In recent weeks, and well before the news that Blake was about to quit had hit the streets, several high-profile Baltimore Politicians had announced their candidacies for Mayor, including former Mayor Sheila Dixon. Rumors about several others are everywhere. Faced with a virtual silent coup, Ms. Blake did the only logical thing, she cried "No Mas!" No Mas indeed.
It was in the middle of the brutal and shocking street uprisings that Rawlings-Blake - the daughter of the late and much lamented Baltimore Political and Elected Leader Wayne Rawlings - said during a news conference that the rioters had to be given "room to destroy." Many who heard her say those words live could only blink in amazement. Did she really mean to say such a ghastly thing? But they weren't aware that she was a personal adherent to the uber leftists in the White House, including the Iranian, Valerie Jarret, who is said to be President Obama's most trusted advisor. Obama and Jarret are openly opposed to any kind of police action airmed at those who riot against traditional authorities. Both Obama and Jarret concede that they follow the uber left Marxist rants of the late Saul Alinsky, who schooled Communists, Anarchists and other Anti-American elements in the rudiments of anti-Americanism. Both learned well, but when Jarret tried to pass these lessons on to Rawlings-Blake as the unrest unfolded, she learned that the Baltimorean was not such a quick learner. Admitting to the press, in the middle of the riots, that she was on the side of the destroyers was not a good idea. Well, she knows it now (although her decision to announce that she wouldn't fun again on the anniversry of 9/11 will remind some that there are those who never really learn life's lessons).
Blake did seeth openly at the rioters as they pulled off the unrest's most egregious and shocking acts - one hound dog stuck a kitchen knife in a fireman's hose as the BCFD tried to douse a huge blaze at a pharmacy - Blake also avoided impassioned calls from Maryland's new Republican Governor, Robert Hogan, who had the National Guard poised and ready to deploy on the first night of the riots, but did not want to act until Blake approved. Instead, Blake would not come on the line with the Governor. Just as Hogan was about to act unilaterally, Blake finally approved, but not until later on Monday night. When she did, the nation was confronted with Baltimore as a City of military occupation for the next ten days. There are countless City residents who wish the Guard had stayed longer - ten months instead of ten days - because their departure touched off an astounding string of murderous rampages that forced the murder rate to skyrocket. The rate of cold-blooded murders has already passed last year's totals and are racomg pell-mell toward national records. Baltimore's murder rate has shot past that of New York's, and is closing in on the World's Shooting and Murder Capital: Chicago, home of the nation's very-own personal political agitator, Barack H. Obama. When confronted with her "room to destroy" statement, Blake initially denied the statement was hers. But when shown a video of the quote, she proceeded to claim it was taken out of context. Huh? How does one even begin to take such a statement out of context? Ms. Blake obviously needs a beginners lesson in Freudian Slips.
Two days before today's concession, Blake announced that the City will pay the family of Freddy Gray - the man whose death while in police custody sparked the urban conflagration back in April - a sum exceeding $6 million to settle their wrongful death claim against the City. The amount would be outrageous in any circumstance, but it was announced against a backdrop that includes a State Wrongful Death Statute that has very firm statutory limits on what a jury or judge can award in a wrongful death case, and a well-known fact that Gray was a career criminal and well-known West Baltimore heroin dealer who has been convicted of selling narcotics, including heroin, to school children. And Blake knows that the money will have to be paid by a City that is cash-starved on its best day. She will live with the knowledge that these millions of taxpayer dollars will be going to the Gray family instead of the many desperately impoverished residents served by City agencies. Many immediately wondered also about the timing of the Mayor's announcement, made, as it was, just two days before the hearing and ruling on the six defendant police officers' motions to have their cases moved out of the City to a state jurisdiction not clamoring for the officers' respective scalps. As it turned out, Blake need not have been concerned about the timing, since the Judge who conducted the hearing immediately ruled against the motion in one of the biggest travesties in the history of the State of Maryland (See Credible and Incisive post of September 10, 2015, entitled "A Really Awful Court Decision in Baltimore All But Eliminates Chances Six Defendants Will Receive Fair Trial.") It is interesting to note that a community center has opened in the same neighborhood where the Gray case unfolded. Although not City-funded, it has been named in honor of the dead narcotics dealer.
Obama Said to Demand No Christians Be Among 10,000 Syrian Refugees Coming to USA
As hundreds of thousands of refugees stream out of Syria and seek asylum in Europe and the USA, Barack Hussein Obama, the USA President, has announced that he wants to take 10,000 of the refugees for asylum here in the USA. Sources say that he has told those involved in the process that none of the people coming to America can be Christian. Hence, they will all be Muslim.
Obama has claimed in the past that he is Christian, but his actions since being re-elected have cast a large question mark on that claim. He has authorized his secretary of state to sign a treaty with Iran that will inevitably lead to Iran getting possession of a nuclear arsenal even though its leaders continue to vow almost daily its intention to destroy the USA and its close ally, Israel. He has kept Christians throughout the Middle East from coming to the USA even though they are being hunted into extinction by ISIS and, some say, Iran. He has prevented the USA's military from doing anything - other than sporadic air strikes - to curtail ISIS as the rogue Islamic Movement butchers tens of thousands of Christians and Moderate Muslims throughout the Middle East and beyond, and continues a land-grab that has resulted in it having actual physical control of most of Syria and Iraq. ISIS calls these occupied lands a new Islamic Caliphate. Obama has also has spoken out publicly when two Muslims were allegedly killed in North Carolina by an American. But Obama remained silent when killers alligned with ISIS butchered Americans. He has criticized Christians for actions taken by their long-ago ancestors during the Crusades of the earliest part of the second millenium, but remained silent as today's Muslims throw gay people off of the roofs of multi-story buildings while being tied to a chair. He has given his full support and that of his administration to those parts of his Obamacare (referred to by this Column as "obamashame") that force Christian organizations such as the Little Sisters of the Poor to provide birth control products to their employees even though such an act would be in direct contravention of their deeply held religious beliefs. In response, national Archdiocesan Groups have joined together to sue the Obama Administration over the policy. There have been many other acts against the Christian Faith, but in the interest of brevity, we will end the list here. Countless citizens, including many who formerly backed Obama, have recoiled at the vicious nature of his anti-Christian campaign, a campaign he neither defends or rationalizes.
When Obama ran for president in 2006 and 2007, and then throughout his first term in office (2008 through early 2012) Barack Hussein Obama stated over and over again, and very publicly, that he was opposed to marraige between members of the same sex; i.e., so-called 'Gay Marraige." After winning a second election, thereby ending any possibility that an act or statement that he makes will haunt him in a future election, Obama made a very public and much-balleyhooed announcement that his views of marraige between members of the same sex have "evolved." Obama said he now is a strong supporter of Gay Marraige. Cynics claimed that Obama has always favored Gay Marraige, but felt he could not make these views public during his campaigns for President because the nation, during these times, was opposed to such marraiges.
Obama was very public in his 'admissions' that he was Christian. He embroiled himself in controversy when he claimed, in a book, that he greatly admired his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright of Chicago, and that he treasured the outspoken Wright's personal and political advice. But the few journalists willing to write anything other than glowing stories about Obama learned that Wright was always incredibly critical of all things American. An excerpt from one sermon, played over and over again in the conservative media, claims that the 9/11 massacres were "Americas chickens coming home to roost." Obama felt compelled to publicly break with Wright. Now, Credible and Incisive, and others, wonder if sometime soon there will be an announcement by Obama that he is converting to the Muslim faith. His identified father's family are all Muslim, although Obama has said that his father did not practice Islam. There are questions about whether Obama is really the son of the late Kenyan. Those who believe those stories point to Frank Marshall Davis as the actual father of the President. They claim there is a facial resemblance and a confluence of lives along about the time Obama was conceived. What differene does it all make now? Well, no one denies that Mr. Davis, an avowed Communist and gifted poet, was a mentor of sorts to Obama in his formative years.
Friday, September 11, 2015
Thursday, September 10, 2015
A Really Awful Court Decision in Baltimore All But Eliminates Chances Six Defendants Will Receive Fair Trial
BALTIMORE, Maryland September 10, 2015 - When you spend your entire life always sympathizing with, and often being active in all things promoting civil rights, finding yourself on the so-called 'wrong' side of a key controversy is very disconcerting. And yet, here I am. The Freddy Gray incident in Baltimore is about as terrible a set of circumstances as one can imagine. The latest development - the really awful decision of Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Barry Williams denying the combined motions of the Defendants to change the venue of the cases - is merely the latest, but it is easily one of the worst.
My simple argument in the venue controversy is, "if not this case, which case?" Changing the venue of high-profile criminal cases is part of American criminal law. The Maryland Rules of Procedure, which codify and annotate the rules by which every piece of litigation in the State of Maryland must abide, contain provisions for changing venue. Each case is one that must be decided on the facts. The very fact that the rules are there, with annotations (i.e., every decision by the Court of Appeals of Maryland and Court of Special Appeals of Maryland which announce law pertaining to any aspect of change of venue issues) is the firmest possible indication that the law in Maryland allows for changes of venue. Once you get to that point of the legal analysis, your work is done. Or, at least it should be done. It simply is not possible for any case to have a more compelling set of facts and circumstances virtually crying out for a change in this trial's venue. The decision should've been a no-brainer even for a first-year law student, unless the judge making the call was a) determined to keep the cases in the jurisdiction where convictions are almost certain; b) concerned about his personal status in the City where he lives; or c) fearful for himself and his family if he rules in favor of a change of venue. These three possible reasons are all directly contrary to the pillars of justice which should underly our legal system. In short, it is the kind of decision that - while possibly placating the mobs in the street in the very short term, does nothing to promote real justice and real respect for the legal system. It is the kind of decision that will lead to derisive comments by people who know the law and respect the law. This latter group will be left to shake their heads in disgust.
There are those in the mob who see a real street justice in this latest turn of events. For decades, Black Americans were discriminated against by racist judges and police. Now the mob screams that it is time for pay back. The racist group calling itself "Black Lives Matter" demonstrated a few days back somewhere in Minnesota, and was recorded chanting, as they marched, something to the effect that police officers should be wrapped up and fried like bacon. Another member of the group said on a radio broadcast that it is now "open season" on white people and especially on white police. They should be shot and if they are, there is nothing they can do about it, the genius said. And he is a fine human being. You see, the scum that did the discriminating those years ago are held in very low public esteem these days. They are hated and scorned, their memory is loaded down with nothing positive. People today do not aspire to be like those old dead racists. The overwhelming majority of people alive today hold no such foul views. Yet the hatred in the streets today give credence to the view that humanity cannot rise above the evils of racism. Instead, racism is like a pendulum, swinging back and forth. No one has the courage or decency to end it. And so, six police officers who might have been negligent in the way they took a career crimal into custody are instead blamed when he managed to get himself killed. The State's Attorney, when she wasn't busy blowing her own ample horn, filed a criminal complaint which alleges no beating or physical abuse. But she charged one with second degree murder. All six are vilified and derided almost daily on local media. Baltimore Police are so incensed that they have stopped trying to control the evil in the streets. As a result, murders are skyrocketing. The entire City boils. But Judge Williams says, "fair impartial jury possible." Of course it is.
I do not know Judge Barry Williams and do not recall being before him, even for minor matters. But this is a case that is a textbook case for changing the venue. The facts are so very much in favor of moving the trial to a Maryland County where the population didn't riot in anger over what they believe these defendants did. There were two days of angry rioting, tens of millions of dollars of property damage, many hundreds of arrests for crimes like rioting, looting, arson, and all manner of crimes whch make up a concept of mayhem, a deployment of the Maryland National Guard for days and days, a deployment of law enforcement officers from around the state and beyond, city-wide curfews, massive school closings, non-stop, high-decibel discussion of events on local TV and radio, running around the clock. store closings (not counting the ones that were looted and closed either for good or for a very long time), and even the cancellation and eventual relocation of several Major League Baseball Games. Despite this massive publicity, despite the riots and demonstrations, demonstrations which continued even up to the date of this decision, despite non-stop press coverage by all manner of urban media, despite the fact that the entire City has squared off about this or that aspect of the case, this judge said the defense did not convince him that residents of the City - the potential jury pool - will be able to separate the mob scenes from the facts. Very very sad, and quite wrong. The courageous decision, the noble decision was to grant the motion of the defendants to change the venue. But that would've meant that the judge would've been held up to public scorn. Instead of the mob loving him - like they do this night - he would've been their personal bad guy. If Judge Williams ever wanted to be considered a great judge by people who know what a great judge is, he would never have made this awful decision. Instead, he'll have to be content with well-wishes from the mob outside his window and boot-lickers and other spineless sorts.
The jury pool and the poor souls who will make up the actual jury in the City will have to have the courage of the greatest heroes of the human race just to get to the deliberation room with an open mind. Every person in the City Courthouse - save for the six Defendants and their attorneys - will be praying for a conviction so the riots don't start up again. The allies of the State and their private attorneys; i.e., everybody, including the media, will be doing everything in their power to convict and incarcerate. Outside of the courtroom where the trial will take place, demonstrators will scream for conviction. Hangers-on and operatives will be everywhere. But according to Judge Williams, it will still be a place where the six defendants will be able to present their evidence and then make their way to prison. Heaven help us.
My simple argument in the venue controversy is, "if not this case, which case?" Changing the venue of high-profile criminal cases is part of American criminal law. The Maryland Rules of Procedure, which codify and annotate the rules by which every piece of litigation in the State of Maryland must abide, contain provisions for changing venue. Each case is one that must be decided on the facts. The very fact that the rules are there, with annotations (i.e., every decision by the Court of Appeals of Maryland and Court of Special Appeals of Maryland which announce law pertaining to any aspect of change of venue issues) is the firmest possible indication that the law in Maryland allows for changes of venue. Once you get to that point of the legal analysis, your work is done. Or, at least it should be done. It simply is not possible for any case to have a more compelling set of facts and circumstances virtually crying out for a change in this trial's venue. The decision should've been a no-brainer even for a first-year law student, unless the judge making the call was a) determined to keep the cases in the jurisdiction where convictions are almost certain; b) concerned about his personal status in the City where he lives; or c) fearful for himself and his family if he rules in favor of a change of venue. These three possible reasons are all directly contrary to the pillars of justice which should underly our legal system. In short, it is the kind of decision that - while possibly placating the mobs in the street in the very short term, does nothing to promote real justice and real respect for the legal system. It is the kind of decision that will lead to derisive comments by people who know the law and respect the law. This latter group will be left to shake their heads in disgust.
There are those in the mob who see a real street justice in this latest turn of events. For decades, Black Americans were discriminated against by racist judges and police. Now the mob screams that it is time for pay back. The racist group calling itself "Black Lives Matter" demonstrated a few days back somewhere in Minnesota, and was recorded chanting, as they marched, something to the effect that police officers should be wrapped up and fried like bacon. Another member of the group said on a radio broadcast that it is now "open season" on white people and especially on white police. They should be shot and if they are, there is nothing they can do about it, the genius said. And he is a fine human being. You see, the scum that did the discriminating those years ago are held in very low public esteem these days. They are hated and scorned, their memory is loaded down with nothing positive. People today do not aspire to be like those old dead racists. The overwhelming majority of people alive today hold no such foul views. Yet the hatred in the streets today give credence to the view that humanity cannot rise above the evils of racism. Instead, racism is like a pendulum, swinging back and forth. No one has the courage or decency to end it. And so, six police officers who might have been negligent in the way they took a career crimal into custody are instead blamed when he managed to get himself killed. The State's Attorney, when she wasn't busy blowing her own ample horn, filed a criminal complaint which alleges no beating or physical abuse. But she charged one with second degree murder. All six are vilified and derided almost daily on local media. Baltimore Police are so incensed that they have stopped trying to control the evil in the streets. As a result, murders are skyrocketing. The entire City boils. But Judge Williams says, "fair impartial jury possible." Of course it is.
I do not know Judge Barry Williams and do not recall being before him, even for minor matters. But this is a case that is a textbook case for changing the venue. The facts are so very much in favor of moving the trial to a Maryland County where the population didn't riot in anger over what they believe these defendants did. There were two days of angry rioting, tens of millions of dollars of property damage, many hundreds of arrests for crimes like rioting, looting, arson, and all manner of crimes whch make up a concept of mayhem, a deployment of the Maryland National Guard for days and days, a deployment of law enforcement officers from around the state and beyond, city-wide curfews, massive school closings, non-stop, high-decibel discussion of events on local TV and radio, running around the clock. store closings (not counting the ones that were looted and closed either for good or for a very long time), and even the cancellation and eventual relocation of several Major League Baseball Games. Despite this massive publicity, despite the riots and demonstrations, demonstrations which continued even up to the date of this decision, despite non-stop press coverage by all manner of urban media, despite the fact that the entire City has squared off about this or that aspect of the case, this judge said the defense did not convince him that residents of the City - the potential jury pool - will be able to separate the mob scenes from the facts. Very very sad, and quite wrong. The courageous decision, the noble decision was to grant the motion of the defendants to change the venue. But that would've meant that the judge would've been held up to public scorn. Instead of the mob loving him - like they do this night - he would've been their personal bad guy. If Judge Williams ever wanted to be considered a great judge by people who know what a great judge is, he would never have made this awful decision. Instead, he'll have to be content with well-wishes from the mob outside his window and boot-lickers and other spineless sorts.
The jury pool and the poor souls who will make up the actual jury in the City will have to have the courage of the greatest heroes of the human race just to get to the deliberation room with an open mind. Every person in the City Courthouse - save for the six Defendants and their attorneys - will be praying for a conviction so the riots don't start up again. The allies of the State and their private attorneys; i.e., everybody, including the media, will be doing everything in their power to convict and incarcerate. Outside of the courtroom where the trial will take place, demonstrators will scream for conviction. Hangers-on and operatives will be everywhere. But according to Judge Williams, it will still be a place where the six defendants will be able to present their evidence and then make their way to prison. Heaven help us.
Friday, September 4, 2015
The Absolute Ugliness of a Presidency When the President Hates His Nation; A Poem; Soccer News: Burnley Rights the Ship, Wins Second Straight; No. 6 Terps Draw With No. 5 Notre Dame, Rout St. John's, Prepare for Tonight's Showdown with No. 1 UCLA
BALTIMORE, Maryland September 4, 2015 - This is Obama's world, the world he had visions about from the time he was a disaffected teen. The only trouble is, it hasn't changed since then, not even a little bit. It hasn't evolved, to use a phrasing from today's parlance. Obama didn't mature and neither did his view of the United States. When I was a teen, each of America's blemishes seemed larger than life. Every ounce of corruption immediately spread to every government official. Every penny spent on anything other than the poor was totally wasted. Every ounce of water or cubic inch of air that had even a trace of foreign matter in it was an indictment against the country's environmental policies. (But you know, even then I couldn't impune the current national leaders with the sins of every western leader since the Birth of Christ.) What I thought and experienced then, Obama still experiences. He can overlook each of Islam's debauched acts (throwing gays off of rooftops while tied to a chair. Putting prisoners of war in a cage and dropping it in the ocean to watch it, and the prisoner inside, sink out of sight.) but he attacks Christians because of the Crusades. I keep wondering what Christians could have done to him to justify what he allows Islam to do to them today, allowing their slaughter around the world. I'd like to debate him about the Crusades, but I'd really like to ask him some questions that reporters today - hapless sell-outs that they are - haven't or won't ask him about Islam. Obama blames an American Constitution and Declaration of Independence for falling short of utopia. He conveniently forgets that both documents constituted landmark breaks with what passed at the time for contemporary human rights guarantees and written guarantees of citizen participation in government decision-making. In fact, when they came into existence at the outset of this Republic, there was nothing anywhere on earth to compare them to. They were revolutions in and of themselves and the men responsible for them were heroes to all, despite the wrongs their documents did not address.
I am sorry that Jefferson and Franklin, Adams and Washington didn't do away with slavery right from the start. Our nation would today have been so much better had they been able to do so. But Obama knows and historians know that neither document would have ever been enacted or accepted at that time if the drafters attempted to do that. If those men had insisted on abolitionist language from the start, there would have been no United States, and the brave men who fought and died to rid this nation of slavery forever would never have the chance to take that stand. We abolished slavery at a great human price. We passed universal suffrage. We saved the world from HItler. But none of those things would've happened if the men Obama seems to loathe had never been born.
Many human beings go through what my contemporaries called a "rebellious period". Such a part of life, often lasting for one to three years, is characterized by stated disagreements with parents, teachers and other authority figures. The teen rebels against those who set a course and established barriers, restrictions or rules. That was the hated word: rules. Rebellious teens hate rules. Obama hates the law so much that he routinely ignores it. When he can't get his way, he acts like an insolent child and signs one of his knucke-headed executive orders. Other Presidents - men from both parties - negotiated with Congress to try and get things done. Obama rejects all things American and embraces all things Middle Eastern and Far Eastern. He embraces and is enthralled by Uber Leftists who gained control of nations by force and ruled with bloody iron fists: Fidel Castro, Robert Mugabe, Omar Hassan Ahmad Al-Bashir (the former Sudanese leader) and, until his death, Hugo Chavez represent, to Obama, what Churchill, Jefferson, Adams and Acheson represent to other western politicians.
The result of Obama's stagnated development is, among other things, the absurd and debauched 'treaty' with Iran. Like many Americans, I believe that the agreement will lead to war and bloodshed with an Iran that is far more powerful and far more evil than it would be had it not been the recipient of Obama's largesse. Forget all of the weak and unforgivable tenets of the agreement, it is the incredlible amount of money that Obama is giving to Iran that is the worst thing of all. His functionaries even admit that the money will be used to fund terror, acquire weapons and wage war. They act like it is unavoidable. Unavoidable? I would far more prefer war than giving an evil pack of satanic fools like the Mullahs a pot of gold. Again and again I ask, why is he doing this? I have to pinch myself when I think like that. It means I am comparing Obama to other Americans who recognize, on its face, the evil that is Iran. But Obama isn't like other Americans. He is an uber Leftist who hates everything American. He is the kind that forgets that the road from dictators to democracy is long and hard, and that mistakes and compromise will be engaged in along that road. Absolute dictatorships and absolute monarchies do not give way to republics in the history of man, not in the west or east or anywhere. But they didn't teach that lesson to Obama while he was at Harvard or Columbia.
Only the Lord knows what represensible uber Left nonsense Obama will ram down the nation's throat in the next few months. I dread November and December of 2016. I really fear what kind of people he will be pardoning on his way out. And you know and I know if there was some way he could continue to inflict his far left nonsense on us after his term is supposed to end, he will do it.
poem no. 2 for now
by John William Trotz in September, 2015
Chained in ancient crumbling prison pocked through squalid plague without any iron or steel bars;
none at all; none! think like ‘mate locked in stale breathless space,
locked tight, squelched in manner, cloying air
squelched in mind, nothing new, nothing that functions.....
There was a sure sense of knowing to release;
when the soft knock was put to the bone-cold door,
and a created vision springs out, fast so arrived
to it there was brilliance there was
the sureness of that, that amazing certainty of its survival
trick them. confuse them. conflict them and slap
across the jowls. smack! crash! smacked; joy of pain inflicted
with him then with passion just bodily,
a certain conjuring a certain nothing a certain nothing
knowing why there was more there
a perfected concert with pure brilliance tonal and serene
serene! whirring and grasping and embracing before meditating
reciprocated not caring not even contemplating
not her problem
life being lived life experienced life recompensed.
Sports: Burnley, With Two Straight Wins, Rights the Ship; No. 6 Terps Impressive in Draw With Notre Dame, Rout of St. John's; Showdown with No. 1 UCLA Tonight in College Park
Quickly stated: Burnley went to Bristol City last weekend and beat back the home team, 2-1, for its second consecutive win. The Claret opened the season with two draws and a loss before breaking through at Turf Moor against Brentford. They followed that win with Saturday's great road win. After the dismal start, the Claret have quickly climbed the table and now stand in 9th place, just two points out of 2nd place and the same automatic promotion to the Premier that they earned in 2013. Burnley is off until September 12, when they entertain Sheffield Wednesday.
No. 6 Maryland opened the regular season one week ago with a thrilling draw with No. 5 Notre Dame at the Indiana tournament in Indianapolis. They followed that result with a 4-0 rout of St. John's at the same venue. All of that sets the stage for tonight's showdown with No. 1 UCLA in College Park. The BTN will have the game live.
I am sorry that Jefferson and Franklin, Adams and Washington didn't do away with slavery right from the start. Our nation would today have been so much better had they been able to do so. But Obama knows and historians know that neither document would have ever been enacted or accepted at that time if the drafters attempted to do that. If those men had insisted on abolitionist language from the start, there would have been no United States, and the brave men who fought and died to rid this nation of slavery forever would never have the chance to take that stand. We abolished slavery at a great human price. We passed universal suffrage. We saved the world from HItler. But none of those things would've happened if the men Obama seems to loathe had never been born.
Many human beings go through what my contemporaries called a "rebellious period". Such a part of life, often lasting for one to three years, is characterized by stated disagreements with parents, teachers and other authority figures. The teen rebels against those who set a course and established barriers, restrictions or rules. That was the hated word: rules. Rebellious teens hate rules. Obama hates the law so much that he routinely ignores it. When he can't get his way, he acts like an insolent child and signs one of his knucke-headed executive orders. Other Presidents - men from both parties - negotiated with Congress to try and get things done. Obama rejects all things American and embraces all things Middle Eastern and Far Eastern. He embraces and is enthralled by Uber Leftists who gained control of nations by force and ruled with bloody iron fists: Fidel Castro, Robert Mugabe, Omar Hassan Ahmad Al-Bashir (the former Sudanese leader) and, until his death, Hugo Chavez represent, to Obama, what Churchill, Jefferson, Adams and Acheson represent to other western politicians.
The result of Obama's stagnated development is, among other things, the absurd and debauched 'treaty' with Iran. Like many Americans, I believe that the agreement will lead to war and bloodshed with an Iran that is far more powerful and far more evil than it would be had it not been the recipient of Obama's largesse. Forget all of the weak and unforgivable tenets of the agreement, it is the incredlible amount of money that Obama is giving to Iran that is the worst thing of all. His functionaries even admit that the money will be used to fund terror, acquire weapons and wage war. They act like it is unavoidable. Unavoidable? I would far more prefer war than giving an evil pack of satanic fools like the Mullahs a pot of gold. Again and again I ask, why is he doing this? I have to pinch myself when I think like that. It means I am comparing Obama to other Americans who recognize, on its face, the evil that is Iran. But Obama isn't like other Americans. He is an uber Leftist who hates everything American. He is the kind that forgets that the road from dictators to democracy is long and hard, and that mistakes and compromise will be engaged in along that road. Absolute dictatorships and absolute monarchies do not give way to republics in the history of man, not in the west or east or anywhere. But they didn't teach that lesson to Obama while he was at Harvard or Columbia.
Only the Lord knows what represensible uber Left nonsense Obama will ram down the nation's throat in the next few months. I dread November and December of 2016. I really fear what kind of people he will be pardoning on his way out. And you know and I know if there was some way he could continue to inflict his far left nonsense on us after his term is supposed to end, he will do it.
poem no. 2 for now
by John William Trotz in September, 2015
Chained in ancient crumbling prison pocked through squalid plague without any iron or steel bars;
none at all; none! think like ‘mate locked in stale breathless space,
locked tight, squelched in manner, cloying air
squelched in mind, nothing new, nothing that functions.....
There was a sure sense of knowing to release;
when the soft knock was put to the bone-cold door,
and a created vision springs out, fast so arrived
to it there was brilliance there was
the sureness of that, that amazing certainty of its survival
trick them. confuse them. conflict them and slap
across the jowls. smack! crash! smacked; joy of pain inflicted
with him then with passion just bodily,
a certain conjuring a certain nothing a certain nothing
knowing why there was more there
a perfected concert with pure brilliance tonal and serene
serene! whirring and grasping and embracing before meditating
reciprocated not caring not even contemplating
not her problem
life being lived life experienced life recompensed.
Sports: Burnley, With Two Straight Wins, Rights the Ship; No. 6 Terps Impressive in Draw With Notre Dame, Rout of St. John's; Showdown with No. 1 UCLA Tonight in College Park
Quickly stated: Burnley went to Bristol City last weekend and beat back the home team, 2-1, for its second consecutive win. The Claret opened the season with two draws and a loss before breaking through at Turf Moor against Brentford. They followed that win with Saturday's great road win. After the dismal start, the Claret have quickly climbed the table and now stand in 9th place, just two points out of 2nd place and the same automatic promotion to the Premier that they earned in 2013. Burnley is off until September 12, when they entertain Sheffield Wednesday.
No. 6 Maryland opened the regular season one week ago with a thrilling draw with No. 5 Notre Dame at the Indiana tournament in Indianapolis. They followed that result with a 4-0 rout of St. John's at the same venue. All of that sets the stage for tonight's showdown with No. 1 UCLA in College Park. The BTN will have the game live.
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
The Vicious ISIS Movement is Protected By Political Correctness
BALTIMORE, Maryland August 25, 2015 - In the 6th century Christians built a monastery at Qaryatain in Syria. Some 300 years before the building began, St. Elian was martyred in the same location. In the monastery are, actually were, frescoes. They are among the oldest of all Christian Frescoes and are the oldest in Syria. Now, the hounddogs that are ISIS have raised the monastery. Our allegedly Christian president sits back, golfing with the rich, and otherwise doing nothing as tens of thousands of Christians are slaughtered.
Let that thought swish around in your being for a bit. Tens of thousand of innocent Christians are slaughtered by the dogs of ISIS, brazenly, and we raise not so much as a wimper. Do we acquiesce so timidly and with such cowardice? Where are the leaders? Has the Holy Father spoken out? I know he has said a few things, but I believe in my heart that he should do more? What about leaders other than Obama? Do they not understand the horrific slaughter we are witness to? Where are their objections to the west's inaction? What about the Rev. Welby, current Archbishop of Canterbury and head the Anglican Church? We could go on, because if the truth be known, no Christian leader has expressed the kind of vicarious outrage that seems appropriate.
It was revealed recently that an American citizen, Kayla Muellar, was held captive, repeatedly raped and tortured and then murdered by the leader of ISIS. The Guardian in London reported that, "the late American hostage Kayla Mueller was repeatedly raped by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State group, US officials have said."
To be honest, this is starting to compare in the shear violence and debauchery of the events to Peart Harbor. And yet, here in these United States, the sickness of political correctness lead ESPN's leaders to pull Curt Schilling off of his job at the Little League World Series because he Tweeted something to the effect that ISIS ia comparable to the Nazi movement. The ESPN people have succumbed to the kind of mind-numb cowardice that has infected all of the western world, and they took their illness out on a man who had the courage to speak out against the terror of ISIS. ISIS is every bit as bad as the Nazi slop, and they're still warming up.
Some short-sighted folk recoil at anything Glen Beck is involved in. They will be the ones not reading Mr Beck's latest book on what the Islamic Faith stands for. The lads at ESPN may want to hold someone's hand when they open that book up. It is scary.
Let that thought swish around in your being for a bit. Tens of thousand of innocent Christians are slaughtered by the dogs of ISIS, brazenly, and we raise not so much as a wimper. Do we acquiesce so timidly and with such cowardice? Where are the leaders? Has the Holy Father spoken out? I know he has said a few things, but I believe in my heart that he should do more? What about leaders other than Obama? Do they not understand the horrific slaughter we are witness to? Where are their objections to the west's inaction? What about the Rev. Welby, current Archbishop of Canterbury and head the Anglican Church? We could go on, because if the truth be known, no Christian leader has expressed the kind of vicarious outrage that seems appropriate.
It was revealed recently that an American citizen, Kayla Muellar, was held captive, repeatedly raped and tortured and then murdered by the leader of ISIS. The Guardian in London reported that, "the late American hostage Kayla Mueller was repeatedly raped by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State group, US officials have said."
To be honest, this is starting to compare in the shear violence and debauchery of the events to Peart Harbor. And yet, here in these United States, the sickness of political correctness lead ESPN's leaders to pull Curt Schilling off of his job at the Little League World Series because he Tweeted something to the effect that ISIS ia comparable to the Nazi movement. The ESPN people have succumbed to the kind of mind-numb cowardice that has infected all of the western world, and they took their illness out on a man who had the courage to speak out against the terror of ISIS. ISIS is every bit as bad as the Nazi slop, and they're still warming up.
Some short-sighted folk recoil at anything Glen Beck is involved in. They will be the ones not reading Mr Beck's latest book on what the Islamic Faith stands for. The lads at ESPN may want to hold someone's hand when they open that book up. It is scary.
Monday, August 24, 2015
Mainstream Media Fire Panic-Stricken Fuselade at All Things and Anything Connected WithTrump; Down-Bound Stocks Get a Hand-Hold in Their Free Fall, Rebound Gets Going; Burnley Shakes Off Blues, Stops Brentford to Gain Three Points; Scripture From St. Paul's Letter to the Ephesians; Comments on Truth and Humility by St. Bernard of Clairvaux; Poetry by John Cleveland
BALTIMORE, Maryland August 24, 2015 - Over this past weekend, the New York Times and CNN led an illustrious but embarassing parade of pernicious media folk hell-bent on trashing Donald Trump as the GOP frontrunner stormed into Mobile, Alabama to speak to a throng of people gathered at the football stadium at South Alabama University. Law Enforcement spokespeople said that some 30,000 people were in the facility, impressive when you consider that the election for President is still 15 months away. The figure is also impressive when you realize that the event was originally scheduled at a Hotel Conference Room. When tickets for that venue flew out the window, Trump's folk moved it to a convention center. Even that wasn't enough, and at the last Mr. Trump's planned remarks were re-located to the football stadium.
Leave it to CNN and the New York Times to yellow-up these facts. CNN's stunt was so slimy it made me wash my hands (no hand-sanitizer would begin to handle this goo). Early in the evening the CNN camera crew on site took pictures of the venue as it began - began! - to fill. Even when the University of Michigan's legendary football stadium (it seats well over 100,000) is sold out, there is a point when only 10,000 are inside. Anyway, CNN makes all of these pictures of the South Alabama stadium with 10,000 people inside. Then, later, the CNN reporter continually says that only 10,000 people are at the speech, and viewers are shown pictures of the stadium with 10,000 people inside, the same ones they made when only 10,000 people were there. The folk at Pravda would be proud. And then the CNN dogs wonder why no one watches their awful channel. The New York Times was almost as bad. They underestimated the crowd at 20,000, and captioned their coverage with the headline "Trump fails to fill stadium.' Now, you know and I know that Hilary was not filling college lecture halls at some of her awful events, but in the minds of the New York Times, it is news that 15 months prior to an election, a hurriedly planned speech by a northerner only drew 30,000. To me, an even bigger and much more profound question is what kind of depraved mind (or, in this case, minds) believe that electing Hilary president is anything but the worst kind of debauchery. Think about it. This abjectly failed person is incapable of original thought, incapable of human leadership, fully capable of criminal acts and fully capable of engaging in the kind of debauched behavior demonstrated in the Benghazi affair, including the sinister behavior at the Andrews Air Force Base when the coffins of four massacred Americans lay on the tarmac and Hilary tells the families of the dead that she will bring the man who made the film that caused the deaths to justice. Except she knew full well that no film had anything to do with the four deaths. The deaths were caused by filthy Islamic Terrorists carrying out a planned attack that Hilary knew of in advance and did absolutely nothing to prevent.
Over at the left-wing Politico web page, a breathless Sunday dispatch informed readers that Trump is just like George Wallace. Oh, Please! Like I said, the election is still 15 months away and you're already into this kind of scum. Get comfortable in your seats, because it is only now getting started, and if the gang is already using this kind of yellowish unjournalistic space-fill, imagine if you dare what is looming.
New York Stock Exchange Free Falls Another 1,000 Points, Then Halts Slide and Rebounds 200 Points by 11 am
Fox News reported at 11 am that the New York Stock Exchange free fell another 1,000 points after opening Monday morning, but then managed to catch itself and rebound some 200 points by 11 am. The Guardian and NBC also put the plunge at 1,000 points before the rebound began. The Guardian said that the Chinese Market experienced its biggest drop since the start of the current imbroglio. A Philadelphia analyst advised The Guardian that the free fall of stock prices would continue until "policy" makers "get a grip" on the current problems (whatever that means). On Wall Street, a reporter for The Guardian, Rupert Neate, wrote, "US stock markets collapsed on Monday, continuing a global stock market rout that has wiped hundreds of billions of dollars off shares across the world. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped by 6.4%, the S&P 500 dropped 4%, and the Nasdaq lost 8.5%, raising fears that a fresh tech bubble has burst. The drops followed already-heavy falls last week. Technology stocks were the hardest hit with Facebook losing 14% at one point and Apple off 11%....."
Michael Keane Heads In Match-Winner as Burnley Beats Back Bees, 1-0
Burnley had but two points - coming on two draws- while Brentford was undefeated. Burnley, on Friday, reportedly paid a club-record 9 million pounds for Brentford striker Andre Gray, but the closest Gray got to the Turf Moor pitch was the stands. Burnley's long struggle to find the kind of consistent offense they enjoyed during the 2013-2014 campaign seems to have no end. No matter. Defender Michael Keane, once of Manchester United, headed in a corner kick taken by David Jones, and Burnley grabbed three precious points by stopping the Bees, 1-0. The win left the Claret, 1-2-1 in 13th place, five points behind the leader, Ipswich Town (3-1-0), which has ten points. Recall that in the Championship, the first and second place finishers in the 24 team league are promoted to the Premier, while the third, fourth, fifth and sixth place finishers enter into a playoff for a third promotion to the Premier. The 22nd, 23rd and 24th place finishers are demoted to League One.
Throughout the long stretch of offensive difficulties, Burnley has continued to play competitive and exciting soccer due largely to the wonderful play of Keeper Tom Heaton and a defense led by the likes of Michael Duff, Keane, Ben Mee and Michael Kightly. Despite being demoted out of the Premier last season, Burnley at one point played three straight scoreless draws, while also winning at Arsenal and Chelsea and drawing with Manchester United. Heaton came up big again on Saturday before a crowd of almost 15,000 at Turf Moor. According to the BBC, Heaton "pushed away Alan Judge's free-kick, then kept out two shots from Lasse Vibe," keeping the match even until Keane scored to give the Claret the victory.
From The Letter of St. Paul to the Ephesians, Chapter 1, Verses 3 through 10:
Verse 3: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, Verse 4: even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. Verse 5: He destined us in love (other sources say: "Before him in love, having destined us) to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, Verse 6: to the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. Verse 7: In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace Verse 8: which he lavished upon us. Verse 9: For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ Verse 10: as a plan for the fulness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
From Bernard of Clairvaux, Essential Writings (translated by Dennis E. Tamburello, O.F.M., The Crossland Publishing Company, New York, 2000). Fr. Tamburello quotes from St. Bernard's writings on attaining true humilty. I believe that humility is the great overlooked and underemphasized trait of Christians. The Bible returns to the subject endlessly, so often, I believe, that we allow our eyes to blur is studying the Scripture on it. According to St. Bernard and Fr. Tamburello, humility has truth as a base and jumping off point.
St. Bernard, who was born in 1090 in Fontaines-les-Dijon in Burgundy, France, once wrote a letter to a new Abbot who had complained to the Saint that he was new to his office and, thus, inexperienced. "Barren modesty is not acceptable nor is humility praiseworthy when it is not in accordance with the facts. Attend to your duty. Put aside false modesty by considering youor position...You say you have no capacity for these things. As though you would have to answer for what you cannot do as well s for what you can! No, prepare yourself to answer for the one talent entrusted to you, and set your mind easy about the rest. If you have received much, then give much; if little, then give little."
About truth and its relationship to modesty, St. Bernard wrote: "There are three degrees in the perception of truth...We must look for truth in ourselves; in our neighbors; in itself. We look for truth in ourselves when we judge ourselves; in our neighbors when we have sympathy for their sufferings; in itself when we contemplate it with a clean heart. It is important to observe the order of these degrees as well as their number. First of all, truth teaches that we must look for it in our neighbors before we seek it in itself. You will then see easily why you must seek it in yourself before you seek it in your neighbors."
John Cleveland was an English poet who lived between 1615 and 1658. The emminent and essential scholar on all things poetical, Harold Bloom (b. 1930), the Sterling Professor at Yale, says that Cleveland enjoyed quite a bit of fame during his life, when he was viewed as a kind of last stand "of John Donne's metaphysical wit." Today, Bloom concedes, he is mostly known only to scholars. Too bad, because he was an outstanding and memorable poet. But what do I know? This is his poem "The Scot's Apostasie."
Is't come to this? What shall the cheeks of fame
Stretch'd with the breath of learned Loudon's name,
Be flogg'd again? And that great piece of sense,
As rich in loyalty and eloquence,
Brought to the test be found a trick of state,
Like chemist's tinctures, proved adulterate;
The devil sure such language did achieve,
To cheat our unforewarned grand-dam Eve,
As this imposture found out to be sot
The experienced English to believe a Scot,
Who reconciled the Covenant's doubtful sense,
The Commons argument, or the City's pence?
Or did you doubt persistence in one good,
Would spoil the fabric of your brotherhood,
Projected first in such a forge of sin,
Was fit for the grand devil's hammering?
Or was't ambition that this damned fact
Should tell the world you know the sins you act?
The infamy this super-treason brings.
Blasts more than murders of your sixty kings;
A crime so black, as being advisedly done,
Those hold with these no competition.
Kings only suffered then; in this doth lie
The assassination of monarchy,
Beyond this sin no one step can be trod.
If not to attempt deposing of your God.
O, were you so engaged, that we might see
Heav'ns angry lightning 'bout your ears to flee,
Till you were shrivell'd to dust, and your cold land
Parch't to a drought beyond the Libyan sand!
But 'tis reserv'd till Heaven plague you worse;
The objects of an epidemic curse,
First, may your brethren, to whose viler ends
Your power hath bawded, cease to be your friends;
And prompted by the dictate of their reason;
And may their jealousies increase and breed
Till they confine your steps beyond the Tweed.
In foreign nations may your loathed name be
A stigmatizing brand of infamy;
Till forced by general hate you cease to roam
The world, and for a plague live at home:
Till you resume your poverty, and be
Reduced to beg where none can be so free
To grant: and may your scabby land be all
Translated to a generall hospital.
Let not the sun afford one gentle ray,
To give you comfort of a summer's day;
But, as a guerdon for your traitorous war,
Love cherished only by the northern star.
No stranger deign to visit your rude coast,
And be, to all but banisht men, as lost.
And such in heightening of the indiction due
Let provok'd princes send them all to you.
Your State a chaos be, where not the law,
But power, your lives and liberties may give.
No subject 'mongst you keep a quiet breast
But each man strive through blood to be the best;
Till, for those miseries on us you've brought
By your own sword our just revenge be wrought.
To sum up all ... let your religion be
As your allegiance--maskt hypocrisie
Until when Charles shall be composed in dust
Perfum'd with epithets of good and just.
He saved--incensed Heaven may have forgot--
To afford one act of mercy to a Scot:
Unless that Scot deny himself and do
What's easier far--Renounce his nation too.
Leave it to CNN and the New York Times to yellow-up these facts. CNN's stunt was so slimy it made me wash my hands (no hand-sanitizer would begin to handle this goo). Early in the evening the CNN camera crew on site took pictures of the venue as it began - began! - to fill. Even when the University of Michigan's legendary football stadium (it seats well over 100,000) is sold out, there is a point when only 10,000 are inside. Anyway, CNN makes all of these pictures of the South Alabama stadium with 10,000 people inside. Then, later, the CNN reporter continually says that only 10,000 people are at the speech, and viewers are shown pictures of the stadium with 10,000 people inside, the same ones they made when only 10,000 people were there. The folk at Pravda would be proud. And then the CNN dogs wonder why no one watches their awful channel. The New York Times was almost as bad. They underestimated the crowd at 20,000, and captioned their coverage with the headline "Trump fails to fill stadium.' Now, you know and I know that Hilary was not filling college lecture halls at some of her awful events, but in the minds of the New York Times, it is news that 15 months prior to an election, a hurriedly planned speech by a northerner only drew 30,000. To me, an even bigger and much more profound question is what kind of depraved mind (or, in this case, minds) believe that electing Hilary president is anything but the worst kind of debauchery. Think about it. This abjectly failed person is incapable of original thought, incapable of human leadership, fully capable of criminal acts and fully capable of engaging in the kind of debauched behavior demonstrated in the Benghazi affair, including the sinister behavior at the Andrews Air Force Base when the coffins of four massacred Americans lay on the tarmac and Hilary tells the families of the dead that she will bring the man who made the film that caused the deaths to justice. Except she knew full well that no film had anything to do with the four deaths. The deaths were caused by filthy Islamic Terrorists carrying out a planned attack that Hilary knew of in advance and did absolutely nothing to prevent.
Over at the left-wing Politico web page, a breathless Sunday dispatch informed readers that Trump is just like George Wallace. Oh, Please! Like I said, the election is still 15 months away and you're already into this kind of scum. Get comfortable in your seats, because it is only now getting started, and if the gang is already using this kind of yellowish unjournalistic space-fill, imagine if you dare what is looming.
New York Stock Exchange Free Falls Another 1,000 Points, Then Halts Slide and Rebounds 200 Points by 11 am
Fox News reported at 11 am that the New York Stock Exchange free fell another 1,000 points after opening Monday morning, but then managed to catch itself and rebound some 200 points by 11 am. The Guardian and NBC also put the plunge at 1,000 points before the rebound began. The Guardian said that the Chinese Market experienced its biggest drop since the start of the current imbroglio. A Philadelphia analyst advised The Guardian that the free fall of stock prices would continue until "policy" makers "get a grip" on the current problems (whatever that means). On Wall Street, a reporter for The Guardian, Rupert Neate, wrote, "US stock markets collapsed on Monday, continuing a global stock market rout that has wiped hundreds of billions of dollars off shares across the world. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped by 6.4%, the S&P 500 dropped 4%, and the Nasdaq lost 8.5%, raising fears that a fresh tech bubble has burst. The drops followed already-heavy falls last week. Technology stocks were the hardest hit with Facebook losing 14% at one point and Apple off 11%....."
Michael Keane Heads In Match-Winner as Burnley Beats Back Bees, 1-0
Burnley had but two points - coming on two draws- while Brentford was undefeated. Burnley, on Friday, reportedly paid a club-record 9 million pounds for Brentford striker Andre Gray, but the closest Gray got to the Turf Moor pitch was the stands. Burnley's long struggle to find the kind of consistent offense they enjoyed during the 2013-2014 campaign seems to have no end. No matter. Defender Michael Keane, once of Manchester United, headed in a corner kick taken by David Jones, and Burnley grabbed three precious points by stopping the Bees, 1-0. The win left the Claret, 1-2-1 in 13th place, five points behind the leader, Ipswich Town (3-1-0), which has ten points. Recall that in the Championship, the first and second place finishers in the 24 team league are promoted to the Premier, while the third, fourth, fifth and sixth place finishers enter into a playoff for a third promotion to the Premier. The 22nd, 23rd and 24th place finishers are demoted to League One.
Throughout the long stretch of offensive difficulties, Burnley has continued to play competitive and exciting soccer due largely to the wonderful play of Keeper Tom Heaton and a defense led by the likes of Michael Duff, Keane, Ben Mee and Michael Kightly. Despite being demoted out of the Premier last season, Burnley at one point played three straight scoreless draws, while also winning at Arsenal and Chelsea and drawing with Manchester United. Heaton came up big again on Saturday before a crowd of almost 15,000 at Turf Moor. According to the BBC, Heaton "pushed away Alan Judge's free-kick, then kept out two shots from Lasse Vibe," keeping the match even until Keane scored to give the Claret the victory.
From The Letter of St. Paul to the Ephesians, Chapter 1, Verses 3 through 10:
Verse 3: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, Verse 4: even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. Verse 5: He destined us in love (other sources say: "Before him in love, having destined us) to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, Verse 6: to the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. Verse 7: In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace Verse 8: which he lavished upon us. Verse 9: For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ Verse 10: as a plan for the fulness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
From Bernard of Clairvaux, Essential Writings (translated by Dennis E. Tamburello, O.F.M., The Crossland Publishing Company, New York, 2000). Fr. Tamburello quotes from St. Bernard's writings on attaining true humilty. I believe that humility is the great overlooked and underemphasized trait of Christians. The Bible returns to the subject endlessly, so often, I believe, that we allow our eyes to blur is studying the Scripture on it. According to St. Bernard and Fr. Tamburello, humility has truth as a base and jumping off point.
St. Bernard, who was born in 1090 in Fontaines-les-Dijon in Burgundy, France, once wrote a letter to a new Abbot who had complained to the Saint that he was new to his office and, thus, inexperienced. "Barren modesty is not acceptable nor is humility praiseworthy when it is not in accordance with the facts. Attend to your duty. Put aside false modesty by considering youor position...You say you have no capacity for these things. As though you would have to answer for what you cannot do as well s for what you can! No, prepare yourself to answer for the one talent entrusted to you, and set your mind easy about the rest. If you have received much, then give much; if little, then give little."
About truth and its relationship to modesty, St. Bernard wrote: "There are three degrees in the perception of truth...We must look for truth in ourselves; in our neighbors; in itself. We look for truth in ourselves when we judge ourselves; in our neighbors when we have sympathy for their sufferings; in itself when we contemplate it with a clean heart. It is important to observe the order of these degrees as well as their number. First of all, truth teaches that we must look for it in our neighbors before we seek it in itself. You will then see easily why you must seek it in yourself before you seek it in your neighbors."
John Cleveland was an English poet who lived between 1615 and 1658. The emminent and essential scholar on all things poetical, Harold Bloom (b. 1930), the Sterling Professor at Yale, says that Cleveland enjoyed quite a bit of fame during his life, when he was viewed as a kind of last stand "of John Donne's metaphysical wit." Today, Bloom concedes, he is mostly known only to scholars. Too bad, because he was an outstanding and memorable poet. But what do I know? This is his poem "The Scot's Apostasie."
Is't come to this? What shall the cheeks of fame
Stretch'd with the breath of learned Loudon's name,
Be flogg'd again? And that great piece of sense,
As rich in loyalty and eloquence,
Brought to the test be found a trick of state,
Like chemist's tinctures, proved adulterate;
The devil sure such language did achieve,
To cheat our unforewarned grand-dam Eve,
As this imposture found out to be sot
The experienced English to believe a Scot,
Who reconciled the Covenant's doubtful sense,
The Commons argument, or the City's pence?
Or did you doubt persistence in one good,
Would spoil the fabric of your brotherhood,
Projected first in such a forge of sin,
Was fit for the grand devil's hammering?
Or was't ambition that this damned fact
Should tell the world you know the sins you act?
The infamy this super-treason brings.
Blasts more than murders of your sixty kings;
A crime so black, as being advisedly done,
Those hold with these no competition.
Kings only suffered then; in this doth lie
The assassination of monarchy,
Beyond this sin no one step can be trod.
If not to attempt deposing of your God.
O, were you so engaged, that we might see
Heav'ns angry lightning 'bout your ears to flee,
Till you were shrivell'd to dust, and your cold land
Parch't to a drought beyond the Libyan sand!
But 'tis reserv'd till Heaven plague you worse;
The objects of an epidemic curse,
First, may your brethren, to whose viler ends
Your power hath bawded, cease to be your friends;
And prompted by the dictate of their reason;
And may their jealousies increase and breed
Till they confine your steps beyond the Tweed.
In foreign nations may your loathed name be
A stigmatizing brand of infamy;
Till forced by general hate you cease to roam
The world, and for a plague live at home:
Till you resume your poverty, and be
Reduced to beg where none can be so free
To grant: and may your scabby land be all
Translated to a generall hospital.
Let not the sun afford one gentle ray,
To give you comfort of a summer's day;
But, as a guerdon for your traitorous war,
Love cherished only by the northern star.
No stranger deign to visit your rude coast,
And be, to all but banisht men, as lost.
And such in heightening of the indiction due
Let provok'd princes send them all to you.
Your State a chaos be, where not the law,
But power, your lives and liberties may give.
No subject 'mongst you keep a quiet breast
But each man strive through blood to be the best;
Till, for those miseries on us you've brought
By your own sword our just revenge be wrought.
To sum up all ... let your religion be
As your allegiance--maskt hypocrisie
Until when Charles shall be composed in dust
Perfum'd with epithets of good and just.
He saved--incensed Heaven may have forgot--
To afford one act of mercy to a Scot:
Unless that Scot deny himself and do
What's easier far--Renounce his nation too.
Yearning for Peace
BALTIMORE, Maryland August 24, 2015 - Many people believe that peace can only come, and then take hold, if mankind acts as one and lays down all of its weapons. The thinking is that we are by nature a militaristic species bent on destruction in all of its forms. Only if we renounce the substance of what we are can we actually change. I do not accept any of that. As a Christian, it is clear to me that the Lord has clearly showed us a way of life that will provide eternal peace and happiness. We were created in the very image of God. We are challenged to live our lives in a way that reflects our creator. If we live our lives in the manner spelled out in the Gospels of Christ, we will achieve our goals of a just and peaceful society.
"I was reading a review of the movie “Joyeux Noel,” a French-made movie about an actual incident that took place on Christmas Eve during World War I. The incident was a truce that broke out spontaneously along the horrid fronts between the respective combatants. The truce was not arranged by diplomats or even generals; it was arranged by soldiers in the trenches. The words below were sung, supposedly by a German soldier:
"Still through the cloven skies they come
with peaceful wings unfurled,
and still their heavenly music floats
o'er all the weary world;
above its sad and lowly plain
they bend on hovering wing,
and ever o'er its Babel-sounds
the blessed angels sing."
Yet with the woes of sin and strife
the world has suffered long;
beneath the heavenly hymn have rolled
two thousand years of wrong;
and warring humankind hears not
the tidings which they bring;
O hush the noise and cease your strife
and hear the angels sing!"
What beautiful and profound thoughts and hopes. A lad by the name of Leonard Feisig wrote the review I was reading. It was posted on Amazon in December, 2006. Humans are imbued with a sanctity that is straight from the Lord. With the power of the Holy Spirit, one can change his life and find a peace that is more powerful than all of the evil of the world combined. The Western World developed and grew as Christian. There was a time, and it was a long time, when the great universities in Europe had larger Schools of Theology than they did Academic Schools. I continue to feel it is outrageous that things secular have overtaken our society and even our way of thinking. It is to the point where Christian people are looked down on. This, even though our greatest people and our greatest minds were Christian How we got to the point in time would take months to properly analyze. I do not need anytime to conclude that the move to secularism in our society and culture is not a good thing. Christians yearn for peace and pray to the Lord to grant peace. Dear God, grant peace to this world and those who live here. Grant serenity to your people, and me..
"I was reading a review of the movie “Joyeux Noel,” a French-made movie about an actual incident that took place on Christmas Eve during World War I. The incident was a truce that broke out spontaneously along the horrid fronts between the respective combatants. The truce was not arranged by diplomats or even generals; it was arranged by soldiers in the trenches. The words below were sung, supposedly by a German soldier:
"Still through the cloven skies they come
with peaceful wings unfurled,
and still their heavenly music floats
o'er all the weary world;
above its sad and lowly plain
they bend on hovering wing,
and ever o'er its Babel-sounds
the blessed angels sing."
Yet with the woes of sin and strife
the world has suffered long;
beneath the heavenly hymn have rolled
two thousand years of wrong;
and warring humankind hears not
the tidings which they bring;
O hush the noise and cease your strife
and hear the angels sing!"
What beautiful and profound thoughts and hopes. A lad by the name of Leonard Feisig wrote the review I was reading. It was posted on Amazon in December, 2006. Humans are imbued with a sanctity that is straight from the Lord. With the power of the Holy Spirit, one can change his life and find a peace that is more powerful than all of the evil of the world combined. The Western World developed and grew as Christian. There was a time, and it was a long time, when the great universities in Europe had larger Schools of Theology than they did Academic Schools. I continue to feel it is outrageous that things secular have overtaken our society and even our way of thinking. It is to the point where Christian people are looked down on. This, even though our greatest people and our greatest minds were Christian How we got to the point in time would take months to properly analyze. I do not need anytime to conclude that the move to secularism in our society and culture is not a good thing. Christians yearn for peace and pray to the Lord to grant peace. Dear God, grant peace to this world and those who live here. Grant serenity to your people, and me..
Thursday, August 20, 2015
Former Prosecuter in Baltimore State's Attorney's Office Blasts Mosby for Incompetance and Failure to Attack Crime
"BALTIMORE, Maryland August 20, 2015 - Baltimore State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby is incompetent and hardly a crime fighter, according to an articlei n the Commentary Section of the Baltimore Sun. The paper itself has morphed into an uber left newsletter (except for the Sports Pages, which continue to hold out), so the placement of this article seems unfathonable. Under the headline, "Mosby derailed program to analyze Baltimore homicides," and the sub-headline, "Baltimore police and prosecutors struggle with witness cooperation," writer Roya Hanna, a former Assistant State's Attorney, wrote in the August 12 editions of the paper:
"It is only August, and Baltimore is staring at 200 dead men, women and children. Having been a prosecutor in this city for 12 years, four in the Homicide Division, I can no longer stand idly by and watch State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby avoid taking responsibility for her role in the increase in violence. The most recent example of her questionable leadership is her decision to restrict the Homicide Review Commission to closed cases that occurred before she became state's attorney. She claims the program is a waste of money, places witnesses in jeopardy and is pointless because she knows the reason for the increase in violence is drugs.
"When I was involved in the commission in its early stages, organizers asked us to send one prosecutor, for one afternoon, once a month. It did not cost the state's attorney's office anything except time. Coming off the deadliest month in decades –— deadliest in our history per capita — is now really the time to be turning down free help? In Ms. Mosby's recent op-ed she claimed that she was limiting the office's participation to closed cases out of concern for witnesses' safety. All experienced prosecutors know the dangers of being labeled a snitch do not end when the case closes. Where was her purported concern for witnesses' safety when her administration published a press release including the name of a witness on April 15? (It was later changed after complaints.) Certainly sharing a witness' involvement with the whole city is more dangerous than sharing it with three researchers from Johns Hopkins who could have been required to sign a non-disclosure agreement.
"Ms. Mosby indicated that she already knows the reason for the increase in homicides: drugs and gangs. In February, her administration sent out a memo stating that for all nonviolent crimes prosecutors were "expected and encouraged" to offer probation and services, unless the defendant had a violent history. If, as she claims, the increase in violence is caused by drugs, constantly offering probation to drug dealers is senseless. Her decisions also have led to irresponsibly light plea offers for violent crimes. Despite the prosecutor's office already being short staffed, in her first week, Ms. Mosby fired six well respected prosecutors with extensive violent crime experience — one in the middle of a robbery trial. At least 10 more trial attorneys have left the office since then. Their cases were redistributed to new prosecutors who were forced to try the cases unprepared or plea them to incredibly low sentences. I have been in court and watched case after case plea to sentences that would have never been offered a year ago. While Ms. Mosby's predecessor had a strict policy about invoking mandatory sentences for gun cases, the current administration has no such policy. The "bad guys with guns" get slaps on the wrist.
"Felony prosecutor positions have been left vacant for months while Ms. Mosby added staff to her media team and community outreach people. Before becoming a prosecutor, I helped found the National Center for Community Prosecution. I fully understand the benefit of community outreach programs, but first and foremost the prosecutor's office has to prosecute crimes. Ms. Mosby has allocated over $1 million in salaries for newly created positions for people who do not regularly prosecute cases. Ms. Mosby's press conference announcing her decision to indict the officers involved in the Freddie Gray arrest had a chilling effect on the Baltimore Police Department. The state's attorney's office has always prosecuted police officers for crimes, including murder, and I have personally tried and convicted a former police officer for shooting an unarmed man and was trying another one for murder when I left the office. It is not officers being charged that impacted the department but the words and political rhetoric that accompanied those charges. Ms. Mosby has demonstrated that if she disagrees with an officer's assessment of probable cause to make an arrest, the officer will be charged. Following her press conference, city arrests dropped and violence increased because officers cannot trust that she won't again decide to place their futures in jeopardy.
"While specifics needed to be worked out, the Homicide Review Commission could hold agencies accountable. Unlike programs that just track trends, the fledgling commission looked to see if a homicide could have been prevented. It could do that without any witness information. For example, if a suspect had a case dismissed, the commission would see if better case handling could have prevented the suspect from being released. Of the 200 murders so far this year, 28 cases have led to charges against roughly 30 people. Five of those defendants were released this year in earlier cases under the Mosby administration. Had these cases been handled differently, had her office worked more effectively with police or made stronger arguments in court, perhaps the victims would still be alive.
"I call upon the Mosby administration to allow an independent group to examine the records of suspects involved in the recent violence to see if they were released under the current administration. The administration should also release statistics reflecting outcomes and sentences in felony cases. Those statistics will allow for an accurate assessment of the performance of her office. It is time for the community to have an informed discussion about what is happening in the state's attorney office and how it is affecting the lives of every resident. Ms. Mosby speaks often of her commitment to transparency; now is the time to see if those words are genuine.
Roya Hanna is a former Baltimore assistant state's attorney who left the office in April to open a criminal defense practice. Her email is attorney@baltimorejustice.com. The Story below ran the same day as a feature article.
"Repeat offenders? Though Ms. Mosby's office argues extenuating circumstances in some instances, five of the roughly 30 people charged in the city's 200 killings thus far this year were released in other cases under Marilyn Mosby's administration:
"Donnell Walker: His handgun case pled to probation before judgment on Jan. 8; he is alleged to have killed Victor Gwaultney on March 25.
"Charles Henson: He was out on bail in a felony drug case pending when he allegedly killed Davon Johnson on Jan. 28. Even though the SAO indicted him for murder in February, his felony drug case, in which he could have received 20 years or more, was pled in June to time served.
"Brandon Payton: He was charged with rioting and released on bail on June 4; he is alleged to have killed Steve Bass on June 12.
"Davon Vennie: His felony drug case was dismissed on June 26; he is alleged to have killed Nathaniel Jackson on July 2.
"Randy Jones: He was out on bail in a first-degree assault case when his case was postponed July 2; he is alleged to have killed Antonio Anderson on July 7."
"It is only August, and Baltimore is staring at 200 dead men, women and children. Having been a prosecutor in this city for 12 years, four in the Homicide Division, I can no longer stand idly by and watch State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby avoid taking responsibility for her role in the increase in violence. The most recent example of her questionable leadership is her decision to restrict the Homicide Review Commission to closed cases that occurred before she became state's attorney. She claims the program is a waste of money, places witnesses in jeopardy and is pointless because she knows the reason for the increase in violence is drugs.
"When I was involved in the commission in its early stages, organizers asked us to send one prosecutor, for one afternoon, once a month. It did not cost the state's attorney's office anything except time. Coming off the deadliest month in decades –— deadliest in our history per capita — is now really the time to be turning down free help? In Ms. Mosby's recent op-ed she claimed that she was limiting the office's participation to closed cases out of concern for witnesses' safety. All experienced prosecutors know the dangers of being labeled a snitch do not end when the case closes. Where was her purported concern for witnesses' safety when her administration published a press release including the name of a witness on April 15? (It was later changed after complaints.) Certainly sharing a witness' involvement with the whole city is more dangerous than sharing it with three researchers from Johns Hopkins who could have been required to sign a non-disclosure agreement.
"Ms. Mosby indicated that she already knows the reason for the increase in homicides: drugs and gangs. In February, her administration sent out a memo stating that for all nonviolent crimes prosecutors were "expected and encouraged" to offer probation and services, unless the defendant had a violent history. If, as she claims, the increase in violence is caused by drugs, constantly offering probation to drug dealers is senseless. Her decisions also have led to irresponsibly light plea offers for violent crimes. Despite the prosecutor's office already being short staffed, in her first week, Ms. Mosby fired six well respected prosecutors with extensive violent crime experience — one in the middle of a robbery trial. At least 10 more trial attorneys have left the office since then. Their cases were redistributed to new prosecutors who were forced to try the cases unprepared or plea them to incredibly low sentences. I have been in court and watched case after case plea to sentences that would have never been offered a year ago. While Ms. Mosby's predecessor had a strict policy about invoking mandatory sentences for gun cases, the current administration has no such policy. The "bad guys with guns" get slaps on the wrist.
"Felony prosecutor positions have been left vacant for months while Ms. Mosby added staff to her media team and community outreach people. Before becoming a prosecutor, I helped found the National Center for Community Prosecution. I fully understand the benefit of community outreach programs, but first and foremost the prosecutor's office has to prosecute crimes. Ms. Mosby has allocated over $1 million in salaries for newly created positions for people who do not regularly prosecute cases. Ms. Mosby's press conference announcing her decision to indict the officers involved in the Freddie Gray arrest had a chilling effect on the Baltimore Police Department. The state's attorney's office has always prosecuted police officers for crimes, including murder, and I have personally tried and convicted a former police officer for shooting an unarmed man and was trying another one for murder when I left the office. It is not officers being charged that impacted the department but the words and political rhetoric that accompanied those charges. Ms. Mosby has demonstrated that if she disagrees with an officer's assessment of probable cause to make an arrest, the officer will be charged. Following her press conference, city arrests dropped and violence increased because officers cannot trust that she won't again decide to place their futures in jeopardy.
"While specifics needed to be worked out, the Homicide Review Commission could hold agencies accountable. Unlike programs that just track trends, the fledgling commission looked to see if a homicide could have been prevented. It could do that without any witness information. For example, if a suspect had a case dismissed, the commission would see if better case handling could have prevented the suspect from being released. Of the 200 murders so far this year, 28 cases have led to charges against roughly 30 people. Five of those defendants were released this year in earlier cases under the Mosby administration. Had these cases been handled differently, had her office worked more effectively with police or made stronger arguments in court, perhaps the victims would still be alive.
"I call upon the Mosby administration to allow an independent group to examine the records of suspects involved in the recent violence to see if they were released under the current administration. The administration should also release statistics reflecting outcomes and sentences in felony cases. Those statistics will allow for an accurate assessment of the performance of her office. It is time for the community to have an informed discussion about what is happening in the state's attorney office and how it is affecting the lives of every resident. Ms. Mosby speaks often of her commitment to transparency; now is the time to see if those words are genuine.
Roya Hanna is a former Baltimore assistant state's attorney who left the office in April to open a criminal defense practice. Her email is attorney@baltimorejustice.com. The Story below ran the same day as a feature article.
"Repeat offenders? Though Ms. Mosby's office argues extenuating circumstances in some instances, five of the roughly 30 people charged in the city's 200 killings thus far this year were released in other cases under Marilyn Mosby's administration:
"Donnell Walker: His handgun case pled to probation before judgment on Jan. 8; he is alleged to have killed Victor Gwaultney on March 25.
"Charles Henson: He was out on bail in a felony drug case pending when he allegedly killed Davon Johnson on Jan. 28. Even though the SAO indicted him for murder in February, his felony drug case, in which he could have received 20 years or more, was pled in June to time served.
"Brandon Payton: He was charged with rioting and released on bail on June 4; he is alleged to have killed Steve Bass on June 12.
"Davon Vennie: His felony drug case was dismissed on June 26; he is alleged to have killed Nathaniel Jackson on July 2.
"Randy Jones: He was out on bail in a first-degree assault case when his case was postponed July 2; he is alleged to have killed Antonio Anderson on July 7."
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