Saint George and King Charles I

But the knight, turning him about, bade her remain where she was, and went out to meet the dragon.

When it observed him approach, the beast was struck with amazement, and, having paused for but a moment, it ran toward the knight with a great swiftness, and beating its dark wings upon the ground as it ran.

 

When it drew near to him, it puffed out from its nostrils a smoke so dense that the knight was enveloped in it as in a cloud; and darted hot flames from its eyes. Rearing its horrid body, it beat against the knight, dealing him fearful blows; but he, bending, thrust his spear against it, and caught the blows upon his shield. 

~ Legend of St. George and the Dragon

St. George's Day is on April 23. St. George is the patron saint of England as well as the patron of the Royal Order of the Garter, the order of chivalry cherished by King Charles I. The legend of St. George and the dragon was one of the most popular stories in the Middle Ages. St. George is generally believed to have lived in Asia Minor and to have suffered under the Emperor Diocletian. Ascalon, the sword of St. George, was celebrated by knights who took the martyred warrior as the patron of chivalry. While his name became the battle-cry of Merry Old England, St. George  was universally venerated in both the East and the West; in the Roman Church he was one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers.

While we know there was indeed a martyr named George, how true is the account of his battle with the dragon? According to New Advent:

This episode of the dragon is in fact a very late development, which cannot be traced further back than the twelfth or thirteenth century. It is found in the Golden Legend (Historia Lombardic of James de Voragine and to this circumstance it probably owes its wide diffusion. It may have been derived from an allegorization of the tyrant Diocletian or Dadianus, who is sometimes called a dragon (ho bythios drakon) in the older text, but despite the researches of Vetter (Reinbot von Durne, pp.lxxv-cix) the origin of the dragon story remains very obscure. In any case the late occurrence of this development refutes the attempts made to derive it from pagan sources....

The best known form of the legend of St. George and the Dragon is that made popular by the "Legenda Aurea", and translated into English by Caxton. According to this, a terrible dragon had ravaged all the country round a city of Libya, called Selena, making its lair in a marshy swamp. Its breath caused pestilence whenever it approached the town, so the people gave the monster two sheep every day to satisfy its hunger, but, when the sheep failed, a human victim was necessary and lots were drawn to determine the victim.

On one occasion the lot fell to the king's little daughter. The king offered all his wealth to purchase a substitute, but the people had pledged themselves that no substitutes should be allowed, and so the maiden, dressed as a bride, was led to the marsh. There St. George chanced to ride by, and asked the maiden what she did, but she bade him leave her lest he also might perish. The good knight stayed, however, and, when the dragon appeared, St. George, making the sign of the cross, bravely attacked it and transfixed it with his lance. Then asking the maiden for her girdle (an incident in the story which may possibly have something to do with St. George's selection as patron of the Order of the Garter), he bound it round the neck of the monster, and thereupon the princess was able to lead it like a lamb.

They then returned to the city, where St. George bade the people have no fear but only be baptized, after which he cut off the dragon's head and the townsfolk were all converted. The king would have given George half his kingdom, but the saint replied that he must ride on, bidding the king meanwhile take good care of God's churches, honour the clergy, and have pity on the poor. The earliest reference to any such episode in art is probably to be found in an old Roman tombstone at Conisborough in Yorkshire, considered to belong to the first half of the twelfth century. Here the princess is depicted as already in the dragon's clutches, while an abbot stands by and blesses the rescuer.

The key to the legend of St. George is that it epitomizes the spiritual combat in which all Christians are engaged, on one level or another. As Fr. Blake explains:

I love saints like St George, whose true story is lost in myth. In both stories George becomes a Christian "everyman". The first legend reminds us that despite every attempt to overcome him by God's grace George endures and survives all, and even in death is victorious.

The second story draws on apocalyptic imagery, the dragon is the symbol of evil, the power of sin, but here it is to be contrasted with the pure virgin. I am reminded of St Athanasius' struggle for twenty years in the tomb against demons. In all of us there is the pure virgin and the dragon. George, here takes on the attributes of St Michael (Michael means "Who is like God"), in his struggle he overcomes evil which then becomes subject to purity.

King Charles I was greatly devoted to the chivalric mission of the English Order of the Garter, founded by Edward III on Saint George's Day, 1348. Charles I had the Garter Star embroidered on the cloaks of all the knights, as a "testimony to the World." From The Victoria and Albert:

This form of the Order of the Garter (the highest order of English knighthood) as a star was introduced by Charles I (ruled 1625-1649) in 1627. It was to be worn by Knights of the Garter 'upon the left part of their cloaks, coats and riding cassocks, at all times when they shall not wear their robes, and in all places and assemblies...a testimony to the World, of the honour they hold...the Order Instituted and Ordained for persons of the highest honour and greatest worth'. (Read more.)

A pendant of Saint George slaying the dragon was also worn. From Sotheby's:

By the end of the fifteenth century a collar had been added to the regalia, possibly as a result of the influence of foreign Orders where a collar was worn to form a badge. The collar design has changed very little since its introduction being composed of a series of gold heraldic knots and roses encircled by the Garter, with a hanging pendant of St George slaying a dragon, known as the Great George.  As for other British chivalric orders, the collar is worn on ceremonial occasions and designated Collar Days throughout the year.

Over time the collar came to be regarded as an encumbrance during ordinary activities and by the early sixteenth century the first reference can be found to the Lesser George [Lots 24; 28], an image of St George encircled with the Garter worn as a separate badge. Lesser Georges were originally hung from a blue ribbon around the neck so as to be worn upon the breast. But by the late seventeenth century it had become practice to sling the Lesser George under the right arm, a contemporary chronicler explaining that this was for ‘conveniency of riding and action’. (Read more.)

From the Royal Collection Trust:

A length of blue silk attached to a book in the Royal Collection may in fact be the Garter ribbon worn by Charles I as he sat for Sir Anthony van Dyck’s famous triple portrait, scientific analysis has revealed. The portrait and the ribbon will be brought together for the first time for In Fine Style: The Art of Tudor and Stuart Fashion, which opens on 10 May, 2013, at The Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace.  The exhibition explores the changing fashions of the rich and powerful of the Tudor and Stuart era through paintings, drawings and prints, as well as rare surviving examples of clothing and accessories.

Charles I placed great importance on the Order of the Garter, the oldest and highest order of chivalry in England – even wearing a Garter badge to his execution in 1649.  Fourteen years earlier, in Van Dyck’s portrait, the monarch is shown wearing a pale blue Garter ribbon around his neck. 

The inclusion of Van Dyck’s painting in the exhibition prompted Royal Collection Trust curators to take a closer look at four lengths of blue silk ribbon attached to the binding of a copy of the Eikon Basilike (‘The Royal Portrait’), now in the Royal Library, Windsor Castle.  The book was first published just ten days after the monarch’s execution on 30 January 1649 and quickly became one of the biggest-selling books of the 17th century, fuelling the image of Charles I as a martyr. (Read more.)

Charles I never converted to Catholicism, in spite of his wife Queen Henrietta Maria's efforts and prayers. He continued to collect recusancy fines from practicing Catholics throughout his personal rule. However, he frequently showed  leniency to Catholics who had been arrested. Charles insisted that the Church of England be hierarchical and appointed bishops who were in favor of a majestic and dignified liturgy. His mentor and Archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud, upset the Puritans when he said that the Church of Rome was not the "Whore of Babylon." (In spite of that, Henrietta Maria never liked him.) From The Amish Catholic on the life and death of Charles I:

A few years ago, Fr. Hunwicke produced a very good argument as to why, canonically and liturgically, a soul who died in schism could be recognized as a saint (taking the precedent of various Eastern saints like Palamas and Gregory of Narek). He has argued for a favorable reading of Charles’s Catholicizing tendencies before.

I would add my voice to Fr. Hunwicke’s. Charles was, on the whole, a boon to the Catholic Church. Charles’s marriage to a formidable Catholic princess, Henrietta Maria of France, saw the arrival at court of Roman Catholic priests, a first since the days of Mary Tudor. He allowed the ambassadors of foreign courts to hold their own chaplains, notably at St. James’s, Spanish Place. Charles even opened up diplomatic talks with the Pope for the first time in decades, receiving more than one papal legate during his personal reign. High-level talks about reunion between the two churches were carried on in secret. He wrote to the Pope, in a letter of 1623 preserved and collected for publication by Sir Charles Petrie (1935),

Be your holiness persuaded that I am, and ever shall be, of such moderation as to keep aloof, as far as possible, from every undertaking which may testify any hatred towards the Roman Catholic religion. Nay, rather I will seize all opportunities, by a gentle and generous mode of conduct, to remove all sinister suspicions entirely; so that, as we all confess one undivided Trinity and one Christ crucified, we may be banded together unanimously into one faith. (See Petrie, The Letters…of King Charles I, pg. 16).

Of course, Charles was inconstant in these measures of good will. He was harsher on Recusants when it came to fines, but significantly lowered priest-hunting efforts. I believe I will not err in saying that, among the many martyrs of the English Reformation, none came during the King’s personal reign in the 1630’s. I only count four overall, of which we can probably acquit Charles from the burden of guilt. The two Catholics executed in 1628 – St. Edmund Arrowsmith, a Jesuit, and Blessed Richard Herst, a layman – seem to have fallen victim to the prejudices of lower officials rather than to any especially anti-Catholic venom emanating from the Crown. And once trouble with the Scots and Parliament began, Charles attempted to hold the situation together by, among other things, clamping down on priests. But even those martyrs which followed in the wake of these efforts owe their deaths more to the actions of local and middling anti-Papist forces than to the intentions of a harried crown. Only two seem to have died in 1641, the last year the King had any discernible control over what was going on in London. Realistically, it would be more appropriate to blame parliament for those deaths. In his church appointments, Charles always preferred those clerics who showed a marked sympathy to the doctrine of Rome. William Laud is only one among several examples that could be cited. (Read more.)

This triple portrait by Van Dyck was for the purpose of making a sculpture of the King

 

Henrietta Maria holding a butterfly

 

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‘Trumping’ Woke Savages

 From Chronicles:

In 2021, the New York City Council voted unanimously to remove a bronze statue of Jefferson from its chamber. The statue had stood there since 1834. Councilors framed the sculpture as a constant reminder of injustices once perpetrated against racial minorities. They cited Jefferson’s ownership of slaves as the embodiment of that injustice while ignoring his authorship of the Declaration of Independence.

At the University of Virginia, which Jefferson founded, the student newspaper published an editorial demanding the removal of every reference to him. It accused the famously liberal university of upholding white supremacy. The editorial even linked Jefferson’s presence to the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville.

Efforts to diminish Jefferson have reached his historic home at Monticello. Exhibits and programming there face justified criticism for fixating on his slaveholding and supposed relationship with Sally Hemings. These displays overshadow his roles as statesman, inventor, and advocate for individual liberty. (Read more.)

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The Second Partition of Poland

 From Charles Coulombe:

THE First Partition of Poland was a dreadful blow, not just to Polish morale, but that of the Lithuanians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians with whom they shared the Commonwealth. The Allied Powers — Russia, Prussia, and Austria — that had undertaken the First Partition were watchful over any signs of independence that the Polish King and government might exert. Russia in particular supervised both the meeting of the Sejm and the Permanent Council made up of pro-Russian nobles and now deputed to carry on most of the business of governing. Stanislaus’ royal prerogative was restricted, so that he lost the right to confer noble titles, and military promotions and to appoint ministers and senators. Provincial Governorships, and Crown lands would be auctioned off. With the King reduced to seeming impotence, and the government firmly in pro-Russian hands, it seemed that the Commonwealth was now a complete puppet.

But King Stanislaus was a wily man. There was strong Conservative opposition to the Council, made up of nobility who feared loss of their own powers to a resurgent central government. The King became adept at playing the two sides off against each other and creating his own King’s party. Moreover, although his own powers had been severely clipped, his ability to influence and cajole became if anything ever stronger. He became very adept at mitigating or frustrating the worst of legislation that the Russians favoured. In secret, with trusted advisers, he created a reform programme. But while the King was able to slow the rate of decay, his opponents in the Sejm were able to block his reforms.

This standoff would continue for almost two decades. But on the wider world, things were happening. In 1781, Austria and Russia allied as a means of countering — and, they hoped, eventually conquering — the Ottomans (Catherine the Great had one of her grandsons named Constantine, in hopes that he would reign over a new Byzantine Empire). Stanislaus attempted to join this alliance, reasoning that it would strengthen Poland-Lithuania, and buy the country some independence. They were unable to agree on terms, but in 1787, the two Christian Empires went to war with the Muslim one. In response, Stanislaus convoked the “Great Sejm” the following year, which would sit for four years. Then in 1789, the revolution in France began, and that country created a constitution. (Read more.)

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The Death of Jacques de Molay

 

Awhile ago I listened to a fabulous book on the Templars by historian Barbara Frale, who spent years researching in the Vatican secret archives. Templars were not ordained to the priesthood but professed vows like monks. They were accused of heresy by King Philip IV of France. The Templars were absolved of the accusations of heresy by the Pope, only to be executed by King Philip. Philip wanted the wealth of the Templars and would stop at nothing to get it. The execution of the Templar Grand Master Jacques de Molay and his brethren was in violation of Church law, rather like the execution of St. Joan of Arc. When Jacques de Molay was bound to the stake on an island in the Seine near Notre Dame de Paris, he asked that his arms remain free. While burning, the Grand Master lifted his arms towards the spire of Notre Dame, offering his life to Our Lady, as once his order had been completely consecrated to her. From Dominic Selwood:

In Paris, King Philip immediately saw that the tide was turning against him, and that he needed to do something decisive. He therefore summoned the bishop of Sens and forced him to re-examine the Templars in his diocese. When 54 Templars insisted on their innocence, the bishop dutifully denounced them as relapsed heretics.

As Philip had known all along, a heretic who confessed was welcomed as a lost sheep, given penance, and reconciled to the Church. But if the penitent then slipped back into the heresy, he had rejected all grace, spurned salvation, and was a direct threat to Christian society.

On the 12th of May 1310, as Philip knew he would, the bishop of Sens burned the 54 Templars alive. This appalling cruelty gave Philip the shot in the arm he needed. The remaining Templar resistance petered out.

The sorry tale was drawing to a close. In October 1311, the long-awaited Council of Vienne opened to give final judgement. The evidence did not amount to much. The only Templars who had comprehensively confessed to Philip’s 127 charges were the ones tortured in his dungeons or those in territories loyal to him. There were virtually no confessions from abroad.

True to form, Philip showed up to threaten Clement with physical violence unless he shut down the Templars. There were protests from the other church delegates, who felt the Templars had not been given an opportunity to defend themselves. They also pointed to the suspicious similarity of the charges with those Philip had recently brought against the dead Pope Boniface VIII. None of this helped Clement, who threatened anyone who spoke further with excommunication.

Finally clear to impose Philip’s will, in March 1312, with Philip and his son flanking him, Clement issued the bull Vox in excelso. Citing the irreparable damage done to the Templars’ reputation, he pronounced judgement with a formula that completely sidestepped the question of innocence or guilt:

We suppress, with the approval of the sacred council, the order of Templars, and its rule, habit and name, by an inviolable and perpetual decree, and we entirely forbid that anyone from now on enter the order, or receive or wear its habit, or presume to behave as a Templar. (Vox in excelso)

It was over. All that remained was to tie up the loose ends. Templars who had confessed crimes were sentenced to imprisonment. Those who had remained silent were sent to other religious Orders.

To draw down the final curtain, on the 18th of March 1314 the four most senior living Templars were hauled to Paris. On a rostrum erected on the parvis before the great cathedral of Notre-Dame, they were publicly condemned to perpetual imprisonment. Hugues de Pairaud and Geoffroi de Gonneville accepted the sentences in silence. But Jacques de Molay and Geoffroi de Charney stunned the crowd by talking over the cardinals and professing their innocence and that of the Temple.

The electrifying news was rushed across the city to King Philip at the Louvre. Desperate to crush this dangerous new defiance, he abandoned all legal procedures and ordered the two old Templars to be burned without delay.

So as dusk fell and the canons of Notre-Dame lit the candles and incense for the lucernare before Vespers, the provost of Paris’s men torched two nearby pyres and sent de Molay and de Pairaud up in smoke alongside the canons’ prayers.

A royal chaplain eyewitness described de Molay’s last words (in verse):

“God knows who is in the wrong and has sinned. Misfortune will soon befall those who have wrongly condemned us; God will avenge our deaths. Make no mistake, all who are against us will suffer because of us. I beseech you to turn my face towards the Virgin Mary, of whom our Lord Christ was born.” His request was granted, and so gently was he taken by death that everyone marvelled. (Geoffroi de Paris)

Rumours began to circulate that, at the end, de Molay had also shouted out, summoning Philip and Clement to meet him within a year and a day before God, where they would be judged for their crimes. (Read more.)

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Color Revolution: Thune and Johnson Built the Runway for a One Party State

 From Amuse on X:

On April 17, 2026, the veteran Democrat strategist James Carville and the longtime journalist Al Hunt sat down for their Politicon podcast and described, on the record, the architecture of a one party American state. A listener had asked a hypothetical. Hunt answered that the first order of business after a 2027 Democrat Congress would be to “hold Trump as accountable as they possibly can.” Carville went further. On day one of unified Democrat control, he said, “they should make Puerto Rico [and] D.C. a state, and they should expand the Supreme Court to 13. Fuck it. Eat our dust.” Then came the sentence that should be read aloud in every Republican campaign office in the country. “Don’t run on it. Don’t talk about it. Just do it.”

That sentence is the thesis of this essay. Everything that follows is commentary on it.

Consider first what an ordinary political promise looks like. A candidate announces a program, explains its tradeoffs, and asks voters to ratify it. The ratification is the mandate, and the mandate is the moral basis on which the program moves. Carville has proposed the opposite. He is instructing Democrat candidates to run on grievance, on tariffs, on the cost of eggs, on the 2026 slogan he has suggested, “We demand a repeal,” and then to execute, in office, a structural program the candidates deliberately concealed from the voters. An intelligent reader may ask whether this is really so different from ordinary political surprise. Politicians disappoint voters all the time. The difference is scale. What Carville described is not a broken campaign promise. It is a coordinated remaking of the constitutional order, executed behind a campaign designed to prevent voters from weighing in on it. The deception is not incidental to the program. It is the program’s operating assumption.

Now consider what the program is. Nine pillars can be extracted from Democrat statements on the record, and each one, considered in isolation, would be a generational fight. Considered together, they are a color revolution.

The first pillar is a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Hunt’s phrase, “hold Trump as accountable as they possibly can,” has a specific vehicle behind it. In October 2020, Robert Reich, Bill Clinton’s former Labor Secretary, called for a post Trump commission that would name every official, politician, executive, and media figure whose conduct “enabled this catastrophe.” Senator Elizabeth Warren has floated a version. In February 2026, John Kenneth White of Catholic University published a column in The Hill invoking Nelson Mandela’s 1995 South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission as the explicit model. Readers are told the South African TRC was a neutral reconciliation mechanism. It was not. It was a state commission empowered to establish an officially sanctioned national narrative, and that narrative became the moral scaffolding for black economic empowerment laws that the South African Institute of Race Relations, the Tax Foundation, and the Cato Institute have all documented as a codified regime of race based discrimination. A 1998 study by South Africa’s own Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation found that most surveyed victims believed the TRC had failed to produce reconciliation but instead solidified government control of the ‘truth’ and the narrative. That is the template. An American TRC would haul sitting Republican officials, conservative judges, and possibly Supreme Court Justices before televised hearings to extract confessions or condemnations, codify those moments into a federal record of Republican wrongdoing, and use that record as the permission structure for the prosecutions, the statutes, and the purges that follow. The goal is not truth. The goal is compliance. (Read more.)

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Daily Life in Ancient Mesopotamia

 From The Collector:

Over 6,000 years ago, along the banks of the mighty Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, civilization took its first teetering steps towards glory. Mesopotamia, within the Fertile Crescent that stretched from these rivers to Egypt, has been called the Cradle of Civilization for good reason. It was here that the Sumerian culture flourished, followed by the Akkadians, the Babylonians, and the Assyrians, all intriguing societies in their own right. And all were nourished by the geography of the land and the rich soil it provided. This geography and the vicissitudes of the rivers shaped daily life, demanding co-operation on a massive scale, and fostering the birth of civilization. From kings and gods to the merchants, farmers, and laborers, all had their role to play.

The origin of the Sumerians is a debated topic, but by the Late Chalcolithic Era, they had established several city-states in Lower Mesopotamia, which continued to grow and evolve into the Bronze Age. No longer small settlements, these cities had centralized governments, organized religion, access to developed trade networks, and social hierarchies that reflected the move from Neolithic settlements to fully fledged civilizations.

These Sumerian cities followed similar themes in their culture and construction. At the center of each city was a ziggurat, a huge pyramidal temple dedicated to the city’s patron god or goddess. Surrounding each ziggurat was a large complex that housed the city’s priests and religious elite. Temples also served as banks and conducted trade, providing valuable services to the city’s residents, in addition to their religious endeavors. (Read more.)

 

From The Greek Reporter:

Sumerian civilization appears to have been established in southern Mesopotamia around 4000 BC, while some historians place it as far back as 5000 BC. Established in the Fertile Crescent between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers in modern-day Iraq, Sumer was the first urban civilization in the region. From early on, they had developed skills in farming and raising cattle. They also wove textiles and were skilled carpenters and pottery makers. More importantly, Sumerians are credited with inventing the wheel around 2500 BC. Mesopotamians are noted for developing one of the first written scripts around 3000 BC in the form of wedge-shaped marks pressed into clay tablets. This cuneiform script was also adapted and used for roughly two thousand years by surrounding peoples. (Read more.)

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My Lagan Love

Where Lagan stream sings lullaby 
There blows a lily fair 
The twilight gleam is in her eye 
The night is on her hair 
And like a love-sick leánan sídhe
She has my heart in thrall 
Nor life I own nor liberty 
For love is lord of all.  

Her father sails a running-barge 
'Twixt Leamh-beag and The Druim; 
And on the lonely river-marge 
She clears his hearth for him. 
When she was only fairy-high 
Her gentle mother died; 
But dew-Love keeps her memory 
Green on the Lagan side.  

And often when the beetle's horn 
Hath lulled the eve to sleep 
I steal unto her shieling lorn 
And thru the dooring peep. 
There on the cricket's singing stone, 
She spares the bogwood fire, 
And hums in sad sweet undertone 
The songs of heart's desire  

Her welcome, like her love for me, 
Is from her heart within: 
Her warm kiss is felicity 
That knows no taint of sin.
And, when I stir my foot to go, 
'Tis leaving Love and light
To feel the wind of longing blow 
From out the dark of night.  

Where Lagan stream sings lullaby 
There blows a lily fair 
The twilight gleam is in her eye 
The night is on her hair 
And like a love-sick leánan sídhe
She has my heart in thrall 
Nor life I owe nor liberty 
For love is lord of all. 

(from an old Irish song)
A beautiful rendition, HERE, HERE and HERE.

To quote from Mary O'Hara's notes on this song, from her book A Song For Ireland:

The leánan sídhe (fairy mistress) mentioned in the song is a malicious figure who frequently crops up in Gaelic love stories. One could call her the femme fatale of Gaelic folklore. She sought the love of men; if they refused, she became their slave, but if they consented, they became her slaves and could only escape by finding another to take their place. She fed off them so her lovers gradually wasted away - a common enough theme in Gaelic medieval poetry, which often saw love as a kind of sickness. Most Gaelic poets in the past had their leanán sídhe to give them inspiration. This malignant fairy was for them a sort of Gaelic muse. On the other hand, the crickets mentioned in the song are a sign of good luck and their sound on the hearth a good omen. It was the custom of newly-married couples about to set up home to bring crickets from the hearths of their parents' house....

Waterhouse's "Hylas and the Nymphs"

 

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Eating the Elephant One Bite at a Time

 From Tierney's Real News:

Trump has always been honest about what he values: battlefield presence, TV “central casting” presence, and the ability to sell his strategies to the public and keep the base fired up.

Pam Bondi did her job — she empaneled grand juries, put boots on the ground in Florida, and set the stage for the prosecutions Trump wanted to see. Ultimately, her track record in cases is the best the DOJ has seen in 50 years. But she never really learned how to play the media board. She is better in a courtroom than on TV.

Bondi is good at the mechanics of the job. She lined up cases. She did her best to put the right prosecutors in place. She cleared the way for the kind of RICO‑style grand conspiracy work now targeting figures like John Brennan. In that sense, she was the perfect rook: you move her straight into the right squares and then let someone else handle the finishing moves.

Trump loved Pam Bondi enough to put her in the Attorney General’s chair, but he also found out she’s not built for the TV war — so he’s moved her to the private sector, where she can amplify his message like Dan Bongino is doing right now - rather than slow‑walk it from inside the DOJ. Remember, President Trump said nobody knows how someone will perform until they are tested. Correct!

Now Tulsi Gabbard, Todd Blanche, Kash Patel, and Joe diGenova are lining up the pieces for what could be the biggest legal reckoning in the deep state’s history.

Trump still loves her, but he’s not blind. He knows that if you’re going to run the Justice Department in a hyper‑visible political war, you need someone who can show up on TV, talk directly to the camera, and keep the Fox‑News‑and‑talk‑radio‑aligned audience engaged. That’s not Bondi’s strength. That’s Blanche’s role now.

Her move to the private sector could be a lot more useful than harmful. She can go out and talk, write, build a media presence, and operate like Dan Bongino — not from inside the bureaucracy, but as an outside voice that amplifies what the administration is doing. That’s often more powerful than a hesitant, over‑cautious mouthpiece in a government chair. (Read more.)

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Romans, Not “Byzantines”

 From Medievalists:

Few historical civilizations suffer from a greater identity mismatch than the Byzantine Empire. To modern readers, “Byzantine” conjures images of decadence, intrigue, and a shadowy afterlife of ancient Rome. Yet to the people who lived in the empire we now call Byzantine, this label would have been meaningless. They did not call themselves Byzantines. They did not believe they lived in a successor state. They were Rhomaioi—Romans—and their empire was the Roman Empire.

Understanding how Byzantines saw themselves is more than a matter of semantics. It reshapes our understanding of medieval history, Roman continuity, and the profound cultural divide between Eastern and Western Europe. The Byzantine self-image as Roman endured for more than a thousand years, surviving language change, religious transformation, territorial loss, and even the fall of Rome itself. (Read more.)

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