Tea at Trianon: The Coming Civil War

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, July 11, 2016

The Coming Civil War

From Deal Hudson:

Social media erupted with more calls for more cop killing — see the worst of them here. To cap it off, anyone who carried a Trump sign in public is risking physical harm, perhaps death. Attacks on Trump supporters have, sadly, become routine at his campaign events, one of the worst being in San Jose. In the wake of the Dallas tragedy, Hillary Clinton lectures white people on why its their responsibility, and Loretta Lynch promises BlackLivesMatter that they will not lose their freedom to demonstrate. In other words, they offer comfort to the killers and blame the victims. How do we know a violent disposition exists among these BlackLivesMatters protest. Moments after five Dallas police were killed groups from the “peaceful” demonstration celebrated nearby and reported delight with the murders via twitter.

Jesse Jackson, predictably, blamed Donald Trump for the “anti-black” mood that fueled the Dallas shootings. The Republican National Convention promises to be a non-stop riot with various groups vowing to shut it down. There is even a “Resist the 2016 Cleveland RNC” page on Facebook. I wonder how quickly a similar Facebook page encouraging demonstrations at the Democratic Convention in Philadelphia would be shut down.

Obama, meanwhile, smiles broadly and toasts David Cameron with champagne, far away, and denies the deep division he’s helped to create in our nation. I’m sure he didn’t consider returning to the USA for more than a nano-second. We are in serious trouble here in the United States. We desperately need new leadership who don’t care about approval from the mainstream media or the elites here and overseas. These new leaders need to simultaneously seek justice against those who commit violence and address the causes of the violence without playing the race card, as Hillary Clinton did after the Dallas killings. Seeking justice does include addressing unnecessary police force against minorities and racial profiling. The death of Alton Sterling confirms, once again, that there are police using their power and authority to express their prejudice through violence. It has been reported that the Dallas shooter was motivated by the desire for “payback” against “whites” and police officers. (Read more.)