Chesterton on St. Joan

 

From Rae at Educating Souls:

Joan of Arc had all that, and again with this difference, that she did not praise fighting, but fought. We know that she was not afraid of an army, while Nietzsche, for all we know, was afraid of a cow. Tolstoy only praised the peasant; she was the peasant. Nietzsche only praised the warrior; she was the warrior. She beat them both at their own antagonistic ideals; she was more gentle than the one, more violent than the other. Yet she was a perfectly practical person who did something, while they are wild speculators who do nothing. — G.K. Chesterton

(Illustration by Jessie Willcox Smith)

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The 400,000 USAID Deaths

 From DataRepublican:

South Sudan’s independence was the product of a twenty-year American political project that united four constituencies who agreed on nothing else. Evangelicals found Christians enslaved by an Islamist government; Francis Bok, captured at age seven, became the first formerly enslaved person to testify before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The Congressional Black Caucus found Arab militias enslaving Black Africans; the apartheid divestment playbook was redeployed against Talisman Energy, the last major Western oil company in Sudan. Neoconservatives found a state sponsor of terrorism that had hosted bin Laden. Liberal interventionists found a genocide in Darfur; the Save Darfur rally on the National Mall in 2006 drew tens of thousands of people.

The Darfur Peace and Accountability Act passed the House 416 to 3. All four constituencies arrived at the same policy: pressure Khartoum, support the south, self-determination. The Save Darfur Coalition merged in 2011 — referendum year — into “United to End Genocide”. The momentum from one crisis was redirected to engineer the independence of a different part of the country.

Meanwhile, Operation Lifeline Sudan had been running since 1989 — sixteen years of airstrips, supply chains, and NGO networks that USAID inherited. OLS was the first time the UN negotiated directly with a non-state armed group, implicitly legitimizing the SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army) as a governing authority before it governed anything. (Read more.)

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Did Medieval Women Have No Power?

 From History...the Interesting Bits:

Another way women could exert power and influence was in the arena of war. Aethelflaed, daughter of King Alfred the Great, ruled the kingdom of Mercia throughout her husband’s illness and then as a ruler in her own right after he died in 911. Alongside her brother, Edward the Elder, Aethelflaed halted the attacks of the Vikings and even reclaimed much territory lost to them in the previous generations. Aethelflaed can be found directly participating in warfare, fulfilling the role of a commander.

Later examples of the involvement of women in warfare can be found on the Continent. Matilda of Tuscany raised and led armies in her struggle to secure her inheritance. The mighty Holy Roman Emperor proved no match for Matilda, and he was forced to relinquish his claims to Matilda’s Italian domains in the late eleventh century. Sikelgaita, the wife of the Southern Italian Norman ruler, Robert Guiscard, earned a reputation equally formidable as that of her husband. No mere passive consort to a powerful Norman baron, Sikelgaita lent authority to her husband’s power in the region through her lineage. Guiscard trusted Sikelgaita as a military commander and is perhaps best remembered for her orders to the fleeing soldiers of her husband’s army, whereby she challenged them to fight and ‘be men’. Born in the early fifteenth century, Joan of Arc is one of the most famous examples of a medieval woman participating in warfare. From humble origins, Joan followed what she believed to be spiritual voices, which led her all the way to the French court. Joan proved to be a valuable asset to the French Dauphin, achieving a series of military victories over the English and even securing his coronation before finding herself discarded by the monarch once her usefulness had run its course. Some women found power and even fame through their military activities and accomplishments, with women such as Joan of Arc continuing to intrigue modern audiences. (Read more.)

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The Power of Francis Poulenc’s “Dialogues of the Carmelites”

The nuns were martyred on July 17, 1794. From The Voegelin View:

The 1957 opera is based on the true story of the Martyrs of Compiègne, a community of sixteen Carmelite nuns who were guillotined during the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror. The libretto is the work of Georges Bernanos, the French Catholic author best known for his novel The Diary of a Country Priest.

Dialogues balances the sweep of historical events with the inner spiritual journey of Blanche de la Force, a young woman from an aristocratic family who fears the oncoming Revolution. Blanche’s fear impels her to join the Carmelite order, but in doing so she goes straight into the target of the revolutionary mob. Arrested and cast out of their convent, the nuns take a vow of martyrdom rather than renounce their vocation. Blanche initially panics and runs away, but at the last moment she finds her courage, steps out from the crowd, and joins her sisters at the guillotine. Many hold Dialogues in high esteem as one of the twentieth century’s greatest operas, even for its subject alone. The intolerant repression of religion by the architects of the French Revolution—ironically carried out in the name of “liberty,” “fraternity,” and “equality”—is a story that must be told, with heroic themes befitting grand opera.

If I have reservations about the piece, it is largely because its first half is filled with abstract spiritual discussions that are poorly suited to musical treatment. This portion of the opera feels static and verbose—not to mention overlong—with Poulenc having little to do but spin exquisite filigree around the text, between increasingly powerful orchestral interludes. The opera’s second half livens up considerably, though, as the revolutionary forces close in on the convent and the nuns take their vow of martyrdom. This is a spiritual, even intellectual opera, one that examines themes of fear and grace—particularly what Poulenc termed “transfer of grace” by which one human death can redeem another. (Read more.)

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CDC Investigates Multistate Parasite Outbreak

 From Big League Politics:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is investigating a multistate outbreak of Cyclospora, a microscopic parasite that has sickened people across the United States.

Federal health officials have not yet identified the source of the outbreak, though previous investigations have frequently linked Cyclospora infections to contaminated fresh herbs, leafy greens, berries, and other produce.

While investigators continue searching for the source, the illness caused by the parasite can produce severe gastrointestinal symptoms.

According to the CDC, Cyclospora spreads through food or water contaminated with human feces and causes the intestinal illness cyclosporiasis. Symptoms include watery diarrhea, abdominal cramps, nausea, fatigue, loss of appetite, low-grade fever, and vomiting. The agency notes that many patients experience frequent—and sometimes explosive—bowel movements.

According to the CDC’s latest published figures, 145 cases have been identified across 17 states.

New York, Texas, Illinois, and Michigan have reported the highest number of infections. Additional cases have been reported in Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin.

State health departments are now reporting additional cases beyond the CDC’s latest national update, suggesting the outbreak continues to expand.

Michigan health officials say they are investigating a large and growing outbreak, with more than 300 cases reported since June 22—far above the state’s typical annual total of roughly 50 cases.

New York has also reported elevated activity, with more than 100 cases identified since May 1. Officials in New York City say reported infections during the first half of the year have roughly doubled compared to the same period in 2025.

(Read more.)

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Les Dragonnades

 From LBV:

In reality, those Protestants first called themselves les inspirés (“the inspired”) and later les Raiòus (“the Royals”), whether because that was the unofficial demonym of the region or to make clear that they were not rising against the king but against the intendant of Languedoc. Jean Cavalier, Pierre Rolland Laporte, Nicolas Jouanny, and Abdias Maurel, alias Catinat—ironically a former dragoon—were their main leaders, but there were many more local leaders, prophets who proclaimed a spiritual awakening under divine inspiration, urging their followers to free their imprisoned companions.

But the camisards displayed brutality comparable to their adversaries. In September 1703, for example, they massacred the sixty Catholic inhabitants of Saturargues, and it was not an isolated case, as they repeated the atrocity in Brenoux, killing another fifty-two people, as well as in Fraissinet-de-Fourques, where they murdered forty Catholic women and children. To be fair, not all behaved the same; there were Protestant communities like Fraissinet-de-Lozère that preferred not to join the rebellion and even opposed it (which did not prevent them from suffering later reprisals as well). (Read more.)

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"A Lush, Passionate Portrait"

  From BookLife:

In the first of her Henrietta of France trilogy, Vidal (Marie-Antoinette, Daughter of the Caesars) paints a lush, passionate portrait of the life of Henriette-Marie, a seventeenth century French princess descended from the Bourbons and Medicis. Wed to King Charles I of England at the tender age of fifteen, Henriette is determined to bring Catholicism back to England, despite her Protestant husband and the country’s “hatred of Catholicism.” Often buffeted by political and social forces beyond her control, Henriette, known in England as Queen Mary, faces the challenges she encounters with the courage and resolve that she draws from her deep Catholic faith.

Firmly grounded in real historical events and settings, Vidal breathes life into Henriette’s era through extensive, evocative descriptions of its clothing, food, and palaces. This attention to detail offers a tantalizing immersion in this royal world, from the elaborately-costumed “masques” she and courtiers create to entertain the King at holiday celebrations to her beloved spaniel, Hebe. Vidal also illustrates the complexity of royal life through her careful elaboration of the complicated web of marriages, kinships, and associations. Some readers will be overwhelmed by the many branches of the royal family tree, but the text’s clear exposition and strong narrative arc offer clarity and guidance.

Vidal highlights the most important characters through her vivid depiction of their personalities and motivations. Antagonist George Villiers, the Duke of Buckingham, creates a true sense of menace as he threatens Henriette and works to disempower her. Although she is pure and steadfast in her intentions, Henriette’s struggles to balance her devotion to her husband and to her faith will earn readers’ respect and sympathy, even if they do not share her allegiance to the Catholic church. Offering insight into the passions behind the protocols, My Queen, My Love infuses these historical figures with humanity.

Takeaway: Readers of historical fiction will appreciate the depth and nuance Vidal brings to this often overlooked historical figure. (Read more.)

"Elena Maria Vidal brings history to life again with the story of Queen Henriette Marie, complete with an unlikely but true love story of the Queen and King Charles I of England, a formidable personal enemy in the menacing Duke of Buckingham, lots of well-researched period details, and the matters of Christian faith behind many of the conflicts. An antidote to the Whiggish story that is often passed off as history in America, with its anti-monarchical bias. Though Henriette Marie is not nearly as well known as another maligned consort, Marie Antoinette, Americans should learn her story because, coming after Jamestown's founding, she was their queen." —John Beeler, A Conservative Blog for Peace

 

Available HERE.

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Rubio Overturns Walz’s Gift to Child Rapist

From The Daily BS:

Secretary of State Marco Rubio says a convicted child rapist whom Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz helped shield from deportation is now out of the United States for good.

The case is quickly becoming one of the most politically damaging immigration controversies facing Walz, who is already under scrutiny for Minnesota’s sanctuary-state policies and a series of clemency decisions involving criminal illegal aliens.

At the center of the firestorm is Tue Lue Vang, a Laotian national convicted of repeatedly sexually assaulting a 10-year-old girl. Federal officials say Vang was scheduled for deportation when Walz and Minnesota’s Board of Pardons intervened and granted him clemency last month.

That pardon immediately raised alarms inside the Department of Homeland Security, which warned that the move could complicate federal efforts to remove him from the country.

According to Rubio, the Trump administration found another way.

“Just weeks ago, a foreign child rapist was freed to once again endanger America’s children after receiving a pardon from Minnesota Governor Tim Walz,” Rubio told Fox News Digital.

Rubio didn’t mince words. (Read more.)

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Vatican Begins Restoration of Raphael Loggias

 From The Art Newspaper:

The restoration follows two pilot projects carried out between 2019 and 2024, in which experts tested the technology that will be applied to the entire cycle.

The restoration is supported by $5.5m from the Legacy of Raphael: The Vatican and Beyond initiative, a World Monuments Fund project for restoration, training, digital documentation and dissemination. That initiative was itself funded with a $14.3m donation by the Stephen A. Schwarzman Foundation, a New York-based philanthropic organisation. The work on the loggias has also been supported by the group Patrons of the Arts in the Vatican Museums.

Jatta adds that the installation of the new windows had been made possible with a donation by The Patrons of the Arts in the Vatican Museums, which also financed the pilot projects.

“The new windows are absolutely essential,” Jatta says. “If the right microclimatic conditions aren’t created in that space, there’s no point in carrying out the restoration, as those areas and the frescoes would certainly deteriorate again.” (Read more.)

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The Original Nakedness and Shame

 

 From Justi Andreasen:

It is true that Adam and Eve before the Fall were naked and not ashamed. But the old Christian writers did not think of them as bare in our poor modern way. They say man was clothed with glory. That is to say, there was a rightness in him which made outer covering unnecessary. The body was not a trouble because the soul was not yet at war with itself. St. Ephrem says they were surrounded by glory. One can say it more simply still: grace had not yet gone out of them.

As the serpent is called the most subtle of the beasts, it is the most "naked" and closest to nature. It belongs to the raw pull of undifferentiated matter, the current that drags everything back toward dust. The serpent is not evil because it is powerful. It is dangerous because it is uncovered by any purpose higher than itself. It has not been named and integrated by Adam.

So when Adam and Eve ate, they felt shame because something had been lost. Like the serpent, they were now uncovered, no longer clothed in higher purpose. They had broken the law and, with it, the purpose God had given them. And so they snatch fig leaves.

Then comes that strange and merciful thing. God makes them garments of skin. The world is hard now, and He clothes them for hardness. Leaves are for summer. They will not do outside Eden. Since then men have been making larger and larger versions of the same defense. Clothes, houses, laws, customs, walls, roofs, medicine: all these are ways by which fallen creatures make life possible in a fallen world. (Read more.)

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McConnell’s Absence Gives Trump’s Voter ID Push an Unexpected Opening

 From The Daily BS:

President Donald Trump’s push for a nationwide voter ID and citizenship verification law remains stuck in the Senate, but one of its most persistent Republican opponents is suddenly off the field.

Sen. Mitch McConnell’s extended absence due to health issues has temporarily removed a reliable “no” vote from the equation, offering a small but politically significant break for supporters of the SAVE America Act. The Kentucky Republican has repeatedly bucked both Trump and much of the GOP conference on the legislation, helping stall one of the president’s signature election-security priorities.

The development does not solve the bill’s larger problem: Senate Democrats remain unanimously opposed, and Republicans still lack the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster. Senate Majority Leader John Thune has made clear that he has no intention of detonating the chamber’s legislative filibuster to get the bill across the finish line.

“The only way you could get there is to undo or get rid of the legislative filibuster,” Thune said previously. “There aren’t even close to the votes here in the United States Senate in order to achieve that.” (Read more.)

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Book Review: "War Before Civilization: The Myth of the Peaceful Savage" by Lawrence Keeley

 From Steam Calliope Scherzos:

Before we get ahead of ourselves, though, Keeley’s study has been a long overdue contribution not just to anthropology but military history and theory as well. The mid-1990s was a time in which it still wasn’t altogether clear within academia if primitive cultures are capable of engaging in something like “total war,” or if the kind of violence they engage in could be considered “war” at all. Of course, the archeological record couldn’t have been clearer that primitive war is, in fact, war, and that it could be not only damaging but existentially threatening to entire communities. But Keeley’s main hurdle in writing War Before Civilization was not one of epistemology but rather ideology.

By the mid-90s, the field of anthropology had gone through two distinct phases that had impoverished the academic understanding of savage violence. The first treated primitive war with an air of condescension marked by ethnocentric assumptions. This attitude was best exemplified by Harry Holbert Turney-High and Quincy Wright, who composed their seminal works during the 1940s. They each understood primitive violence as a sort of pastime to alleviate boredom, or even a sporting affair. Actually, the idea that savages engage in war as a sport persisted in western culture for a surprisingly long time, and the educated would often refer to the idea in passing. In one interview from 1977, for instance, Marshall McLuhan says, “Tribal people — one of their main kinds of sport is butchering each other. It’s a full-time sport in tribal societies.” This characterization owes a lot to Turney-High and Wright, who not only minimized the seriousness of primitive war but also seriously undervalued the skill and ability with which primitives fought while overestimating the significance of civilized military organization.

But eventually, this sensibility grew to pass in favor of the second phase of anthropology: the politically correct phase. Instead of using the phrase “politically correct,” Keeley describes this sensibility as Rousseauist in nature, citing the enlightenment-era dispute between Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Hobbes in which the former posited that primitive man is a “noble savage” incapable of violence as a response to Hobbes’s view of man’s natural state as a “war of all against all.” Anthropology was in an unusual situation during this time because although field reporting had revealed that primitive tribes absolutely do engage in violent conflict, many anthropologists still preferred to maintain that these tribes were essentially peaceful.(Read more.)

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Death of Baby Sophie

Vive La Reine reminds us of the death of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette's youngest child, HERE. The portrait below was originally supposed to be a happy one, of the Queen and her children preparing the cradle for the new baby. The Queen is wearing a maternity dress. However, by the time the painting was completed the baby, Madame Sophie, had died and so the artist, Madame Lebrun, had to cover the cradle with black crêpe. Here is a quote from a letter of Madame Elizabeth's:

The queen is very kind to me just now; we are going together to Saint-Cyr, which she calls my cradle. She calls Montreuil my little Trianon. I have been to hers the last few days with her, without any consequences, and there was no attention she did not show me. She prepared for me one of those surprises in which she excels; but what we did most was to weep over the death of my poor little niece [Madame Sophie.]

The Empty Cradle 

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The Democratic Socialists’ War on America

 From AMAC:

America’s most radical left-wing movement is no longer content to protest from outside; it is now working to dismantle the republic from within. It would be a grave error to dismiss members of the Democratic Socialists of America as mere campus radicals or online agitators. In New York City and beyond, the group and its allies have scored primary victories, toppling incumbents and capturing nominations. The DSA wants power, and it is learning how to seize it.

That is why its agenda demands scrutiny.

In June, as City Journal reported, DSA national leadership adopted a revamped platform titled “Workers Deserve More!” The innocuous name belies a radical program to upend America’s constitutional order.

The document calls for scrapping the U.S. Senate, replacing the president and Supreme Court with bodies chosen by and subordinate to Congress, drafting a new constitution, and creating a “democratic socialist republic.” It goes far beyond higher taxes or regulation: it seeks to abolish the separation of powers crafted by the Founders.

The DSA is not demanding different policies. It is demanding a different country. (Read more.)

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“Animalia"

 From Galerie:

When Sheikh Hamad Bin Abdullah Al Thani sold off the Hotel Lambert in Paris and its extraordinary contents in 2022, the depth and extent of his collecting became a thing of legend. A soup tureen gifted to Catherine the Great by Count Orloff; a gilded candelabra commissioned by Marie Antoinette; a hand-painted screen of the Bay of Naples that had belonged to Coco Chanel… it took five distinctive lots to deliver this unparalleled treasure trove of decorative arts to the market. The sale made $76.56 million, and the house—an early baroque palace by architect Louis Le Vau with interiors by Charles le Brun and Eustache Le Sueur—sold for $226 million to the French businessman and art collector Xavier Niel. Actually not bad for a mini-Versailles: the same design team went on to make the most famous palace in the world.

But Sheikh Hamad, a key member of the Qatari royal family who is now in his mid-40s, has not stopped collecting. Since 2021, carefully curated exhibitions at the Hôtel de la Marine in Paris have shown highlights from The Al Thani Collection, which now contains over 5,000 works of art, including very contemporary paintings by artists including Issy Wood and Adrian Ghenie. The latest exhibition, called “Animalia,” offers a look at man’s relationship to animals through the medium of finely crafted objects, from Neolithic times to 1900.

“Sheik Hamad has the mind and the eyes of a falcon,” Giambatista Valli, the couturier who is a friend of the prince, told me at the time of the Hotel Lambert sale. “He is passionate about beauty first and foremost. He is driven by a curiosity which is backed up by incredible knowledge.” (Read more.)

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The Mysterious Frescoes of Castelseprio

 

 From Hilary White at The Sacred Images Project:

It might seem surprising that this fresco of Christ Pantocrator, discovered in the apse of a small obscure church in the north of Italy, is so unusual that it caused a major re-write of the art-history timeline. It looks like any early Byzantine image that we’ve seen hundreds of times: serene, otherworldly, with the face symmetrical with classical proportions, modelled with lights and darks to give the impression of lifelike three-dimensionality. But at the same time, we can see it is stylistically different: the softness of the facial modelling, the natural fall of the hair, the subtly rendered shadow beneath the chin, the piercing gaze and human expression.

In fact, it immediately reminds me in its naturalism of the frescos discovered at Pompei and Herculaneum. It might not be surprising to find that it dates to the earliest paleo-Christian period, when Roman standards were still in use.

But that would be the wrong guess. 

In today’s post for all subscribers, we will explore the treasure left forgotten in a tiny church in the forests of Lombardy. Hidden for centuries beneath layers of plaster, the exceptionally beautiful and lively Byzantine frescoes of Castelseprio challenge everything scholars thought they knew about Western art of the early middle ages - the time of the Lombard Kingdom, Carolingian and Ottonian empires.

Were they painted by a wandering Byzantine master, or do they reveal a local tradition that quietly preserved the grace and theology of late antique sacred art? (Read more.)

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Kavanaugh Hands Republicans a New Path

 From The Daily BS:

The Court ruled against Trump’s executive order that sought to limit automatic citizenship for children born in the United States to illegal immigrants and certain temporary visa holders. The majority concluded that the order could not stand, preserving the long-standing interpretation of the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause.

That headline generated predictable celebration from immigration activists and predictable frustration from conservatives. Yet the more interesting story may be found in the concurring opinion written by Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Kavanaugh agreed that Trump could not simply rewrite existing law through executive action. At the same time, he suggested Congress could potentially revisit the issue legislatively.

“Congress could — consistent with the Fourteenth Amendment — amend” existing citizenship statutes or “otherwise enact new legislation establishing exceptions to birthright citizenship for children born to foreign citizens unlawfully or temporarily in the country,” Kavanaugh wrote, according to reports summarizing the opinion.

That single paragraph immediately electrified Republicans who have long argued that modern immigration realities bear little resemblance to the circumstances lawmakers faced when the 14th Amendment was ratified in the aftermath of the Civil War. (Read more.)

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Pensées on the Pascal Institute

 From The New Criterion:

The third-oldest college in the United States is small and, to borrow a word from the headline of a recent positive article about it in The Chronicle of Higher Education, “weird.” Founded in 1696 as King William’s School, St. John’s College in Annapolis has since 1937 provided its undergraduates, all of whom study Ancient Greek and are working toward a BA in liberal arts, with a University of Chicago–inspired curriculum in the great books that eschews nearly all secondary material. My mother-in-law went there, and two of my most talented former students are “tutors,” as the members of the faculty who teach small groups of self-motivated “Johnnies” are referred to locally.

Great books programs are a North American, and largely American, phenomenon. And there is—or, rather, has been—nothing like St. John’s outside the United States. What is surprising, in view of the Eurocentric nature of the curriculum, is that the idea of great books hasn’t had much of a hold in Europe. At least, that is, until now, with the advent of the Pascal Institute, in the Netherlands, with which St. John’s has formed a partnership.

This is the first thing one sees when going to the St. John’s website: “The following teachers will return to St. John’s College next year,” followed by a scrolling list with such names as Sappho, Sophocles, Lucretius, Virgil, Thomas Aquinas, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Jane Austen, Abraham Lincoln, Friedrich Nietzsche, Albert Einstein, Flannery O’Connor, and James Baldwin—and, oh yes, Blaise Pascal. Some are American, true. But most of these remarkable figures are European.

Also European, by birth, was St. John’s most famous tutor-teacher of the past few decades, the classicist and philosopher Eva Brann (1929–2024), though she became as American as apple pie. To quote the beautiful appreciation of Brann in The Lamp by St. John’s best-known current tutor-teacher, the classical philosopher Zena Hitz, “Her American identity was the strongest of anyone I have known.” (Read more.)

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The Meadows of Medieval Summer

 From Eleanor Parker at History Today:

A 15th-century calendar poem, turning these labours into rhyming verse, has its speaker say in July, ‘With my scythe my mede I mowe’, and in August, ‘And here I shere my corne full lowe’. This work may even have given July one of its names in English: in some sources it is called ‘Mead-month’, which may go back to a lost Old English name, Mædmonað.

A mead and a meadow are the same thing, though the words now have different connotations. Both go back to Old English forms of the same word, mæd and mædwe. They are related to the Germanic base of the verb mow, just as hay is related to the verb hew, i.e. ‘cut down’. A meadow is land that’s ‘mown’, just as hay is grass that’s ‘hewn’.

These days meadow is the usual term in modern English, while mead has become archaic – not quite obsolete, but certainly carrying an old-fashioned and poetic air. It calls to mind literary landscapes more than real ones, such as the place where Keats’ woebegone knight in La Belle Dame Sans Merci ‘met a lady in the meads, full beautiful, a faery’s child’.

Such romantic, medievalising associations of mead, compared to the more ordinary meadow, probably owe something to the way the word is used by Middle English poets, especially Chaucer. Chaucer writes often of meads and their beauties, praising their colourful flowers and fragrant scents and the enchantments that might be met there. At the beginning of ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’, for instance, the wife nostalgically describes the good old days of King Arthur when Britain was full of fairy magic and ‘The elf-queene, with hir joly compaignye, daunced ful ofte in many a grene mede’. (Read more.)

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The Empathy Weapon

 From The Brownstone Institute:

It never mentions the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, which has paid out over $4 billion to families over the decades – a federal court that exists for the sole purpose of acknowledging that these injuries are real. You’d think that would make conversations about risk perfectly reasonable. Apparently not. Instead, raising the topic at all gets you labeled dangerous.

It never mentions the work of researchers like Toby Rogers or organizations like Children’s Health Defense who’ve spent years digging into the actual data on adverse events, pushing back on the accepted risk-benefit math, and demanding that manufacturers and regulators show their work. For what it’s worth, agreeing with everything they publish isn’t the point. These people don’t exist in any mainstream conversation about vaccines. They’re not debated. They’re not refuted. Just absent. If I didn’t know better I’d call that a guardrail, not a mere oversight.

I would argue that absence is doing more to erode public trust than anything those researchers have ever published. When parents go looking for answers and find a whole world of data the New York Times pretends doesn’t exist, they may conclude the Times is handling its readers, not informing them. (Read more.)

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'The Trial': A Rare Documentary Reveals the Hell of a Communist Show Trial

 From Mark Judge at Hot Air:

A cold Moscow winter in 1930 is the setting for The Trial, a rarely seen but vitally important 2019 documentary by Ukrainian filmmaker  Sergei Loznitsa. The Trial - which should not be confused with Trial, the great 1955 anti-communist drama starring Glenn Ford - is constructed of restored black-and-white footage from one of Joseph Stalin’s first show trials, recorded in 1930 in Moscow. Stalin had falsely accused a political rival of seeking to sabotage the USSR at the behest of French Prime Minister Raymond Poincaré and other Western leaders. In shocking footage, the accused, all innocent, confess to crimes they never actually committed. 

    The Trial is not available on streaming, but I reached out to director Loznitsa and his team was kind enough to provide me with a screener. I am currently in talks with them to perhaps show the film at the upcoming Anti-Communist Film Festival. The Trial is a film that should be shown in every university classroom in the United States and the West. It depicts the kind of nightmare that our own American socialists would not hesitate to inflict on the rest of us. (Read more.)

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The King's Spy (The Rebellion Series, Book 1)

 

When I asked Mark Turnbull to write the forward of my novel Generalissima, I was impressed by his credentials as both a novelist and biographer, as well as his vast knowledge of the period known as the Wars of the Three Kingdoms aka the English Civil Wars. As an American who grew up near a battlefield of our own Civil War, I have friends who know the details of every conflict, of every regiment, of who died where and how, and so on. Mark Turnbull is similarly familiar with the highly complicated warfare amid shifting alliances that comprised the English Civil Wars. He also has the ability to tell a riveting story while building fascinating characters. The King's Spy, a thriller of a novella, is the first of a trilogy about the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, The Rebellion Series. Mark is also author of the award-winning novel Allegiance of Blood, likewise about the English Civil Wars. I enjoyed and reviewed his biography of Charles I and look forward to the new biography of Prince Rupert.

 

From the Amazon page:

14th June 1645. The Battle of Naseby is set to decide the outcome of the civil war in England.

The armies of King Charles I face those of Parliament and its untested New Model Army. Yet amidst the carnage, an intensely personal battle takes place between two men.

Captain Maxwell Walker is a royalist cavalry officer, widower and father. Loyal and brave, but haunted by his grief, Maxwell thirsts for revenge. His life has never been the same since his encounter with the parliamentarian Gervase Harper, a man whose ruthless streak sees him prosecute the war with vigour. Harper cuts down anyone who gets in his way. Maxwell’s wife was no exception.

The outcome of Naseby causes Maxwell to be tasked with a royal rescue mission. The King’s most personal possession must be retrieved. His cypher would allow Parliament to decode captured royal correspondence and that would deal a major blow in the propaganda war.

The soldier must play the spy.

His actions, however, earn him the enmity of both sides. The hunter becomes the hunted.

Facing a murder charge, as well as a great siege, Maxwell makes a discovery that might just save himself and the King’s remaining cavalry.

However, all of this rests upon his next encounter with Gervase Harper. (Read more.)

A most moving scene is of an aged Anglican pastor after he and his church have been attacked by the Puritan army. The Puritans hated altars, vestments and stained glass, all the things Charles I insisted upon having in his churches. Such vignettes convey the religious upheavals which seared the souls of the populace, along with the other atrocities.

 

Since The King's Spy begins with a description of Naseby and the immediate fallout after the battle, I waited to read it until now when I am researching the final volume in the Henrietta of France Trilogy. It is an excellent book for young readers as a politically incorrect, non-woke introduction into the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Because, as I have found, well-researched historical fiction tends to challenge our contemporary preconceptions, giving us a glimpse into a lost world. Share

How Trump Duped Iran

 From Tierney's Real News:

By signing a deliberately vague Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in Islamabad on June 17, 2026, I believe that the Trump administration set up Iran - while President Trump, Oman and Iraq worked together with Israel and the rest of the Gulf to neuter the IRGC.

While Iran believed the agreement would hand them de facto control over the Strait of Hormuz and their proxies - allowing them to establish tolls, inspections, and a new revenue stream run by the IRGC - the Trump administration had other plans.

Google Gemini* reluctantly admitted I was right about this and the MoU. Trump fooled Iran into signing it as is and then Trump worked with Oman to allow ships to pass on a different route through the Strait. Iran thought Oman would side with them - wrong!!! (Read more.)

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12 Housekeeping Secrets from Grandma

 From Country Living:

1. Keep up, don't catch up.

Grandma kept after messes every day, and you should, too. "It's easier than saving all your chores for one big cleaning session," says Donna Smallin Kuper, certified housecleaning technician and author of Clear the Clutter, Find Happiness. Get into a daily routine and your house will always look neat as a pin: Make the bed, do the dishes after every meal, and sweep the kitchen floor daily.

2. Stockpile tea towels.

Instead of using paper towels, invest in flour-sack tea towels. "They're 100 percent cotton so you can dry glasses lint-free, wipe down the stove, or let dishes drip-dry on them," says Becky Rapinchuk, blogger at Cleanmama.net and author of The Organically Clean Home. "They launder well and dry fast." Grandma-approved bonus: They come in pretty patterns, colors, and embroidered motifs to add vintage charm to your kitchen.

3. Use DIY window cleaner.

Your grandma didn't have fancy window and mirror cleaning sprays, and you don't need them either. Mix up this streak-free recipe, courtesy of Rapinchuk:

•1 ½ c. water

•1 ½ T. white vinegar

•1 ½ T. rubbing alcohol

•3 drops peppermint essential oil

Mix in a spray bottle, spray liberally on windows and mirrors and wipe with a lint-free cloth.

(Read more.)

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Tench Tilghman of Maryland

Washington, Lafayette, and Tilghman at Yorktown

And so, as the dawn of that day grew bright
Was the dawn that followed the dreary night
Of trouble and woe and gloom and fear
That broke at last to a morning clear,
Brought by Tilghman over away
From Yorktown and Gloucester, far below
To the South, one hundred and twenty-five years ago.

~ Howard Pyle on Tilghman's Ride

 In the above painting the lily banner of royal France flies beside the American flag even as George Washington and Colonel Tench Tilghman, Washington's trusted aide-de-camp, stand with the Marquis de Lafayette, sent by King Louis XVI to help the Americans in their struggle for independence. The painting is after the Battle of Yorktown where the British were defeated by the French and American forces in October, 1781. Tilghman holds in his hands the dispatches with news of the victory which he would personally take to Congress in Philadelphia. According to Revolutionary War Archives:

Additionally, it was Tench Tilghman who brought the news of the surrender of General Cornwallis and the British on October 19th, 1781 following their defeat at Yorktown, to Congress. Tilghman, in his journey to notify Congress in Philadelphia, first stopped in Annapolis, Maryland and informed Maryland Governor Thomas Sim Lee of the surrender. However, Governor Lee had already been informed of the news, and as a result, sent the State House messenger, Jonathan Parker, to Philadelphia with the news. But, since those in Philadelphia were used to hearing information in the past that turned out to be rumors, and afraid to celebrate too soon, they waited anxiously for the official word; those dispatches that Tilghman carried. From Annapolis, Tilghman boarded a ferry at Rock Hall, Maryland, and after stopping to rest and see his family, continued on his journey to Philadelphia, arriving on October 24th, 1781. He first delivered the news to the President of Congress, Thomas McKean, then later that afternoon, attired in his full uniform and dress sword, Tench delivered the news to the members of Congress, as well as answered the numerous questions about the Battle of Yorktown. In appreciation for his faithful service, Congress awarded Tilghman a horse and another dress sword. That evening, a celebration by torchlight was held in Philadelphia in honor of Colonel Tilghman and the victory at Yorktown. In preparation for this celebration, the following was written and distributed to those in Philadelphia, saying, "those citizens who chose to illuminate on the Glorious Occasion, will do it this evening at Six, and extinguish their lights at Nine o’clock , and decorum and harmony are earnestly recommended to every Citizen, and a general discountenance to the least appearance of a riot."

 Dr. William H. Wroten, Jr. of Salsbury, Maryland wrote the following in the Salisbury Times in 1962:

Tench Tilghman's ride has become somewhat of a legend; therefore, various accounts have been given of his journey between Yorktown and Philadelphia. In some accounts, where that facts are not known, writers have attempted to picture what it must have been like as he crossed the Chesapeake Bay, rode through Kent County, etc. But for this story we will use Esther M. Dole's "Maryland during the American Revolution."

"By the terms of the surrender Cornwallis gave up 7,247 regular troops besides 840 sailors. One hundred and six guns were taken. The land forces and stores were assigned to the Americans and the ships and marines to the French who had ably assisted with their fleet. Maryland troops deserve a full share of the honor of this achievement for they have given material aid in the field under Gist and the State had exerted every effort to furnish the necessary supplies for the combined armies to maintain the siege."

ON THE surrender of Cornwallis, Col. Tench Tilghman of Maryland, aide-de-camp, was selected by Washington to carry the news to Congress at Philadelphia in the form of an official dispatch. Taking boat in York harbor he went to Annapolis which had received the news the day before from the Count do Grasse. He crossed the bay to Kent County, landing at Rock Hall, where he found a horse waiting for him. he then took the old post road to Edesville to Chestertown, thence north to Georgetown where he crossed the Sassafras River. When a horse would tire he would stop at a farmhouse so the account goes, and would shout, 'Cornwallis is taken, a fresh horse for Congress,' and one he would go."

He passed through Wilmington, and on to Philadelphia. It took him four days to make this memorable trip, and he arrived at midnight Oct. 23, 1781.

He knocked on the door of Thomas McKean's house (the President of the Continental Congress) told him of the glad tidings. Soon watchmen throughout the city were proclaiming the hour and shouting "All is well and Cornwallis taken." Within minutes most of the citizens were awake and in the streets celebrating the happy news. The State House bell rang out "Liberty" for the new American nation.

...Of more interest to us was the celebration that took place on Oct. 22, after Tench Tilghman rode into Chestertown. "This great event was no sooner announced to the public, than a large number of worthy citizens assembled, to celebrate the signal victory, (in a high degree auspicious to the cause of freedom and virtue) which was done with a decency and dignity becoming firm patriots, liberal citizens, and prudent members of the community-amidst the roaring of cannon, and the exhibition of bonfires, illumination, et., the gentlemen (having repaired to a hall suitable for the purpose) Drank the following toast, viz., 1. General Washington and the Allied Army; 2. Count de Grasse, and the Navy of France; 3. Congress; 4. Louis the 16th; a friend to the Rights of Mankind; 5. The United States; 6. General Greene and the Southern Army; 7. Count de Rochambeau; 8. The Memory of the illustrious Heroes who have fallen in the defense of American liberty; 9. King of Spain; 10. The United Provinces; 11. The Marquis de la Fayett; 12. The northern Arm; 13. The State of Maryland-the last in order but not the last in Love."

Tench Tilghman was the son of one of Maryland's oldest families. As the Maryland State Archives tell:

Tench Tilghman, one of Maryland's great patriots, was born on December 25, 1744 in Talbot County on his father's plantation. He was educated privately until the age of 14, when he went to Philadelphia to live with his grandfather, Tench Francis. In 1761, he graduated from the College and Academy of Philadelphia, which later became the University of Pennsylvania, and then went into business with his uncle Tench Francis, Jr. until just before the Revolutionary War. 

Tench Tilghman's public service began with his appointment by Congress to a commission established to form treaties with the Six Nations of Indian tribes. In 1776, Tilghman was commissioned captain in the Pennsylvania Battalion of the Flying Camp. In August 1776, he joined George Washington's staff as aide-de-camp and secretary. He served without pay until May 1781, when Washington, calling him a "zealous servant and slave to the public, and faithful assistant to me for nearly five years," procured for him a regular commission in the Continental Army....

After the War, Tilghman returned to Maryland where he resumed his career in business in Baltimore and married his cousin, Anna Marie Tilghman. They had two daughters, Anna Margaretta and Elizabeth Tench. Tilghman died on April 18, 1786 at the age of 41.

Tench Tilghman's Grave in Oxford, Maryland

In the words of George Washington (from a letter to Richard Tilghman, the brother of Tench Tilghman):

As there were few man for whom I had a warmer friendship or greater regard for your brother Colonel Tilghman—when living; so, with much truth I can assure you that there are whose death I could have more sincerely regretted—And I pray you and his numerous friends to permit me to mingle my sorrows with theirs on this unexpected and melancholy occasion. June 5, 1786 ...none could have felt his death with more regard than I did, because no one entertained a higher opinion of his worth.

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An Existential Crisis

From The Federalist:

The simple yet shocking reality is that generations of Americans have been taught since early childhood to hate their country and despise their heritage. How can you celebrate a nation you have been taught is morally corrupt, hypocritical, and responsible for a legacy of oppression and violence? You can’t, which is why so many Americans are greeting our semiquincentennial with a shrug or an apology.

And that points to a deeper problem with the state of America in 2026, a problem that won’t be solved with better reading lists or institutional reform or a GOP victory in 2026 or 2028. The problem is this: too many people in this country either despise America or are completely indifferent to it.

Among these are the tens of millions of foreigners now living in the United States who don’t just reject the natural law principles upon which our form of government rests, but also have no intention of adopting American culture or an American way of life. Many of them have made little or no effort even to learn the English language. They are here, essentially, to make money, and have no real vested interest in America as such.

Many others are not just indifferent but actively hostile toward their adopted country. This tendency seems especially pronounced among the adult children of immigrants, who grew up in the United States but were taught by liberal public schools and the mainstream culture to despise their country and resent it. They essentially revived the Third World politics of their parents’ home countries and adopted the anti-colonialist mentality of their leftist teachers and professors. (Read more.)

 

Obama fraud. From Tierney's Real News:

I wrote about suitcases of cash leaving Minnesota in 2018 when it was $100 million a year. Now it's $300+ million a year. So, this is nothing new…

Here’s what I wrote in 2018: “Wow, Minnesota, I hope you’re sitting down for this one. Millions of dollars in carry-on cash in suitcases fly out of the Minneapolis airport every week. But, why? Daycare fraud. Daycare fraud is costing Minnesota taxpayers as much as $100 million a year. According to public records and government sources, most Minnesota daycare fraud is perpetrated by Somali immigrants.

How does it work? Where does the money go? The story begins at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP), where mysterious suitcases filled with cash have become a common carry-on. On the morning of March 15, a man took a carry-on bag through security that was packed with $1 million in cash. Travelers can do that, as long as they fill out the proper government forms. This happens almost weekly at MSP. The money is usually headed to North Africa, the Middle East, Dubai and points beyond.

In 2015, investigators documented $14 million in carry on cash. By 2016, it had mushroomed to $84 million. Then last year, $100 million. So, in 2017, more than $100 million in cash left MSP in carry-on luggage. The same thing is happening in other cities, like Seattle.

The money is sent via “Hawalas.” Hawalas are businesses used to courier money to countries that have no official banking system. Some immigrant communities rely on Hawalas to send funds back to their home countries. However, investigators discovered some of the money was being funneled to Hawalas in the region of Somalia that is controlled by the al Shabaab terrorist group. When the money arrives in Somalia, whether it’s intended for legitimate purposes or not, al Shabaab terrorists demand a cut. Tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of remittance payments are from immigrants who are on US government assistance. How could they possibly come up with such big bucks to transfer back home to Somalia?” (Read more.)

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Be Careful Whom You Trust

 From Chronicles:

Rasputin’s arrival in the Russian capital came at a moment of acute vulnerability both for the Russian nation and the Romanov dynasty. Timid, insecure, and stubborn, with an unbending belief in his God-given right to rule, Tsar Nicholas possessed neither the temperament nor the vision to govern a sprawling empire of 175 million subjects at a time when the chancelleries of Europe were sleepwalking towards the cataclysm of world war. His German-born wife, Alexandra, was even more problematic. Not only was she politically naïve, but she became psychologically unbalanced by the hemophilia of the royal couple’s only son, Alexei.

Within days of meeting the family, Rasputin was advising the tsar on family matters, Beevor writes. The mystic’s influence at court took another significant step forward when he appeared to “heal” the young tsarevich after a leg injury caused a life-threatening hemorrhage. The doctors believed that Rasputin’s calm demeanor may simply have relaxed the boy, lowering his blood pressure and thus slowing the bleeding. But to Nicholas and Alexandra, it was proof that the dipsomaniac, sexually profligate traveler in their midst was in fact God’s instrument on earth.

Inevitably, there were rumors that he was the tsarina’s lover, which Rasputin himself never actively discouraged. Such a development would not have been inconsistent with his relations elsewhere in high Russian society. On the other hand, Beevor’s research extends to the discovery that “while Rasputin was content to lie naked with many women, he had sex with very few of them.” The author further doubts that Alexandra, a loyal and devoted wife and mother, whatever her other shortcomings, would have yielded in this way. Nor does he credit the rumor, widespread in the feverish atmosphere surrounding the Romanov court, that there had been anything improper in Rasputin’s relations with the four royal princesses, then aged between nine and 14, even if his late-night conduct in their bedchamber might have raised eyebrows in our own, more morally vigilant times. (Read more.)

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Louis XVI and American Independence

It is fairly well-known that without the military and financial aid given by Louis XVI to the American colonists in their struggle for independence from Great Britain, our nation may never have arisen. The King of France was reluctant to go to war, recoiling from both the expense and the shedding of blood; he did so only when convinced that it would benefit France in the long run. Marie-Antoinette was initially against assisting the Americans; she thought it set a dangerous precedent to help the colonists rebel against their king. Nevertheless, once war was declared, she did not hesitate to embrace the joint cause of France and America. According to Lafayette she once greeted him by saying: "Give me news of our good Americans, of our dear Republicans!"

Lafayette may have colored her words with his own enthusiasm for the cause. However, the general repartee in the French court over the American revolt is rather humorous, or at least it would be, had the consequences for France not been so tragic. When Marie-Antoinette's brother, Emperor Joseph II, was visiting Versailles, some pro-American French lady kept badgering him about the colonists' revolt. Finally, the Holy Roman Emperor curtly replied: "Madame, I am a royalist by profession." When Lafayette joined the followers of Mesmer, Louis XVI asked him, ironically: "What will Washington think when he hears that you have become the first apothecary of Mesmer?"

The King and Queen graciously received Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and other Americans at Versailles. Louis XVI was depicted in art with Benjamin Franklin and George Washington. Sadly, the bankruptcy France incurred by the war caused the political crisis in France to escalate, leading to a bloody revolution and to the deaths of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette. But Louis XVI did indeed show foresight in his decision to help the colonies. Twice the new nation would come to the aid of France when France was in dire need. I always have thought that in addition to saying "Lafayette, we are here," General Pershing should have said "Louis XVI, we are here" since without the King's help America may never have become a nation.

(Quotations from Marie-Antoinette, Daughter of the Caesars)

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American Exceptionalism

 From Tierney's Real News:

Modern-day Communists like Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Zohran Mamdani, Abigail Spanberger, Karen Bass and Aurélie Chevalier often make the same broad claim: that America is inherently flawed and a country that's not worth saving. They say it’s an oligarchy, rigged by billionaires, with workers paying the price for a system that can’t be fixed. In their view, the Constitution and the Founding Fathers hardcoded racism and inequality into the nation from the very beginning, designing it to protect “white elites” through slavery, racial hierarchy, and concentrated property rights.

They believe America should be burned to the ground and rebuilt as a collectivist country, using "messianic" figures like Marx, Mao, Muhammad, Stalin, Hitler, Lenin, and Castro as our heroes. The Communists who want to destroy America are backed by our adversaries in the Red-Green axis of Communist China, Russia, Iran & North Korea who want Islamo-Communism to rule America and the world. While their arguments may sound emotional and confident, they are based on a lie. That lie is repeated by liberal teachers and professors in textbooks in public schools and colleges - where our children are being indoctrinated to hate God, hate America, hate themselves and love Communism - and through headlines and memes in the fake news day after day. (Read more.)

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Why the American Revolution Brought Liberty — And the French Revolution a Reign of Terror

 From The National Catholic Register:

People are wrong to compare the two revolutions,” historian Reynald Sécher, one of France’s foremost scholars of the counterrevolutionary movements and author of A French Genocide: the Vendée, told the Register. “The American Revolution had for its sole aim to free itself from the tutelage of the king of England — a tutelage that expressed itself almost exclusively through fiscal obligations. Fundamentally, the insurgents did not call into question the nature of society.”

France was a very different matter, Sécher said.

“The revolutionaries had a specific program,” he explained, “which consisted of destroying the divine right monarchy and the traditional, ordered society, to replace them with a new world, a new order, a new man.”

He argued, moreover, that the American Revolution was political in nature — aimed at breaking away from a distant crown that had overstepped its rights — while the French Revolution was purely ideological. In Sécher’s view, it was a project of fundamental transformation that targeted everything beyond its control, including the faith of ordinary people. (Read more.)

Why France helped America. From France 24:

French support for the American Revolution began well before the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. King Louis XVI saw the rebellion in North America as an opportunity to weaken his British rival and avenge past defeats. FRANCE 24 looks back at how European colonial rivalry and Enlightenment ideals forged a decisive alliance between the nascent United States and its "oldest ally".

On July 4, 1776, 13 British colonies in North America broke with the British Crown and declared their independence in a momentous act of rebellion that would change the course of history. As the United States celebrates its 250th birthday, FRANCE 24 looks back at France’s decisive – and often overlooked – role in the American Revolution.

Behind the fight for independence lies another story: that of a long-standing rivalry between Great Britain and France, the two great European powers at the time. When the Thirteen Colonies proclaimed their independence, they were still a long way from winning the war. Across the Atlantic, France watched the brewing rebellion with increasing interest. (Read more.)

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