Tea at Trianon: Ghouls

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

Sunday, July 19, 2026

Ghouls

From Unlicensed Punditry:

Lindsey Graham’s sudden death caused the ghoulish cretins on the left to slither out of their dens once again. I’ve come to expect any death of a conservative or a Republican to result in grotesque hatred spewing from the left – and yes, without fear of contradiction, I can state that most of this behavior does come from the left. It has become who they are.
When I look at things that some find disagreeable today that were once entirely unremarkable, I find myself wondering where the line is between principled disagreement and conditioned reflex. At what point does opposition cease to be the product of reason and become little more than an autonomic response? When does “I disagree because I think you’re wrong” quietly become “I disagree because you’re the one saying it”?
That is not a trivial distinction. It is the difference between a healthy society/republic and dysfunctional ones.
Once people drift into the mindset of “I’m against it because you’re for it” or “I’m for it because you’re against it,” the possibility of persuasion begins to disappear. Facts become secondary. Evidence becomes negotiable. The merits of the policy no longer matter because the policy itself has become little more than a tribal flag. Supporting or opposing it is no longer an exercise in judgment; it is a declaration of identity. (Read more.)