I went out to Wilderstead today to do various chores. First up was the need to burn a brush pile. I tried burning it last week, and I couldn't get a strong enough fire going to catch the brush (mostly old, nasty Asian honeysuckle). So I brought some extra -- ahem -- assistance. God bless accelerants. I had that pile going in minutes ( Read more... )

Donald Trump’s default mode of operation is maximum belligerence, adorned with narcissistic commentary. That doesn’t mean he’s not right, sometimes. For instance, his dismissal of Inspectors General, while provocative, is not a fixation peculiar to him. There is a long-standing controversy over the constitutionality of IGs, which Trump’s ( Read more... )

President Trump has ordered a number of actions to eliminate DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) from the government workplace. This follows a number of companies scaling back or eliminating their own DEI practices. And there was much rejoicing.( Read more... )

Progressive Christians are warning us against their favorite bogeyman, the White Christian Nationalist. I don’t doubt that such people as they describe exist, but they’re not nearly as common as the progs would have us think. For that matter, they’re no nuttier or more obsessed than the progs themselves, who are in many ways their mirror images ( Read more... )

The Fall of the Roman Empire was not a single event, nor did it involve the entire empire. It was the gradual disintegration of an increasingly ramshackle polity in western Europe that, suddenly, wasn’t there anymore (or was it?). There was a lot going on between, say, 400 and 600 AD (the approximate dates of “before” and “after” in which ( Read more... )

One of the bait-and-switch maneuvers progressives love to use involves Unity. We’ve got to be unified. In unity is strength. We’ve all got to pull in the same direction. Are you on board, or are you holding us back? Et cetera. When one says, “But what goals or principles are we to be unified over? Shouldn’t we decide if there is a basis for ( Read more... )

The snow lingered on the hills to give us a wintry camping experience. Even a bit of rain couldn't turn the ground to the usual Indiana mud. Most campers left Saturday night to get ahead of a coming drop in temperatures expected to turn roads to ice. I'm sitting in the dining hall and drinking my morning coffee. It's all over but the cleaning ( Read more... )

Why is a nickel bigger than a dime? For that matter, why is a penny bigger than a dime ( Read more... )

I was listening to a lecture by David Starkey about Renaissances - note the plural -- about the continuing re-engagement with what he considers the foundation of The West: the Greco-Roman past. Not Christianity, which Tom Holland argues is central to our civilization (so that “even atheists are swimming in Christian waters”). Starkey is a ( Read more... )

There is a pattern in European history which reveals how our modern world was created. After a long period of war and confusion, the nations would attempt to sort out an arrangement under which all parties could live in peace. One such arrangement is the Treaty of Westphalia (1648), another is the Congress of Vienna (1815). An attempt was made ( Read more... )