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This is going to be a short post, since I've been reduced to the necessity of borrowing a computer from my son. My new box, cobbled together from mooched, used, obsolete, and cheap parts, is apparently too technically advanced for Win95 (attempting a hard drive transplant). No smoke yet, but I'm still trying. Later.

 
See previous post below. The more I think about it, the madder I get. This racist crap has got to stop.

Besides the flimsy "states rights" cover used by the segregationists, there is the question of how to remember those who fought the Confederacy. We have heard the arguments that they merely honor the bravery of those fighting, or the heritage of the South, not the cause they fought for. I don't buy it. In Richmond VA, they built monuments in the early 20th century (the height of kukluxery) to 3 Confederate generals and one Confederate commodore. They were all sons of Virginia, my birth state. In 1996, they added a monument to Arthur Ashe, the tennis champion. Leaving tennis aside, if they were truly interested in honoring the courage of Virginians in the Civil War, then there were some significant omissions:

• Admiral David Glasgow Farragut USN, who uttered the immortal order "Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!" at the attack on Mobile. Running under the battery at Vicksburg, he and Grant cut the Confederacy in two. His family adhered to the Confederacy; he remained loyal to his shipmates and his country. He left behind everything but the clothes he wore and never returned.
  
• General Winfield Scott USA was the leader of the American forces against Mexico in 1846, his conduct so exemplary that the defeated Mexicans offered him their presidency. He was well past his prime when the Civil War broke out, and unequal to the exertions of command. He remained, however, a superb strategian. His "anaconda strategy" of blockading the southern ports was the ultimate downfall of the South.
  
• General George H. Thomas earned the epithet "The Rock of Chickamauga" for his stubborn rearguard defense of the retreating Union forces at that battle, his troops resorting to bashing with splintered rifle butts when their ammunition was exhausted. At Chattanooga, his utter destruction of Hood's Confederate forces in the west laid the South open to invasion on that front. He later served as Sherman's second in command in the march to the sea, often forcing his enemies to withdraw by catching or forcing them out of position, and demonstrating his tactical mastery as often as the situation required.

Curious omissions, wouldn't you say?

 
Back to the political stuff.

Trent Lott must step aside. If he won't move without being pushed, Bush should give him a shove. Speaking as a former Democrat and current Republican, the Republican party is really a coalition party. I could never have voted for Strom Thurmond for president. For one thing, my African-American, Asian-American, and mixed-race relatives would never forgive me, besides its being flat wrong. I voted for McGovern over Nixon, whom I considered to be crooked enough to hide behind a spiral staircase (and don't get me started on Clinton). I voted for Reagan over the feckless Carter, and never looked back. Call me a Reagan Democrat, but never call me a Dixiecrat. The current Republican party is a coalition of classical liberals (me, for one) tending toward libertarianism and, on the other hand, traditionalists. I can sort of appreciate the traditionalist argument, which is that if something has been shown to work, let's consider it workable unless proven otherwise. It's like a political expression of the scientific method -- try it, see if it works, try something else if it doesn't.

The Republican party has, I think, transformed itself from what it was when I was a baby (these things take time -- I'm an old man). Anti-semitism was at one time a characteristic of the Right. Now, positions are reversed to the extent that the Left can't do more than clear their throats and scuff their feet when a Palestinian kills himself and a dozen Jewish children in a pizza parlor at lunch time. Another part of the ancient Right was racism. If they can't put that behind them, they are going to lose the classical liberals. The whole "states' rights" bit really was a cover for the majority to oppress the minority. This is always the danger of democracy, but it is really a specific instance of the State asserting its predominance over the individual. The Republicans must renounce this, now and forever, or lose those whe truly trace their politics back to the self-evident truths of the Declaration of Independence. A substantial part of the Republican party is anti-statist, and in favor of individual rights. If Lott really thinks that treating people impartially is a cause of "all these problems," whatever they might be, then he is going to split the Republican party, and I'll race you to the door.

 
Well, it seems to be an occupational hazard for bloggers, but I got laid off yesterday. No, I wasn't goofing off or working on my blog instead of what the company paid me for. My former employer had rarely laid people off, and this came as a bit of a surprise to everyone. That's the bad news. So after sanding and staining some bookcases this morning, I finished putting my resume together while waiting for the stain to dry and posted it to Dice.com, a techie job board. That was at about 1:30. The phone rang at about 4:15, and it was a recruiter who had worked with me at another place in another line of work. I don't want to go into it, but I used this instance to drill a lesson into my daughter -- be good to people who can't do you a bit of good. If it results in something good happening to you, that's just a bonus. The real payment is what you are gradually making of yourself by "exercising" your character (and yes, I am consciously paraphrasing C. S. Lewis).

I sure hope that urethane dries fast, or I may not get a chance to finish the bookcases.

 
This stuff is hitting a little too close to home (again).

Problem

Solution

 
Oh. My. God. I just read this article by Oriana Fallaci. I'm in awe. If you want to see ranting done right, here it is. Perhaps the best response to the barbarity of the jihadist murderers is just rage. What seems most to infuriate her is the slimy moral posturing of their European apologists. She sees it as a betrayal by the Left of their basic principals, but I would remind her that the European Left developed this amazing ethical flexibility while justifying Stalin's rule, long after the US Left had given up in disgust.