In other words, sure and uncertain

• ambigue, noun. An ambiguous statement or expression.
• ayuh, adverb (interjection). Yes.
• brigue, noun. A quarrel, an argument; strife, contention.
• buycott, noun. The opposite of a boycott: deliberately purchasing a company’s or a country’s products in support of their policies, or to counter a boycott.
• confirmation bias, noun. The tendency to process information by looking for, or interpreting, information that is consistent with one’s existing beliefs.
• doozy, noun. Something outstanding or unique of its kind.
• dreich, adjective. Of a person: appropriately serious or solemn. Obsolete.
• echo chamber, noun. An environment in which a person encounters only beliefs or opinions that coincide with their own, so that their existing views are reinforced and alternative ideas are not considered.
• epidemic, adjective. (of a disease) Affecting many persons at the same time, and spreading from person to person in a locality where the disease is not permanently prevalent. noun, a temporary prevalence of a disease.
• fait accompli, noun. An accomplished, presumably irreversible deed or fact; a fact accomplished; a thing done; a scheme already carried into execution.
• foot-hot, adverb. In great haste; without pause or slackening of speed.
• gribiche, noun. A sauce similar to mayonnaise, typically made from hard-boiled eggs, oil, vinegar, and mustard combined with chopped herbs, capers, and cornichons, and served cold as an accompaniment to meat, fish, or vegetables.
• heckler’s veto, noun. A situation in which a party who disagrees with a speaker’s message is able to unilaterally trigger events that result in the speaker being silenced.
• iconoclasm, noun. The act of attacking cherished beliefs or traditional institutions regarded as based on error or superstition: the doctrine or spirit of one who so attacks.
• iconoclast, noun. A person who attacks settled beliefs or institutions; a person who destroys religious images or opposes their veneration.
• intolerista, noun (Slang). Someone who enforces tolerance by behaving intolerantly toward people who disagree with them (combination of English word “intolerance” with the Latin suffix -ista, meaning “one who practises or believes”).
• lustration, noun. Ceremonial purification; especially, a religious act of purgation or cleansing by the use of water or certain sacrifices or ceremonies, or both, performed among the ancients upon persons, armies, cities, localities, animals, etc.
• offendinista, noun (Slang). A person that wakes up every morning looking for something to be upset about (combination of English word “offend” with the Latin suffix -ista, meaning “one who practises or believes”).
• pandemic, adjective. (of a disease) Prevalent throughout an entire country, continent, or the whole world; epidemic over a large area. noun, a pandemic disease.
• quin incerta, noun. Something doubtful, unsure, or uncertain; an uncertain possibility.
• reductio, noun. An act or process of reducing—used as the first term in phrases relating to disproof of a proposition by arguing it to an obviously false conclusion (e.g. reductio ad absurdum).
• sounding board, noun. .A person or group whose reactions to suggested ideas are used as a test of their validity or likely success before they are made public.
• snowflake, noun. A very sensitive person; a hypersensitive person who cannot stand to have his or her worldview challenged; a person with an inflated sense of uniqueness, an unwarranted sense of entitlement, or is unable to deal with opposing opinions.
• strident, adjective. Loud and harsh; grating.

The Clown Anchors of CNN

The Clown Anchors of CNN have every right to their own opinions, but they do not comprehend the basic issues and understandings of the Christian faith, and should not bloviate as if they do.

Catholic Chris Cuomo probably does not understand the teaching of his own church, if he even cares to, opining, “If you believe in one another and if do the right thing for yourself and your community, things will get better in this country. You don’t need help from above. It’s within us.” Sounds to me that Cuomo could use a great deal of help from above instead of looking within himself!

I-do-not-know-the-religious-affiliation-of Don Lemon at a different time told the sympathetic Cuomo, “Jesus Christ, if that’s who you believe in, Jesus Christ, admittedly was not perfect when he was here on this earth.” Lemon probably spoke from his heart his sincerely-held belief, but that clearly is not the “admittedly” held teaching of Jesus Christ, the Bible, or thousands of Christian believers. Beyond all that, his point that men like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson should not be “deified” because even Jesus was “not perfect” is boundless nonsense. No one who believes Jesus was and is perfect believes that Washington and Jefferson were.

Maybe CNN just has to say crazy stuff to be noticed nowadays.

Every totalitarian experiment

It is not the truth of Marxism that explains the willingness of intellectuals to believe it, but the power that it confers on intellectuals, in their attempts to control the world. And since, as Swift says, it is futile to reason someone out of a thing that he was not reasoned into, we can conclude that Marxism owes its remarkable power to survive every criticism to the fact that it is not a truth-directed but a power-directed system of thought...In every totalitarian experiment, therefore, you will find that the first act of the centralized power is to single out certain groups for punishment...One function of the ideology is to tell an elaborate story about the target group, showing it to be less than human, unjustly successful and intrinsically worthy of punishment...totalitarian ideologies invariably divide human beings into innocent and guilty groups.

Roger Scruton

Bitter Sweet

A hymn called “Resignation,” by Benjamin Beddome, 1787. Oliver Holden wrote the tune Bitter Sweet in 1800, for the fourth stanza of this hymn. This song was first published in 1787 in A Selection of Hymns from the Best Authors, by John Rippon. However, “Resignation” was actually composed earlier by Beddome, to be sung at his church (Bourton-on-the-Water in Gloucestershire, 1740-1795) on Sunday, January 14, 1778. On this day also, “by a singular coincidence...his son died, most unexpectedly, in Edinburgh.” (From John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology)

1.  My times of sorrow and of joy,

Great God, are in thy hand;

My chief enjoyments come from thee,

And go at thy command.

2.  Oh Lord, should thou withhold them all,

Yet would I not repine;

Before they were by me possessed,

They were entirely thine.

3.  Nor would I drop a murmuring word,

If all the world were gone,

But seek substantial happiness,

In thee and thee alone.

4.  What is the world with all its store?

’Tis but a bitter sweet;

When I attempt to pluck the rose,

A pricking thorn I meet.

5.  Here perfect bliss can ne’er be found,

The honey’s mixed with gall;

Midst changing scenes and dying friends,

Be thou my all in all.

First they came

• First they came for WAR DEPARTMENT, and I did not speak out— because I did not sing WAR DEPARTMENT.
• Then they came for EDMONDS, and I did not speak out— because I did not lead EDMONDS.
• Then they came for STAFFORD, and I did not speak out— because I did not lead STAFFORD.
• Finally they came for The Sacred Harp book— by then there were none left with the moral authority to speak for it.

The sort of thing is inherently limitless; as soon as one target is smashed, another one is found. -- Robt McK

If you recognize the song titles, you know what this is about. If you do not, it is too much to explain.

The deep freeze

This likely will put a chill on folks wanting to get tested:

Texas county warns of arrests for COVID-19 positive residents who don’t self-isolate -- “Brooks County Attorney David Garcia warned in a July 4 post on Facebook that residents who have tested positive for COVID-19 should stay home except to receive medical care. He said that failure to do so may result in an arrest.”

More than data transmission, and other quotes

The posting of quotes by human authors does not constitute agreement with either the quotes or their sources. (I try to confirm the sources that I give, but may miss on occasion; please verify when possible.)

“Discipleship is more than data transmission.” -- Scott Aniol

“If you marry the Zeitgeist, you will become a widow or a widower soon.” -- Thomas Schirrmacher

“You don’t try to change a language when you’re learning it, you learn it as it is.” -- Unknown

“People who feel guilty are easier to manipulate.” -- Bob Smith

“Truth is stranger than fiction, because we don’t meet it as often.” -- Unknown

“If people educated beyond their intelligence want to ruin their lives, I’m happy to let them. But they don’t want to just ruin their lives. They want to ruin life.” -- Derek Hunter

“Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.” -- Robert J. Hanlon

“The Lord's mercy often rides to the door of our heart upon the black horse of affliction.” -- Charles Spurgeon

“That’s too coincidental to be a coincidence.” -- Yogi Berra

“It is clear that he does not pray, who, far from uplifting himself to God, requires that God shall lower Himself to him, and who resorts to prayer not to stir the man in us to will what God wills, but only to persuade God to will what the man in us wills.”  -- Thomas Aquinas

“Calvary’s hill still reverberates, ‘It is finished’.” Hal Brunson

“Extraordinary afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins, but sometimes the trial of extraordinary graces.” -- Matthew Henry

A black child who matters

“She just wanted to get home to see her cousins.” So sad for this child, only 8 years old, and her family.

Regarding the death of Secoriea Turner, Atlanta, Georgia Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms pleaded for the capture of the killers, “You can’t blame this on a police officer, you can’t say this is about criminal justice reform. This is about some people carrying some weapons who shot up a car with an eight-year-old baby in the car. We got to stop this. We are doing each other more harm than any police officer on this force. We’ve had over 75 shootings in the city over the past several weeks. You can’t blame that on APD. So, I’m just asking you to please honor this baby’s life. Please, if you know who did this, please turn them in. These people are a danger to all of us.”

Secoriea Turner’s father said, “They say Black Lives Matter. You killed your own. You killed your own this time just because of a barrier. They killed my baby because she crossed a barrier and made a U turn. You killed a child. She didn’t do nothing to nobody. You killed an 8-year-old child. She didn’t do anything to any one of you all. She just wanted to get home to see her cousins. That’s all she wanted to do.”

As divisions threaten America, and other links

The posting of links does not constitute an endorsement of the sites linked, and not necessarily even agreement with the specific posts linked.

• As divisions threaten America, the pressure to cancel presidents is dangerous -- “John Kennedy praised Lee as well as pro-slavery Sen. John C. Calhoun — recently scrubbed from a Yale college — whom Kennedy included in his Pulitzer Prize-winning ‘Profiles in Courage’.”
• Black Lives Matter Needs To Care About All Black Lives, Not Just Those Ended By Police -- “If BLM leaders care about black lives, they ought to focus on what can improve the quality of life for black Americans.”
• Brother Against Brother: The Akune Brothers in World War II -- “In 1918, many immigrants were coming to the United States in search of the American Dream. Among these immigrants were Ichiro and Yukiye Akune, who came to California.”
• Church window illuminates complexity of past -- “Not slavery, nor war. Not segregation, nor civil rights. Not even fire could destroy the bonds forged more than 150 years ago between a group of Virginia slaves and a Confederate general.”
• Companies Firing Innocent Employees Over Alleged Racial Offenses To Save Face, Report Finds -- “Companies across the country, desperate to show that they are not racist, have been firing employees after they have been publicly accused of racism – whether the evidence supports the accusation or not.”
• Cuomo, de Blasio wrong to limit worship services, condone mass protests: federal judge -- “Thomas More Society Special Counsel Christopher Ferrara celebrated the decision and called Cuomo's executive orders a ‘sham’ that ‘went right out the window as soon as he and Mayor de Blasio saw a mass protest movement they favored taking to the streets by the thousands’.”
• Discipleship: More Than Data Transmission -- “A child who is terrified of dogs will not pet one no matter how many statistics you give her about the docile nature of domesticated canines.”
• Liberals Are Creating A Nation Of Spoiled Brats -- “It's not the police who need to be retrained, it's the public. We have grown into a mouthy, cell phone-wielding, vulgar, uncivil society with no personal responsibility...”
• More evidence that most coronavirus cases are now weaker than the flu -- “...much of the increase is superficial and illusory because of mass testing, multiple tests to return to work, and people coming back to the hospitals for normal care that was previously suspended.”
• Our Homeschool Curriculum (I Bought a Whole Program!) -- “I’m going to tell you what I love, what parts I don’t use, and how we implement it in our home.”
• Slavery Is Detroit's Big, Bad Secret. Why Don't We Know Anything About It? -- “Not surprisingly, Detroit’s slaveholders came from the wealthiest segment of French society and produced a disproportionate amount of the village’s grain and livestock.”
• Stop Firing the Innocent -- “...those of us who want to build a better society should defend the innocent because movements willing to sacrifice justice in the pursuit of noble goals have, again and again, built societies characterized by pervasive injustice.”
• The “Golden Chain” of Salvation in Romans 8:29–30 -- “Knowing that we love God and that our salvation is secure from eternity past to future, we are encouraged that nothing can ever separate us from the saving love of God in Christ to us.”
• The Media is Lying About the ‘Second Wave’ -- “...from the peak in April, deaths had decreased by 90 percent and were continuing to crash. That was not terrifying enough so the media pretended this good news did not exist.”
• This Is Not About Statues. It Is a War on Civilization! -- “The criteria for toppling historical figures is ever-broadening. Rioters aim to throw down all that was once revered...Even figures that support the rioter’s cause might be attacked.”
• What’s More Risky, Going to a Bar or Opening the Mail? -- “The levels are based on input from the physician members of the task force and the committee, who worked from the assumption that – no matter the activity – participants were taking as many safety precautions as they can.”

Seven

• Genesis 2:2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
• Genesis 2:3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
• Leviticus 4:6 and the priest shall dip his finger in the blood, and sprinkle of the blood seven times before the Lord, before the vail of the sanctuary.
• Leviticus 25:8 And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years.
• Joshua 6:4 And seven priests shall bear before the ark seven trumpets of rams’ horns: and the seventh day ye shall compass the city seven times, and the priests shall blow with the trumpets.
• 1 Kings 18:43 and said to his servant, Go up now, look toward the sea. And he went up, and looked, and said, There is nothing. And he said, Go again seven times.
• 2 Kings 4:35 Then he returned, and walked in the house to and fro; and went up, and stretched himself upon him: and the child sneezed seven times, and the child opened his eyes.
• 2 Kings 5:10 And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee, and thou shalt be clean.
• Matthew 18:22 Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.
• Revelation 1:20 The mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches: and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches.

No private interpretation

“The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue.” 2 Samuel 23:2

We read that “no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation;” that is to say, it is the public property of the whole family of Jehovah; and “holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost;” the Holy Ghost so influencing and working upon their minds as to make them bring forth out of their hearts that which should be suitable to the whole family of God. For instance, we read in Psalm 51, David's confession of sin; but David's confession of sin applies to every soul that is condemned on account of sin. When Job, too, poured out his piteous complaints, he was speaking; though he might know it not, for the children of God to the remotest time. So when the Lord said to Joshua, “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee,” it was a promise specially given to Joshua; it seemed to be confined to that individual; it appeared to be of private interpretation, as though Joshua, and Joshua alone, was entitled to that promise. But we find the apostle Paul bringing forward this promise as the general property of the whole Church of God: “Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee” (Heb. 13:5). “He hath said?” to whom? To Joshua; but in saying it to Joshua, he said it to the Church of God; in giving Joshua the promise, he gave that promise to every soul that needed with Joshua his help, that feared with Joshua to be forsaken, that wanted with Joshua his sustaining hand; and therefore this private promise to Joshua was not of private interpretation, but, when applied by the blessed Spirit, suits every living soul that is placed in similar circumstances with the individual to whom that promise was addressed.

J. C. Philpot (1802-1869)

The Turtle Dove

1. Hark! don’t you hear the turtle dove,
The token of redeeming love?
From hill to hill we hear the sound,
The neighbouring valleys echo round.
O Zion, hear the turtle dove,
The token of your Savior’s love!
She’s come the desert land to cheer,
And welcome in the jubil-year.

2. The winter’s past, the rain is o’er,
We feel the chilling winds no more;
The spring is come;—how sweet the view!
All things appear divinely new.
On Zion’s mount the watchmen cry,
“The resurrection’s drawing nigh:”
Behold, the nations from abroad,
Are flocking to the mount of God.

3. The trumpet sounds, both far and nigh;
O sinners, turn! why will ye die?
How can you spurn the gospel charms?
Enlist with Christ, gird on your arms.
These are the days that were foretold,
In ancient times, by prophets old:
They long’d to see this glorious light,
But all have died without the sight.

4. The latter days on us have come,
And fugitives are flocking home;
Behold them crowd the gospel road,
All pressing to the mount of God.
O yes! and I will join that band,
Now here’s my heart, and here’s my hand
With Satan’s band no more I’ll be,
But fight for Christ and liberty.

5. His banner soon will be unfurl’d,
And he will come to judge the world;
On Zion’s mountain we shall stand,
In Canaan’s fair, celestial land.
When sun and moon shall darken’d be,
And flames consume the land and sea,
When worlds on worlds together blaze,
We’ll shout, and loud hosannas raise.

As printed No. 154 in The Dover Selection of Spiritual Songs, Andrew Broaddus, Richmond, VA: R. I. Smith, 1831 – The Turtle Dove, L.M.D. In his book The Choice: in Two Parts, William Dossey names Daniel’s Selection as his source for the hymn. I have not found a copy of Daniel’s Selection, but this apparently is the book referenced below. If this is the original source, it may be that Robert Daniel wrote the hymn.

Daniel’s Selection, Robert Thomas Daniel (1773-1840), Raleigh, NC: Thomas Henderson, 1812.

The North Carolina Historical Review, Autumn 1962 (Christopher Crittenden, Editor in Chief)
XXV (October, 1905), 16-17, Charles E. Taylor noted that Robert Thomas Daniel published a 280-page book entitled “Daniel’s Selection” in Raleigh in 1812. It consisted of 176 hymns and 52 “Spiritual Songs.” In 1905 Taylor had a copy which he described as “well printed and strongly bound,” but recent efforts to locate this copy have been unsuccessful.

A completed subscription form. No copy of Daniel’s hymnal has been found, but Dr. Chas. E. Taylor, writing in the Wake Forest Student for October, 1905, described a copy which he then had before him. Entitled Daniel's Selection, this 280-page book was printed in Raleigh by Thomas Henderson in 1812. This subscription form is in the Bruce Gotten Collection of North Caroliniana at the University of North Carolina
Library.

Dictionary of North Carolina Biography: Volume 2, D-G, edited by William S. Powell, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1986, p. 11 says “Thirty-eight of the hymns were composed by Daniel himself.”

“A Biography of the Poetic Literature of North Carolina in 1906,” Hight C. Moore, The Farmer and Mechanic (Raleigh, North Carolina), Tuesday, November 20, 1906, page 5; Moore says that about 80 of the Selections are original, and that Mrs. Hardy Saunders assisted in the compilation.

Declaration of Independence

In Congress, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, 
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Georgia

Button Gwinnett

Lyman Hall

George Walton

North Carolina

William Hooper

Joseph Hewes

John Penn

South Carolina

Edward Rutledge

Thomas Heyward, Jr.

Thomas Lynch, Jr.

Arthur Middleton

Massachusetts

John Hancock

Maryland

Samuel Chase

William Paca

Thomas Stone

Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia

George Wythe

Richard Henry Lee

Thomas Jefferson

Benjamin Harrison

Thomas Nelson, Jr.

Francis Lightfoot Lee

Carter Braxton

Pennsylvania

Robert Morris

Benjamin Rush

Benjamin Franklin

John Morton

George Clymer

James Smith

George Taylor

James Wilson

George Ross

Delaware

Caesar Rodney

George Read

Thomas McKean

New York

William Floyd

Philip Livingston

Francis Lewis

Lewis Morris

New Jersey

Richard Stockton

John Witherspoon

Francis Hopkinson

John Hart

Abraham Clark

New Hampshire

Josiah Bartlett

William Whipple

Massachusetts

Samuel Adams

John Adams

Robert Treat Paine

Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island

Stephen Hopkins

William Ellery

Connecticut

Roger Sherman

Samuel Huntington

William Williams

Oliver Wolcott

New Hampshire

Matthew Thornton

Sowell speaks

“Have we reached the ultimate stage of absurdity where some people are held responsible for things that happened before they were born, while other people are not held responsible for what they themselves are doing today?” -- Thomas Sowell

Other definitions

Cell phone: a phone that holds one prisoner to it.

Education: what you think you got when your parents paid to send you to college, but what you really got when you paid to send your children to college.

Statism: the belief that a group of people who can’t fix potholes can fix an entire planet.

Suffering: having what you don’t want or wanting what you don’t have.

In other words, present and accounted for

• ambiate, verb, transitive. To aspire to have; to desire strongly, be ambitious for.
• autofiction, noun. Writing that merges and violates the boundaries of autobiography and fiction.
• cancel culture, noun. The popular practice of withdrawing support for (canceling) public figures and companies after they have done or said something deemed objectionable or offensive. (Often accomplished through social media in the form of group shaming.)
• catfishing, noun. Luring into a relationship by means of a fictional online persona; t construct false identities online and lure other people into continued messaging correspondence.
• dox, verb. To search for and publish private or identifying information about (a particular individual) on the Internet, typically with malicious intent.
• gaslight, verb. To manipulate someone by psychological means into questioning their own sanity (From George Cukor’s 1944 film Gaslight, where a man attempts to convince his wife that she’s mad in order to have her committed to an insane asylum).
• gaslighting, noun. A form of psychological manipulation. 
• kvetch, verb, intransitive. To criticize or complain a great deal. Frequently with “about.”
• manners-painting, adjective. Of a writer, a work of literature, etc.: concerned with or skilled in the depiction of contemporary manners, habits, etc.
• pars pro toto, noun. A part or aspect of something taken as representative of the whole.
• simi-dimi, noun. Elaborate or meaningless ritual; superstition; mumbo-jumbo. Also: fuss, rigmarole.
• slacktivism, noun. Actions taken to bring about political or social change but requiring only minimal commitment, effort, or risk.
• woke, adjective. Roused to political self-awareness; well-informed in a “social justice” context.
• wokescold, noun. A person who is woke and scolds others who are not. 
• wokescold, verb. The act of scolding in the name of wokeness. A neologism = woke (“well-informed in a social justice context”) +‎ scold (“to rebuke angrily”).
• Zeitgeist, noun (German). The spirit of the time; general trend of thought or feeling characteristic of a particular period of time.

Watermelon, watermelon

Why we don’t fear the ’rona: a tale that is tall but true

The story you are about to read is true. The names have been changed to protect the innocent, the iniquitous, and the indifferent. In fact, there are no names.

Picture a family, a rural Southern family. They surround the table and cut in half a large red meat watermelon. There is no watermelon distancing. No heretical slicing. No tedious cubing. Just two halves inviting a whole family. Needed, forks. Optional, salt. All consume together, sensibly spitting the seeds back into the remaining rind, so that the soon scrapping to the stock will be simple, short and sweet. They are not finished yet. Cut a V in the top edge of the rind and drink the juice. Waste not, want not.

Who will testify?

Time will tell

The silence of white leaders on the issue of black deaths when the matter is not a hashtag on the nightly news betrays our real racial indifference...

As the black community, you have survived mistreatment on both sides of the Atlantic, from both dark and light-skinned men alike. Your community has survived capture by West African warlords and survived a trans-Atlantic slave trade by the Dutch. Your community has survived antebellum slavery and post-war systemic racism through Jim Crow laws. Your community survived the Civil Rights Movement of the mid-twentieth century and emerged strong, vibrant, and victorious. Through all of these tumults, troubles, and tribulations, your families, churches, and communities remained dignified and intact.

However, time will tell if your community can survive the damage done by pandering white people who betray their bigotry by thinking little of you and expecting even less.

J. D. Hall

Droll definitions

Paramonyms: words that sound similar and have similar meanings. Example:

Incongruous \
In Congress  /

Definition: Out of keeping or out of place; inappropriate; unbecoming; not harmonious in character; inconsonant; lacking harmony of parts.

The American Press, and other links

The posting of links does not constitute an endorsement of the sites linked, and not necessarily even agreement with the specific posts linked.

• Chapter 10: Deliberating The Arguments -- “...we should also embrace the biblical promises from God concerning preservation, thereby approaching the issue both scripturally and scholastically.”
• DA: Pregnant woman, boyfriend fatally stabbed woman after social distancing argument -- “He says Price-Green may have gotten too close to Toran when she stepped back, leading to the verbal altercation.”
• DOJ Has Been on an Indictment Spree Against Violent Anarchists -- “Since late May and early June, violence has erupted in leftist cities around the country and the Department of Justice has wasted no time indicting and arresting violent rioters.”
• How fast food got caught in the crossfire of viral social debates -- “Welp. It’s unfortunate that thanking a customer for a compliment back in 2012 would be viewed as political. Guess that’s 2020 for ya.”
• LGBT Rights Supreme Court Ruling Is a Power Play by Gorsuch -- “The ground on which Gorsuch is fighting is the theory of statutory interpretation known as “textualism.” The basic idea is that...the overwhelming focus of statutory interpretation should be the words of the law itself: the text.”
• Macron says France won’t remove statues, erase history -- “I will be very clear tonight, compatriots: the Republic won’t erase any name from its history. It will forget none of its artworks, it won’t take down statues.”
• Missing Tallahassee activist, 19, and woman, 75, found dead, police say -- “On June 6, she tweeted that she was molested by a black man in his mid-40s who offered to give her a ride to find a place to sleep. That was the last day Salau was seen alive.”
• Muhammad Ali’s son said his dad wouldn’t have supported Black Lives Matter movement or protests over George Floyd’s death -- “In 2016, Ali’s most famous child, television personality and retired boxer Laila Ali, made similar statement, saying, ‘All lives matter’.”
• Small Beginnings: C. H. Spurgeon at Waterbeach -- “Before he was the pastor of the largest of church in London...C. H. Spurgeon pastored a small Baptist church in the village of Waterbeach...”
• The American Press Is Destroying Itself -- “Today no one with a salary will stand up for colleagues like Lee Fang. Our brave truth-tellers make great shows of shaking fists at our parody president, but not one of them will talk honestly about the fear running through their own newsrooms.”
• The 5 weirdest rules unveiled for MLB's shortened 2020 season -- “In the name of reducing playtime and person-to-person exposure, teams playing extra innings this season will start with a runner on second base.”
• The 7 Largest Cemeteries in the World -- “The largest cemetery in the world spans nearly 1500 acres.”
• Trolling Is a Terrible Way to Write Laws -- “There are many different angles here, some of which involve larger debates about the role of courts, how to read law, and what socially conservative voters expect from conservative judges.”
• UK’s Sunak sees ‘enormous difference’ after social distance review -- “Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who announced the review a week ago, has said he will do everything he can to get the country back to normal as soon as possible without risking lives.”
• 4 Reasons Pastors Ought to Be Gentle -- “...gentleness is not only godlike in general, but Christlike in specific.”