I am fundamentally a Weberian Sociologist – and some have claimed that Weber’s writings are merely a long-running debate with the ghost of Karl Marx. However you translate it, at the foundation, the base of my thoughts on society is that there is a hell of a lot of social conflict going on.

In a democracy the people choose a leader in whom they trust. Then the chosen leader says, ‘Now shut up and obey me.’ People and party are then no longer free to interfere in his business.

The great virtue of bureaucracy – indeed, perhaps its defining characteristic ~ was that it was an institutional method for applying general rules to specific cases, thereby making the actions of government fair and predictable.

It is not true that good can follow only from good and evil only from evil, but that often the opposite is true.

Politics means striving to share power or striving to influence the distribution of power, either among states or among groups within a state.

The primary task of a useful teacher is to teach his students to recognize ‘inconvenient’ facts – I mean facts that are inconvenient for their party opinions.

Politics is a strong and slow boring of hard boards.

Daily and hourly, the politician inwardly has to overcome a quite trivial and all-too-human enemy: a quite vulgar vanity.

The nation is burdened with the heavy curse on those who come afterwards. The generation before us was inspired by an activism and a naive enthusiasm, which we cannot rekindle, because we confront tasks of a different kind from those which our fathers faced.

The prediction is that the ocean currents off Peru will shift, and la nina will return. I learned 50 years ago that the little girl has a great influence on our local weather patterns – so I’ve shifted to NOAA to see what the predictions are:

And later in the winter, it looks like

It makes me glad that I researched what part had failed that my 25-year-old snowblower was refusing to go forward – fixing it was a fairly simple task this summer. I suspect I will need it.

Rudyard Kipling wrote the poem “Cleared” in 1890, ‘in memory of the Parnell Commission.’ I don’t know if Parnell wrote  “Though I regret the accident of Lord F Cavendish’s death I cannot refuse to admit that Burke got no more than his deserts” and was signed “Yours very truly, Charles S. Parnell”. or if the statement was a forgery. Like today, the 1880’s were a time of political conflict and violence – in the UK as well as the US Kipling wrote “The charge is old”? — As old as Cain — as fresh as yesterday; Old as the Ten Commandments — have ye talked those laws away? If words are words, or death is death, or powder sends the ball, You spoke the words that sped the shot — the curse be on you all. a time of great political disagreement and violence. Anyway, Kipling’s poem deals with violence 140 years ago – yet, despite the differing locations and details seems current today. It’s a short read:

Help for a patriot distressed, a spotless spirit hurt,
Help for an honourable clan sore trampled in the dirt!
From Queenstown Bay to Donegal, O listen to my song,
The honourable gentlemen have suffered grievous wrong. 
2 
Their noble names were mentioned—O the burning black disgrace!—
By a brutal Saxon paper in an Irish shooting-case;
They sat upon it for a year, then steeled their heart to brave it,
And “coruscating innocence” the learned Judges gave it. 
3 
Bear witness, Heaven, of that grim crime beneath the surgeon’s knife,
The honourable gentlemen deplored the loss of life!
Bear witness of those chanting choirs that burke and shirk and snigger,
No man laid hand upon the knife or finger to the trigger! 
4 
Cleared in the face of all mankind beneath the winking skies,
Like phœnixes from Phœnix Park (and what lay there) they rise!
Go shout it to the emerald seas—give word to Erin now,
Her honourable gentlemen are cleared—and this is how:—
5 
They only paid the Moonlighter his cattle-hocking price,
They only helped the murderer with counsel’s best advice,
But—sure it keeps their honour white—the learned Court believes
They never gave a piece of plate to murderers and thieves. 
6 
They never told the ramping crowd to card a woman’s hide,
They never marked a man for death—what fault of theirs he died?—
They only said “intimidate”, and talked and went away—
By God, the boys that did the work were braver men than they! 
7 
Their sin it was that fed the fire—small blame to them that heard—
The “bhoys” get drunk on rhetoric, and madden at a word—
They knew whom they were talking at, if they were Irish too,
The gentlemen that lied in Court, they knew, and well they knew. 
8 
They only took the Judas-gold from Fenians out of jail,
They only fawned for dollars on the blood-dyed Clan-na-Gael.
If black is black or white is white, in black and white it’s down,
They’re only traitors to the Queen and rebels to the Crown. 
9 
“Cleared”, honourable gentlemen! Be thankful it’s no more:—
The widow’s curse is on your house, the dead are at your door.
On you the shame of open shame, on you from North to South
The hand of every honest man flat-heeled across your mouth. 
10 
“Less black than we were painted”?—Faith, no word of black was said;
The lightest touch was human blood, and that, you know, runs red.
It’s sticking to your fist to-day for all your sneer and scoff,
And by the Judge’s well-weighed word you cannot wipe it off. 
11 
Hold up those hands of innocence—go, scare your sheep together,
The blundering, tripping tups that bleat behind the old bell-wether;
And if they snuff the taint and break to find another pen,
Tell them it’s tar that glistens so, and daub them yours again! 
12 
“The charge is old”?—As old as Cain—as fresh as yesterday;
Old as the Ten Commandments—have ye talked those laws away?
If words are words, or death is death, or powder sends the ball,
You spoke the words that sped the shot—the curse be on you all. 
13 
“Our friends believe”?—Of course they do—as sheltered women may;
But have they seen the shrieking soul ripped from the quivering clay?
They!—If their own front door is shut, they’ll swear the whole world’s warm;
What do they know of dread of death or hanging fear of harm? 
14 
The secret half a county keeps, the whisper in the lane,
The shriek that tells the shot went home behind the broken pane,
The dry blood crisping in the sun that scares the honest bees,
And shows the “bhoys” have heard your talk—what do they know of these? 
15 
But you—you know—ay, ten times more; the secrets of the dead,
Black terror on the country-side by word and whisper bred,
The mangled stallion’s scream at night, the tail-cropped heifer’s low.
Who set the whisper going first? You know, and well you know! 
16 
My soul! I’d sooner lie in jail for murder plain and straight,
Pure crime I’d done with my own hand for money, lust, or hate,
Than take a seat in Parliament by fellow-felons cheered,
While one of those “not provens” proved me cleared as you are cleared. 
17 
Cleared—you that “lost” the League accounts—go, guard our honour still,
Go, help to make our country’s laws that broke God’s law at will—
One hand stuck out behind the back, to signal “strike again”;
The other on your dress-shirt-front to show your heart is clane. 
18 
If black is black or white is white, in black and white it’s down,
You’re only traitors to the Queen and rebels to the Crown.
If print is print or words are words, the learned Court perpends:—
We are not ruled by murderers, but only—by their friends.

I’ve known that they come in different sizes – but I never did the minimal research to be able to recognize and name them.

The talent required to build these watertight wooden barrels was once fairly common. Humbling.

One of the unwritten tenets of demography is that the future will belong to those who are there – and the only ways of being there are to be born or to migrate. This chart reflects birth and political stance:

Birth rates vary across our nation – I recall a conversation where an attorney, working for planned parenthood, believed that abortion was equally common on the Reservations of South Dakota. It wasn’t – good data was available, and South Dakota is predominately white with Native being a strong second. Birth rates among the Natives are higher. The chart above shows that birth rates among conservatives are higher.

The future belongs to those who are there. Immigration can tilt the equations.

Sometimes a photograph and its date does say more than 1000 words.