News Flash!!

From Clemens News Central, this just in.

The Moon is shrinking.

100 meters in the last billion years.

The great state to our south

Here is a picture of a school in Jacksonville. A school where half the student body is black.

And yes, the N.B. in its name does indeed stand for Nathan Bedford Forrest.

Questions?

unfortunately my brother the Confederate Nut does not read blogs.

robots

Robots. A Czech word, I believe. Anyway, here is one of them. Isn't he (she? it?) pretty?
[from Matthew Yglesias]

why, look. I believe it is coming your way.

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History as it never happened

History that never happened

Down in the cellar the Gestapo was licensed to practice what the Ministry of Justice called "heightened interogation." The rules had been drawn up by civilized men in warm offices, and they stipulated the presence of a doctor.

...

Inside, beyond the SS sentries and the creaky revolving door, the board announced the current state of terrorist alert. There were four codes, in ascending order of seriousness: green, blue, black, and red. Today, as always, the alert was red.

Random quotes from The Fatherland by Robert Harris. It was published in 1992, a work of imagination about 1964 that never could have happened. It never did happen.

The Value of History

From The Fatherland, a dystopia about a victorious Third Reich.

Clio, the Muse of History, guarded the Reichsarchiv: an Amazonian nude designed by Adolf Ziegler, the "Reich Master of the Pubic Hair." ... Behind her, a sign had been carved above the entrance to the archive, gold leaf inlaid on polished granite. A quotation from the Fuhrer: FOR ANY NATION, THE RIGHT HISTORY IS WORTH 100 DIVISIONS.

Later, the hero March enters the archives with an archivist, Halder.

"'The right history is worth a hundred divisions,' remember? That's the place where the wrong history goes. Shit. Look out."

Halder pulled March into a doorway. A security guard was coming towards them, bent like a miner in an underground shaft, pushing a metal cart. March thought he was certain to see them, but he went straight past, grunting with the effort. He stopped at the metal barrier and unlocked it. There was a glimpse of a furnace, a roar of flames, before the door clanged shut behind him.

And such is the value of honest history.

Old Russia

I found this on You Tube while doing some serious research on Medieval Russia. Fourteenth century in fact. Era of the Golden Horde (long story).

I have no idea what it means but it looks funny as hell. And it's only part one of four.

Does anyone out there have any idea what this is about.

the three pretty ladies form a trio called Via Gra. Really.

Latin Music

I am so weird that every time I go into a store with music and I see the section labeled "Latin Music" for one brief moment I expect it to be LATIN. Instead, it's always stuff in that neo-Latin dialect called Spanish in vulgo, though it is really Castilian.

But there are a few hit songs in Old Latin. The Old One has done some research and found this version of "Gaudete" by Steeleye Span to match the one I linked to some time back.

And "O Caritas" by Cat Stevens has always been a favorite of mine.

And how could I forget this. It Academic I suppose.

I am appalled however by the people who criticize the English accent used by Steeleye Span. Are they so ignorant that they think there is a correct Latin accent, these days? There are various systems of pronunciation, and Germans sing theirs with a German accent, the Italians with theirs (that awful ecclesiastical pronunciation), and the English, ever weird, with their own idiosyncratic version with an upper class English accent. Even if we could bring back someone who could pronounce it as a native, we have 1500 years to chose from and a stretch of space from Scotland to Iraq. Think they all would sing it with the same accent?

Non of that working class Cockney stuff for us! Can't have that.

I just had a flash image in my mind of John Cleese saying that with his best upper class accent.
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Thank God he got his mother's brains

... and his father's looks.

and he made both the media and his opponents look like ... twits.

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Washington DC - in a nut shell

From Tom Toles, cartoonist for the Washington Post:

The secret ingredient that defines the unique character of DC as a culture is this: It is a city of former Student Council presidents. Think back to high school. Now you know everything you need to about DC.

Oh dear.

and I do men NUT shell.