John McCain and Marco Rubio win key primaries in establishment comeback
Wasserman Schultz, other center-left Dems renominated, too.
Trumpists, Sandersites defeated.
Wednesday, August 31, 2016
Tuesday, August 30, 2016
Colonel Baron Pontmercy
A hero of the wars of the Revolution and of Napoleon, who made him a colonel, a Baron, and an officer of the Legion of Honor during the Hundred Days.
Louis XVIII recognized none of that, nothing that was done during the Hundred Days, as valid.
He is the father of Marius, pushed aside by his father in law, M. Gillenormand, a rich old royalist bourgeois who seized his grandson at his birth, fatal to his daughter.
We have heard of this Pontmercy before.
Wounded and lying on the quiet field at Waterloo, he was robbed by then Sergeant Thenardier, who emptied his pockets and took the cross of the Legion of Honor from his neck.
But he had succored the man, who would remember him for saving his life.
Marius sees his dead father, and it means nothing to him.
He has never seen him before.
He has a note from the dead man telling him to be of service to Thenardier.
Who does not foresee that will cause trouble?
Les Miserables.
Acts
At 16:37 Paul claims that he and Silas are Roman citizens.
First we've heard of it.
In 17:16-34, Paul preaches in Athens, talking about the God who created everything and controls history, speaking of him to the Greeks from a world historical perspective and, as it were, about God's own world historical perspective.
30 God overlooked people's ignorance about these things in earlier times, but now he commands everyone everywhere to repent of their sins and turn to him.
31 For he has set a day for judging the world with justice by the man he has appointed, and he proved to everyone who this is by raising him from the dead.
A pause for reflection
There is no God, and there are neither gods, nor demons, nor angels, nor Satan, nor the Devil, nor miracles, nor resurrections.
There were no eye witnesses to any such things.
Much of what is related in the gospels and Acts simply did not happen.
Who told all the lies?
Was there a Jesus?
Were there disciples?
Was there a community of Jews who were followers of Jesus?
It is people who believe these documents are true who believe and have believed there was a Jesus and an early Christian community as the NT says, with a history much as it says.
And there could be some truth at the core of them, as it seems there actually was, or probably was, a Trojan War.
But that suggestion is not very helpful.
And there is no assurance that these documents are true or mostly true, or true on the whole, as it were, except for the supernatural stuff.
Who thinks that if you just take the supernatural stuff out of The Iliad the rest is true?
Not quite the same, sure.
But how far should we accept on the authority of the Christian tradition that at least Paul, the authors of other letters, the apostles/disciples, Jesus, and the major characters of the gospels were real people?
Monday, August 29, 2016
Blather
After 20 odd pages of blather about Paris and gamins, the story resumes "8 or 9 years later."
Les Miserables.
Sunday, August 28, 2016
Acts 15
It is decided at Jerusalem that Gentile converts don't need to be circumcised or follow the whole law of Moses.
Peter and Paul and the apostles agree and lay it down in a letter that it is enough for Gentile believers to abstain from food offered to idols, from meat of strangled animals, and from "sexual immorality," presumably as commonly understood by Jewish Christians of that time (15:28,29).
All three are requirements of Jewish law.
I am not aware Jesus ever said a word to revise the Jewish understanding of sexual morality, except to make it stricter.
Nothing in the gospels shows any other sort of revision.
The point is repeated that salvation did and does not come from the law of Moses or observance thereof.
Oh, boo hoo
Democrats point to horrific shootings all the time to make their political points, not just to white on white crackpot massacres but also to black on black drive-buys and the like.
Trump does the same and he is skinned for it.
Trump Comment on Shooting Death of NBA Star’s Cousin Draws Outrage
The left leaning media really are seriously biased and one might even say full of shit.
Trump does the same and he is skinned for it.
Trump Comment on Shooting Death of NBA Star’s Cousin Draws Outrage
The left leaning media really are seriously biased and one might even say full of shit.
Well, no, he didn't quite say that
Pretty close, though.
Maine governor Paul LePage says people of color are the enemy
No, using a wholly inappropriate, even rather shocking, military metaphor for drug couriers and runners from Southern Connecticut and New York City, he said the enemy is mostly people of color and Hispanic, which could well be right.
Not the same thing at all, as the politically motivated spinmeisters of The Guardian are well aware.
And, anyway, this story denouncing his words does not say he was wrong on the fact.
It reports somebody else as good as saying it, but they don't say it.
Addressing the state’s Republican house minority leader, Ken Fredette, a military lawyer, he said:
“Don’t you? Ken, you’ve been in uniform. You shoot at the enemy. You try to identify the enemy and the enemy right now, the overwhelming majority of people coming in, are people of colour or people of Hispanic origin.”
Their point is that the man is a blatant racist and that does seem to be right, though.
This surely sounds the note of racial contempt.
LePage has made other controversial comments about race.
In January, he claimed his state’s drug problems were due to “guys with the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty” who traveled to Maine and “half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave”.
LePage subsequently said he had meant to say “Maine women” rather than “white women”.
And the guy is certainly out there, a sort of significantly angrier Trump.
But this is untrue and probably just a lie, I think.
At best an invidious stretch.
In a statement, Alison Beyea, executive director of the Maine ACLU, cited LePage’s assertion that Maine police were nine times more likely to arrest people of color for selling drugs than white people, and said: “We know white people are just as likely to commit drug offenses.”
Beyea added: “This alarming disparity in arrests raises significant concerns that Maine law enforcement is participating in unconstitutional racial profiling … We look forward to examining the governor’s records so we can get to the bottom of this and hold our elected officials accountable to the constitution and the rule of law.”
Maine governor Paul LePage says people of color are the enemy
No, using a wholly inappropriate, even rather shocking, military metaphor for drug couriers and runners from Southern Connecticut and New York City, he said the enemy is mostly people of color and Hispanic, which could well be right.
Not the same thing at all, as the politically motivated spinmeisters of The Guardian are well aware.
It reports somebody else as good as saying it, but they don't say it.
Addressing the state’s Republican house minority leader, Ken Fredette, a military lawyer, he said:
“Don’t you? Ken, you’ve been in uniform. You shoot at the enemy. You try to identify the enemy and the enemy right now, the overwhelming majority of people coming in, are people of colour or people of Hispanic origin.”
Their point is that the man is a blatant racist and that does seem to be right, though.
This surely sounds the note of racial contempt.
LePage has made other controversial comments about race.
In January, he claimed his state’s drug problems were due to “guys with the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty” who traveled to Maine and “half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave”.
LePage subsequently said he had meant to say “Maine women” rather than “white women”.
And the guy is certainly out there, a sort of significantly angrier Trump.
But this is untrue and probably just a lie, I think.
At best an invidious stretch.
In a statement, Alison Beyea, executive director of the Maine ACLU, cited LePage’s assertion that Maine police were nine times more likely to arrest people of color for selling drugs than white people, and said: “We know white people are just as likely to commit drug offenses.”
Beyea added: “This alarming disparity in arrests raises significant concerns that Maine law enforcement is participating in unconstitutional racial profiling … We look forward to examining the governor’s records so we can get to the bottom of this and hold our elected officials accountable to the constitution and the rule of law.”
Maybe more delusional than Jill Stein
Libertarian Gary Johnson: crazy election cycle means 'I might be next president'
Things would have to get a lot stranger.
Things would have to get a lot stranger.
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