- Lyndon Baines Johnson was famous for starting some of his bad news speeches and announcements with the gibberish blurb of "It is is with a heavy heart that I.....etc.etc.etc." My task is similar. We shall try to make it brief.This is not a condemnatory missive. If anything, it is my opinion that, on balance, and especially towards the very end of the period of Indian hostilities, we think that unnecessary abuses were conducted against the Indians, both individually and collectively, that would condemn them forever to a barren, rewardless life. Their culture would essentially be lost forever from the period starting with the Trail of Tears and ending with the Bureau of Indian Affairs taking control of every aspect of Indian activity, directly or indirectly.Below we have included two back-to-back sets of observations, one by a liberal and the first by a conservative, that just happened to appear in sequence on Facebook. Jim, the conservative, is angry and puzzled because of the rotten reporting by the local (Bismarck) press. He is nearly hostile towards the hypocrital and mendacious "protest leadership", and his points are succinct and well made.Rebecca is a well-spoken liberal (it happens, sometimes) and speaks out....then speaks again (reasonably) to revise and extend her observations. It is depressing when one sees some of the pictures of all the garbage and filth, left behind for "someone else" to clean up. Several score tonnes of discard, filth, broken and misused things, rotted food, just a complete contamination both hygienically and esthetically. Little mention be made in terms of the notion of "protecting sacred sites", because (a) all the land is sacred, and (b) according to the provocateurs, this particular land was especially sacred because of Indian burial grounds, because it was/is a "Spirit Gathering Site", or maybe because it had a lottery ticket dispenser at one time....phooey...all false.We close this pre-ambulatory with the reminder that El Gringo Viejo's father was an only child. My father was saved in earliest infancy when about 20 Sioux Indian women and their children, horses, and dogs came by my grandparent's three story Victorian during the first week in April, 108 years ago. My grandmother was trapped inside of a house with snow up to the eaves, blocking all exits and windows. The Indian women, knowing my grandmother was pregnant and expected to deliver her first (and only) at the age of 40 had suffered the early arrival of the Stork. She lay, weak and unable to rise, on the main floor of the house, in the parlour. The Indian women who appreciated her medical work among them, also saw that the White man's home had no smoke coming from the various chimneys. They dug through the snow, opened the door, and found my grandmother with her baby wrapped up and under a pile of blankets and seat cushions with her. The women laid a fire, held the horses on the outside gallery and the dogs inside the house. The older children led the horse to stall in the very nice barn, and returned to help tend to the White lady. My grandfather returned three days later after his visit to Minneapolis to buy replacement machinery for the planting and harvest for later in the month, and for the seeds and tack for the hundreds of Morgan horses who would be drawing equipment during the late spring and early autumn's wheat crop. The child was given little or no chance to live, but through the efforts of my grandparents and those same Indian women, my father proved equal to the task, and obviously, survived.We retire and leave the floor to the speakers below:____________________
Monday, 27 February 2017
A Couple of Civilian Commentators Sum it Up - The "Lakota War Against Normalcy"
Sunday, 26 February 2017
News About the New Way of Thinking at the Pentagon
This particular message was sent to El Gringo Viejo by our resident physician and man about town, popular on all fronts and in any society. He is the one we have mentioned both here in the blog and among other associates as the grandson of the fellow who made grapefruit, especially the various really fine types of Red Grapefruit for which the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas is justly famous, a year-round citrus alternative for millions of people in America and around the world.
My friend, Xxxx Xxxxxx, is a West Point graduate and former Army Ranger (Vietnam). This email came to him from another West Point classmate. I think you'll find it encouraging.
________________________
My friend, Xxxx Xxxxxx, is a West Point graduate and former Army Ranger (Vietnam). This email came to him from another West Point classmate. I think you'll find it encouraging.
Dear Family and Friends,
Most of you know that our son, Xxxx, works in a leadership position within US Xxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxx, specializing in Xxxxxxxx at the Pentagon. I spoke with him last night to get his view of how the first week of the Trump administration was perceived there. It was a short conversation but very informative.
The difference he said is nothing short of amazing. It is almost as though you can feel it in the air, in the pace of peoples strides, in the expressions on their faces. But beyond that, the change in process has been immediate. Within 48 hours several action orders that had been languishing for up to six months between State, NSC, and the White House, were approved and executed. Over the last 8 years ( has been there for about 15 years) and particularly, the last 3 to 4, the atmosphere has been stifling. Every little thing had to be vetted by dozens of 30-year old State Department lawyers ( with no military experience) before it even got up the chain, effectively neutering the senior officers and reducing effectiveness to near zero. This past week, Xxxx took something to General Dunford, our Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and within minutes it was approved by the SecDef, General Mattis ( both Marines, by the way) and greenlighted.
There is new energy flowing through the whole building. There is a new sense of purpose, a new resolve that is palpable. A cloud has been lifted.
Say what you will about our new president, and there certainly is a lot ( pro and con) that could be and is being said, the folks at the pentagon are walking with a new skip in their step.
Thought you might like to hear about this.
Sincerely,
Xxxxxxx X. Xxxxxxxxxx
______________________________
An Old Lady tires of the condescension and the arrogance spawned by ignorance.
Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the much older lady that she should bring her own grocery bags, because plastic bags are not good for the environment.
The woman apologized to the young girl and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."
The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."
The older lady said that she was right -- our generation didn't have the "green thing" in its day. The older lady went on to explain:
Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled. But we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.
Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable besides household garbage bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags. But, too bad we didn't do the "green thing" back then.
We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.
But she was right. We didn't have the "green thing" in our day.
Back then we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.
But that young lady is right; we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.
Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana. In the kitchen we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us. When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.
But she's right; we didn't have the "green thing" back then.
We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blade in a r azor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.
But we didn't have the "green thing" back then.
Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's $45,000 SUV or van, which cost what a whole house did before the"green thing." We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.
But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?
Please forward this on to another selfish old person who needs a lesson in conservation from a young smart-ass, self-absorbed, arrogant thrip.
We don't like being old in the first place, so it doesn't take much to tick us off... Especially from a tattooed, multiple pierced smart-ass who can't make change without the cash register telling her how much. We counted it, backwards, to the client / customer.
Thursday, 23 February 2017
Potpourri of Thoughts, Notions, and Observations
For the past couple of weeks or a little more, your humble servant was down at our place on the Rio Corona in Nowhere, Mexico a little northwest of Ciudad Victoria, Tamaulipas. It was another episode of dull and boring days, small projects such a pruning, cleaning, and a bit of fix-up work. The routine is pleasant enough, however, to enjoy, given the incessant arrival of new birds or interesting old-timer birds, and the occasional visitor who drops by briefly to gossip and opine a bit.
We even had the return en force of two skulks of fox, numbering about fifteen, plus or minus. Their laughing and giggling routine in the early morning hours....especially during the full moon episode....was particularly entertaining.
Every few hours, after overdosing on television news, both Mexican and American, I declared war on the new reality and threatened to write the final and definitive book of social and political rules. If the Left can write rules that declare that every child has the right to a compulsory education, then certainly I can require that primary and secondary school should be accomplished in eight years, or nine at the very most. And further, I can demand the immediate end to public education as we know it, and require that all docentry and tutelage be provided by teachers who would receive very low pay. Further, it would be established that all educational activity be controlled strictly locally and by private agency.
It would be my perfect world should all local sporting teams....football, baseball, basketball, ping-pong, tiddlywinks, chess, track and field....be community based and supported by admission fees or sponsorships by churches, businesses, and any source save for known criminals or government agencies of any kind. The same would apply to the fine arts....all private.
The reasons we (your humble servant and his fellow father-in-law) would like for the pro-Trump people to shut-up or at least turn down the volume because is because they know things but do not understand things. The two individuals (your humble servant and his fellow father-in-law) have over 100 years of combined experience in Mexico...and experience in how this or that trade and immigration policy affects America and more especially Texas.
The above graphs show the juxtaposition of various candidates who are presently passively or actively posturing for the position of President of Mexico.
Please be aware that Margarita Zavala de Calderon (PAN), is the wife Felipe Calderon Hinojosa, the President who served before the present incumbent. Also, remember that in Mexico, there is no re-election. All of these numbers will be changing like the back-computers of the digital "slot-machines' one might find in Las Vegas during the next eighteen months or so:
(a) The blue labels are the PAN (conservative party).
(b) The green labels are the PRI (old official government party from the previous century, and then once again during this particular 6 year term with Pena-Nieto).
(c) Then there is the yellow label which is the far-left Party of the Democratic Revolution - PRD).
(d) The brown label is the Party of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO), the very dangerous and dedicated marxist who is his own party....having been rejected by the his old PRD home base after two failed runs for President.
(e) Finally, the purple label is a fully independent party based upon the personality of Jaime Rodriquez, present governor of Nuevo Leon State (Monterrey and Co.) who came in like a lion based on his victories over the Cartels during his service as a County President of Garcia, Nuevo Leon, but once upon ascending to the throne of governor has made a series of bad calls and positionings on tax reduction issues.
The only way AMLO can win this coming election is by railing against the "New Berlin Wall of Hatred"....ironic since AMLO is a stark-raving marxist and continuously pushing leftist nationalism and "from each according to his ability and to each according to his need" policies. Confronting people like AMLO and Jorge Ramos with the fact that the Berlin Wall was designed to keep people in East German / Berlin, and the Gringo Wall is proposed with the purpose being to keep people out is pointless. They will respond...."It's exactly the same. It's meant to keep people apart and to suppress the poor."
El Gringo Viejo has written before that his father was in the horse cavalry.....the 1st Division, 12 Regiment, Headquarters Squadron (mounted) of the United States Army. He was stationed principally on the border...between Fort Brown in Brownsville and Fort Ringgold in Rio Grande City. Times have changed.....but the idea of a mechanised and / or mounted cavalry or mounted infantry in many places along the border would be much better than any wall.
Before the guffawing begins, please understand that the Border Patrol has expanded the mounted patrol substantially during the past few years. The employment of full scale mounted, mechanised, and air-supported cavalry tactics being integrated to a true strategy of interception and deflection is much better than any wall.
We have incredibly accurate sonic detection systems as well as FLIR and IR Drones and globs of civilian volunteers who could be readily marshaled, disciplined, trained in short order (many, many, many of them Latin of origen) to support the uniformed service and serve as eyes and ears to an extremely complex border. So, "who's the good Indian?" or "who's the good Mexican?" or "who's the good Anglo?" questions could be resolved by people who have total comfortability in that environment and, 99.99999% of the time, can differentiate between "the good'ns and the bad'ns". We are not the shoot-em up yahoos and jethros we are painted to be. A lot of us know the difference between Renoir and Warhol....or Monet and Mapplethorp....Dizzy Dean and Dizzy Gillespie.
Instead of pushing away very competent people and agencies, by the way, and denigrating the Mexican effort in this matter, it would be immensely better to incorporate the Mexican Army and Naval Infantry into a co-ordinated effort, like a caliper, in the effort to interdict the human sex-slave trade, the human transnational invasion, the meth / cocaine / heroin and other "estupificantes" (you can figure out what that means) import - export industry. It does, and will continue to require, the direct intervention of the American Coast Guard co-ordinating with the Mexican Navy on both side of the Continent.
If we were to be stupid enough to build a wall, the agents who capitalise on despair would quickly and nimbly begin to transport millions of tonnes and scores of thousands of humans via the sea-routes. This is not a joke or a thrashing ill- founded reason to not build a wall, it is just the facts. Already, the Mexican Navy, the past year alone, sank or disabled three "narco-submarinos" carrying over three tonnes of cocaine. These are things that few know and even fewer understand. And we shan't even think about re-visiting the ridiculous "Fast and Furious" scandal that should have resulted in Eric Holder, Hillary Rodham, and Barry Soetoro being marched to the nearest SuperMax prison.
The effort requires co-ordinating with confidable Mexican resources, mixed with a ghostly, powerful, techno-adapted antique and super-futuristic mix of American resources. No wall. The "wall" is something akin to the idea of "Forget Hell - The South Will Rise Again" gibberish. We will be judged as foolish if we don't build a real live cowboy-cyber-unpredictable-informants on the ground - nimble impenetrable "wall" that no one can see clearly.
These are my sincere, and informed thoughts. The idea that we are not co-ordinating with the Mexican military, which is about as corrupt as our own military as did the George Bush administration with positive results, and using real resources instead of what will have to be 2,000 miles of curving, instantly crumbling, sabotaged by night, and useless wall disturbs me. My own sensibilities concerning the ruin of territory rightfully controlled by the Republic of Texas so as to satisfy the sensibilities of a blowhard, liberal Republican presidential candidate's "campaign promise" have been strained several-and-a-dozen times since the campaign and election of 2016.
We have refrained from our ire, fire, and brimstone for a while at this point. But my will has suddenly returned....and perhaps you will see my "liberal" (conservationist) side and thereby know that the old fool is a bit more complex than than the regular rightwing bomb-thrower. I am a special rightwing bomb-thrower.
We do remain,
Ever grateful and appreciative of your participation in this journey.
El Gringo Viejo
____________________________
We even had the return en force of two skulks of fox, numbering about fifteen, plus or minus. Their laughing and giggling routine in the early morning hours....especially during the full moon episode....was particularly entertaining.
Every few hours, after overdosing on television news, both Mexican and American, I declared war on the new reality and threatened to write the final and definitive book of social and political rules. If the Left can write rules that declare that every child has the right to a compulsory education, then certainly I can require that primary and secondary school should be accomplished in eight years, or nine at the very most. And further, I can demand the immediate end to public education as we know it, and require that all docentry and tutelage be provided by teachers who would receive very low pay. Further, it would be established that all educational activity be controlled strictly locally and by private agency.
It would be my perfect world should all local sporting teams....football, baseball, basketball, ping-pong, tiddlywinks, chess, track and field....be community based and supported by admission fees or sponsorships by churches, businesses, and any source save for known criminals or government agencies of any kind. The same would apply to the fine arts....all private.
_________________________
The above graphs show the juxtaposition of various candidates who are presently passively or actively posturing for the position of President of Mexico.
Please be aware that Margarita Zavala de Calderon (PAN), is the wife Felipe Calderon Hinojosa, the President who served before the present incumbent. Also, remember that in Mexico, there is no re-election. All of these numbers will be changing like the back-computers of the digital "slot-machines' one might find in Las Vegas during the next eighteen months or so:
(a) The blue labels are the PAN (conservative party).
(b) The green labels are the PRI (old official government party from the previous century, and then once again during this particular 6 year term with Pena-Nieto).
(c) Then there is the yellow label which is the far-left Party of the Democratic Revolution - PRD).
(d) The brown label is the Party of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO), the very dangerous and dedicated marxist who is his own party....having been rejected by the his old PRD home base after two failed runs for President.
(e) Finally, the purple label is a fully independent party based upon the personality of Jaime Rodriquez, present governor of Nuevo Leon State (Monterrey and Co.) who came in like a lion based on his victories over the Cartels during his service as a County President of Garcia, Nuevo Leon, but once upon ascending to the throne of governor has made a series of bad calls and positionings on tax reduction issues.
The only way AMLO can win this coming election is by railing against the "New Berlin Wall of Hatred"....ironic since AMLO is a stark-raving marxist and continuously pushing leftist nationalism and "from each according to his ability and to each according to his need" policies. Confronting people like AMLO and Jorge Ramos with the fact that the Berlin Wall was designed to keep people in East German / Berlin, and the Gringo Wall is proposed with the purpose being to keep people out is pointless. They will respond...."It's exactly the same. It's meant to keep people apart and to suppress the poor."
El Gringo Viejo has written before that his father was in the horse cavalry.....the 1st Division, 12 Regiment, Headquarters Squadron (mounted) of the United States Army. He was stationed principally on the border...between Fort Brown in Brownsville and Fort Ringgold in Rio Grande City. Times have changed.....but the idea of a mechanised and / or mounted cavalry or mounted infantry in many places along the border would be much better than any wall.
Before the guffawing begins, please understand that the Border Patrol has expanded the mounted patrol substantially during the past few years. The employment of full scale mounted, mechanised, and air-supported cavalry tactics being integrated to a true strategy of interception and deflection is much better than any wall.
We have incredibly accurate sonic detection systems as well as FLIR and IR Drones and globs of civilian volunteers who could be readily marshaled, disciplined, trained in short order (many, many, many of them Latin of origen) to support the uniformed service and serve as eyes and ears to an extremely complex border. So, "who's the good Indian?" or "who's the good Mexican?" or "who's the good Anglo?" questions could be resolved by people who have total comfortability in that environment and, 99.99999% of the time, can differentiate between "the good'ns and the bad'ns". We are not the shoot-em up yahoos and jethros we are painted to be. A lot of us know the difference between Renoir and Warhol....or Monet and Mapplethorp....Dizzy Dean and Dizzy Gillespie.
Instead of pushing away very competent people and agencies, by the way, and denigrating the Mexican effort in this matter, it would be immensely better to incorporate the Mexican Army and Naval Infantry into a co-ordinated effort, like a caliper, in the effort to interdict the human sex-slave trade, the human transnational invasion, the meth / cocaine / heroin and other "estupificantes" (you can figure out what that means) import - export industry. It does, and will continue to require, the direct intervention of the American Coast Guard co-ordinating with the Mexican Navy on both side of the Continent.
If we were to be stupid enough to build a wall, the agents who capitalise on despair would quickly and nimbly begin to transport millions of tonnes and scores of thousands of humans via the sea-routes. This is not a joke or a thrashing ill- founded reason to not build a wall, it is just the facts. Already, the Mexican Navy, the past year alone, sank or disabled three "narco-submarinos" carrying over three tonnes of cocaine. These are things that few know and even fewer understand. And we shan't even think about re-visiting the ridiculous "Fast and Furious" scandal that should have resulted in Eric Holder, Hillary Rodham, and Barry Soetoro being marched to the nearest SuperMax prison.
 |
| Ingenious....and pointless |
These are my sincere, and informed thoughts. The idea that we are not co-ordinating with the Mexican military, which is about as corrupt as our own military as did the George Bush administration with positive results, and using real resources instead of what will have to be 2,000 miles of curving, instantly crumbling, sabotaged by night, and useless wall disturbs me. My own sensibilities concerning the ruin of territory rightfully controlled by the Republic of Texas so as to satisfy the sensibilities of a blowhard, liberal Republican presidential candidate's "campaign promise" have been strained several-and-a-dozen times since the campaign and election of 2016.
We have refrained from our ire, fire, and brimstone for a while at this point. But my will has suddenly returned....and perhaps you will see my "liberal" (conservationist) side and thereby know that the old fool is a bit more complex than than the regular rightwing bomb-thrower. I am a special rightwing bomb-thrower.
We do remain,
Ever grateful and appreciative of your participation in this journey.
El Gringo Viejo
____________________________
Wednesday, 22 February 2017
The thistle and thorned paths El Gringo Viejo follows as the Roman and Anglican Churches decompose
This is genuinely not a statement about "....look how smart I am and how stupid and ignorant everyone else is." This is published in these precincts because we are noticing the secondary and tertiary circulation numbers. They seem to be massive for a side-line minor league blog. We simply wish the people who venture, by intention or by accident, to this corner of the cyber-universe find that there is an ancient well of never ending waters. And Wisdom.....
Many great minds, far greater than my own, including scientists, alchemists, philosophers, astronomers, secularists and sacred, have dealt with the issues that weigh profoundly upon soul and mind. Some not-so-great-thinkers such as your humble servant follow along as does the lamprey on the belly or back of the whale (or dolphin, shark, any fish, or marine mammal) and that is what we are including below.
We did not arrive at our backwater of human intellectual development by waking up one day and seeing the tooth-fairy leaving dime under the pillow or Santa Clause shooting up the chimney. But, we do believe in seeing the unseen. Sometimes it is too obvious to deny....such as the fact that we breathe the air that keeps us alive, although we cannot see it. Other times it is a bit....or more than a bit....more difficult to "not see".
We submit to the review of the OROG community the entry below which speaks lightly into the bubbles of difference within the Christian Quilt....and how thin the onion-skin is....and how inclusive it is even with the disagreements within the denominational and sub-denominational groups of the Christian brotherhood. These are things the Anglican Curmudgeon, El Zorro, Mr. Finch, Dr. Shary, and scores of others who read this supposedly intolerant petrified-conservative meany Traditionalists struggle with during their daily affairs. We try to study and believe and stumble towards the truth.....
_____________________________
In the review, Williams provides a compelling vision of the sacramental imagination, of its theological and pastoral significance. The catholic confession of Real Presence is a joyful affirmation of the transfiguring redemption of the material:
Langland implies that God habitually deals with us for our salvation through the hiddenness of his work in finite agency and finite substance; but this is not the same as the adoption of an arbitrary concealment. Nor is it the deliberate assumption of a deceiving form, as with Satan’s “goyng of an addre”: Satan adopts this disguise in order to tell lies to Adam and Eve about himself and God and them; his purpose in concealing himself is to create a false perception, with all the disaster that follows therefrom. God demonstrates that what seems desolate and defeated, the shabby and wounded humanity of Piers, is in fact the place where charity lives and triumphs, despite appearances; and the sacramental re-embodiment of this, Christ present as the common food of a renewed social community, likewise declares that what seems lifeless is in fact the source of life and joy—an insight that also makes sense of the recommendation to venerate the cross (XXI.471ff.). When the finite stuff of this world is indwelt in this way by God, it is not that the finite is a deceptive surface concealing a different truth beneath or within: it conceals the infinite as infinite (since this cannot in any case be seen or apprehended in its infinity, as if it were an object in the world), but reveals the universal indwelling of the infinite in the finite. It is a “disguise” that establishes the truth. The deceit of Satan in the garden of Eden is what happens when a finite agent pretends to be what it is not in order to corrupt and mislead other finite agents and make them what they are not. The divine self-concealment in Jesus / Piers / the Eucharistic bread is in contrast the infinite declaring that it is truly present in what it is not, the finite, through the indwelling of the agency of divine love.
Wednesday, 1 February 2017
Fiddler On The Roof sunrise sunset
Consider these things....The Jews are the chosen people...with all their "characteristics", and we are their successors.....America is the New Land of Milk and Honey....without one there is not the other. No Jews, no Christians, no Abrahamic Ishmaelites......no order set forth by Yahweh.
Sunrise.....Sunset....Tradition....Tradition....
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