I'm wrong, are you?

 poor georgie’s almanack.  

Who knew (and Who is not talking). Irish slaves once were cheaper than African.  South Africa treated its slaves worse than the USA.  

After recently reading a lot of history, humanities and science … new, heavy stuff above my grade level … I learned how wrong I’ve been about a lot of things. Some new science is beyond science fiction. That stuff about other universes might just be right. 

Some new historical research shows my high school and college teachers, bright and lovable as they were, were flat-out-wrong. For instance, the pox from pigs that Spanish Conquistadores brought to the New World killed up to 90 millions Native Americans, which is why a few white guys and their camp followers could take over two continents.

I no longer am comfortable in my media/history/religious bubble.   Learning is not only interesting, it is fun. For instance, there is are historic reasons the guy in N. Korean with the funny haircut acts the way he does … evil as he is. And why China, Japan and Russia, his immediate neighbors, react in expected ways. I have not been reading up on grammar, but whoever, or whomever, of the men (always the guys) who said “Those who don’t study history are doomed to repeat it,” really knew his stuff. But, science is way more fascinating.

bombast to bomb blast

poor georgie’s almanack:

Remember the Doomsday Clock?

The gap between bombast and bomb blast just narrowed again.

Things I don’t understand #1.

poor georgie’s almanack:
Things I don’t understand #1.
Why the songs "Strange Fruit" and "The House I Live In" are not mandatory in Grammar School. Lyrics below.  Songs on YouTube.

 


STRANGE FRUIT ... Billie Holiday

Southern trees bear strange fruit.
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root.
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze.
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south.
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth.
Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh.
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck.
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck.
For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop.
Here is a strange and bitter crop.
---------------------------------------------------
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THE HOUSE I LIVE IN … Frank Sinatra
What is America to me.
A name, a map, or a flag I see.
A certain word, democracy.

What is America to me.
The house I live in.
A plot of Earth, a street.

The grocer and the butcher
And the people that I meet.
The children in the playground.
The faces that I see.
All races and religions.
That's America to me.

The place I work in.
The worker by my side.

The little town the city.
Where my people lived and died.

The howdy and the handshake.
The air a feeling free.

And the right to speak your mind out.
That's America to me

The things I see about me.

The big things and the small.
The little corner newsstand.
Or the house a mile tall.

The wedding and the churchyard.
The laughter and the tears.

The dream that's been a growing.
For a hundred and fifty years

The town I live in.
The street, the house, the room
The pavement of the city,
Or the garden all in bloom.
The church the school the clubhouse.
The million lights I see.
But especially the people.
That's America to me.

Boomerang

 poor georgie’s almanack: From the Far Side.

Trump, Obama, Bush Secretaries of State discuss Afghanistan.  

deja vu

poor georgie’s almanack:
deja vu: CBS foreign correspondent Eric Sevareid said in June 1940, as Nazi Germany was about to conquer France, that politicians in Paris were acting like petulant, quarreling children. “They talked the language of party, special interests, of regional concerns …but no voice rose above the clamor to speak for France.” From The Murrow Boys by Stanley Cloud and Lynne Olson.

Aaron's eclipse

poor georgie’s almanack:

Best Eclipse quote comes from grandson Aaron who was front-row-center in Portland Oregon. 

“It was like the 4th of July and the Apocalypse."

Sweet

poor georgie’s almanack:
Isn’t it sweet someone behind us said … after 55 years they still hold hands. Look closer, I said ... she’s checking my pulse.

washington equilibrium

poor george’s almanack:

Understanding Washington thermodynamics and equilibrium. 

To fight global warming … launch new Cold War.

SNARK

poor georgie’s almanack:

FYI: Snark: Punctuation’s Irony Mark.

Smart writers use it in a sentence designed to make readers feel stupid.

Do you hear what I hear?

Stock up on lead-lined underwear. 

Yesterday and today I sensed a shift in Washington rhetoric from avoiding war, to war with N Korea.