"Where such a shift in power is in favor of the governing elite, Power
can now achieve its potential. Where the elite also has built-up
frustrations regarding those who have lost power, or nonetheless feels
threatened by them; where it sees them as outside the moral universe,
or where it has dehumanized them; where the outgroup is culturally or
ethnically distinct and perceived by the elite as inferior; or where any
other such factors are present, Power will achieve its murderous
potential.
It simply waits for an excuse, an event of some sort, an
assassination, a massacre in a neighboring country, an attempted coup,
a famine, or a natural disaster, to justify the beginning of murder en
masse. Most democides occur under the cover of war, revolution, or
guerrilla war, or in their aftermath."
R. J. Rummel, Death by Government, 1993
“Violence does not necessarily take people by the throat and strangle them. They are required merely to become accomplices in its lies.”
Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Nobel Prize in Literature, 1970
“She was truthful when lying was the common speech of men; she was honest when honesty was become a lost virtue; she was a keeper of promises when the keeping of a promise was expected of no one; she was modest, and fine, and delicate when to be loud and coarse might be said to be universal; she was full of pity when a merciless cruelty was the rule; she was steadfast when stability was unknown, and honorable in an age which had forgotten what honor was; she was a rock of convictions in a time when men believed in nothing and scoffed at all things.
She was unfailingly true to an age that was false; she maintained her personal dignity unimpaired in an age of fawnings and servilities; she was of a dauntless courage when hope and courage had perished in the hearts of her nation; she was spotlessly pure in mind and body when society in the highest places was foul in both — she was all these things in an age when crime was the common business of lords and princes, and when the highest personages in Christendom were able to astonish even that infamous era and make it stand aghast at the spectacle of their atrocious lives black with unimaginable treacheries, butcheries, and beastialities.”
Mark Twain, Joan of Arc, 1896
"We are all lost. We have burned a Saint!"
Jean Tressart, Secretary to Henry VI of England, May 30, 1431
"I know this now. Every man gives his life to what he believes. Every woman gives her life for what she believes. Sometimes people believe in little or nothing, and so they give their lives to little or nothing."
Jeanne d'Arc, Trial records, 15 March 1431
The offenses against the Constitution and the waves of lawlessness that we seem to be accepting, if you step back and compare what is happening now and how things were when we were younger, is startling. The reasons for this are obvious. They don't even bother to hide it.
Reporter: The DOJ has this new fund — $1.7 billion. Why should taxpayers pay for the January 6ers?
Trump: Because in my world, loyalty outranks law. They broke the rules for me, so you pay the bill for them. That’s the transaction.
Stocks popped and flopped a bit.
I'm a little surprised they did that well, considering how the wheels are falling off the global political situation and economy.
Gold and silver were hit hard again, but managed to take some of that back into the close.
This past Saturday was the feast day of Saint Joan of Arc.
Her accomplishments are all the more remarkable when we recall that she was executed on 30 May 1431 at age 19.
This warrior-saint, deserving of all honor, who led the army of France to astonishing victory against fierce opposition. How would we treat her today?
Have a pleasant evening.
