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I've decided to celebrate this milestone Independence Day by re-reading Moby Dick, almost 50 years after it was assigned to me in college. (Honestly, though, the "re-" is doing a lot of work in that sentence; I only remembered about four words: "Ishmael," "Ahab," "Pequod," and "Whale").

I have the 150th Anniversary Penguin edition, for which the forward was penned by Nathaniel Philbrick, whose bestseller, In The Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whale Ship Essex won the 2000 National Book Award. The fate of the Essex was Melville's clay for the ending of his immortal tale.

Many consider Moby Dick to be the great American novel, and so far, I'm not arguing. Published in 1851, it feels like it could have been written last week. The language is wondrous, strikingly modern, and Melville's descriptive powers are endlessly astonishing. I am an enormous fan of Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin series as well, so life on board the Pequod has a wonderful familiarity to it, and Ishmael is the best and most companionable of shipmates, although I'm beginning to get the feeling that trouble may lie ahead.

Moby Dick

I read the book in my youth. Then re-read it about 15 years ago. Then I got an audiobook version and listened to that at night to help me go back to sleep. Don't get me wrong, it's a great novel, but it's dense enough and the audio version I had was read by a lackluster narrator, so it was good as a soporific. : )

I had was read by a lackluster narrator, so it was good as a soporific.

Maybe they should have had Ricardo Montalbán reading Ahab.

For those who missed it, Khan's dying speech is lifted from "Moby Dick".

Khan's Last Breath - Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrUEjpHbUMM

Steve...not doing anything for the 250. The "bicentennial minutes" were quite enough.

Don't get me wrong, it's a great novel, but it's dense enough and the audio version I had was read by a lackluster narrator, so it was good as a soporific. : )

My brain is the narrator, and it's doing a fantastic job! 😉

The 4th? Depends upon what the weather does.

Right now we are commencing a blistering heatwave, with temps in the 90s projected for the next week, up to and including the 4th.

Whatever we do, we'll be celebrating the grand ideals enshrined in the founding documents- which don't include flag waving or paying obeisance to an overweight, presidential embodiement of all of the qualities that the founders opposed.

The other day, I drove to town- 7 miles one way, then came back by a different route. In that 14 mile roundtrip, I counted 202 American flags. It reminded me of photographs of Nuremberg on the day of a Nazi torchlight parade....

There will be time enough to reclaim the flag and its original meaning. But not yet. The fascists have full sway at the moment, even though their base is beginning to crack.

"No Kings" is more in the spirit of the moment, and I daresay- the motivating principle that lay at the heart of that document to which the founders affixed their names on July 4, 1776 in Philadelphia.

Once the country is back on track- then we'll bring out the flag on Memorial Day and July 4th- observing proper flag protocols and decorum. Till then, American flags simply proclaim something that no longer exists.

The other day, I drove to town- 7 miles one way, then came back by a different route. In that 14 mile roundtrip, I counted 202 American flags. It reminded me of photographs of Nuremberg on the day of a Nazi torchlight parade....

Freaking.

Hilarious.

But beyond that, really, really sad: left wing hatred has burned up literally everything.

Freaking.

Hilarious.

But beyond that, really, really sad: left wing hatred has burned up literally everything.

It's right wing hatred that has torched everything for which the founders fought.

We now have a king.... who sends troops into the streets of America to threaten and even kill Americans.

And then when they kill them- they lie about what they've done.

We have a president who views this country as his own piggy bank to squeeze on behalf of himself, his family and his grifting (but supportive) friends.

We have a president who has already started two wars, one of which he has lost disastrously, even as he claims to have won it.

He claims his powers are "unlimited".

Today the Supreme Court told him he could turn the FTC and just about every federal agency into carbon copies of the Kennedy Center Board of Directors. We've already seen his successful attempts to turn the civil service into a spoils system. Now he has a green light to complete the corruption.

And you support what he does.

You.... Dope.... yes, you.

It's right wing hatred that has torched everything for which the founders fought.


Not so much. Read literally everything you're posting and have posted for oh, about 10 years now.

I'm done with trying to reason with you. You've marinated your brain in left Wing Hate Juice for a decade plus and look what it's done to you: you see Nazis everywhere, can't celebrate your nation's birth without losing your mind and have fever dreams about where the country is. Now you can't even drive past an American flag without seeing a swastika on it.

That's seriously messed up. Get some rest and maybe some antidepressants.

Welp, you're not getting your version of the United States (whatever even that means) now or in the future. The rest of us who live here and genuinely want the USA to do well won't allow your new team (the dsa and the suicidal democrats who are empowering them and even worse elements) to remake the country into some left wing "paradise". History tells us that too many heads have to literally roll, too many people have to be locked away in "camps" and too many other people end up against some blood-stained wall.

Not happening here. Ever.

Happy 4th, Bill. Try not to get triggered when somebody wishes you that IRL.

Hilarious. But beyond that, really, really sad: left wing hatred has burned up literally everything. ~Dope1, guy who's cult leader was endorsed twice by the "Crusader" the official newspaper of the KKK.

ucmtsu

Ben Meiselas piece on Fox Noise hyping the daylights out of the "fair", while their live video shows hardly anyone actually attending the fair.

Fox News IN PANIC MODE as Trump PLANS COLLAPSE!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCNsC8QMoDw

Steve

Welp, you're not getting your version of the United States (whatever even that means) now or in the future. The rest of us who live here and genuinely want the USA to do well won't allow your new team (the dsa and the suicidal democrats who are empowering them and even worse elements) to remake the country into some left wing "paradise". History tells us that too many heads have to literally roll, too many people have to be locked away in "camps" and too many other people end up against some blood-stained wall.

Here's how I read what you just said:

You've said here that you are against free and fair elections, because it does seem that Republicans are headed to defeat in November if the elections are free and fair.

And you justify your desire for illegally suppressing the vote, or even declaring elections invalid.... because you are not willing to have a majority of Americans determine the destiny of America.

That's exactly what I hear you saying.

And you end what you say by appealing to the fear of right wingers- of heads rolling, "camps" and blood stained walls.

But the only group in America that seems to be headed in this direction is the Republican Party. The only heads rolling are those of immigrants. The only camps are immigrant detention centers. And the only blood stained walls are in Minneapolis, Chicago and Los Angeles.

Here's how I read what you just said: How much left wing fenty did you cook on the foil?

You've said here that you are against free and fair elections, because it does seem that Republicans are headed to defeat in November if the elections are free and fair.

A lot. Like enough to cook the brains of normal people, but here we are. You're basically hallucinating what other people are saying, now. My advice is to get a subscription to a higher level AI so you don't make as many mistakes like this.

That's exactly what I hear you saying.

I'm sure you hear that, along with half a dozen other voices in your head all competing for attention. Which one do you listen to the most?

All left wing "Revolutions" end the same way.

I'm different Padre. Screw these assholes who think they own the flag. I have 10-12 small flags lining the edge of the swale that fronts my property. I have a 3'x2' 82d Airborne insignia read on white flag hanging one one side, and another 3x5 red on blue Airborne on the other side. I'll be damned if MAGA thinks they own the flag. The big MAGA flag wavers here aren't waving that much. When I go to NO KINGS protests, I bring my flags taped to a long bamboo garden stick and six stuck lining the highway in front of me.

Some of my MAGA trivia friends saw me at a NO KINGS protest and asked me, so I explained to them it's a NO KINGS protest. I let them have their rants at times and don't respond, because we're all old and need to have fun, cruises, and social nights. Nobody changes their minds this late in the game.

Seen on the web. It applies to every leftist poster here:

He's the President of the United States - not you ex, not your personal villain, and not the cause of your misery. You don't have to support him. That's America.

But if someone is simply backing the sitting President and it makes you rage, cut people off, attack families, or act like garbage - you are the problem.

You've turned politics into a personality disorder: nonstop outrage and toddler meltdowns online. Grow up. He won. The sky didn't fall. Pay your bills, care for your family, touch grass and move on.

Bolding mine.

American flags simply proclaim something that no longer exists.

The Forth of July and its two hundred fiftieth Birthday of America is a chance
for patriotic Americans to demonstrate their love of freedom and democracy.
The Forth of July is a reminder countless Americans died for in defense of the Republic.

The Fourth of July has nothing to do with your politics and your hate for President Trump.

My condolences to the Dope,
He wasted his entire day defending a pedophile and regurgitating his RW programming, 16+ posts.
Time he will never get back.
Absolutely Tragic.

“Much of our activity these days is nothing more than a cheap anesthetic to deaden the pain of an empty life.” Bukowski

1poorkid is a sports nut. We watched her play for a travel team, so we got to understand soccer pretty well. Therefore, we'll likely be watching the World Cup matches. Guaranteed 1poorkid will be.

If I were to hang a flag, it would be upside down. We're in deep doo doo, IMHO. Our Republic hangs by a thread. Franklin's comment "if you can keep it" has never been more prescient.

The Forth of July and its two hundred fiftieth Birthday of America is a chance
for patriotic Americans to demonstrate their love of freedom and democracy.

For strait white Americans.

For other Americans? not so much.

You’ve lost the story of America, LM.

My condolences to the Dope

My condolences to Dope1 also.
Dope, the lone American Patriot defending the honor of America against the horde of the Boards
socialistdnazidemocrats, who no doubt will be celebrating America’s two hundred fiftieth birthday
with bonfires burning the American Flag.

against the horde of the Boards
socialistdnazidemocrats, who no doubt will be celebrating America’s two hundred fiftieth birthday
with bonfires burning the American Flag.

You’re just weird, LM.

For strait white Americans.

For other Americans? not so much.

You’ve lost the story of America, LM.

Oh for crying out loud Bill.
Can’t you come up with something orgional instead of regurgitating the dem’s
stupid and ignorant talking points?

You’re just weird, LM.

LM has a weak mind and is easily brainwashed.

Oh for crying out loud Bill.
Can’t you come up with something orgional instead of regurgitating the dem’s
stupid and ignorant talking points?

When the talking points align with what is plain to see by over half the country on a daily basis…

Or perhaps you have your eyes shut and cannot see?

You’re just weird, LM.

I’d rather be weird than a democrat who has lost his way
wandering around in socialist wasteland.

to remake the country into some left wing "paradise".

You mean like Norway? Looks pretty good to me. I'd settle for a version of Norway.


History tells us that too many heads have to literally roll, too many people have to be locked away in "camps" and too many other people end up against some blood-stained wall.

Actually Norway's pretty democratic and has a blend of socialism and capitalism that I admire, and the state owns 65% of an oil company last I looked. I think you'd be happy with a version of Norway too, Dope. It was negotiations and compromise.

My condolences to Dope1 also.
Dope, the lone American Patriot defending the honor of America against the horde of the Boards
socialistdnazidemocrats, who no doubt will be celebrating America’s two hundred fiftieth birthday
with bonfires burning the American Flag.

Trump didn’t make all these people bitter, angry sociopaths. They did that all by themselves.

Your post inspired me to go in the opposite direction in my reading. I'm going to start a book that's been on my TBR list for too long, An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz.

Your post inspired me to go in the opposite direction in my reading. I'm going to start a book that's been on my TBR list for too long, An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz.

A sobering choice.

Ever worth re-reading, too, is Frederick Douglass's “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”

"On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a keynote address at an Independence Day celebration and asked, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” Douglass was a powerful orator, often traveling six months out of the year to give lectures on abolition. His speech, given at an event commemorating the signing of the Declaration of Independence, was held at Corinthian Hall in Rochester, New York. It was a scathing speech in which Douglass stated, “This Fourth of July is yours, not mine, You may rejoice, I must mourn.”"

I also try to read The Great Gatsby every year, and it is coming up toward the top of the rotation again. For me, its portrait of hollow striving and failed aspiration set against the backdrop of money worship of the 1920s (no echoes of today there!) not to mention Fitzgerald's gorgeous prose, place it among the very greatest American novels.

The Fourth of July and its two hundred fiftieth Birthday of America is a chance
for [--] Americans to demonstrate their love of freedom and democracy.

Americans - even the proto-fascists and fascist Americans. I celebrate as I look on in horror at what you are doing.

I wasn't sure that I read "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" until I looked for it. I remembered reading it in a US History class on the Civil War. This reading must have been in the first class or two on the prelude to the war. Here it is for those interested.

What to the Slave, is the Fourth of July?
​Frederick Douglass

Fellow citizens, pardon me, and allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here today? What have I or those I represent to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? And am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits, and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?

Would to God, both for your sakes and ours, that an affirmative answer could be truthfully returned to these questions. Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. For who is there so cold that a nation's sympathy could not warm him? Who so obdurate and dead to the claims of gratitude, that would not thankfully acknowledge such priceless benefits? Who so stolid and selfish that would not give his voice to swell the hallelujahs of a nation's jubilee, when the chains of servitude had been torn from his limbs? I am not that man. In a case like that, the dumb might eloquently speak, and the "lame man leap as an hart."

But such is not the state of the case. I say it with a sad sense of disparity between us. I am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you this day rejoice are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence bequeathed by your fathers is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought life and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak today? If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. And let me warn you, that it is dangerous to copy the example of a nation (Babylon) whose crimes, towering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrecoverable ruin.

Fellow citizens, above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions, whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are today rendered more intolerable by the jubilant shouts that reach them. If I do forget, if I do not remember those bleeding children of sorrow this day, "may my right hand forget her cunning, and may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth!"

To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs and to chime in with the popular theme would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world.

My subject, then, fellow citizens, is "American Slavery." I shall see this day and its popular characteristics from the slave's point of view. Standing here, identified with the American bondman, making his wrongs mine, I do not hesitate to declare, with all my soul, that the character and conduct of this nation never looked blacker to me than on this Fourth of July.

Whether we turn to the declarations of the past, or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity, which is outraged, in the name of liberty, which is fettered, in the name of the Constitution and the Bible, which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery -- the great sin and shame of America! "I will not equivocate - I will not excuse." I will use the severest language I can command, and yet not one word shall escape me that any man, whose judgment is not blinded by prejudice, or who is not at heart a slave-holder, shall not confess to be right and just.

But I fancy I hear some of my audience say it is just in this circumstance that you and your brother Abolitionists fail to make a favorable impression on the public mind. Would you argue more and denounce less, would you persuade more and rebuke less, your cause would be much more likely to succeed. But, I submit, where all is plain there is nothing to be argued. What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? On what branch of the subject do the people of this country need light? Must I undertake to prove that the slave is a man? That point is conceded already. Nobody doubts it. The slave-holders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. There are seventy-two crimes in the State of Virginia, which, if committed by a black man (no matter how ignorant he be), subject him to the punishment of death; while only two of these same crimes will subject a white man to like punishment.

What is this but the acknowledgment that the slave is a moral, intellectual, and responsible being? The manhood of the slave is conceded. It is admitted in the fact that Southern statute books are covered with enactments, forbidding, under severe fines and penalties, the teaching of the slave to read and write. When you can point to any such laws in reference to the beasts of the field, then I may consent to argue the manhood of the slave. When the dogs in your streets, when the fowls of the air, when the cattle on your hills, when the fish of the sea, and the reptiles that crawl, shall be unable to distinguish the slave from a brute, then I will argue with you that the slave is a man!

For the present it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. Is it not astonishing that, while we are plowing, planting, and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver, and gold; that while we are reading, writing, and ciphering, acting as clerks, merchants, and secretaries, having among us lawyers, doctors, ministers, poets, authors, editors, orators, and teachers; that we are engaged in all the enterprises common to other men -- digging gold in California, capturing the whale in the Pacific, feeding sheep and cattle on the hillside, living, moving, acting, thinking, planning, living in families as husbands, wives, and children, and above all, confessing and worshipping the Christian God, and looking hopefully for life and immortality beyond the grave -- we are called upon to prove that we are men?

Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? That he is the rightful owner of his own body? You have already declared it. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? Is that a question for republicans? Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation, as a matter beset with great difficulty, involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to understand? How should I look today in the presence of Americans, dividing and subdividing a discourse, to show that men have a natural right to freedom, speaking of it relatively and positively, negatively and affirmatively? To do so would be to make myself ridiculous, and to offer an insult to your understanding. There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven who does not know that slavery is wrong for him.

What! Am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood and stained with pollution is wrong? No - I will not. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply.

What, then, remains to be argued? Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? There is blasphemy in the thought. That which is inhuman cannot be divine. Who can reason on such a proposition? They that can, may - I cannot. The time for such argument is past.

At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed. Oh! had I the ability, and could I reach the nation's ear, I would today pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be denounced.

What to the American slave is your Fourth of July? I answer, a day that reveals to him more than all other days of the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mock; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy - a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation of the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of these United States at this very hour.

Go search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the Old World, travel through South America, search out every abuse and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.

Frederick Douglass - July 4, 1852

An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz.
insightful book.

check out new podcast 'First America'.
proposes that american revolution was due to colonists' expansion desires.
british were uninterested in any new conflicts outside europe, and attempted indigenous treaty for all lands west of appalachians. problem : settlers already defied rules and wanted even more. (hello Israel !)
americans attacked arms and supplies sent by british for natives to defend themselves.
british taxes and other such noble complaints came as later justifications.

was i ever brainwashed!

proposes that american revolution was due to colonists' expansion desires.

That's not a new theory. That was presented as one of the causes of the American Revolution in both my high school and 100 level US History classes over 50 years ago. The British promised Native Americans that the colonists would not expand into their territory after the 7 Years War. The colonists wanted the crown to provide troops to protect them as they pushed westward.

The colonists wanted the crown to provide troops to protect them as they pushed westward.

Like all of us, the colonists were a mixture of sunlight and shadows, baser motives and a few noble motives as well.

The genius of the American experiment is that we keep trying to come to terms with the baser motives while perfecting the noble.

Unless you’re MAGA, because you’re perfect already and the baser parts of our history are simply DEI libtards trying to paralyze you with guilt, and lying about our glorious ancestors who walked on water.

mea culpa.
despite good grades in AP history, my brained was overwhelmed by 'taxation w/out rep' , YankeeDoodle Bugs, and other such bitesized cultural tidbits. same as 99% of all those schooled here?

anyways, this allows another perspective on self-defined Conservatives.
they are willing to accept everything great about america (many of which are true), but unwilling to accept the most appalling regardless of how overwhelming the likelihood and\or evidence.
and in the modern gop, unwilling to accept this is a psychological defect, being anti-stem and such.

they are willing to accept everything great about america (many of which are true), but unwilling to accept the most appalling regardless of how overwhelming the likelihood and\or evidence.

Remember the token Russian in the original "Star Trek"? According to him, everything good was "a Russian invention".

Steve

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