Aks or Ask

"Aks" is a perfectly legitimate variant of "ask" that's been part of English for nearly 800 years. From the romance King Horn (c. 1250): He axede what hi soghte Other to londe broghte.

Primary Day tomorrow

I have been so busy.I am inclined to vote for Corona and David Dewhurst and am surprised the Morning News didn't endorse Dewhurst. Inclined to go with them on the other candidates but given we disagree on the latter may defer. Decided instead against Dewhurst and for Dan Patrick, yes, their recommendation.

In Honor of a Colored Musician

Ann Althouse makes a blog post about singer Sam Cooke. In the comments I learned the sad story about the death of the man with most melodious voice in pop music. One of the commenters has links to his songs. My favorite is Wonderful World.

Mainly Irish history

Great post on Irish history and Catholic or Protestant massacres including more recent Orthodox Serb history which, not mentioned there but in a book about him, Pius XII supposedy supported.

Weltanschauung

Part of the cultural background for right and wrong and ideals are readings from the Bible. But the Bible provides angry and empathetic viewpoints that can be hard to reconcile. I came to Jews and Anti-Judaism in the New Testament: Decision Points and Divergent Interpretationsas he commented on Gregory Baum's earlier work. It is an excellent analysis of the problem brought up in its title. It gave me a new perspective on the New Testament. Along with taking the arguments seriously, it occurs to me that in some sense the modern age is anti-Christian just in the thought 'it is hard to consider such things without data.' Nevertheless, I wonder if, in considering the wisp of an ideal, and, wondering if I could have studied Latin more, I will be reading Paula Fredriksen's Augustine and the Jews, being 'prepared to look for more positive models and constructive patterns of interpretation.'

Social Change as an example of Punctuated Equilibria

Five Germanys I Have Knownis partly written in response to the question of how the Nazi period came to be. The question lingers. Various factors are discussed. I wonder if it isn't useful in considering this issue to have lived inside a cultural shift; such a thing happened in the late 60's. There was the suppression of leftist viewpoints in the 50s, the discovery of the pill, the real price of the 'pay any price' anticommunism for a generation raised in part according to the doctrine of tell the child why. Suddenly there was a change; ultimately I think because the youth wanted to go there reorganizing the factors just mentioned. This was like a reorganization of chromosomes in a punctuated equilibrium. Ultimately I think German society wanted to go to the Nazi period out of previous factors in a similar way as a punctuated cultural equilibrium.

Dallas Mayor Rawlings JFK Event speech.

Oprah and criticism of the president

In a person's death, 'I will come as a thief in the night.' Fr. Denis Farkasfalvy pointed out 'for the skeptics' that Jesus must certainly have said that for none of his followers would have put those words in his mouth. 'Have you ever had a thief in your house?' Fr. Abbot said. 'It is a surprise, disruptive, and humiliating. The passage of time is the passage of opportunity and can you imagine the disruption, the humiliation of the thief death.' And I think in a roundabout way these thoughts explain Oprah Winfrey's assertion that criticism of the president is racist. Many back lives did not come to a full fruition but rather were taken, at least in part, by thieves. So, opportunity lost, Oprah sees her black president as not being able to come to fruition because of criticism; and it reminds her of those other losses, the racism in them. But sometimes, as the not so Catholic Sigmund Freud said, 'A cigar is just a cigar;' or criticism is just criticism, ordinary political competition.

Divide and Ruin

Been reading . Just read about 'Munich' regarding which the author, Fritz Stern, asserts that General Beck, then head of the German military, had prepared a coup should England have refused to give in to Hitler's demands. The first World War was in part occasioned by Britain's strategy of keeping down a strong power on the continent, which conflict Germany looked to win without German opposition. This apparently mirrored Britain's strategy in India where it sought to keep in conflict potentially rival factions so that it could rule. It is what Britain did in interwar Palestine promoting ant anti-Jewish mufti over other more natural or qualified rulers for the Arab side. It looks to be a policy that was 'too clever by half' as it impairs successful cultural or personal development.