Amendment V: No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any …
Category: trust
Jan 07 2023
Trust And Its Enemies
This morning, Cold Fury co-contributor SteveF has posted an excellent piece on a subject of great importance: trust. (Yes, I’ve ranted about it too.) Steve delves into the developments that allowed dishonest behavior to explode: One is the increasing population and increased concentration in urban areas. When everyone in a small town knows …
Nov 28 2022
Perspectives
One of my favorite Catholic writers is the late Venerable Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen: Venerable Fulton John Sheen (born Peter John Sheen, May 8, 1895 – December 9, 1979) was an American bishop (later archbishop) of the Catholic Church known for his preaching and especially his work on television and radio. His cause for …
Oct 08 2022
Progressions
Time was, anyone with a high school diploma could be relied upon to know at least a little about mathematical progressions: arithmetic (additive), geometric (multiplicative), and others. If you had a little awareness of limits, you might even be able to work out how an open-form progression can be reduced to a closed-form expression. …
Aug 21 2022
Strokes
I’d intended to write a Jeremiad about this bit of viciousness — thank you, John Hinderaker, for bringing that to my attention — but I’m just recently back from Sunday Mass, and events, or perhaps non-events, have pointed me in another direction for today’s tirade. You’re unlikely to read anything else today like …
Jul 22 2022
One Incident, Two Observations
Just yesterday evening, Congressman and gubernatorial candidate Lee Zeldin was attacked during a campaign rally: Lee Zeldin, the Republican candidate for New York governor, was attacked during a campaign stop near Rochester in upstate Monroe County on Thursday night…. The suspect approached Zeldin wielding an unknown weapon and Chenelly tackled him. …
Apr 11 2022
Faith Among The Faithless
Relax, this won’t be a religious piece. Rather, it’s about one’s reluctance to award credence to persons who’ve already proved unreliable. We start from this story: Nearly 100 House Republicans are urging Attorney General Merrick Garland to appoint a special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden’s foreign business deals, saying they had the …
Mar 18 2022
Theorizing Unbounded
First, a few quotations – hey, quotations are my thing, you know: “The Shing law forbids killing, but they killed knowledge, they burned books, and what may be worse, they falsified what was left. They slipped in the Lie, as always. We aren’t sure of anything concerning the Age of the League; how …
Mar 07 2022
The Left’s Approach To Facts And Truth
Dig this: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been taking some punches by activist media for “bullying” a group of young men by explaining to them that they don’t need to wear masks that are useless just to virtue signal mask compliance, and saying that people need to cut it out with the ridiculous …
Jan 29 2022
Trust: What It Can And What It Can’t
I feel certain that my Gentle Readers have all, at some time, heard the acidly funny line, “What are you going to believe? Me, or your lying eyes?” It’s not really funny, of course. Nevertheless, it alludes to a condition that has become almost as pandemic as the Kung Flu: the determination of politicians …
Aug 06 2021
Your Decision Tree And What It Means For You
You’ve probably seen the phrase decision tree before. It’s become a frequent element in op-ed columns such as this one. While it looks forbiddingly formal and technical, it refers to one of the most pedestrian things in human life: our priorities and how we use them to make choices. Everyone has priorities. However, …
Aug 02 2021
The Paramount Social Principle
Way back when the world was, if not new, still only gently used, I wrote a rather melancholic piece about the loss of trust. It evoked a range of reactions from “C’mon!” all the way to “It’s even worse than you think, Fran.” But I was mostly right. Where I failed was in noting …
Jul 03 2021
Formerly Unconscionable Connections
News item: Former Police Officer Recounts Witnessing ‘Industrialized’ Organ Harvesting in China The following are questions our society would almost certainly have insisted be asked in another era. Have you asked what is the source of your life-saving organ? To what soul or grieving family may you direct thanks for it? If you asked, did …
Apr 08 2021
Authority Versus Evidence
It’s risky to reflexively attribute actual knowledge to persons who represent themselves as “authorities.” More Americans have been led badly astray by such “authorities” than have contracted the Wuhan Virus. Speaking of which, courtesy of Ragin’ Dave at Peace or Freedom, here’s a contemporary example: Last month, when Texas Governor Greg Abbott axed …
Mar 10 2021
Rejoining One Another
A passage in Bookworm’s piece for today resonated powerfully with me: One of the things that has helped me be a nicer person is discovering that, if you ask the right questions, everyone has something interesting to tell. For that reason, I always start conversations with people — clerks, gardeners, guard gates, whomever. …
Mar 10 2021
What Comes Of The Loss Of Trust
“A thousand truths do not mark a man as a truth-teller, but a single lie marks him as a damned liar….Lying to other people is your business, but I tell you this: once a man gets a reputation as a liar, he might as well be struck dumb, for people do not listen to …
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