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mrepstein · 2 years

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‘The Fifth Beatle’s Double Life’ (The Sunday Times - December 5, 2021)

Craig Brown reveals how the band’s debonair manager Brian Epstein made them millions but was tortured by drugs, homosexuality - and a fixation with John Lennon.

[Below is Craig Brown’s introduction to a new edition of Epstein’s A Cellarful of Noise]

With his polite side-parting, unflashy suits, diffident manner and public-school accent, Brian Epstein appeared much more mature than the Beatles. In interviews, he would call them ‘my boys’ or ‘the boys’; they, in turn, would always refer to him as ‘Mr Epstein’.

So it comes as a surprise to realise he was only six years older than John and Ringo. In April 1964, when he embarked on this memoir, he was twenty-nine. That same month, the top five places in the American top ten were all occupied by the Beatles, and there were a further seven Beatles’ singles in the top one hundred, along with two songs about them – ‘We Love You Beatles’ by the Carefrees and ‘A Letter to the Beatles’ by the Four Preps.

Since February, they had become the four most famous young men in the world. Even Ringo Starr, the least prepossessing of the Beatles, had been made the subject of a song, ‘Ringo, I Love You’, written and produced by Phil Spector and sung by Bobbie Jo Mason, soon to become more famous as Cher.

Having engineered all this fame, Epstein was clearly in no mood to play it down. In A Cellarful of Noise he describes the Beatles as ‘a worldwide phenomenon, like nothing in any of our lifetimes, and like nothing any of us will ever see again’. Mixing condescension with a dash of hyperbole he writes, ‘The haunted, wonderful wistful eyes of little Ringo Starr from Liverpool’s Dingle are more instantly recognisable than any single feature of any of the world’s great statesmen.’

A Cellarful of Noise is a period piece. At times the period seems much earlier than the 1960s, exhibiting the muscular snobbery of John Buchan or Baden-Powell. At one point Epstein declares that the Beatles ‘never sit while a woman stands’ and at another that ‘their naturalness … wins them the admiration of people like Lord Montgomery’. Of one of his artistes, Gerry Marsden, he boasts that ‘Princess Alexandra twice requested him for cabaret at society balls’.

Many of his observations about the world of pop are now as dated as the National Milk Bar in Liverpool where he and the boys tucked into four packets of biscuits to celebrate the promise of a recording session at EMI. ‘The disc charts cannot stand very many girls,’ he writes, ‘however gorgeous they may look on stage.’

Nearly sixty years on, the Beatles are still part of the air we breathe, but some of Epstein’s other artistes, as he always called them, have vanished without trace. Who remembers Tommy Quickly? Epstein confidently predicts ‘he is going to be a star’, but alas he never was. Taken up by Epstein, he left his job as a telephone fitter, changed his name from Quigley to Quickly, took part in three Beatles tours and recorded five singles, all flops. He retired from the music business in 1965.

Michael Haslam – ‘he, I believe, is going to be very big’ – was part of the Beatles Christmas Show at the Hammersmith Odeon for three weeks in 1963. He recorded two unsuccessful singles, both produced by George Martin, the last of which was called, ominously, ‘There Goes the Forgotten Man’. Eventually, he fell out with Brian Epstein over an expenses claim for a pair of socks. Epstein let him go, and in 1966 Haslam returned to his £15-a-week job on a fleshing machine at Walker and Martin’s tannery in Weston Street, Bolton. His fellow workers greeted his return with a jaunty banner that read, ‘Welcome back Mike. Top of the Flops.’

In contrast to the devil-may-care merriment of the Beatles, Brian Epstein cultivated a reserved, fastidious air. He wore a Burberry raincoat, well-polished buckled shoes, gold cufflinks, a monogrammed shirt and a Christian Dior silk tie or a polka-dot cravat. ‘He was immaculate from head to toe, like Cary Grant,’ recalled Cilla Black. ‘He was everything you wanted a posh fella to look like.’ His Liverpool tailor, George Hayes, maintained that he always looked as if he’d just stepped out of the bath.

Epstein would have preferred Godfrey Winn or Beverley Nichols, well-manicured household names, to ghostwrite his memoir, but his publisher, Ernest Hecht, vetoed them for being ‘far too pricey and the wrong image’. In the end, Epstein settled for Derek Taylor, then a showbiz journalist on the Daily Express, but soon to become the Beatles’ press officer.

The two men motored down to the Imperial Hotel, Torquay in Epstein’s chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce. Taylor was particularly impressed by the electric windows. ‘I’d never seen such a thing.’ The two men got on well. In their first session Epstein opened up about his uneasy childhood and troubled adolescence, but he hesitated before revealing his greatest secret. There came a point when he realised he would have to broach the subject. Over lunch, he suddenly asked, ‘Did you know that I was queer?’ ‘No, I didn’t,’ replied Taylor. ‘Well, I am, and if we’re going to do this book I’m going to have to stop buggering about saying I was with this girl when I would not be with a girl, it would be a boy. Does that make any difference?’

It must have been an agonising confession – in 1964 homosexuality was still an imprisonable offence – but Taylor was unfazed. ‘No,’ he remembered saying, ‘it doesn’t make any difference. It’ll make it a lot easier. So you mustn’t worry any more, difficult as it may be to convince you perhaps, but I won’t ever let you down.’

Between the two of them, they conspired to render everything seemly. The book makes no mention of Epstein’s sexuality or the deep torment it caused him. Of his time in National Service, for instance, we hear simply that he was ‘the lousiest soldier in the world’. Wearing a pinstriped suit and a bowler hat, he was charged with impersonating an officer and confined to barracks. This caused his nerves to become ‘seriously upset’. Psychiatrists decided he was ‘a compulsive civilian and quite unfit for military service’, so he was ‘discharged on medical grounds’.

The truth is both more fraught and more interesting. Stationed at the Albany Barracks in Regent’s Park, Epstein had hated his ‘hideous’ private’s uniform and had asked his tailor to run him up a rather more elegant officer’s outfit, which he then wore to cruise the West End in search of young men. At the Army and Navy Club on Piccadilly, military police arrested him and charged him with impersonating an officer. His parents employed lawyers, who succeeded in saving him from a court martial. He was eventually discharged for being ‘emotionally and mentally unfit’ – code for homosexuality.

Elsewhere in the book Epstein claims, ‘I lost a girlfriend called Rita Harris who worked for me and who said, “I’m not going to compete with four kids who think they’re entering the big time”.’ In reality, ‘Rita’ was a boy.

In his unpublished diaries he was much less guarded, confessing that, after leaving the army, ‘My life became a succession of mental illnesses and sordid, unhappy events bringing great sorrow to my family.’ It now seems probable that his sexuality led to his torment and his torment led, eventually, to his death. John Lennon’s school friend Pete Shotton noted, ‘Not only was Brian homosexual; he was sexually aroused by precisely those traits that otherwise most affronted or menaced him: qualities like vulgarity, insolence, callousness, and aggressiveness, all so abundantly on display in the persona of the Beatles’ rhythm guitarist … Brian Epstein was irredeemably mesmerised by the one whose demeanour most resembled that of a caged animal.’

True to character, John Lennon taunted him about the memoir. When Epstein was wondering out loud what to call it, Lennon said, ‘Why don’t you call it Queer Jew?’ Later, when Epstein said it was called A Cellarful of Noise, Lennon replied that he would be better off calling it A Cellarful of Boys.

The self-portrait in A Cellarful of Noise may be partial, but it is not untrue. Epstein portrays himself as lonely, businesslike, scrupulous, obsessive, shrewd, awkward and pernickety, all of which he was. Now that we know how his story ended, the odd phrase flashes on the page like a fork of lightning. Quite late in the book, he confesses that the strain of being in sole charge of management ‘continues and increases and thrives like a malignant disease’. Soon after, he talks of the pressures he is under. ‘The chief of them is loneliness, for ultimately I must bear the strain alone, not only in the office or the theatre, but at home in the small hours.’

He was fanatical, in both senses of the word. When he writes ‘I can think of no warmer experience than to be in a vast audience at a Beatles concert’ he is guilty only of understatement. The four Beatles were everything he could never be. He told an interviewer in 1964 that the Beatles ‘represented the direct, unselfconscious, goodnatured, uninhibited human relationships which I hadn’t found and had wanted and felt deprived of. And my own sense of inferiority evaporated with the Beatles because I knew I could help them, and that they wanted me to help them, and trusted me to help them.’

Simon Napier-Bell, manager of the Yardbirds, Wham! and many others, once recalled Epstein telling him that at a Beatles stadium concert in America ‘he went into the crowd of girls and he just screamed like one of the girls, which he said is what he’d always wanted to do from the first minute he’d ever seen them. He had spent his whole life being restrained and wearing suits and suddenly he just screamed and became the mad fan he wanted to be.’

John, Paul, George and Ringo sometimes went wild, and sometimes behaved foolishly, but they were always able to adapt and move on. They were survivors. Each of them was equipped with a safety valve. But for all his extraordinary abilities, for all his carefully buttoned-up exterior, Brian Epstein was not. He could manage others, but he could never manage himself; he lived in perpetual jeopardy. He took drugs – uppers, downers, acid, heroin, coke – far more recklessly than his boys, and was known to gamble away £20,000 in a single night. Nor could he resist picking up the type of young man who would steal from him, beat him up and blackmail him.

‘Eppy seems to be in a terrible state,’ John told Pete Shotton one night. ‘The guy’s head’s a total mess, and we’re all really worried about him.’ John then played a tape. Pete described it as ‘one of the most harrowing performances I’ve ever heard’, adding, The recording was barely recognisable as that of a human voice, alternately groaning, grunting and shrieking words which, even when decipherable, made no apparent sense whatsoever. The man on the tape was obviously suffering from great emotional stress, and very likely under the influence of some extremely potent drugs.

‘What the fuck’s all that, John?’ I said incredulously.

‘Don’t you recognise the voice? That’s Brian. He made the tape for me in his house. I don’t know why he sent it, but he’s trying to tell me something – fuck knows what. He just can’t seem to communicate with us in his usual way any more.’

Three years after the publication of A Cellarful of Noise, on Sunday 27 August 1967, Brian Epstein was found dead in the bedroom of his house in Belgravia. Two brief suicide notes were found, hidden away in a book, but they were both dated several weeks before. At the inquest his psychiatrist Dr Flood reported that ‘his main complaint was insomnia, anxiety and depression’. Epstein had, he said, ‘always shown some signs of emotional instability … The patient was homosexual, but had been unable to come to terms with this problem.’ Recording a verdict of accidental death, the coroner said that it was due to poisoning by the sedative Carbitral, caused by an incautious self-overdose.

Together, the Beatles went round to comfort Brian’s mother, Queenie. They wanted to attend his funeral, but Queenie dreaded it turning into a media circus, and thought it best if they stayed away. ‘They were like four lost children,’ she recalled.

In the vast Beatles Story Museum in Liverpool, just around the corner from the cabinet containing the four Sgt. Pepper costumes and housed in a glass case of its own, stands a dapper knee-length blue coat with three shiny buttons. It dresses a headless mannequin. A little triangle of sharp white shirt and a paisley tie poke out through the top. The caption on the cabinet reads, ‘Brian’s wool and cashmere coat made by Aquascutum of Regent Street’.

Had he lived, Brian Epstein would now be pushing ninety. He would probably control the Beatles Story Museum and have ensured the Beatles a decent share of the profits. He would undoubtedly have expanded his empire. Over the past fifty-odd years society’s misgivings about his homosexuality would have transformed into qualifications. By now he would be Sir Brian Epstein, or perhaps even Lord Epstein of Belgravia, a valued board member of the Garrick Club, Tate Modern and the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts.

Instead, he lies buried in Everton Cemetery, while his Aquascutum coat, spick and span as ever, retains a life of its own, resplendent under a spotlight in its glass case, admired by 300,000 people a year. It is a modern relic or, in sacramental terms, an outward sign of inward grace. In gold letters, embossed on the bottom of the case, is a quote from Paul McCartney: ‘If anyone was the fifth Beatle, it was Brian.’

#Brian Epstein #Craig Brown #Sunday Times #A Cellarful of Noise #2021 #newspaper

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fatehbaz · 3 years

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This was how the initial TEAM coalition was built among the Muscogee (Creek), Chickasaw, Seminole, Osage, Citizen Potawatomi, Eastern Shawnee, and Miami tribal nations. [...]

TEAM, now known as the Tribal Alliance for Pollinators, or TAP, is now a well-oiled [...] machine. [...] According to the TAP website, the tribal coalition is responsible for planting 50,000 milkweeds and 30,000 native wildflowers, which stand in addition to the 142 seed types the collective now has stored at a seed bank at the Euchee Butterfly Farm.

TAP began with a handful of people deciding that tribal nations could, and should, step into the void the federal and state governments had left on monarch conservation. Now it’s looking like it could be a model for conservation efforts far beyond a single species. [...] What TAP has managed to do, in just a few short years, is alter how tribal nations in Oklahoma view the lands they maintain control over.

Tribal nations like the Eastern Shawnee have since published their plans for pollinator restoration programs. The Chickasaw Nation has created as efficient a milkweed planting program as exists in the nation. [...]

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Every winter, monarch butterflies across the northern corners of the continent fly south to the mountains of central Mexico. The migration pattern -- which, for some, stretches over 3,000 miles -- is a natural wonder, not replicated by any other butterfly in the world. Nobody knows how the monarchs’ homing system works; the butterflies that return to Mexico are often the great-grandchildren of those who made the trip the year before. Many of the winged creatures fly through Iowa, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas before plunging through Mexico. And, as has now been widely reported, many are dying before they can complete the full trip. [...]

Monarchs cover the vegetation of their Mexican winter territory so densely that it’s easier to count them by area than insect-by-insect. Last week [February 2021], researchers in Mexico announced that the winter monarch population had dropped by 25 percent between 2019 and 2020, declining from 2.6 hectares to 2.1 hectares. In 2018, the monarchs covered 6.1 hectares. In the 1990s, they regularly covered 20 hectares. Something is going very wrong.

The issue, which he has documented extensively on Monarch Watch’s blog and acknowledged in our conversation as being “pretty complex,” is basically about food. Monarch butterflies have, for centuries, relied on milkweed and nectar plants -- in Oklahoma and Kansas, this includes sunflowers, ironweed, coneflower, and a host of others -- to fuel their journey up and down the continent. With no milkweed or nectar-rich options to restore their fat reserves, monarchs can’t fly -- and if they can’t fly, they can’t migrate or serve their role as pollinators. But landowners often see milkweed as an annoying weed and remove it using herbicide.

There is also the issue of reduction via overgrazing on cattle lands -- which is a problem given that the butterflies’ traditional path takes them through Oklahoma and Texas, two states that lead the nation both in terms of beef production and cattle population.

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For those who have been observing and researching the monarchs for decades, like Dr. Chip Taylor, head of Monarch Watch at the University of Kansas, the numbers are troubling but not surprising. Taylor, who has been studying pollinators since 1969 and monarchs in particular since he started Monarch Watch in 1992, nearly predicted this year’s drop on the nose [...]. Breckinridge sent Taylor an email, asking for his help in creating a monarch migration trail through tribal lands in Oklahoma. Taylor agreed to lend a hand, but he warned Breckinridge that a “capacity issue” might arise. “He said, ‘You don’t have the milkweed seed resources, you don’t have the nectar plant seed resources, you don’t have any of that locally sourced. And that’s how we do restoration work. You don’t have greenhouses or hoop houses that are willing to grow the seeds out in organic, pesticide-free environments. [...]’“

Breckenridge, undaunted, joined with Taylor to found Tribal Environmental Action for Monarchs, or TEAM. The idea was to create a coalition among the tribal nations along the migratory path, which required a hefty organizing plan. [...] A few months later, that same consultant introduced Breckinridge to Dr. Carol Crouch, a Salish Kootenai citizen and Oklahoma’s state-tribal liaison for the USDA’s National Resources Conservation Service. [...] Along with her husband and her mother, Breckinridge spent three years driving across the state with Taylor, visiting any and all tribal communities that would have her. Crouch’s support offered the legitimacy she needed to get TEAM’s foot in the door. And on those trips, Taylor helped Breckinridge see the scope of the man-made problem. [...]

Bermuda grass as far as the eye could see. Entire ranges grazed down to the nub. Lawn after lawn of nonnative grasses, the product of over-normalized herbicide treatments. The casual but vast destruction of the monarch habitat was impossible to unsee, and it fueled Breckinridge’s sense of urgency. By the end of that initial outreach phase, she had put over 30,000 miles on her car. [...]

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When it came to building that coalition, the Euchee farm’s central location in the state -- “two hours away from everything,” Breckenridge said -- helped. “For instance, maybe the Citizen Potawatomi Nation can’t get an expert on organic pest management and greenhouses to come in and speak to them,” Breckinridge said. “But if TAP contacts the university and says, ‘We’re going to have 20 different tribes there, it’s going to be 40 people, can you come in and present and provide guidance on these issues?’ we can get all sorts of really interesting people participating.” [...]

As Breckinridge noted in our conversation, the message she heard from environmentalists and conservationists while living in the Twin Cities was almost entirely focused on leaving land and resources wild and untouched. But that is not how the land was prior to colonization, when Indigenous nations and communities across the country actively managed and stewarded their natural relatives. “Being a Native person, land is not something separate,” Breckinridge said. “We live here, we’re a part of it.”

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Headline, images, captions, and text published by: Nick Martin. “The Tribal Coalition Fighting to Save Monarch Butterflies.” New Republic. 4 March 2021.

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dansnaturepictures · 2 years

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My wildlife/photography highlights blogs of 2021: Post 8-The story of my Easter weekend and April week off of day trips

Cuckoo, Kingfisher, seabirds, Whinchat, Glossy Ibis, early purple orchid, early spider orchid, Duke of Burgundy, Grizzled Skipper, Golden Plover, Little Ringed Plover, Ruff and more

In true pandemic fashion which we are now all so used to this old style of my highlights post is one I would have written about our return to Pembrokeshire for the seabirds of Skomer Island and more in April but of course just like our 2020 Anglesey trip (which eventually went ahead in 2021 as my next highlights post details) the health and safety of the nation had to come first as we battled the new variant of Coronavirus as a country and the holiday could quite rightly not go ahead. We did like the Anglesey 2020 holiday manage to postpone it until next year. But we kept the week’s leave following my Mum’s birthday on the Saturday, and I decided to do a highlights blog about the trips we did during that week off and also on the Easter weekend not long before it in a run of a few long weekends I had due to using up annual leave too so a key period of my year for many reasons. This was something interesting to record together as the week off in this format was happening due to the pandemic you could say but by April restrictions had begun easing with the stay at home order ending so we could go back to walks at nature reserves etc. that little bit further afield which we couldn’t go to in fuller lockdown and day trips too so there was something of a real rebirth of getting back to precious places for us around these times.

On a brilliant warm and very sunny Good Friday capping a week of that kind of weather and spring abounding everywhere I saw so much and took consistently very high amounts of photos that week we relished the chance to as we had hoped to on this bank holiday visit the marvellous Martin Down one of our favourite places a true beautiful wildlife haven. On Good Friday we got a quintessential farmland and spring quartet of year ticks for birds the first time we had got four bird year ticks in a day since week one the year 5th January as my year list hurtled into the 120s with its resurgence continuing. All incredible species Corn Bunting, Wheatear, Yellowhammer smashing to see rarer/harder to see or key spring time birds and a fairly surprising gem of birds to see two Golden Plovers in a field their gold shone a bit in the bright sunshine. The Golden Plovers one we missed at the coast until this point but farmland in spring is a good place to find them which we hadn’t done much before so I looked back on this as one of my key year ticks in 2021. It was also amazing to see Roe Deers in this field and a possible Fallow Deer elsewhere on this athletic walk as well as two Brown Hares my first of the year adding to the top day very nicely with one running towards another. Rooks a key bird of Martin Down showed very well that day at Martin Down their presence instead of Carrion Crow and Magpie I’d become so used to whilst working from home symbolised how we swapped an urban area for a rural one that day for me I’d noted something similar before and on the way I had not seen any for a while and it was epic to watch two tussle with a Buzzard as they mobbed it a very beautiful and interesting sight. We saw more Buzzards as we walked on with notably three in their air at once all looking sublime against a bright blue sky as they always do. The adorable Skylarks provided an electric, beautiful and intricate soundtrack to the day and we got some stunning views of this special bird too. Being up high on the paths I adored taking in the panorama of the countryside, with splashes of that addictive spring time green colour as well as pockets of blooming blossom and flowering gorse. I took the first picture in this photoset of such a view. I was delighted to then spot a rustic bright brown Kestrel glide on the wind as the Skylarks were to the backdrop of one distant field with a bit of the iconic yellow oilseed rape transforming the landscape yellow which you so often see here. A stunning image that I took away from the trip for sure. A little bit later a gigantic Red Kite flew over and it was a pleasing hat trick of raptors which we quite often do here. A key element of a brilliant walk. I also loved seeing Brimstone butterfly very close and getting a picture of one landed on a dandelion which I was pleased with I loved being so close alongside Peacocks the two big butterflies out and being seen by me at that stage in the year as well as lots of lovely little violet flowers a key flower of my spring. That day I also really was charmed to see firm looking Mistle Thrushes really well in my best ever year for them, Pheasants seen well with one flying not something we see too often actually, an unexpected Great Black-backed Gull for the rural farmland area and some big bees and lovely bee flies a key spring species I loved looking at which I did have a good spring for this year.

On Good Friday I had great day at home before coming out too in a time I saw so much and took so many pictures at home in a relaxing morning I enjoyed a lot of those at that time in the year too I really liked taking in the flowers and blossom around and seeing how much green there was in the landscape out both the back and front that delicious and addictive shade of light green on the trees in spring which I also took in at Martin Down. On the way to and back from Martin Down I loved taking in very colourful flower scenes too including primroses and daffodils I saw the latter at Martin Down too. We also took a detour at Harbridge near Blashford Lakes on the way. Alongside Canada Geese, Mute Swans and Lapwings well we also saw two Small Tortoiseshell butterflies flying by a very nice spring time and hopeful view of my original favourite butterfly which I liked my first of the year.

Easter Saturday brought an equally packed, fantastic, captivating and wild day of exploring the vast blue Solent and sweet sea air and feel, with the sun in and out a little but shining for so much of the time which I felt absolutely so lucky at illuminating the precious and gorgeous reedbeds, lagoons and mudflats of this also one of my favourite reserves the Pennington part of Lymington-Keyhaven nature reserve. It was a smashing bird fest in a time of the year I went through so many glorious days of seeing lists of wildlife especially birds as long as my arm as I saw my first lovely rosy Linnets, adorable, smart and pretty Little Ringed Plovers one shown in the second picture I took in this photoset that day, heard and saw the one of my favourite calls and sights wonderful Cetti’s Warbler, sweet looking first hurundine of the year Sand Martins and gorgeous beautiful, notable and striking patterned Ruff including the one here with the smashing white head of 2021 topping the day before with four year ticks by getting five. All of these such crucial parts of spring which I just adored seeing, like the gorse and blossom beautifying this already such stunning and peaceful New Forest coastal landscape and such precious habitat so well. Bluebells and flowering gorse mixed together made a sweet mental image and one I took too with my camera to take away from the day too. This helped my year list soar well through the 120s as my proud run of catching up with my year list continued well. There were reminders of winter around that day too with Brent Geese and ducks Shoveler, Red-breasted Merganser, Teal, Wigeon and Pintail around more traditional winter sightings here alongside key spring time species like the plovers and Avocets whilst around in winter too but really showing they were there to nest on fishtail lagoon at that stage we got a striking view of two right over our heads. Standing out also on that walk was a few rapturous minutes of raptors when first of all we spotted a Marsh Harrier a key bird for Lymington-Keyhaven gliding at the back of a lagoon a nice view our first for a while at that stage. Then we scanned into the distance with binoculars and spotted a wonderful Peregrine on a post. A lovely bird to see and it warmed my heart at a time I was connecting to the regular Peregrines I usually see so much at Winchester Cathedral in normal times via the webcam. But things got a whole lot better for us with the Peregrine as it flew towards us and dashed over our head! An exquisite view and startling sight. It was flying loosely towards the Marsh Harrier too so an amazing moment and those few minutes adding to what was very much an Easter of raptors.

This was also supported well before we came out that day by seeing another fantastic Red Kite at home in a strong time for this as my first patch birds old style highlights post mentioned gliding over the houses and going towards Lakeside where I had never seen one at before so this counted as a fifth patch tick for me this year. There were great moments with a fly I got a macro picture of, flowers and sunset on a second I found notably light quite late evening that weekend. At Pennington other highlights that day included more bees and bird wise yet another Dartford Warbler luckily this year, many Shelduck getting a great moment seeing them and the similarly coloured Shoveler together, Great Crested Grebe, Little Egret, Reed Bunting, Rock Pipit, Snipe, great Lapwing and Oystercatcher views with Mediterranean Gull and Skylark heard very well too they both have sensational calls with the distinctive wail and the beautiful song respectively.

The next day yet another very sunny and warm one which we were so lucky with we were back at the same reserve at the Lymington end meaning we walked nearly all of the coastal path within the reserve over the Easter weekend we did walk the whole way once before on a day. On the walk that looked so beautiful and serenely blue drenched in the sunshine I was thrilled to see so much wildlife and across the whole of Easter Sunday take an incredible amount of photos again, including my first Swallows of the year always such a key moment of any spring and one that brought me so much joy it was probably my best ever day for seeing Swallows for the first time in a year I think with rather than the usual one a very decent few seen and some very close really getting to make our their fairly exotic colours and strong features with those iconic long tale streamers. Like Crossbill the month before it was a year tick a year to the day that it was in 2020 which was very interesting and it was the third time my first Swallow of a year symbolising spring had come in the perfect moment on an Easter Sunday. This took my year list to a wonderful place as year tick ten of my Easter weekend, in a spring rather than a time at the start of the year with everything being in a year tick for amount you get on walks then this was rivalled only at that stage by a day I got ten year ticks in one day in spring 2014 for the scale of what was happening.

Also that walk I loved seeing a bold and large Sandwich Tern dash over us fishing over the sea. It flew up the coast and flew back round again, a brilliant showing and this was a fantastic fresh nautical moment a star of my week off in January and I reflected at that moment upon how good a few years I was having for seeing Sandwich Terns feeling I could see them with more ease the past few years. I also adored as we did a few weeks prior at Pig Bush in the New Forest mentioned in my New Forest highlights posts seeing the iconic Lapwing in flight driving right over our heads on what was a fantastic Easter weekend of waders for me, not only screaming their delightful “pee-wit” call which gives them another of their names but we heard the almost sonic boom-eque drum of their wings beating surrounding us as it passed over a sensational natural experience. I also enjoyed that day hearing Mediterranean Gull and hearing and seeing Skylark so well again, seeing another B list favourite bird of mine to the tern and gull Spotted Redshank their bright, shining, distinctive and impressive scarlet, grey and black markings we got some great up close views as well as seeing once again this year loads of stunning bronze brown summer plumage Black-tailed Godwits also taking a picture of “Where’s Wally” ilk memorably with one Redshank visible in a picture with loads of these birds gathered together on Normandy lagoon which I was pleased with and the photo of this seemed to do well on Twitter during the #BirdsSeenIn2021 hashtag I enjoyed taking part in part of a wonderful initiative of the hashtag challenges started in lockdown by the amazing BritishNatureGuide and on the Self-Isolating Bird Club on Facebook. So many of the star species were the same as the day before with Avocets and Teals everywhere which was brilliant I loved seeing both well in numbers as well as straggling Brent Geese, Shelducks, Oystercatchers with one I photographed well wading in mud with the mud on its beak and feet and Shoveler. Other highlights that day were Grey Heron, close Turnstone view and Meadow Pipit seen, Carrion Crow with something interesting in its beak as well as an unidentified butterfly and gorse, fumitory and other flowers I loved seeing and some New Forest ponies.

I couldn’t resist an early afternoon Lakeside walk before coming out on Easter Sunday which produced as well as great colourful scenes of the forsythia hedge and tree out the back going from pink blossom to red and another budding and other great at home scenes that day an exciting view of a Blackcap and Brimstone and Small White butterflies. Over the Easter weekend we got chatting at a safe social distance to so many brilliant people enjoying being out and in nature too which was fantastic and made me happy.

Slightly different weather on Easter Monday was characterised by breathtaking and notable sky scenes with memorable clouds which I loved taking in and photographing both at home and on a walk at the Titchfield canal path I took the third picture in this photoset looking over Posbrook flood there some of the best looking skies I’d seen this year the year I loved taking in and photographing sky scenes more than ever. On the Titchfield canal path walk I made it a third hirundine year tick in three days as with a group of Swallows and Sand Martins stars of previous days we were thrilled to spot the bluer plumage of a House Martin flying another very important spring year tick it was great to watch these beautiful birds for a bit. It was my milestone 130th bird of 2021, getting eleven year ticks during the Easter weekend was incredible and unprecedented for me it also meant four consecutive days of year ticks for the first time since the early weeks of the year. I also liked seeing a Stock Dove that day as well as good numbers of Shoveler and Gadwall like the two prior days at Lymington-Keyhaven, Little Egret, a Grey Heron’s head skulking in the long grass, more Shelduck and Black-tailed Godwit, Greenfinch in a top year for them which I took a picture of as well as a Great Tit which I photographed in a spring tree like I had done with a Blue Tit at Lakeside the Thursday before the Easter weekend which was interesting and we heard nice amounts of the beautiful Cetti’s Warbler that day. With the sun in and out in the day I had a wonderful sunny Easter Monday late afternoon/evening as I relaxed a lot that afternoon and I enjoyed seeing this and taking pictures out the front as well as seeing birds well in the sun in the garden the time at home was brilliant over the Easter weekend too and I photographed two of my favourite garden bird the Goldfinch on the feeders that day.

On my Mum’s birthday we spent some time in Winchester as I had a dental hygienist appointment and we headed to the cathedral beforehand in case we saw a Peregrine nesting at that time there which we didn’t but did know from the webcam Winnie the female was behind the ledge incubating the eggs which was great. It was very enjoyable to see a Large White butterfly flying by my first of the year, I saw Peacock and Brimstone fly by too as the butterfly season was well and up and running and going very well for me I was on a good run at that stage. In Winchester that day we spent a very pleasant while in this beautiful now slightly unlocked city in brilliant sunshine with special blue sky. We liked observing varied and colourful flowers including at the cathedral grounds straggling daffodils, as well as some blooming bluebells in a strong run for them and some periwinkle in Winchester. It was also great to see beautiful views as well as see birds such as Pied Wagtail and Great Tit go onto headstones in the cemetery type area which was interesting. We saw Blackbird, Goldfinch and Winchester park regular Grey Squirrel making its way over the grass for a long time well in the sun here too which was nice I saw well and got a picture of a Grey Squirrel on 1st June at nearby Abbey Gardens. It was also quite poignant to see the flag on Winchester cathedral of course flying at half mast on the day of the funeral of His Royal Highness Prince Philip Duke of Edinburgh a key point of the year. It was great to see three Buzzards on the motorway on a gloriously sunny early afternoon as well some pretty solid yellow oilseed rape fields and get great views of Rook flying, Goldfinch, Starling and House Sparrow including an adorable view of one drinking from our water fountain as they do and a lovely bee on one of the many dandelions at home that strong day.

We then that Saturday moved onto Stanpit Marsh where we were stunned to see the jet black curved beak exotic beauty of a bird that is the long-staying Glossy Ibis there that day our first of the species this year only our fourth ever sighting of one we have had a lot of joy with them in Dorset. It was great to spot it that day and see it moving in and out of view in long marshy grass and get an astonishing moment watching it on the wing and then it flew right over our head it was just sensational to be able to have that intimate moment seeing it so closely a cracking view of this special bird. Securing a view of one three years running symbolised a quite rare bird that we happily have had the opportunities to see more frequently these days it seems. We saw it again in a little pool here having a wade it looked glorious especially when it raised its head for a second and the soft early evening sunlight caressed the feathers of its back and head. It was one of the most beautiful and captivating natural moments I’d had this year. I managed the fourth picture in this photoset of this bird. Such is this bird’s exotic nature that for a minute I could have been in an African swamp rather than a Dorset marsh and I am not trying to criticise the sensational Dorset or anywhere in the UK by saying this and indeed it’s a way to help me express that I feel British wildlife is world class and we celebrated this a lot when speaking to others that day which was great.

That day I also saw my important for spring first Redstart of the year a female, Little Egrets and Shelducks two of my favourite birds in great numbers, stunning views of another of my favourites Great Spotted Woodpecker and Kestrel in the woods flying, two lingering Wigeon, lots of Mute Swans, Black-tailed Godwit well in the orange plumage and in numbers again, Curlews, other waders, both black-backed gull species we don’t often see them together, Rock Pipit, Wren and Linnet and Greenfinch on another nice day of finches were among the other highlights. We also heard Cetti’s Warbler and possibly a faint Reed Warbler that day a first of the year if so, and there was a great view of some Sandwich Terns two sat with Black-tailed Godwits in the water and one battling with a gull who wanted its catch it was great to enjoy Sandwich Terns again one for the weeks off for me it seems and one I had a top 2021 for. We did also see two great different flowers at Stanpit, some bright white scurvygrass adorning the marsh floor and some bright yellow marsh marigold emanating also from the grassy areas which looked stunning I had seen neither before. Daffodil and bluebell were around there too as we loved taking in ideal conditions of bright sunshine flowing through and pretty warm and sky and sea a divine shade of blue. In a perfect beginning to the time off that day on the way in and out we took in some beautiful New Forest vistas and this included some nice bright red tulips with some daffodils which I took a picture of and liked admiring on the way back.

The next day another very sunny one where some soft cloud lingered against the bright blue sky that day and I took quite a lot of vegetation photos at home and there was a beautiful sunset that night, we went to a colourful including blossom and very green local Stoke Park Wood for a walk to the chorus of a Chiffchaff calling and Robin singing we enjoyed a brilliant view of the former too and I liked seeing the latter as well. It was one of my key walks of spring as I loved seeing the bright blue butterfly Holly Blue my important first of the year of this key species as it was here last year taking my year list to a milestone ten which I was thrilled with and it was my third butterfly year tick in as many days during a sweet circus of butterflies that sunny and pretty warm day where Peacock, Brimstone and Large White were stars too. I took many photos I was really pleased with that day it was quite a colourful and varied set including a photo during a cracking view of a key bird for this place and one of my favourites the handsome crow that is the Jay. It was also as I celebrated on that Sunday’s #WildflowerHour on Twitter which I always love taking part in when I can a brilliant day of flowers. I loved seeing loads of two types of bright white delights and smooth and immaculate gems of flowers the larger wood anemones and smaller greater stitchwort both like the Holly Blue I really wanted to see at that time. I also really very much enjoyed seeing 2021 star for me lesser celandine and more marsh marigold create a yellow carpet in the woods and some bluebells had just started to create a sea of them which is one of the best sights in nature. There was a strong moment that sticks in my mind which I photographed the scene of with a bee sat on a lesser celandine and a wood anemone next to it which was stunning. I also liked seeing Song Thrush well as well as bees and hoverfly that day and some nice broom.

The next morning I noticed a Buzzard out the back at home glide beautifully against a great blue sky right outside my window it was fantastic to see it in sharp focus and make out its pure beauty and large extent. A smashing wildlife moment to kick start my first day of the five days of annual leave. On that Monday we did one of our favourite trips to do in the country, going to Portland harbour and bill and we called into RSPB Lodmoor on the way back having passed other Weymouth nature reserve Radipole Lake on the way in too a trip that for excitement has been a bit of a cup final style day over the years. We had an incredible day of wildlife watching and photos it was absolutely one of the best days of my year and ever. I saw butterflies and flowers well too alongside stunning scenery in the most gorgeous of sunshine that day ideal, sensational and spacious scenes it was so rewarding to take in and be in I loved taking a picture the fifth in this photoset looking down chesil beach too but birds took the headlines as we timed our visit to this migration hub perfectly to pick up some needed and crucial species coming in on the spring migration and throughout the day in a nice variety of habitats I got a staggering eight bird year ticks making a personally historic day for me an area I did have a day like that before for amount of year ticks during, taking my year list to 141. This was monumental figure to reach as it meant I had at that stage seen the same amount of birds as I had in 2020 at that stage I was so far behind for so long and a few days like this with so many year ticks and incredible runs helped me get level. We first went to Portland harbour in the sunshine poking through another interesting soft cloud formation and here we enjoyed trying out a present my Mum got jointly for her birthday and it was also for her wedding anniversary and her husband’s birthday too we had been giving money on these occasions towards this too a new telescope. It was great to look at a ship a Disney one, the famous white horse in this area in the telescope seeing the brilliant sharp quality it offers at a few zooms and more landmarks as well as a Cormorant we saw Carrion Crow and Herring Gull well here too it really is a quality telescope really brilliant to look through certainly a present we were proud we could get for them. At the harbour I also enjoyed seeing the moon in the day time I took so many pictures of the moon around that time and firstly there but throughout the day I noticed it in the view some yellow rapeseed oil fields the beautiful yellow colour the fields go in spring which I love every year.

At Portland Bill we were delighted to see our first this year of four of my favourite birds the adorable Guillemot, glossy looking Razorbills seen very well, elegant Fulmars with some seen so well gliding and swerving from the cliff’s edge and a glorious large Gannet. I reflected at this point how after months of lockdown it was just so nice to be at a coastal place we hold dear my favourite habitat watching birds I really do adore. I had obviously done my “#ASeabirdADay” Twitter daily past photo tweeting thread on Dans_Pictures as part of many like butterflies I did to see me through the winter lockdown which got me very passionately thinking about my almost unparalleled love for and history with seabirds so seabirds in particular was something I longed for when restrictions eased and this sums up exactly what this week off was all about for me. We also went on to maybe unexpectedly see two quintessential migrants and both quite early for us a striking Whinchat and a delightful group of Willow Warblers. At Portland Bill also that day we got a cracking view of a Rock Pipit on arrival and saw loads of Wheatears really well these exotic white rumped buff birds showing so very well they seemed to everywhere one of my best ever days for them. Other highlights at Portland Bill that day were Great Black-backed Gull, Raven, Linnet, Skylark, lots of great views of Swallows and a Sand Martin, Small White butterfly with a glorious view of two mating and I saw some smashing flowers at Portland that day with seathrift and my first buttercup of the spring standing out.

Two more crucial year ticks this year followed at a sun kissed Lodmoor after I loved taking in my childhood holiday location and second home Weymouth the sights of this special place, with more supremely bronzed black-taileds a Bar-tailed Godwit with its nicely paler plumage, striking eye stripe, slightly upturned beak and bars on its tail and a nicely almost goldy looking Common Sandpiper. Mediterranean Gulls seen and heard and same for Sandwich Terns as they delightfully wheeled overhead stood out too as did a stunning view of a star bird here the Marsh Harrier drifting over the reedbed. Other Lodmoor highlights were two of my favourite birds the Little Egret and Shelduck, Grey Heron seen very well too, Mute Swan interestingly coming over to us with their wings stretched out behind and other waterbirds I saw in quite stunning lowering evening sun which presented perfect photography conditions one I took of a swan I was very pleased with one of my standouts this year, great views of Robin and Blackbird with some beautiful singing too and nice flowers here too like green alkanet and periwinkle. We eat a chippy tea on the outskirts of Weymouth at Preston that night looking back over into Portland and at a beautiful little church and lovely bit of pink blossom to see which I loved taking. A fond memory I took from this one of my days of the year and best days ever I am sure. When home just as it was getting dark the moon looked amazing and bright so I took a picture of it once more over those days and I also photographed a lovely spider in my en suite I had seen this right before leaving that morning.

After being near its estuary at Stanpit Marsh on the Saturday in more stunning and gorgeous sunny and pretty warm weather we loved being at the river and surrounding woodlands and rural landscape it was a perfect place to be at Stour Valley nature reserve in Bournemouth where we had been and really liked. It really was so relaxing and refreshing to stroll down this beautiful landscape taking in some beautiful views and spring time scenes illuminated by the sunshine once again. Wildlife wise on the walk I loved hearing the scratchy and echoing sound of the Reed Warbler and then we saw it my first this year moving my year list one ahead of how many I had seen a year previously and the third highest amount of birds I had seen at that point in a year, and we also saw our first damselfly of the year in the form of one of my favourites the Large Red Damselfly getting a great view of it. Great to get started on damselflies there, and there were many other great insect and flower moments that day too there was a brilliant scene where we saw a large swarm coming out of a tree it almost looked like smoke coming down it was really beautiful to see. It was quite a mysterious group of midges which was captivating to watch. And a photograph I took of this allowed for a wonderful moment later on in my year when after reposting this picture in response to similar being shown live on BBC Springwatch on the Friday before, on 1st June my favourite TV programme which inspires me and I love seeing every year used the picture on air which I was so humbled by and thrilled with. Having presenter, well known photographer and one of my idols Chris Packham introduce my image was amazing. He had actually introduced a photo of mine not on TV but on a winner’s day 10 years earlier when my Water Vole at Arundel WWT photo was regional under 16’s people’s choice winner in the WWT Photography competition. I am still so thankful to the team for this. Back to Stour Valley Nature Reserve in April and on some lovely flowers and nettle type vegetation I enjoyed seeing some ladybirds as we did the day before and I took a macro picture of one and then noticed some ants with this beautiful ruby red beetle we saw a black beetle earlier on too and there were a few ladybirds about which I always love seeing and there were a lot of other great flies and things around. Brimstone, a special view of one of my favourites the Orange Tip, Speckled Wood, Comma and the in the ascendency at that stage Peacock and Small Whites about a lot gave me a high in the year at that stage of six butterflies seen in a day. Star flowers that day included bluebells including some pink and white I loved seeing all the different varieties of bluebells this year, lesser celandine with a fly on at one point, dandelions and cuckooflower and garlic mustard of which there was much which I loved learning and taking in that day.

We reached a stunning and noisy of piece of fast flowing river with some rapids, and three birds stayed there near enough the whole time we were there as we walked on then came back to this spot and sat on a bench for a bit; a lovely Grey Heron skulking on the opposite bank and having a little look into the water, a Black-Headed gull fixed on its post not something we too commonly see actually within a river really but the good few we saw that day seemed to use it as a happy hunting ground and a Mute Swan that had an occasional shake which was spectacular to see as always and a second Common Sandpiper in as many days at this bit was striking to see and it eye catching to see Kingfishers the star bird of this place and habitat, the visitor centre is named after it and a bird we had hoped to see that day. Walking back we heard a delightful Cetti’s Warbler and heard a Chiffchaff calling too. All of a sudden the divine Cetti’s darted right out of the vegetation and spectacularly flew right in front of our faces. A top intimate bird and wild moment. Later on we got a great view of a Blackcap in a bush very nice to see this warbler too. We saw a Chiffchaff, as well as nicely singing Blackbird and Robin at the visitor centre as we enjoyed tea and cake it was really nice to indulge in this side of the holiday for relaxation. Tea tastes so good when drunk al fresco as I have always said. Other highlights at Stour Valley nature reserve that day were; Buzzard, Nuthatch, a great view of a Wren, Moorhen, and some mayfly and some other flies. I loved seeing Jay on the way and Sparrowhawk just as we left the reserve that day too. When home I liked seeing flowering on the camellia bush and daffodils going strong still in the front garden as well as see some blossom coming on a tree in a neighbouring property visible from my room and I took a photo of another on the street behind it looking nice and red after it had blossomed before we left that day and I liked seeing the now regular gathering of Starlings on the green out the front (which Lesser Black-backed Gull, Herring Gull and Jackdaw would join in with later in the year as it continued) and in trees in the evening as well as some Feral Pigeons there in another strong day for stuff at home around the day trip.

I had one of my most unforgettable days of the year and ever the next day as we returned to another star of the June week off last year of day trips which this one mimicked, Surrey’s Thursley Common. One of the main points to this was to try and see the famous “Colin” the Cuckoo who visits this reserve and we were not disappointed as we spent a few hours in the Parish Field at the reserve and got the most phenomenal, sensational, close and magical views of this iconic species. I took so many pictures of this bird and was in aw to watch it so close. Through hearing him both at a distance and up close it was our first time hearing and seeing a Cuckoo this year an important and key moment if I am so lucky enough to get it in any spring. It was surreal at this first moment and all afternoon to hear a Cuckoo calling so closely. It’s so pure and magical and almost unbelievable that you can actually hear it. I did find it almost sounded different close up but amazing. As we sat very comfortably in some foldable chairs I just loved seeing the shiny grey feathers, piercing eyes and distinct posture and mannerisms of this one of my favourite birds being just metres away it was as though I was looking at (with the greatest respect to other species I love) garden birds feeding rather than a quite rare migrant. Magnificent views as it flew around in the area it goes on the ground and to the tree, called lots and eat mealworms. I took the sixth picture in this photoset of this amazing Cuckoo that day.

There were many other star birds that day including yet more Woodlarks this year we got sensational views of two of these rustic beauties coming to the same area in the field, we saw Redstarts well too another star of Thursley giving an amazing showing these bright and beautiful red, black and grey birds on my B list of favourites. We got a special view of another of my favourite birds the Dartford Warbler one we got a smashing view of flying and on top of vegetation. Hearing a Curlew on World Curlew Day and Green Woodpecker stood out too hearing both Curlew and Cuckoo calling at once at one point was an incredible natural moment it was great to hear Curlews in this precious habitat a quite endangered bird, as did seeing Linnet; Chaffinch, Blackbird, Robin and Carrion Crow came to feed too in this really wildlife rich area of field, Red Kite, Buzzard and Kestrel all circled over this field at one point with Kestrel seen elsewhere on the reserve and Buzzard seen on the way in on the journey and Mistle Thrush a star here too showed well that afternoon with a Peacock butterfly going over at one point too. At home when we got back Starlings showed well on the green out the front again and I took a picture of blooming green trees in great evening sunlight. It was great to see the landscape and vegetation of Thursley Common really recovering from the heath fire of last year that day too and also fascinating to see the addictive light green springtime shade in the trees which I loved seeing so much this year everywhere as we do usually come a bit later so it was different to what we’ve seen here before.

I loved hearing Colin call when he left the immediate area and went into a further away clump of trees too between his two showings and I managed to record him calling when close on my phone as I have done with a Cuckoo before just before we left just for my personal use which I liked a different souvenir to the 24 photos I produced of him some of them among my favourite ever wildlife photos to take and all of them together among my best ever Cuckoo photos I would say, both so precious for me as I left feeling quite sad to and that evening I remember being stunned and so happy with what we’d seen and done that day and feeling positively tired it was a great buzz of something so special. Well that week had things been different we could have been at one of the greatest places for nature in the country having one of the most intimate and amazing experiences of nature in this country with one of my favourite birds and maybe been on Skomer Island in Pembrokeshire seeing the Puffins. But I was absolutely getting just that with this extraordinary Cuckoo and the other top class wildlife. It was the perfect way to enjoy this one of my favourite birds in my ten year anniversary year of seeing my first some of my greatest and closest ever views and moments with a Cuckoo this was the stuff of dreams for sure. I have to say a key part too of why I just had so much fun that afternoon and felt so in aw of what was happening was at a safe social distance the people we got to talk to as well. Those who watch Colin a lot so gave us invaluable information about this special bird, this special reserve as well as helpful tips on how to get the best photos and information about Cuckoos and everyone else people who had never or rarely been before about the Cuckoos, Thursley and general nature topics. It was so much sheer fun and such intimate wildlife experiences had and all at no cost and in a safe way.

During a productive morning before going out the next day I took a little stroll at Lakeside. I wanted to do a walk there just along the northern path and back out before a trip with the whole family as it was stunning again weather wise that day very sunny and pretty warm it seemed to have got a bit warmer and I put sun cream on when we all went out for the first time this year . So it would be nice to see it like that. Before reaching Lakeside I noticed that just like memorably over the full lockdown Easter of 2020 the tree in a neighbouring property visible from my room had started to blossom really rapidly and it now looked a sight for sore eyes with the white blossom bursting out against a blue sky. So I walked past this in the street and took a picture. At Lakeside I took in more beautiful views of lush and green vegetation which I was loving seeing at that time and some blossom, as well as breathtaking scenes over the lakes and around the grasses of the estate seeing it covered in daisies and dandelions was fantastic and all of this was a brilliant way to mark the important Earth Day a day I love celebrating to show why Earth is an amazing place and we need to protect it. I was so happy to see a male Orange Tip at Lakeside really well again and I was on to a great spring for them seeing so many. On the walk also I liked hearing a Song Thrush and geese going overhead, and seeing Robin, lots of Starlings and Mute Swan. I took some flower pictures at home and pictures around the garden too including one of a Collared Dove and Woodpigeon, and I also saw Starlings well at home.

On the Thursday afternoon we went to the quaint Blanford Forum, so back to the river Stour, in Dorset. When we arrived it was still really sunny and pretty warm a perfect day really, we enjoyed an ice cream before we left. It was brilliant to take in splendid riverine, waterfall and reedbed views as well as spring time sights like a field in full oilseed rape yellow there as well as on the way, blossom which this place is so good for and green trees all draped in this gorgeous sunshine. Here we saw one of the key birds of this place the Kingfisher zip along the river once more that week and brighten up the bank in its electrifying way we got some glorious views of it either a couple or the same one twice and I got some photos, one in particular the seventh in this photoset topping the ones I took in the January week off I would say. We also saw a Little Egret fishing in the shallow water which was really interesting there that day I took pictures of that too, I reflected at that point what a special week off of favourite birds of mine it was that week off with so many of them seen at various places. Other great birds we saw that day included more Mute Swans in great light that week too with some nesting on a pond beside the river, some House Sparrows appearing to be nesting in a reedbed not something I’d seen before and Mandarin Duck. It was a great walk for butterflies too with a brilliant more few male Orange Tips seen they are so beautiful to watch and I saw my first female of the season too an important moment in my spring, Peacock, Comma and mayfly made brilliant sightings too that day. I also loved seeing three flower species here that I had seen or learnt for the first time this year some snowflakes brightening up the river bank alongside daffodils, as well as more lovely cuckooflower and garlic mustard and a nice pink flower too. A special Thursday in the sun.

Friday brought another of the most anticipated trips as we went to Durlston again in Dorset for our annual April visit that we’ve been doing since 2015 apart from last year obviously, but as suggested by one of the kind people we spoke to whilst watching “Colin” the Cuckoo two days earlier we first parked up at the National Trust’s Spyway car park and visited Dancing Ledge where we hadn’t been for eight years I was so excited to do this. At the walk down and at this interesting and distinctive coastal feature we took in some simply breathtaking and sensational views especially seeing right down the coast my very favourite type of dramatic rocky coastline and type of habitat really. In pristine, brightly sunny, pretty warm and sparkly blue conditions it just looked so purely beautiful. I managed the eighth picture in this photoset of a view at Dancing Ledge with its sheer cliff coastal scenery. At Durlston we took in more sensational shining views of the special Purbeck and Jurassic coast. I loved all the shades of blue and it was great to take all this in on a very sunny and quite warm spring day. I felt a sense of peace, calm and excitement as I looked at, listened to, smelt and felt the sea one of my favourite places to be. It was nice to take in views of the big globe sculpture they have here, the other famous feature Old Harry Rocks and as we had done here before see back into Hampshire at Fawley Power station I had seen it from Durlston in 2017 on another clear day with the impending demolition it might be the last year I see this local landmark from well into the next county and the moon was out as it constantly seemed to be that week I photographed it that day too.

It was another sensational day of birds as I saw my first Whitethroats of the year at both locations, seeing the exquisite bright brown back which glowed in the sun, splendid grey head and of course creamy throat it was so great to have this bird back in the UK seen for the first time this year near Spyway but a key part of the Durlston trip these past few years. My year list ended that day on a figure I didn’t reach until May last year and only in my two highest ever year list totals 2019 and 2018 had I seen more at that stage in a year showing how massive that year list revival was. We saw a good deal of birds at Dancing Ledge as we walked down to right beside it; Guillemots and Razorbills sat and flew over so gently on the bright blue water. Rock Pipit and a bright crimson almost paint dipped Linnet made very pleasurable sightings. As we spoke at a safe social distance to a lovely gentleman in great weather once again we spoke to a few brilliant people that day we all enjoyed seeing a good few Shags with one appearing to build a nest on the cliff. A special moment with one of my B list favourite birds which I had a good year for. On the Dancing Ledge walk Skylarks performing overhead seen well and photographed at Durlston later on too the sort of runaway star of Durlston different to the usual species I might expect to see which I seem to get in a on this annual trip, Swallows skimming the field and a bright Yellowhammer seen well added to some quintessential farmland scenes which I found nice. It was great to see Blackbirds appearing to have chicks on a spring note. Also nice to see a Herring Gull down at Dancing Ledge and House Sparrow we saw so many of these on our rural trips that week a common urban bird which is always great and Jackdaw was a strong bird at both close to each other locations too. At Durlston we enjoyed taking in more stunning views where Guillemot and Razorbill were rafting and flying on and over the tranquil water again, Shag were around here too. We then caught up with the other two ocean wanderers. Fulmars which I always love seeing at this bit and it’s become a key part of the Durlston experience every year to see glided beside the cliff just like the Monday at Portland. This was so beautiful to see, and it was as though they were a boomerang being thrown from below us on the cliff and coming back as they disappeared below us. Five gigantic Gannets in a glorious group flew high over the ocean, adding to that sense of peace. I saw a few as the walk went on. A rocking Raven pair barked and darted right above us over the cliff at Durlston I took a picture of these, very special to see another star bird here when we see it an intimate moment. And we also got a cracking view of one of the true birds of the week the Rock Pipit. I also enjoyed Great Black-backed Gull, Stonechat and Robin at Durlston.

It was one of my flower days of the year seeing ones I have loved seeing here in previous years the distinctive, beautiful and natural work of art that is the early spider orchid and the stunning early purple orchid just starting to come out that day. I relished the chance to see these that day I took the ninth picture in this photoset of one at Durlston, and cowslips, speedwell, daisies, dandelions and other flowers were stars that day too especially nice to see the cowslips really turn the landscape yellow as they can do and I have happily noticed so much this year. My new macro lens that I got for my birthday in January 2020 with this trip not possible in April 2020 made its debut for these orchids which was great. Setting off home like on the way in we got a fantastic view of Corte Castle always a key point in the journey of our annual trip to Durlston, this view on the way back from the village of Corfe Castle was very beautiful it was illuminated by a smashing piece of lowering sun. It was also great to see the sun setting over the beautiful New Forest on the way back a special scene I often enjoy on the way back from Dorset trips and we did on the Monday coming back from Portland too. I managed a sunset picture just about that night when home too after a few pictures and a great few bits of garden birdwatching before we left that day. Also on the journey back I got a second mammal year tick that day after my first Field Vole of the year at Durlston I saw and photographed a Grey Squirrel as part of a group that was eating blossom there in a memorable day for mammals, as it was brilliant to spot a group of Sika Deers a strong species for the area by the A35 a very special moment with one of my favourite species there was a white one in the group which was notable too. This was one of those unexpected moments that stuck in my mind from the week as much as anything else which you often get in weeks and time off.

The next day the Saturday we returned to Martin Down after Good Friday where in more bright sunny and pretty warm conditions I hoped to sneak one of the group of next and slightly rarer butterflies into the week off and all the bright sunshine it brought. We managed that in the form of some time spent with three Grizzled Skippers it was so exciting to see this cute, intricate, pretty and rustic butterfly which can be indicative of dry and grassy habitats and spring my earliest sighting of one in a year and a beautiful Dingy Skipper another spring time gem it felt so crucial to see as I said during one of my a butterfly a day tweet threads this year you always know spring has stepped up a notch when you see the dingy. As my twelfth butterfly species of the year it saw my year list at that stage competing well with past years, the season both at home and further afield was ticking along very nicely. We also saw four other species that day; lots of Peacocks well, Brimstone and more Holly Blue and Orange tip as well as bee flies very well again, lots of bees which was lovely, a beetle and nice flowers such as cowslip and greater stitchwort again.

It was also a top day of seeing birds again I had seen well on previous days either over Easter or during the week off, as predicted by me more Whitethroats very well getting an exceptional view of one in particular a bird especially when they arrive in spring I am becoming quite in aw of and attached to the last few years especially with how good the years have been. It was also great to see Corn Bunting glowing in an exotic way in the glorious sunlight, Skylarks over the open area a lot and interestingly in a sheep field providing a brilliant sound track to the day and seen extremely well and it was great to see Linnet, Wheatear and sky wanderers Buzzard and Red Kite two of my favourite birds again. We saw Corn Buntings well on a subsequent Martin Down visit in May seeing three of them and hearing one’s charming and delightful song which was exceptional they are doing so well at Martin Down a quite rare bird which is brilliant to see. As we walked around there that day I liked taking in the gorse and blossom just like the day before at Dancing Ledge the gorse in some neat and lovely patches on the hill which I took a photo showing which was interesting there and oilseed rape that had as well as obviously the delicious green painted the landscape in spring glory. It hit me or perhaps it just came into thought what I had known all of this spectacular week off and around that time that it looked, tasted, smelt, sounded and felt so much like the dizzy days of spring and all the species were falling right into place too. This made my heart sing and I was so excited. On the way home that day we saw Mistle Thrush and Pheasant and took in a great view over the beautiful New Forest as we stopped for an ice cream which was nice with the gorse also shining here, and I saw Blackbird well there.

On the Sunday like we did on the Saturday in more stunning sunshine I enjoyed taking in sights in the garden and at home and took many pictures from home, including of blossom and an honesty flower a beautiful one which made a fantastic addition to the garden. On our last day of the week off we seized the sunny moments and went to Noar Hill with its star species the Duke of Burgundy reported there it was getting to just about time for them to come out and when there I was so happy that we did spot two of this coin sized natural pearl of wonder and beauty, with a delicious colour scheme and striking markings with one of them looking particularly pristine and fresh so maybe newly emerged and they both looked so beautiful. It was yet another stunning and phenomenal wildlife encounter to have that week, it felt so special and it was a privilege to get to see this rare and beautiful butterfly so well and spend some glorious minutes with it. I took the tenth picture in this photoset of a Duke of Burgundy at Noar Hill that day. Also that day we saw six more butterflies getting a yearly high at that stage of amount of butterflies seen in a day that day with another Dingy Skipper seen well and I got another macro picture I was proud of and we also saw Orange Tip and Holly Blue very well as well as Peacock, Comma and I also saw my first Green-veined White of the year an important common butterfly for me to see this year meaning I’d seen all of the all season common ones at that stage really. My year list momentarily nudged ahead of how many I had seen at that stage last year and levelled how many I had seen in 2019 at that stage as it continued to compete well with my past years. It was another top flower day at Noar Hill with early purple orchid, lesser celandine, cowslips, dandelions and violets standing out as well as some great bee flies seen again. Bird wise it was also lovely to see other stars of recent days on the walk such as Buzzard, Yellowhammer, Chiffchaff and Whitethroat getting some great view of them all and hear an all important first Cuckoo in Hampshire for me this year briefly. I also saw Red Kite on the way there that day and at Noar Hill some Blue Tit’s excitingly flying over made a nice sight. It was great to see again on this annual trips for us the beautiful South Downs landscape, looking very lovely and green with some great blossom and yellow bits of landscape too created by flowers and the dune type hills of Noar Hill looked great too. On the way home we took in some stunning solid yellow fields overcome by oilseed rape some top landscape photo opportunities this is something so key to this wonderful area and wonderful time of year. We didn’t plan to visit Noar Hill on the Sunday we maybe thought it was too early for the dukes but as I mentioned in my wider butterflies highlights post the changeable weather after that point did mean we had to work hard to see a few of the species so we may have struggled for Duke of Burgundy as I find them very sensitive to if the sun is out. We only decided to go thanks to finding the sightings online on the Saturday night, a magical moment of my year.

2nd-5th April 2021 was a fantastic, wild, packed and truly memorable Easter Weekend. Over four days we were able to visit three nature reserves we had really missed, seeing incredible wildlife; birds, butterflies, mammals and flowers and take in some exceptional Hampshire (and maybe bits of Dorset and Wiltshire where Martin Down was concerned on Good Friday) scenery with so much colour like blossom, buds and that delicious shade of light green I love seeing on trees in April, early spring and Easter popping up everywhere I took so many pictures some of my most ever in such a short space of time I really did take so many it was unbelievable at times I averaged nearly 50 a day produced that weekend. On the wildlife note there was also unbelievable volume in that it was days of lists of birds in particular but other wildlife seen too as long as my arm it was incredible how much I was seeing and I think that was because with restrictions allowing us to get a little further afield for walks I was seeing not only the spring species across the board but also a lot of the winter birds were still around and then there were year round birds that were around and showing bits of nesting behaviour too so there was just so much that I was captivated by seeing. The weather was so brilliant over the weekend too really perfect mostly sunny and pretty warm conditions which I was so thankful for and there was so many top moments at home and very locally too for wildlife and photography. On top of this it was a truly positive and very relaxing time for which I really enjoyed and valued with so much interaction with other people on and offline which I valued a lot too as I did on the week off.

And what a fantastic week off I had from 17th-25th April. We visited some of the best locations for wildlife and beauty in the country, doing amazing and year defining further afield day trips allowed by restrictions lifting slightly at that stage and doing some great more local walks too. We saw an incredible amount of birds with fourteen more year ticks during my great year list revival this spring with some days being packed with them and we had some phenomenal moments of nature watching with birds some of my best ever. It was amazing how many of the star species that week that I saw and/or photographed well, especially for birds, were among my favourites whenever you see your favourite of something it’s always such an enriching and thrilling moment and I got to enjoy that so much that week. All my year lists that I had at that stage grew during my week off and I got especially an incredible amount of bird year ticks during Easter and the week off I got twenty seven year ticks this April making it my highest ever amount of them I got in this month beating my previous highest in 2014 which was phenomenal and something I found so amazing with some really high calibre species seen along the way and it’s really something I am so proud of. It helped me massively to complete the catch up compared to last year and really get my year competing with my best year lists. Butterflies and flowers helped define the week off too with so many incredible species seen my years for both were ticking along so well with some new species seen and learnt where flowers are concerned as both alongside the colours of the landscape like green, yellow, white and the blue sky and sea, river and lake water made it a sensational week of spring. There were also some brilliant moments with other insects and mammals, all in the most amazing weather with that shining sun we got so lucky and it was a big part of it. This all allowed me to take so many pictures each day, producing some of my most ever over a week I think. There were also so many general moments of relaxation such as lie ins, listening to music in the car and having ice creams and tea and cake. I loved this time off. This was a week off of day trips where if things had been different we may have physically been on holiday in Pembrokeshire but with all that we did and how it felt and how I fondly looked back on the time, it was every inch the holiday.

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statetalks · 3 years

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Were Democrats Or Republicans For Slavery

Presidency Of Martin Van Buren

Democrats Responsible for Slavery, Republican Party for Abolition.mp4

The Presidency of Martin Van Buren was hobbled by a long economic depression called the Panic of 1837. The presidency promoted hard money based on gold and silver, an independent federal treasury, a reduced role for the government in the economy, and a liberal policy for the sale of public lands to encourage settlement; they opposed high tariffs to encourage industry. The Jackson policies were kept, such as Indian removal and the Trail of Tears. Van Buren personally disliked slavery but he kept the slaveholder’s rights intact. Nevertheless, he was distrusted across the South.

The 1840 Democratic convention was the first at which the party adopted a platform. Delegates reaffirmed their belief that the Constitution was the primary guide for each state’s political affairs. To them, this meant that all roles of the federal government not specifically defined fell to each respective state government, including such responsibilities as debt created by local projects. Decentralized power and states’ rights pervaded each and every resolution adopted at the convention, including those on slavery, taxes, and the possibility of a central bank. Regarding slavery, the Convention adopted the following resolution:

What Happened In 1969

The war in Vietnam came to a head. The democrats under Kennedy had gotten us into the war and then after Kennedy was killed President Johnson continued and grew our presence in Vietnam.

Peoples opposition to the war became the focus of the democrat party and the emotional democrats became the protagonists for eliminating the policies that kept blacks in the back of the bus as well as free love and marijuana.

I was young at the time and this is the Democratic Party i remember which were opposed to real things. There was a war in vietnam. People were dying. There was segregation.

Republicans didnt resist outlawing segregation. The resistance was focused on the remaining segregationists in the Democratic Party. Strom Thurmond a democrat from the south fillibustered the passage of the civil rights act.

In 1968 the democrats held a national convention. This convention devolved into riots and was the watershed for racism and the Democratic Party. The racists were ejected from the Democratic Party ostensibly.

Democrats today claim that in 1969 what happened is that the racists in the Democratic Party moved to the Republican Party.

There is no evidence of this. Storm Thurmond, Robert Byrd never switched parties. Robert Byrd a former KKK leader stayed a democrat until he retired from the senate in 2010. Biden called Byrd a mentor.

Biden was one of the most outspoken opponents of busing.

None of that is true.

If you arent a democrat then they dont want you in the identity group.

After The Civil War Democrats Continued To Fight Against Equality For Blacks

For 100 years the democrats staged a rear guard action seeking to keep blacks subservient and doing their bidding.

They passed laws to limit black peoples ability to vote, to sit on the front of the bus, to own land, to rent apartments, to go to the same schools and many other things.

If anyone owes black people reparations it is these democrats.

Given this history of democrats it is stunning that the Democratic Party continues to exist. Shouldnt it be disbanded? We are tearing down statues, removing names of historically racist people and institutions so why not destroy the Democratic Party? It is slavery and was the principal advocate of slavery. They also were heavily involved in passing racist laws, hanging blacks and many republicans who opposed the democrats.

Why would anyone want to be part of a party that was historically so critical and central to the whole effort to enslave and repress blacks?

People have a tendency not to be partisan and to label this as white Americans that did this but it was the Democrats. Republicans were the ones fighting it. If not for those republicans the black people in America would never have been freed or gotten voting rights or many other things that had to be fought. Many white republicans were killed by democrats even after the end of the civil war who were called sympathizers.

Again, why doesnt this basic fact that is indisputable matter?

Those blacks who could vote between 1860 and 1969 voted for republicans.

Recommended Reading: How Many Registered Democrats And Republicans Are There

Political Firsts For Women And Minorities

From its inception in 1854 to 1964, when Senate Republicans pushed hard for passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 against a filibuster by Senate Democrats, the GOP had a reputation for supporting blacks and minorities. In 1869, the Republican-controlled legislature in Wyoming Territory and its Republican governor John Allen Campbell made it the first jurisdiction to grant voting rights to women. In 1875, California swore in the first Hispanic governor, Republican Romualdo Pacheco. In 1916, Jeannette Rankin of Montana became the first woman in Congressand indeed the first woman in any high level government position. In 1928, New Mexico elected the first Hispanic U.S. Senator, Republican . In 1898, the first Jewish U.S. Senator elected from outside of the former Confederacy was Republican Joseph Simon of Oregon. In 1924, the first Jewish woman elected to the U.S. House of Representatives was Republican Florence Kahn of California. In 1928, the Republican U.S. Senate Majority Leader, Charles Curtis of Kansas, who grew up on the Kaw Indian reservation, became the first person of significant non-European ancestry to be elected to national office, as Vice President of the United States for Herbert Hoover.

A New Political Party

After passing all these pro-slavery laws, in May 1854, a number of anti-slavery members in Congress formed a new political party to fight slavery. These anti-slavery members were from the Whigs, Free Soil advocates and Emancipationists. They wanted to gain equal rights for black Americans.

The name of that party? They called it the Republican Party. They chose this name because they wanted to return to the principles of freedom and equality. These are the principles first put forth in the documents of the republic before the pro-slavery Congressional members had misused and manipulated to their own purposes those original principles.

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The New Deal Era: 19321939

After Roosevelt took office in 1933, New Deal legislation sailed through Congress at lightning speed. In the 1934 midterm elections, ten Republican senators went down to defeat, leaving them with only 25 against 71 Democrats. The House of Representatives was also split in a similar ratio. The “Second New Deal” was heavily criticized by the Republicans in Congress, who likened it to class warfare and socialism. The volume of legislation, as well as the inability of the Republicans to block it, soon made the opposition to Roosevelt develop into bitterness and sometimes hatred for “that man in the White House. Former President Hoover became a leading orator crusading against the New Deal, hoping unrealistically to be nominated again for president.

Most major newspaper publishers favored Republican moderate Alf Landon for president. In the nation’s 15 largest cities the newspapers that editorially endorsed Landon represented 70% of the circulation. Roosevelt won 69% of the actual voters in those cities by ignoring the press and using the radio to reach voters directly.

Roosevelt carried 46 of the 48 states thanks to traditional Democrats along with newly energized labor unions, city machines and the Works Progress Administration. The realignment creating the Fifth Party System was firmly in place. Since 1928, the GOP had lost 178 House seats, 40 Senate seats and 19 governorships, though it retained a mere 89 seats in the House and 16 in the Senate.

Southernization; Oh That Sounds Fun Wait It Isnt

From the 1960s to the 2000s a southernization of the Republican party occurs. Paired with Goldwater and;Hoover states rights conservatism and along;with old Anti-Communist ideology, it was enough to completely change the political parties.

From the late 1800s to the 2000s Republican progressives moved toward the Democratic Party and Southern Conservatives moved toward the Republican party. See;the New Deal Coalition and Conservative Coalition.

The grand result is that the David Dukes of the world today fly the Confederate Battle flag and vote Republican.

This story;is a major reason why the voter map looks the way it does.

Meanwhile, while we can still see Gores and Clintons, and sometimes even a Byrd, in the modern Democratic party, those Redeemer and Redeemed liberals made a conscious choice to ally with the dominate Progressive and Neoliberal factions in this cycle.

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What Does Republican Mean

The word republicanmeans of, relating to, or of the nature of a republic. Similarly to the word democratic, the word republican also describes things that resemble or involve a particular form of government, in this case the government in question is a republic. A republic is a government system in which power rests with voting citizens who directly or indirectly choose representatives to exercise political power on their behalf.;

You may have noticed that a republic sounds a lot like a democracy. As it happens, most of the present-day democracies are also republics. However, not every republic is democratic and not every democratic country is a republic.

For example, the historical city-state of Venice had a leader known as a doge who was elected by voters. In the case of Venice, though, the voters were a small council of wealthy traders, and the doge held his position for life. Venice and other similar mercantile city-states had republican governments, but as you can see, they were definitely not democratic. At the same time, the United Kingdom is a democratic country that has a monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, and so it is not a republican country because it is not officially a republic.;

Slavery And The Emergence Of The Bipartisan System

Civil Rights and Slavery – Republican and Democrat Parties – Prager University

From 1828 to 1856 the Democrats won all but two presidential elections . During the 1840s and 50s, however, the Democratic Party, as it officially named itself in 1844, suffered serious internal strains over the issue of extending slavery to the Western territories. Southern Democrats, led by Jefferson Davis, wanted to allow slavery in all the territories, while Northern Democrats, led by Stephen A. Douglas, proposed that each territory should decide the question for itself through referendum. The issue split the Democrats at their 1860 presidential convention, where Southern Democrats nominated John C. Breckinridge and Northern Democrats nominated Douglas. The 1860 election also included John Bell, the nominee of the Constitutional Union Party, and Abraham Lincoln, the candidate of the newly established antislavery Republican Party . With the Democrats hopelessly split, Lincoln was elected president with only about 40 percent of the national vote; in contrast, Douglas and Breckinridge won 29 percent and 18 percent of the vote, respectively.

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On This Day The Republican Party Names Its First Candidates

On July 6, 1854, disgruntled voters in a new political party named its first candidates to contest the Democrats over the issue of slavery. Within six and one-half years, the newly christened Republican Party would control the White House and Congress as the Civil War began.

For a brief time in the decade before the Civil War, the Democratic Party of Andrew Jackson and his descendants enjoyed a period of one-party rule. The Democrats had battled the Whigs for power since 1836 and lost the presidency in 1848 to the Whig candidate, Zachary Taylor. After Taylor died in office in 1850, it took only a few short years for the Whig Party to collapse dramatically.

There are at least three dates recognized in the formation of the Republican Party in 1854, built from the ruins of the Whigs. The first is February 24, 1854, when a small group met in Ripon, Wisconsin, to discuss its opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act. The group called themselves Republicans in reference to Thomas Jeffersons Republican faction in the American republics early days. Another meeting was held on March 20, 1854, also in Ripon, where 53 people formally recognized the movement within Wisconsin.

On July 6, 1854, a much-bigger meeting in Jackson, Michigan was attended by about 10,000 people and is considered by many as the official start of the organized Republican Party. By the end of the gathering, the Republicans had compiled a full slate of candidates to run in Michigans elections.

Culture Conflict And Al Smith

At the 1924 Democratic National Convention, a resolution denouncing the Ku Klux Klan was introduced by Catholic and liberal forces allied with Al Smith and Oscar W. Underwood in order to embarrass the front-runner, William Gibbs McAdoo. After much debate, the resolution failed by a single vote. The KKK faded away soon after, but the deep split in the party over cultural issues, especially prohibition, facilitated Republican landslides in 1924 and 1928. However, Al Smith did build a strong Catholic base in the big cities in 1928 and Franklin D. Roosevelt‘s election as Governor of New York that year brought a new leader to center stage.

the myth of the Democratic Party masterfully re-created, a fresh awareness of the elemental differences between the parties, and ideology with which they might make sense of the two often senseless conflicts of the present, and a feeling for the importance of dynamic leadership. The book was a mirror for Democrats.

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Presidency Of Andrew Jackson

The spirit of Jacksonian democracy animated the party from the early 1830s to the 1850s, shaping the Second Party System, with the Whig Party as the main opposition. After the disappearance of the Federalists after 1815 and the Era of Good Feelings , there was a hiatus of weakly organized personal factions until about 18281832, when the modern Democratic Party emerged along with its rival, the Whigs. The new Democratic Party became a coalition of farmers, city-dwelling laborers and Irish Catholics. Both parties worked hard to build grassroots organizations and maximize the turnout of voters, which often reached 80 percent or 90 percent of eligible voters. Both parties used patronage extensively to finance their operations, which included emerging big city political machines as well as national networks of newspapers.

Behind the party platforms, acceptance speeches of candidates, editorials, pamphlets and stump speeches, there was a widespread consensus of political values among Democrats. As Mary Beth Norton explains:

The party was weakest in New England, but strong everywhere else and won most national elections thanks to strength in New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and the American frontier. Democrats opposed elites and aristocrats, the Bank of the United States and the whiggish modernizing programs that would build up industry at the expense of the yeoman or independent small farmer.

Why It Doesnt Make Sense To Equate Modern Democrats With The Old Southern Democrats

The Democrats, formally the;anti-Federalists,;had an;aversion to aristocracy from the late 1700s to the progressive era.

That truism;led to the southern conservatives of the solid south like;John C. Calhoun and small government liberals like Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, and Martin Van Buren allying;in the same party;for most of U.S. history.

However,;that changed;after Civil Rights under LBJ and the rise of Goldwater States Rights Republicans .

Today the solid south, and figures like Jeff Sessions, are in an alliance in the big tent of the Republican Party . This was as much a response to the growing progressiveness of the Democratic Party as anything.

One simple way to confirm this is to look at the factions of;Lincolns time. There were four. They;were:

The Northern liberal Whig/Republicans, The;Nativist Know-Nothing; allies of the Whig/Republicans, The Southern Democrats and their Northern allies , and The;Free Soil;;allies of the Democrats who;took a libertarian like position.

Todays Democrats are more like socially liberal Whig/Republicans , libertarians are like Free Soilers , Trumpians are like Nativist Know-Nothings , and Southern Democrats are like the modern Southern conservative Republicans.

The current parties are thus:

Social Liberals and Neoliberals vs. Social Conservatives and Neoliberal Conservatives AKA Neocons .

Clearly, the country has never been fully polarized, even at its most polarized.

Also Check: Do Republicans Want To Impeach Trump

The Second Bush Era: 20002008

George W. Bush, son of George H. W. Bush, won the 2000 Republican presidential nomination over Arizona Senator John McCain, former Senator Elizabeth Dole and others. With his highly controversial and exceedingly narrow victory in the 2000 election against the Vice President Al Gore, the Republican Party gained control of the Presidency and both houses of Congress for the first time since 1952. However, it lost control of the Senate when Vermont Senator James Jeffords left the Republican Party to become an independent in 2001 and caucused with the Democrats.

In the wake of the on the United States in 2001, Bush gained widespread political support as he pursued the War on Terrorism that included the invasion of Afghanistan and the invasion of Iraq. In March 2003, Bush ordered for an invasion of Iraq because of breakdown of United Nations sanctions and intelligence indicating programs to rebuild or develop new weapons of mass destruction. Bush had near-unanimous Republican support in Congress plus support from many Democratic leaders.

Bush failed to win conservative approval for Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, replacing her with Samuel Alito, whom the Senate confirmed in January 2006. Bush and McCain secured additional tax cuts and blocked moves to raise taxes. Through 2006, they strongly defended his policy in Iraq, saying the Coalition was winning. They secured the renewal of the USA PATRIOT Act.

source https://www.patriotsnet.com/were-democrats-or-republicans-for-slavery/

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ts1989fanatic · 4 years

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How Taylor Swift reset her image with Folklore

In her surprise quarantine album, Taylor Swift ignores the haters and embraces her crown as one of pop’s great storytellers.

By Constance Grady on July 24, 2020 3:50 pm

On Thursday at midnight, Taylor Swift dropped her surprise quarantine album, Folklore, with only 17 hours’ notice. It’s been greeted with rave critical reviews. The Guardian gave it five stars. “This one won’t require an album-length Ryan Adams remake to convince anyone that there’s songwriting there,” said Variety. Rolling Stone called it “headspinning,” “heart-smashing,” and Swift’s “greatest album — so far.”

The rapturous acclaim Folklore has amassed is a sign that the press is at last ready to make nice with Swift after years spent debating her pop culture villainy and/or victimhood. And it suggests that Swift, who declared in January’s Netflix documentary Miss Americana that she was done seeking public approval, has finally found it again.

Folklore announced itself as something different from the traditional Taylor Swift album before it ever arrived. Swift has the release hype cycle down to a science at this point: Her last album, 2019’s Lover, came after months of teases coded into her social media presence and a countdown clock ticking toward the official album announcement. In the months leading up to 2017’s Reputation, Swift’s team plastered her face on UPS trucks across the country. But Folklore — which Swift conceived and produced all while in quarantine as the Covid-19 pandemic forced lockdowns all over the world — made its way into the world less than 24 hours after Swift announced it. There were no Easter eggs embedded into Instagram posts, no national print ad campaigns.

Moreover, Folklore was not preceded by any singles, and contains no songs that sound like the classic Taylor Swift Top 40 hit. That’s a departure from Swift’s increasingly bifurcated album strategy. Her past few album releases have all been preceded by slick, radio-friendly pop tracks that sound as though they’ve been mathematically calibrated to play through the listener’s head on an endless loop. Singles like “Shake It Off” and “ME!” can become massive, ubiquitous earworms, and they show off Swift’s ability to craft an unsinkable pop hook, but they’re also simple, shallow, and often critically smeared.

Swift’s full albums, meanwhile, tend to contain songs richer and more contemplative than those early singles would suggest. And it’s those quieter songs — like “All Too Well” or last year’s “Cornelia Street” — that tend to become both critical and fan favorites, and to be cited as examples of what makes Swift one of pop’s great storytellers.

Folklore is an album full of Taylor Swift in “All Too Well” mode: intimate, lyrical, and vulnerable. None of its songs have that telltale Max Martin hard edge of precision pop engineering. Instead, they’re shaggy and rambling. They don’t drive themselves into your head. They steal their way in.

That subtle, gentle stealth is foundational to the way Swift is currently building her image. She doesn’t need to be the untouchable aspirational pop princess who is also your teenage best friend anymore. Right now, she’s a musical storyteller at the peak of her craft.

Taylor Swift has always struggled to combine intimacy with control. With Folklore, she succeeds in balancing the two.

In 2017, I took a deep dive into Taylor Swift’s star image from the early days of her fame onward. What I found is that the central tension that has defined her image, driving both its highs and its lows, is one between intimacy and control.

Swift is always building a sense of cozy best friendship with her fans — sending out care packages, having them over for cookies — but she is also obliged, as a major celebrity, to consider her image carefully, to calculate and craft the way she presents in public. When her calculation shows in public, as it seemed to during that Kanye West feud, the public reacts as though she’s betraying their trust. So many people seem unable to reconcile the sense of intimate friendship Swift encourages with the evidence of the control she brings to her career.

One of the ways this tension traditionally plays out with Swift is in the single-versus-album split in her songcraft. “Her music mixes an almost impersonal professionalism — it’s so rigorously crafted it sounds like it has been scientifically engineered in a hit factory — with confessions that are squirmingly intimate and true,” wrote Rolling Stone in 2008. Her mathematically exact pop hooks sound exquisitely controlled. Her confessional lyrics feel achingly intimate.

When the combination works, it’s what makes Taylor Swift great. But when it doesn’t, people start to feel like she’s lying to them. That’s part of why the press cycle of the Reputation era was so unfriendly to Swift.

With Folklore, Swift has found a way to make the split work again. She’s still a pop songsmith in control of her craft, and it would be both facile and insulting to say that Folklore is uncontrolled. But in moving away from radio-friendly Top 40 pop and toward the looser structures of indie pop, Swift is allowing the vulnerability and intimacy of her lyrics to take center stage. She’s drawn a veil over the rigorous control she brings to all of her work. For the first time in a long time, she’s making it look natural and easy.

Swift has also found a way to create intimacy with her audience without mining material directly from her own life. In Folklore, she plays with characters: She narrates “Betty” as a 17-year-old boy named James; in “The Last Great American Dynasty,” she tells the story of her house’s former owner in a tale that reflects only obliquely on Swift’s own time dating a Kennedy.

These songs still have the visceral emotional connection that Swift’s fans expect from her, but they no longer seem to be encouraging listeners to trawl through the details of Swift’s life to figure out who she’s subtweeting. The focus is on the storytelling rather than the gossip.

And that means the critical conversation about Swift’s work can shift away from outlining all her relationships — the petty feuds, the flings, the question of whether some of those flings were staged for publicity — and toward the craft. That shift is easier for the press to perform now that the infamous Kanye tape has been released in full, exonerating Swift in the scandal that briefly turned her into a pop culture villain. But a turn away from gossip seems to also be just what Swift wants for her image right now, and it’s a direction she’s been trending in for all of 2020, even before the tape became public.

There’s a scene at the beginning of Miss Americana that might double as a thesis statement for Swift’s career right now. It’s January 24, 2020, the day the Grammy nominations come out, and Swift is sitting tensely by her phone, waiting to hear how Reputation did. Then the news comes: It hasn’t earned a nod in any of the major categories.

For just a moment, Swift’s face falls. It looks as though her world has crumbled.

Then a look of steely reserve marches across her features. “It’s okay,” she says, like she’s trying to convince herself. “I’ll just make a better album.”

Folklore has critics ready and waiting to tell Swift she pulled it off.

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popculturebuffet · 4 years

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Loud House Reviews: The Purrfect Gig

The Sam/Luna trilogy comes to an end here, as we get to the most recent of their now annual episodes, each so far produced and aired toward the end of the season. That being said like last season Sam had at least one apperance before this as I saw her in the thumbnail to “Deep Cuts”, the OTHER Lunacentric episode this season. And while it sounded bad to me at first looking into it.. no. The writers, for the most part, gave almost every kid two episodes a piece, and last season gave each 3, so to the writers credit they TRY to ballance out who gets episodes.

The exceptions are Lincoln, who has around 5 that don’t also feature the girls as a whole, and 2 of those are with Lana, Lori who has 4, 2 of them shared and justifed as she’s possibly leaving for College next season and thus her episodes outside of one focus ont hat, and Lana and Lola: Lana has 3, and Lola has 2, and both have one together. And really even with those imballances it’s really impressive the show juggles 14 leads, with the parents themselves getting 2 this year too, along with Clyde, not counting his ones with Lincoln. | And that’s WITH the baffling decision this season to have the first 5 episodes be “With THe Cassagrandes”, i.e. 5 episodes of the Casagrandes that are counted as loud house episode that weren’t produced over at the sister show for some reason. And I have nothing against the Cassagrandes, what i’ve seen it’s not a bad show: I already have gone on about how much I love bobby, and I also love CJ and new comer Sam. I love the fact it has plenty of representation and a diffrent kind of big family, I love the theme song and I love the fact Melissa Joan Heart is on it because she’s terrific and spent the last decade really not picking her roles well. She was the lead in Holiday in Handcuffs, aka the movie where she kidnaps Mario Lopez and holds him at gunpoint to pretend to be her fiance until he gets Stockholm syndrome for really flimsy reasons. But I dont’ feel i’ts fair to the show to wedge it into another show’s spot: The Cassagrande-Santiago clan has shown up in 2 half hour loud houses and 2 15 minute eps. The kids watching KNOW these characters, and reception of the loudest mission was positive enough to get a spinoff made. You don’t need to spend a huge amount of another show’s episode order to promote a show kids will likely watch because it has characters from a show that airs all the time and is uber popular and has a similar humor style, and fans of the Loud House will at least try becuase they like the mothership and have known was coming for years now. This show HAD an audience going in. I watched both American Dad and the Clevland Show because it was from the same crew as family guy which I liked at the time. Granted American Dad had a decent stretch and Clevland Show .. had David LYnch as a recurring cast member I guess? Seriously david, this and not gravity falls? The point is it feels insulting that they felt the need to try and promote the show more, and all they did was take up episodes of the loud house and confuse children, and possibly turn viewers off a show they would’ve watched anyways. And if your wondering why I took such a massive detour it’s simple: Other than noticing the fact they’ve been specifically making sure each sibling gets more than one spotlight episode, shared or not, and this dumb decision.. Season 4 isn’t THAT much diffrent than Season 3. It carries on plots started there (Lori heading towards college, Luann and Luna’s relationship), but otherwise it’s basically just more shipping and shenanigans. But really. .that’s far from a bad thing, as I consider season 3 a highwater mark for the show, and it introduced a lot of neat new elements (Lynn’s Table, Stella, Leni having a job) that are still prevelant in season 4. It’s not bad and it’s even more understandable given that next season, every character is growing a year (thank you press releases), meaning they have tons of new plots to explore, and large status quo shifts with Lincoln going to middle school, which out of the four schools shown is so far the most underdeveloped and will need development, and Lori possibly moving out of the house and going to college, among many other things that have me chomping at the bit for next season. But that’s probably a few months away so for now, it’s time to get back on focus and with everything else out of the way, the actual review of this episode starts under the cut.

We open with Luna sitting in bed sighing when her poster of Mick Swagger starts talking to her. Whatever she’s smoking I could really use some. Depression is a bitch. Anyways, her drug induced hallucination of her hero starts talking to her. I haven’t really talked about Mick yet since the show uses him sporadically but he’s exactly what you’d expect; The show’s version of Rolling Stones front man Mick Jagger, only slightly younger.. maybe. I dunno. Maybe he’s been around since the 60′s and is just a timelord. Or a groovy robot. Or has a dorian grey thing going on. We haven’t really gotten into Dino Spimoni situation yet where Luna helps her idol and has to help him reunite with a partner or convince him to stop faking his death. Just a reminder that Hey Arnold is great and that if you think it’s odd his crooner dean martin based idol got talked out of faking his death by a 12 year old, keep in mind he also tracked down the daughter his vitamise neighbor gave up so she could go to america and have a better life, helped convince his neighbors not divorce, and had to save his pig from being eaten in a revolutionary war reinactment. Hey Arnold was far weirder than I remembered and i’m here for it. Anyways, Hallucination Mick asks if Luna is coming to his concert this weekend, and she HOPES so she just dosen’t have the money for VIP pass to meet the actual version and do drugs with the actual mick swagger for a change. He says you never know when opportunity will come a knockin and it does in the form of the McBrides! Clyde’s dad’s Howard, the skinny one voiced by national treasure Micheal McDonald and Wayne Brady whose also great.. and i’m not just saying that because i’ve seen this. Don’t be absurddddd....

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Howard and Harold are Clyde’s dads... and while Clarence and Steven Universe beat them to having Gay parents in a children’s cartoon, their still the first interacial gay couple in a children’s cartoon, and on a nicktoon period, and even if they weren’t either of those it’d still be fucking great. Anyways the two are nice characters, while i haven’t seen EVERY ep with them their a loving couple, nice parents, and treat the loud kids as their own.. granted that goes too far in one episode, but still, thems good people. Anyway Howards having a panic attack, respect, and as his husband calms him down, we find out why: the mcbrides are going to pick up nana for the annual family reunion, and their catsitter cancled. Hence Howard’s freakout and Harold worrying about the 20 pounds of amish potato salad in the trunk. So naturally their hoping someone can watch their cats, Cleopawtra and Nefurtiti for the day, and them going to the louds makes sense, both for the obvious of the Louds being their closest friends in the neighborhood, and the not so obvious of a previous episode I haven’t seen having established the older kids as the best babysitters in royal woods, meaning that in addition to knowing them they have skill and this likely isn’t the first time. Luna, not thinking about herself, admits Lori went to hit the golf course early and Leni is at work, a nice way to explaning why it’s Luna that gets the job: She was there and it was implied by the fact she was getting high and talking to her hallucination that Luann isn’t, so most of the other options they’d have without some reservations are gone with no contrivance necessary. Anyways Luna’s Drug Fueld hallucination, points out money can be exchanged for goods and services, such as VIP passes, and also mentions sam already has hers. Either Luna’s forgot or her hallucination can use her phone. Either is probable, and is backed up by Hallucination Sam, before both start playing their guitars and Luna air guitars with them. I”m unsuprsied by all of this. She offers and the McBrides take her up on it immeditley. I do like that it avoids the “I don’t know if your up to this” cliche that always happens in these types of scenarios, the McBrides have no reason not to trust her, so they just.. do. Hell Harold only sets out one rule: don’t invite anyone over.. and it’s not even because he dosen’t trust Luna to have anyone over or anything like that, he just knows the cats get anxious with a crowd, though their therapist is working with them on that. And of course the two rich men with a single child have a cat therapist. I would too if I were rich. Harold and Clyde throw and unconcious Howard into the car and their off, they’ll be back at 6. And TOTALLY won’t be home hours early for hyjinks. Totally. Luna arrives to find a massive binder on feline care. Someone went to the Amy Santiago school of binders. It says to feed the cats at 10 sharp.. and it’s 10:02. Luna tries feeding them but the cats instead attack her in a full on psycotic rage and dump food all over her, so dinners on her.

Anyways, Luna then tries walking the cats which goes as well as you’d expect.. not because she had to put harneses on cats and expect them to do anything at a certain time, but because they pull hard. I can relate to that with my dog.. not my cat. He just goes wherever he wants because he’s old and kind of an asshole. Anyways, with the cats now messy from running over a guy with a cake, because of course, Luna looks up what to do next which is.. give.. them a bath.

Who.. who does that. I know their messy, but use a rag or something. No animal likes being bathed but cats, esepcially one who this episodes shows aren’t declawed (And rightfully so but still), do not LIKE being bathed. Granted they wouldn’t like being cleaned off with a rag or something either, but it still feels less cruel to both them and any prospective babysitter to just hold one down and wipe it off then find the other and repeat. Look witht he walking thing I can see why someone would, in their case because their probably too skittish to let their cats wonder around, and in some cases because said cat is young. But this.. this even for a comedy contrivance is stupid. It’s not the worst uninetional cat abuse i’ve seen in media, Elmyra exists and the mother of the lead of get fuzzy tried putting her cat on a vegetarian diet, which Rob, said lead and a staunch vegetarian himself, not only found concerning but gave said cat the money for takeout.. keep in mind in this strip cats can talk and walk upright. Also I miss when Get Fuzzy was both daily and good. So Luna naturally ends up in the bathtub, soaked and depressed and not sure what to do when her friendly neighborhood sign that the drugs haven’t worn off yet comes by and tells her to shape up if she wants to go to the show with Sam. This gives Luna a great idea. LIke a Zack MOrris great idea it involves breaking the rules.. unlike a Zack Morris idea, it dosen’t involve sexual harassment or a zany scheme. She decides to call Sam, since she’s apparently great with cats and given we saw how she was with chickens last time, not a real stretch. She also pops Mick’s bubble which.. hurts him.. somehow. I dunno. Anyway cut to Sam arriving. She arrived fast because she was picking a new character up from his gamer’s club meeting: Her brother Simon, who’d been mentioned in side materials but makes his first apperance here. I like him, he has a neat design and i’ts nice to give sam a family life of her own, and he’s a nice if glued to his not-nintendo switch kid. Frankly I hope he and LIncoln meet at some point. I mean he has an opening in his friend group starting next season there’s no way Rusty passes 5th grade. And even if he somehow does, it’s not like adding another member is too much of a stretch given, once they got past courting her, the rest of his group warmly welcomed stella in and it’d be an intresting dynamic having his sister’s girlfriend’s brother in the group. Also if your wondering if i’ll ever stop finding ways to bash rusty in these reviews even when he’s entirely absent..

Anyways, Luna slams the door in the kids face, which he takes in stride , and explains the situation, and after fred fliintstonning him is taken off the table, go with “Sneak him past the cats”. It works because cats never look up at the backs of a gay teenage couple sneaking a small child inside. Luna decides to leave Simon in the entertainment room while she and Sam watch the cats and he finds Clyde’s VR gear and asks to try it on, with Luna reluctantly agreeing as long as he’s careful.. which as far as we see.. yeah he entirely is. The Sharpe’s are good people.

Cue a montage! Sam helps luna scrub the cats, with brushes as they should’ve done minute one, put them through spa type pampering which is also a call back to the first time we saw the McBride’s house in the series, take selfies, and then sing the cats to sleep, in a really sweet and really well sung lullaby, notable for being the first time Sam’s sung on the show and Allyson Stoner, who I haven’t mentioned but should’ve before this shame on me, does a terrific job and has done a terrific job as Sam in general. Luna thianks her for the help, Sam says no sweat they get to see the show together, and Sam ducks out... before realizing she forgot something. Her wallet... no wait she has that.. OH SHIT HER BROTHER. And before she can get him DOUBLE OH SHIT THE MCBRIDES ARE BACK. Harold is grumbling about the potato salad... apparenlty Aunt Brenda brought some and wasn’t supposed to. I do like how both McBride dads have their own quirks:While Harold IS the more rational one, he can slip up just like anyone can. Luna prepares to leave.. only to realize oh shit her girlfriend’s brothers in the house still. Her not all complex scheme! She fakes having left something behind to get him out, and once sam calls comes up with a plan: Sneak Simon around back. Sam sneaks around with the bush she ducked into, and we get one of my faviorite tropes: A scooby doo doors sequence! Also the dads speak in unison. Dawww. We also get an adorable bit of Sam gesturing for Luna to hand her the boy. I couldn’t find a gif of it sadly, and I would’ve credited it, but I did find 50 tons of creepy Sam X LIncoln fanart. Just.. why. Why exactly. Why do you do this to me tumblr. And to be clear I have ZERO issue with shipping a character whose sexuality isn’t fully confirmed as just gay in canon with a male character, Bi and Pan representation is important. It’s why I get annoyed at the people who throw a hissy fit any time Della Duck is shipped with Launchpad. Here though I do because it feels like this ship is ENTIRELY a troll, especially since LIncoln has 80 other options, not at all including the icky incest ones, and that I cut and dry have every problem with, and is being done soley to annoy people who ship sam and Luna and are finally enjoying some gay/bi representation on children’s television. If this is a troll then kindly

Thank you John. So anyways Sam does grab the boy and nearly gets him out the door.. only for the mcbrides to run into their bisexual catsitter shoving a small chubby child out their kitchen window only to have a lesbian fall out into their kitchen. Naturally Howard faints again and Harold is displeased... probably because his husband fainted again.. and you know the shenangians in his kitchen. The only time shenanigans are allowed in that kitchen are when Clyde is sleeping at a friends house for the night and only on the table dammit. They got reinforced oak for a reason. We cut to the boys playing, which is a nice touch: Clyde being a nice kid dosen’t mind sharing, Simon has similar intrests, and the only time we’ve seen him be eh on sharing is letting Lincoln borrow his new console.. and he not only felt BAD for not wanting him to borrow it and having to try and get it back, but he only did so because the Loud house is insanley chaotic and understandbly he wasn’t sure it’d get back to him safetly. His dad’s rasied him well, he’s a good boy once he got past his ‘Stalking his friends older sister” phase and got into his “anything besides that “ phase. Luna comes clean to the McBrides and.. Harold appricates the honesty. And both are impressed with how well they took them, with Sam and Luna giving each other credit. So instead of getting upset, especially since Luna was both honest and only called in Sam for help and Simon was an unexpected guest and they both did a fantastic job, they offer to split the money instead. Sam, in a really sweet gesture, then gives Luna her half with no hesitation or prompting from her girlfriend, Luna gives her a cheek smooch and they hug. Then Luna acciently wakes the cats, and we end on the girls singing the cats, Simon and the McBrides all to sleep. Also Luna’s hallucination is alsleep.. those drugs wore off hours ago after all. Final Thoughts: A really fantastic setup. Once again the show shows it’s slowly gained talent for taking stock plots (in this case a babysitting episode) and making them actually intresting, mostly by having the characters behave reasonably. While it didn’t really expand Sam’s character, it didn’t really need to , the previous ep with her having fleshed her out as a sweet, kind girl with a talent for animals, and Simon is a wonderful addition to the series massive cast of side characters that , unlike some additions , will hopefully show up again. Seriously half the reason I bitch about Rusty is that the show is great at making charcters, and improving them after a few bumpy episodes as seen with Clyde, Lori and Luann, but yet still uses him and dosen’t make him any funnier, while I can name handfuls of characters who either need more apperances (Girl Jordan) Or haven’t shown up again at all (Carol Pingery, Rocky, Maggie). And that’s not even all of them obviously, but my point stands. But given he’s the brother of one of the main characters girlfriend and would fit in with the main character well, I have a feeling we’ll see simon again at some point. I also really liked seeing the McBrides, mostly because I haven’t seen many of their episodes, and found them to be delightful, helped by having wonderful va’s behind them as standard for the show and great chemsitry and it was a nice bonus to have the shows two main gay couples interact, without it feeling at all forced, and neither did Sam’s inclusion. And while we haven’t gotten a full on kiss with Sam and Luna, which really they should, CN beat them again on that, the cheek kiss and hug was still very sweet, as is the episode really. It’s funny, heartwarming, and really enjoyable. While itd osen’t have as much emotional weight as the last two eps, I like that it didn’t: For once the conflict was low key but understandable and now Sam and Luna are a full couple, they can just do cute couple shit and get into wacky shenanigans like any other couple on this show without any angst attached. It’s really nice. It also shows that no, a couple being together isn’t boring fuck off will they or won’t they, but i’ve ranted enough about stuff unrelated to this episode. I really liked it and hope to come back to these two someday. For now as I sign off Pride Month is far from over... as next up I have multiple things planned, but one of the biggest is a FIVE PART series on Red Action and Enid from OK KO. Yes FIVE. All 3 of their romantic eps, and Red’s first two for proper context both for the finale, which uses both episodes as part of the plot, and for a proper view of her character arc and to ease readers into the series better. So be there for that, and a donald duck birthday celebration, and until then, later days!

#Sam Sharp #Luna Loud #Saluna #the loud house #howard mcbride #harold mcbride #clide mcbride #simon sharp #the purrfect gig #pride month #lbgtq

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swissmissing · 5 years

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20 things that got better in 2018

Sources: VOX, Wired, A Wealth of Common Sense, Goodnet, Good News Network, Human Rights Watch, Medium

1) Extreme poverty is falling. 35.9 percent in 1990 to only 10 percent in 2015 ... it estimates that the 2018 rate will be about 8.6 percent.

2) Child mortality is falling. The global under-five mortality rate fell from 93 per 1,000 [1990] to 39 to 1,000 [2017], meaning it fell by over 58 percent. We don’t have data for 2018 yet, but given the change just between 2015 and 2017, it’s likely there was a further decline.

3) We’re getting better at preventing preventable diseases. A new technology that could be able to radically control or outright eliminate malaria — gene drive mosquitos — are almost ready and foundations like Gates and Open Philanthropy Project are devoting huge sums to fund its development and testing.

4) Clean energy is getting cheaper. Solar and wind are now cheaper per megawatt hour than gas or oil, though better batteries are needed if the two are to become primary sources of energy.

5) Nepal’s endangered tiger population has doubled. In 2009, there were only 120 wild Bengal tigers in Nepal, but that figure has almost doubled since then. The country’s government has pledged to double numbers by 2022, and is on track to meet that target.

6) We're interstellar once again. In December 2018, Voyager 2 became the second space craft to leave the heliosphere and it's still in good shape.

7) The Nobel prize for physics went to a woman for the first time in 55 years. Only three women have ever won the Nobel prize for physics. Donna Strickland from Canada’s University of Waterloo was awarded a share of the prize for her work on using powerful lasers to study tiny particles.

8) Hospitals have created their own drug company to fight back against high costs. A new company Civica Rx, was announced in January 2018 and a third of the country's [USA] hospitals have either committed to participate or expressed interest. The company CEO Martin Van Trieste is not taking a salary.

9) There are more scientists in politics [USA]. There’s one new senator, and eight new members of Congress with a STEM background, including computer programmers, engineers, and an oceanographer.

10) Fewer war deaths. The proportion of people killed annually in wars is less than a quarter of what it was in the 1980s, one-seventh of what it was in the early 1970s, one-eighteenth of what it was in the early 1950s, and 0.5% of what it was during World War II.

11) Fewer weapons of mass destruction. The world’s nuclear stockpiles have been reduced by 85% since the Cold War.

12) Better crop yields. Between 1961 and 2009 the amount of land used to grow food increased by 12%, but the amount of food that was grown increased by 300%.

13) Increased literacy. The global literacy rate is currently 83%. It’s estimated that by the end of the century this number will be close to 100%.

14) Access to clean water: Between 1980 and today, global access to safe water sources has increased from 58% to 91%.

15) Protected nature reserves. In 1962, there were 9,214 protected nature reserves worldwide. Today, there are over 200,000.

16) Plastic bag use slashed [AUS]. After two of Australia’s biggest supermarket chains announced that they would stop offering single-use plastic bags to their consumers, the initiative has heavily contributed to an 80% drop in plastic bag consumption across the nation.

17) Post-surgical spray gel to prevent cancer recurrence. A UCLA-led research team has developed a spray gel that is embedded with immune-boosting nanoparticles. The substance was successful half of the time in awakening lab animals’ immune systems to stop the cancer from recurring following tumor removal.

18) Norway bans palm oil biofuels that lead to deforestation. The majority of the Norwegian parliament agreed to ban their biofuel industry from buying palm oil and other dangerous biofuels that are linked to deforestation and harmful environmental practices.

19) Drastic decrease in child labor. Since 2000, the number of children in child labor globally fell by 94 million, a drop of more than one-third.

20) Suicides down over one-third. Global suicide rates have dropped by 38% since 1994,

#not sherlock #good things #2018 #good news

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sussex-nature-lover · 3 years

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Saturday 9th January 2021

Birling Gap and The Seven Sisters, Sussex

Brrr it’s really chilly. The big block of ice that Crow tipped out of the bird bath first thing, didn’t give any all day .

We have been getting a touch of frost in the mornings too and some foggy days.

Below is the view at the front towards the next village and where we look for the weather.

I’d used the bed in that room to plonk all the Christmas decorations on as I wanted to sort through them before making the boxes up, so I was there a while and looking at the mist descending.

You can see how it drops over the fields.

As we’re under the level of lockdown where you leave your home only if absolutely necessary, I’ve dug out some more of Ms NW tY’s photos so we can have another virtual trip out. This time it’s down at the south coast - Birling Gap and The Seven Sisters.

The Seven Sisters could be a country and western group, but in this case the name refers to a series of cliffs and because of coastal erosion it’s more like seven sisters and a cousin.

The sequence starts just east of Cuckmere Haven. all the cliffs and peaks between are named separately.

Listed below, the peaks are in italics.

Haven Brow

Short Bottom

Short Brow

Limekiln Bottom

Rough Brow

Rough Bottom

Brass Point

Gap Bottom

Flagstaff Point (continuing into Flagstaff Brow)

Flagstaff Bottom

Flat Hill

Flathill Bottom

Baily's Hill

Michel Dean[citation needed]

Went Hill Brow (grid reference TV549963).

Just east of the last peak is Birling Gap. Beyond, on the top of the next hill, is Belle Tout Lighthouse and beyond that Beachy Head. A lighthouse in the sea marks the latter headland.

Wikipedia

The origins of the names remains obscure.

Because the Seven Sisters area is free of development, the area is used for filming as a stand-in for the White Cliffs of Dover. The famous white cliffs are no longer as white as they sound and are greening with vegetation whereas the Seven Sisters remain pristine. The Seven Sisters are left to erode naturally by the waves and tides of the sea.

The area is designated and protected as a 'Heritage Coast' and is the finest example of unprotected chalk cliffs in Britain. From Seaford towards Eastbourne, including the famed Beachy Head, it’s around 21K.

photo credit: Ms NW tY

Seaford is an original Victorian seaside town with an unspoiled coastline, stunning scenery and is surrounded by the Sussex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Seaford Head Nature Reserve is a Site of Special Scientific Interest and it is from here that you get the classic images of the 'Seven Sisters', looking from Hope Gap across the Cuckmere Valley. Areas of chalk, grassland, salt marsh and shingle spit give a diversity of habitats for wildlife, especially birds.

photo credit: Ms NW tY

photo credit: Ms MW tY

There used to be a sheep centre and you could go down there for lambing, which was lovely, but it’s closed now

Seven Sisters Lambing

photo credit: National Trust

Bird watching

With a wide variety of different habitats packed into this special 280 hectare site, there are some great year round birding opportunities, weather and visitor pressures permitting!!

Early Spring sees the gradual departure of winter “whistling” wigeon, teal, little grebe, curlew, geese, oystercatcher, a mixed bag of gulls and regular kingfisher sightings as they head away to breed.

Their departure heralds the onset of the migrating season. Watch the wetlands for more unusual waders (such as black-tailed godwits) alongside the more familiar redshank, dunlin and ringed plover. The scrubby bushes along the valley, stunted by the salt spray and harsh onshore winds, are alive with warblers and linnets.

Swallows, martins and swifts means late spring has arrived and the Park settles down to summer residents of heron, little egret, shelduck, mallard, Canada geese, redshank and dunlin on the wetlands.

Fulmars, kittiwakes and jackdaws nest precariously on the cliffs, and amongst the Downland; please keep those dogs (and children!) under control to enable the ground nesting skylark, meadow pipits, and wheatear to breed.

The bushes throng with the song of robin, blackbird, various tits and dunnock, and the more unusual whitethroats. Along the valley yellowhammers sing ‘little bit of bread and cheeeeeeeeese’, and several pairs of stonechat parade on bramble perches. Watch out for raptors including sparrowhawks and hovering kestrels.

Late summer migration almost mirrors the spring version – though the birds often stay longer now the haste to breed is over and there is a chance to feed up on the abundant fruits and berries.

Maps and a bird list available in the Visitor Centre.

Male Black Redstart. Photo credit National Trust

I’d not come across Black Redstart before doing a bit of research for this Blog, what a lovely little bird. I found a couple of other Blogs which have more information and photos and are well worth a read

Martin’s Birding

and

Wild Hastings

♦ All the information today is from a combination of the National Trust, the Seven Sisters org and Visit Southern England.

What I Learned Today

The black redstart is a small robin-sized bird that has adapted to live at the heart of industrial and urban centres. Its name comes from the plumage of the male, which is grey-black in colour with a red tail.

With fewer than 100 breeding pairs in the UK, the black redstart is on the Red List of Birds of Conservation Concern. Is is also listed as a Schedule 1 species on The Wildlife and Countryside Act.

What they eat: Insects, spiders, worms, berries and seeds.

Measurements: Length:14.5cm Wingspan:23-26cm Weight:14-20g

Population: UK breeding:19-44 pairs UK wintering:400 birds

Notes from the Kitchen:

Today’s breakfast was omelettes. Crow had some chestnut mushrooms in his and I had cheese and tomato. I souffléd them by separating the eggs and whisking up the yolks and whites independently before combining gently to keep as much

#nature SevenSisters BeachyHead WhiteCliffs beautyspots #Sussex England

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goldensfm · 4 years

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* ╰ 𝐡𝐢 𝐛𝐚𝐛𝐲 𝐥𝐮𝐯𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐟𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐛𝐚𝐠 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐬 , i’m your resident crackhead steven forced out of early writing retirement by miss rona but i ain’t complainin ! 🤡 i’m here to bring you a decidedly non - crackheaded muse utilizing the absolute goddess that is zendaya . like got DAMN 𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐤 at her ! i’m swimming with muse for lex so i am hoping my control freak ice queen offers some sort of justice — i cant wait to meet you all and love you down endlessly ! if you could spare a 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭 for my validation , i’ll offer you all my best plots in return ! 💖

𝒂𝒃𝒐𝒖𝒕

❛ ✶ ( ZENDAYA , CIS - FEMALE , SHE / HER ) spotted ! ALEXANDRIA ‘ LEX ’ GOLDMAN was spotted singing along to BOSS BITCH by DOJA CAT in hilton grove. you’ve heard of them right ? they are a TWENTY - TWO year old ACTRESS & ENTREPRENEUR who has already amassed a net worth of $31M. you should really follow them on insta @GOLDEN , they’re about to hit 39.1M followers. the tabloids have been calling them the EXECUTIVE because they are known for being + PURPOSEFUL but also a bit - AUSTERE. — ooc info ( steven . 21 . pst . she / her / they / them . )

𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒕𝒔

full name : alexandria ( defender of man ) rochelle ( little rock ) goldman ( little golden one ) nicknames : primarily goes by lex . lexie , xan on occasion , and gold / goldie . birthday & age : september 3rd / 22 years old zodiac : virgo gender & pronouns : cis - female , she / her / hers orientation : openly bisexual nationality : american ethnicity : mixed race — african - american , german , irish , english , scottish occupation : former beauty pageant competitor and 2016’s miss teen usa , current film and television actress , model , business entrepreneur , and activist . recognized for : starring in hbo’s television series euphoria , being the first openly queer representative for the usa in the pageant circuit , her advocacy for feminism and criminal justice reform , a bustling social media page , being one of forbes 2019′s top 30 under 30 . char . inspos : meredith grey from grey’s anatomy , spencer hastings from pretty little liars , hermione granger from harry potter , meghan markle , angela martin from the office , alex cabot from law and order svu , and more than anything , claire from fleabag . 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧 𝐢𝐟 𝐮 𝐬𝐤𝐢𝐦 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐞𝐥𝐬𝐞 , 𝐢 𝐛𝐞𝐠 𝐨𝐟 𝐮 𝐭𝐨 𝐰𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐯𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐨 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐠𝐞𝐭 𝐥𝐞𝐱’𝐬 𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝟑 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐬 . tropes : control freak , defrosting the ice queen , perpetual frowner , did you think i can’t feel ? , hidden depths , stepford smiler . aesthetics : an intellect that remembers everything ; wild caramel curls with just enough composure to seem effortless ; a fear of failure more crippling than life itself ; the smell of fresh linen and lavender ; a color - coded itinerary ; a perfectly choreographed interaction , each time ; lilac power - suits and an immaculate composure ; unspoken mommy issues ; tenebrous , intent gazes swimming with the resonance of unspoken thoughts ; ‘ don’t touch me please ‘ syndrome ; kicking out hookups before you both fall asleep ; ordering the same thing at a restaurant , every time ; flinching at ‘ i love you’s ’ ; drafting business emails at the club ; an admiration of atlas , with the world’s weight upon your shoulders .

𝒃𝒂𝒄𝒌𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒚

born the sole continuance of the goldman name to a mother whose pregnancy was all but a career death - sentence , lex bore the weight of the world’s expectations on graceful shoulders from the moment she came into the light . lieutenant olivia goldman , head of the manhattan police department , can deny the salacious accused affair with the district attorney until she’s blue in the face but can’t deny the consequence of their tryst , alexandria being a painful reminder of losing nearly all her mother’s years of hard work while her father simply denied her existence and lived none the more guilted . from the start , the odds were stacked against the goldman progeny , pushing perfection as her only claim to some semblance of attention from liutenant goldman .

as a mixed race child to a white unwed mother in law enforcement , working 80 hours weeks and having spent years building her career , there was little lex saw of her mother that wasn’t something resembling exhaustion or utter disinterest . this forces her to grow independent at an astounding pace , keeping to herself as to not bother her mother with her own whims or desires . at 12 , her mother is courted by an award - winning director who requests her guidance on a police film he’s submitting — she refuses to advise on the film , but goes to dinner with him as a courtesy , and they’re married a year later in a lavish hamptons wedding in the summer . rudy delano is a world -renowned director along the likes of steven spielberg , and takes to lex like she were his own daughter . as if to balance out olivia’s coldness and detachment , he showers lex in adoration and support , encouraging her to pursue her interests of pageantry when she voices them following her 7th grade year .

considering a lifetime spent nitpicking and pushing her own facade of complete calculation , she takes the pageantry world by storm and it seems the rest of her life falls into place . a perfectionist in every sense , she maintains nothing short of flawlessness throughout high school ( taking on student council co-president , heading several clubs , and one of four school valedictorians ) and goes on to compete in the most elite of pageantry circuits . her advocacy for marginalized populations was a major platform and propelled her to miss teen new york and soon after , miss teen usa . in the live aired interview segment , perhaps among the most important moments of her life , lex makes a rare slip and accidentally comes out as bisexual when asked about the LGBTQ+ mental health crisis in her home state of new york . this leads to lex becoming the first openly queer miss teen usa , and would have likely fared well if she were to have continued ; despite its progressions , the pageant world of sponsorships seems to lag behind , and the ‘ controversy ’ of her coming out led to her leaving the pageant world for good .

on her own two wobbly feet , she continues with her advocacy and finds herself excelling in the business element of it all , going on to obtain her business degree from columbia while taking on the big screen in a blossoming film career at the encouragement of her step father . she shoots to stardom upon the release of euphoria , paired with a strong social media presence , a thriving modeling career , and a brand that becomes recognized as a household name synonymous with advocacy and entrepreneurship .

𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒑𝒐𝒔𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏

perhaps lex’s most notable quality is being driven by an unyielding fear of failure and mediocrity . there is no task small enough that lex will not accomplish to the best of her execution , and if she can’t ensure perfection , she will refuse to give it an attempt at all . this all or nothing attitude stems from an obscene obsession with control and remaining in control , something those around her are all too aware of .

despite a rather charming and gregarious disposition on the red carpet , many will note that lex is incredibly reserved when meeting her in real life . the pageantry training has kicked in to give her a facade to push when she’s in the spotlight , though her true disposition is much less play and much more work . she’s stoic and serious , knowing just what to say at what time to continue the narrative that she is completely in control . cool and calculated , her affect is usually stern and unwilling to reflect any sentiment of softness or goofiness — many business associates note her absolute maturity and rationality even at the tender age of 22 . her energy , as subdued as it may be , commands the room with a power of self-assuredness that only stems from a confidence rooted in something to back it up . she’s an elderly woman in a millennial’s body , and this tends to show in her dry wit humor , relative moodiness , and general propensity for wanting things done exclusively her way .

lex’s intellect has always been a strong suit of hers , a photographic memory that allowed her to glide through school with the least of struggles . astute and well - spoken , monotone and unlikely to crack in her stony temperament , she’s a force of nature to be well reckoned with . luckily , lex shows little to no interest in engaging with petty drama and tends to keep in her own lane , losing interest nearly immediately in the mindless pettiness some of her friends wrap themselves up in . rational , arguably to a fault , lex has a bad habit of censoring herself and limiting her own commentary when in the company of anyone she needs to maintain her reputation with ; close friends , on the other hand , will easily characterize her as blunt and straightforward , almost too aggressive with her honesty for her own good . though she’d rarely voice it , she has an undeniable superiority complex stemming from a recognition that whatever she does , she’s incredibly good at ( ignoring her unwillingness to step out and try anything outside her comfort zone . )

this is the curious dichotomy of alexandria goldman , considering one of her most notable flaws is her unwillingness to invest . despite being perhaps overly honest , the moment a conversation ( or relationship ) runs the risk of becoming too emotionally risky , she shuts down . flames have been ghosted , relationships have been ended , and friendships have been cut off simply because lex deemed them to be a danger to her mission of remaining in complete control of herself and her life . the select few that have plowed through lex’s rather prickly initial interactions have earned themselves a friend forged from gold , loyal to a fault and ready to drop anything at a wind’s blow to aide those she loves most . defensive and ornery , the pageant girl facade soon blows over to reveal an anal retentive , emotionally stunted grandmother who loses her lid over the most minute of inconveniences if they step out of her pre-established plans and routines .

hiding beneath her layers of fake smiling at redundant questions , unapproachable hostility and being an otherwise unmeltable ice queen , lex harbors a deep intensity that overcomes her when allowed to reign ( and very rarely is allowed to reign ) . she does not invest in small doses and despite the relative unlikelihood of her allowing a distraction such as a relationship , the few she’s had have been intense whirlwinds led by lex’s own inability to limit herself — she’s all , or she’s nothing , but nowhere in the middle .

#hilton:intro #late. to the. party. : yes #ready 2. party ? : also. yes #😤✊🏽

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awesometheauthor · 4 years

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In any case, last week I finished a project and then I picked up on my research again.

I don't know if you knew that I have de la Merced and de la Mercedes in my family tree. They arose in San Juan a very long time ago. In fact, I have traced them back to 1576 with a Pedro de la Merced.

Source: John J. Browne Ayes, Research Copyright John J. Browne Ayes. All Rights Reserved National and International. On this reference document, I am basing my theory that Melchior de Aponte was part of this family. You will also see Pedro de la Merced included in this list as well.

Vecinos Asistentes to Vista Pública (1616) Según el historiador Ramón Rivera Bermúdez, se efectúa una vista pública donde testifican 21 de los 40 vecinos que vivían más cerca de la actual zona urbana. Se cree la gran mayoría eran los mismos fundadores de 1579 o sus decendientes inmediatos. Juan López de Aliceda: Alcalde mayor. Hijo de Juan López de Aliceda, líder sangermeño quien fue teniente gobernador de Puerto Rico cuando el gobernador lo era Francisco de Solís en 1572. Alonso Meléndez Juan Felipe Cordero Pedro González Juan Colón Melchor de Aponte Juan de la Vega Juan de Morales Juan de Cepeda Alonso García Alonso Garva (o Garvia) Tirado Pedro Lamadrid Pedro de la Merced Juan Bautista Correa Juan Muños de Castroverde, escribano Diego Sánchez Francisco Ramos Pedro Camacho Alonso Trujillo Juan García Portillo Mateo Moreda

I had this little document stashed away in my file and notes within my family tree.

Then last week I decided to browse the many documents that are online within marriage in the cathedral of San Juan in Familysearch.org . I discovered two families that bore the surname de la Merced.

Pedro de la Merced was married to Dona Ana Moreno y Gomez, the daughter of, Alonso Moreno and his wife, Leonor Gomez.

Pedro and his wife had a son, Diego de la Merced y Moreno. He was married to: Paula de los Reyes.

Source: Marriages In The Cathedral of San Juan Online at Family Search.org.

They were married, 7 April of 1691.

Date: 7 de Abril de 1691

Minister: Licenciado Don Juan de Rivafrecha, Cura

Groom: Diego de la Merced de Color Mulatto

Born in San Juan

Parents: Pedro de la Merced y Ana Moreno

Bride: Paula de los Reyes de color Mulato

Born in San Juan

parents: Hija Natural de Lucia de los Reyes/

Note: Dispensados la amonestaciones por el Obispo Don Francisco de Padilla

Testigos: Alferez Domingo Sanchez, Simon Mateo, y Francisco de San Juan.

The next family was quite interesting because of where they came from.

Same Source:

Date: 7 de Septiembre de 1700

Minister: Pedro zenteno, cura de catedral

Groom: Juan de la Merced

Natural de Ciudad de Bruselas, (Ayes, sic, Brussels, Belgium).

Parents Gaspar de Glancy y Maria de Sampson

(Ayes sic, Parents name was written, Gaspar de Glncy y Maria de Smpson).

Bride: Eugenia de Jesus Malave Morera

Bornl in San Juan

Padres: Benito Malave y Geronicia Morera

Note: Dispensada una amonestacion por el Sr. Ordinario Don Martin Calderon de la Varca

Testigos: Santiago de Acevedo, el Capitan Francisco Diaz y Juan Alonso Gonzalez Clerigo de Tonsura.

Brussels, Belgium was a Spanish territory that included the Nederlands.

Our Juan de la Merced's full name was John of the Mercy Glancy Sampson.

I did a research and their original country of origin was Ireland. I even picked up a family crest during my research. I also found out that the surname Glancy has also morphed into the name Clancy.

I can bet that John's de la Merced was a baptismal name that stuck throughout his lifetime in the public records and was passed down to his descendants because the Spanish always get tongue-tied when trying to pronounce Irish names.

So, having found these two families many questions have arisen. If anyone has found how my de la Mercedes from Yabucoa connected to these two families I would appreciate any information shared here.

After all, I've shared some very important information here this morning.

The furthest back I've gotten with my de la Merced was with one Dionecio de la Mercedes born abt 1785, in Yabucoa, PR. died bef 1899.

He was married to, 1: Casimira de Santiago 2: Maria Jose de los Rios Delgado. His marriage seemed to be a consentual one to Maria Jose because their son, Ramon Rios Delgado must have been a natural born son. Unfortunately his father didn't give him his surname or maybe Ramon was the son of a previous marriage. See how many questions arise!

#history #genealogy #Ayesart

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strandedhaze · 4 years

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ONE : MEET NAOMI

FULL NAME: naomi june cheng-bradshaw. PREFERRED NAME: naomi. NICKNAME(S): most people call her nomi, noms, nao, nai and similar variations, elijah calls her nana. DATE OF BIRTH: may 3rd, 1994. GENDER: cis female. PREFERRED PRONOUNS: she/her/hers. ORIENTATION: heterosexual. RELATIONSHIP STATUS: single in main verse. RELIGION: she’s not a particularly religious person. OCCUPATION: press manager for honda racing corporation. CURRENT RESIDENCE: madrid, spain ; she owns a house in the prestigious la finca neighbourhood.

TWO : NAOMI’S BACKGROUND

HOMETOWN: marina bay, singapore. NATIONALITY: singaporean. LINGUISTICS: english is her native language but, asides from it, she speaks spanish, portuguese, italian, french, mandarin chinese and japanese. in some languages, she’s more proficient than others. for instance, she speaks spanish just as well as she speaks english. her spoken japanese is nearly flawless and though she can read and comprehend the language, she can’t write. she’s still getting around to dive deeper into mandarin chinese. EDUCATION: she attended the massachusetts institute of technology - also known as MIT - and she has a double degree in business analytics and management. CRIMINAL RECORD: clean. BIRTH ORDER: first. FATHER: charles bradshaw was born on february 23rd, 1971 in windsor, england. he is an investment banker who resides in between hong kong and dubai. MOTHER: sonoya cheng was born on july 5th, 1971 in sentosa island, singapore. she is a real estate tycoon who resides in between toronto, abu dhabi and singapore. SISTER(S): none. BROTHER(S): edward cheng-bradshaw was born on january 15th, 1997 in marina bay, singapore. he is a software developer manager and resides in san francisco, california. OTHER RELEVANT FAMILY: constance mizuno, sister-in-law. SIGNIFICANT OTHER: naomi is single. CHILDREN: none so far. FRIENDS: to be done. EXES: andrea pagani, marco ricci and aleix martin. PETS: none so far.

THREE : GET UP CLOSE & PERSONAL

HEIGHT: 5′7″ ( 174 cm ). WEIGHT: her weight oscillates between 127 lbs ( 57.6 kg ) and 134 lbs ( 61 kg ). BODY TYPE AND BUILD: she is naturally slim - courtesy of genetics and her fast metabolism - but, despite that fact, she still has a willowy frame. by no means, does she have a hourglass shape with a big bust, tiny waist and thick thighs but with a good, healthy diet and a workout plan ( that she, often, forgets to follow ) consisting of some weight training and fun classes, naomi has still managed to achieve a shape she’s comfortable with. she has particularly long legs and, thanks to all the hot yoga and pilates classes, she holds a rather toned overall body. EYE COLOR: brown. EYESIGHT: she has perfect eyesight though when the work load increases, you’ll find her reaching for her glasses in order to give her eyes a break. she also wears blue light blocking glasses whenever she’s working on a computer. HAIR COLOR: dark brown. HAIR STYLE: her hair is, has always been - and will always be, according to her - long, hitting the middle of her back, at worst, when she goes for a trim to keep its healthy condition and it has a natural wavy texture which naomi has learned to love. styling wise, it rarely gets too eventful... during the season, she’ll throw it on a ponytail or a bun for the race weekends and allow it to dry into its natural texture on the remaining work days. if she’s attending an event of sorts or going out to celebrate, she’ll straighten it or go for a nice blowout. DOMINANT HAND: right. NOTABLE PHYSICAL TRAITS: her lips or, possibly, their plumpness, her legs that often seem endless, her tan complexion and how it makes her dark eyes and hair standout, and for the rare occasions when it makes an appearance, her smile. SCARS AND MARKS: nothing outstanding - she has your average scars and marks here and there. TATTOOS: she has a lotus mandala on the inside of her right wrist, a symbol of enlightenment for her, as well as a way to symbolize all the growth she achieved throughout her life. PIERCINGS: regular lobes. VOICECLAIM: nicole elise. ACCENT AND INTENSITY: having moved out and grown up in london, naomi developed a thick london accent which she never knew how intense it was up until she found herself in massachusetts. the four years spent there, softened the intensity of the british accent and the nearly six years in spain also played a part when washing away what once was a proper londoner accent so, these days, it’s hard to identify what accent she has exactly. it’s more of a mixture than anything specific. ALLERGIES: cherries and insect stings, particularly bee stings. PHOBIAS AND FEARS: extremely deep waters and though it’s not a phobia, she gets really nervous when she’s driving over bridges. MENTAL ILLNESSES: none so far. PHYSICAL ILLNESSES: none so far. SCENT THEY WEAR: it varies depending on a lot of factors, such as season of the year, time of the day, occasion and, above all, her personal mood. during summer, you’ll often catch her wearing soleil blanc by tom ford or replica beach walk by maison margiela, and during summer nights, she'll wear sundaze by byredo. for fancy events, her go-to is bewitching yasmine by penhaligon’s, same way her go-to for nights out with friends is slow dance by byredo. whenever she has an important business meeting, she’ll wear cuir celeste by ex nihilo, simply because in naomi’s opinion, the scent is the definition of boss bitch and throughout race weekends, she’ll go for rose of no man’s land by byredo. le labo’s patchouli 24 and maison margiela’s replica by the fireplace are generally the scents she wears through winter. for date nights where she actually cares to put some effort in and is actually interested in the person, she’ll specifically wear reine de nuit by byredo or santal 33 by le labo. ALCOHOL USE: socially, she does. SMOKING: she doesn’t smoke. OTHER NARCOTICS USE: no. INDULGENT FOOD: she prefers to eat healthy but there’s no denying that every once in a while, she needs to indulge in some soul food. SPLURGE SPENDING: it happens every now and again, but she’s mostly a responsible buyer. GAMBLING: no. ADDICTIONS AND VICES: none.

FOUR : DIG DEEPER

CAN THEY DRIVE? yes, she can drive. CAN THEY COOK AND BAKE? yes and yes. CAN THEY CHANGE A FLAT TIRE? yes. CAN THEY TIE A TIE? yes. CAN THEY SWIM? yes. CAN THEY RIDE A BICYCLE? yes. CAN THEY JUMP START A CAR? yes. CAN THEY BRAID HAIR? yes. CAN THEY PICK A LOCK? yes. EXTROVERTED OR INTROVERTED? extroverted. DISORGANIZED OR ORGANIZED? organized, and she hates when things get messy. CLOSE OR OPEN MINDED? open minded. CALM OR ANXIOUS? calm. PATIENT OR IMPATIENT? healthy in-between and always depends on the situation. OUTSPOKEN OR RESERVED? outspoken. LEADER OR FOLLOWER? she's a leader, all through and through. OPTIMISTIC OR PESSIMISTIC? optimistic, mostly. TRADITIONAL OR MODERN? modern. HARD-WORKING OR LAZY? hard-working. CULTURED OR UNCULTURED? cultured. LOYAL OR DISLOYAL? loyal. FAITHFUL OR UNFAITHFUL? faithful. NIGHT OWL OR EARLY BIRD? honestly, it all depends on the time of the year. HEAVY OR LIGHT SLEEPER? light sleeper. COFFEE OR TEA? tea over coffee, these days. DAY OR NIGHT? night. TAKING BATHS OR SHOWERS? baths. COCA COLA OR PEPSI? none. CATS OR DOGS? both. NETFLIX OR CINEMA? netflix. SHOWS OR MOVIES? both. LAPTOP OR GAMING CONSOLE? laptop. HEALTHY OR JUNK FOOD? healthy. ICE CREAM OR FROZEN YOGURT? ice cream. PIZZA OR HAMBURGER? pizza. LOLLIPOPS OR GUMMY WORMS? gummy worms. BEACH OR POOL? beach. SNOWBALLS FIGHTING OR ICESKATING? iceskating. LITERATURE OR SCIENCE? science. HISTORY OR ART? art. CHOCOLATE BARS OR COTTON CANDY? chocolate bars. XBOX OR PLAYSTATION? playstation. FACE-TO-FACE OR PHONE INTERACTIONS? face-to-face interactions. DRAMA OR SCI-FI? sci-fi. HORROR OR COMEDY? horror.

FIVE : NAOMI’S LIKES & DISLIKES

FAVORITE ACTIVITY: yoga. FAVORITE ANIMAL: giraffe. FAVORITE BOOK: everything i know about love by dolly alderton. FAVORITE QUOTE: ❝ when you’re tired, go slowly. go quietly. go timidly. but do not stop. ❞ — heidi priebe. FAVORITE COLOR(S): it’s a very specific beige/tan colour, a champagne type of shade. FAVORITE DESIGNER: maison christian dior and acne studios. FAVORITE CUISINE: singaporean cuisine, all through and through. there are little things she’s more passionate about than her national cuisine, she often says no one does food like singapore. FAVORITE DISH(ES): hainanese chicken rice, laksa, hokkien fried mee and dumplings. FAVORITE DRINK: matcha ginger latte and bubble tea. FAVORITE FLOWER(S): lotus flower. FAVORITE GEM: diamond. FAVORITE HOLIDAY: new years. FAVORITE MOVIE: currently, it must be parasite by bong joon-ho. FAVORITE MUSIC GENRE: she doesn’t have a favorite music genre. naomi listens to a little bit of everything because for her, it’s more about the songs and artists than the genre itself. FAVORITE SONG(S): xo by beyoncé. GO TO KARAOKE SONG: kiss it better by rihanna. FAVORITE SCENT(S): the scent of gasoline, melting chocolate and freshly baked goods. FAVORITE TELEVISION SHOW(S): la casa de papel. FAVORITE SPORTS: motogp, formula1 and football. SPORTS TEAM THEY SUPPORT: real madrid. FAVORITE EMOJI: probably the 💅🏽 though it’s not what she uses the most. FAVORITE WEATHER: she likes that type of weather at the end of a summer day, when it’s warm but not too much and you walk around the beach feeling that soft breeze of air hitting you, and the day is settling down and all that remains is a wash of what the weather was throughout the day. FAVORITE SEASON OF THE YEAR: summer. FAVORITE PLACE(S): a close tie between her childhood home in marina bay, singapore and her current home in madrid. she loves the memories and how much singapore grounds her, how it freshens up her ties to the culture and reminds her of better days. at the same time, she also loves madrid. the people, the culture and everything in between. both bring her a sense of peace she’s very fond of. SUPERPOWER THEY WISH THEY HAD: teleportation. VACATION DESTINATION: if she was forced to choose, coppenhagen or amsterdam for a solo, self-reflection trip and anywhere in japan or thailand just to unwind.

#tbt / naomi cheng-bradshaw.

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howardweaver · 5 years

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It damn sure suffocates me

(27 March 1993)

Although being an American in England is probably one of the least foreign cultural experiences an expatriate could find, it is still amazingly different -- and, to me, unsettling. The pervasive class consciousness, the social hierarchy, the sense of "why bother?", the lack of initiative, the constant "can't-do" attitudes -- these are things that seem to come up nearly every day.

This seems to be a particularly troubled time in England. The Independent newspaper recently included a special five-page section called "What's gone wrong?" examining a spreading sense of despair in Britain. A recent poll shows that half the people here wish they could emigrate. The monarchy is in trouble (you probably heard); less than 3 percent of the people here attend the Church of England regularly and there was a deeply bitter falling out over women priests (favorite headline: "Vicars In Knickers"); the pound is in the tank and 80 percent of the voters think John Major is a lousy prime minister.

From Martin Jacques' column in the Sunday Times of 28 Feb 93: "One is loath to make apocalyptic judgments, but it would seem that, at the beginning of the 1990s, Britain is experiencing a crisis of historic proportions ... we tend to ignore it because the decline has been borne so stoically. There has been nothing like the trauma that the Americans experienced in Vietnam, or the French in Algeria, or the Russians with the collapse of the Soviet Union. But this sense of reserve should not be allowed to conceal the agony or disorientation of the experience ... We have never found a way of displaying our grief, of drawing a line, of making a new start. We remain a country that has lost its past and never found a future.... The problem is that we have never learnt how to make a fundamental change. We are too steeped in continuity. We are too hierarchal and deferential, a society which has not engendered sufficient points of authority, creativity, energy and initiative. Unless we find some way of tackling this legacy, then we will continue to decline as an increasingly fraught and unhappy society.

A columnist quoted in the Guardian last week used a different approach to make a similar point: "The England cricket team-failing, morally shifty, globally insignificant, distracted by irrelevant attention to demeanor, run by discredited leaders insolently continuing in office-may not be a credit to the nation, but is a perfect reflection of it." Yet another recent column in the Independent talked of young people who have left the country, noting "Most of them left because Britain had worn them down with its depressing outlook and warped priorities." There have been separate magazine covers this year on the failure of Britain's industrial estate and on why the monarchy must end.

The final words of the editorial in the Independent package about what's wrong: "If we feel utter despair, it is because we see no new promise. All our gods have failed."

Brits are known to be naturally reserved and emotionally cool; imagine what they are like with their social system crashing in around them. We have made a lot of good friends here, many of whom I hope will be friends for the rest of my life. Not a one of them is British.

Much of this is probably exacerbated by living in Cambridge, a place that takes itself very seriously, indeed. One is constantly reminded that this was the university where Newton figured out gravity, where the atom was split and the double helix identified. At the very first lecture at Scott Polar, our course director told us "Cambridge is an institution that has been here for 700 years, and it will not change for you." (He also said "If you are not a very different person in June than you are now, then we shall have failed you." He could hardly have guessed how far I would come...)

Undergrads here get automatic overdraft protection on their bank accounts; the colleges employ women to clean up after them, known as "bedders" (for "bed-makers"); Cambridge awards a BA degree after three years (each just 24 weeks long) and an automatic masters (MA) degree accrues two years after graduation. That's right: an MA from Cambridge means nothing, but don't tell these people that. They run the country.

There are 22 people in the cabinet in London; 16 of them are "Oxbridge," that is, graduates either of Oxford or Cambridge. (Mostly Cambridge, since you asked.) The stain of privilege is everywhere here.

Watching (and experiencing) all this has reinforced for me how potent a force culture is. It makes me acutely aware of how strong a sense of community I feel in Anchorage, and how powerfully I identify with the American virtues of egalitarianism, opportunity and initiative. During the Clinton inaugural, the papers here were full of snide commentaries about what a vulgar, show-biz spectacle it was, but one writer (a Brit, Neal Ascherson) seemed to see through that. He said something to the effect that "while all public ceremonies in the US are fertility rites, in Britain they are all ancestor worship." That seems very true to me: for all our rambunctious (yes, and sometimes vulgar) energy, the US still looks forward. Over here, they are always looking back.

The sense of hierarchy, class consciousness and tradition seems suffocating.

It damn sure suffocates me.

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dansnaturepictures · 3 years

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11th April 2021-Barn owl, snow, snipe and more along the Titchfield canal path

We came back to the Titchfield Canal path today where we came on Easter Monday with the barn owls we needed to see this year reported again. We arrived at the canal path Titchfield end and walked the short distance along to the split tree where the owls can often be seen and we had seen them before. Above the white droppings stain on the tree trunk that had momentarily excited us in our fruitless quest for this bird on Monday, we were thrilled to spot one of the barn owls in the hole! We then spent a glorious few minutes watching this stunning and such a beautiful bird. I took the record shot the first picture in this photoset of this bird. I felt so honoured again to see this species, and so lucky I was so in aw of the bird. A brilliant view of on of our greatest species, with either January or February sightings of them the past few years here I had waited a little bit longer to see this species this year. What’s more this is the first time ever I have seen barn owl as a favourite bird of mine as I made it the 31st member of my list of favourite birds in March.

This was bird 131 of my year I continue to be thrilled with my resurgence and how I have started the month with getting year ticks and the calibre of what some of the birds have been and barn owl fitted in so well with that. It means I have seen three owl species in a year this year for the third year running. What’s more 2021 now has the prestige for me of being the first year I have seen both barn owl and tawny owl in which I am so thrilled with to see these iconic species of one of my favourite families of birds, both among my favourite birds. Little owl is the other owl we saw on 2nd January this year and we have never seen four species in a year. So you can be sure, possibly depending on how the pandemic goes from now and any required reapplying of restrictions down the line, that we’ll be trying very hard to see another of my favourite birds and the only other owl species we’ve seen short-eared owl as the year goes on. After our last tawny before this year’s March sighting three weeks ago yesterday in 2015, we saw the other three in one year in 2016 then 2017 and 2018 we saw two species the barn the only constant with the other swapped from short-eared to little between the years so I wondered if there was to be some sort of rota in a weird way obviously until 2019 and 2020 when I saw all three of the others to tawny so I wonder if we can see all four or if there is a new rota as some kind of weird imagined rule. All four of the birds I always think we are very lucky to see whenever we do they are all super birds so you cannot take them for granted and I know this is a big challenge what we are trying to achieve still but its great to have challenges.

I took the second and third pictures in this photoset of a view and blossom and greenery in a smashing bit of sunshine as we walked down the path. Afterwards we got the fairly unusual for so far up the canal path away from Titchfield Haven national nature reserve at the other end and delightful sight of two shelducks flying and settling in a neighbouring field which looked great. As the walk continued we enjoyed spotting the snipe in the fourth picture in this photoset in a field. It was fascinating to watch its head down with its beak persistently drilling into the grass with great force. A wonderful piece of behaviour to see for a bird you don’t always get too close to or necessarily see for so long as they are - like one of a few brilliant and varied people we got to have fantastic conversations at a safe social distance today on wildlife, weather and other current topics an aspect of the walk I really enjoyed said - secretive.

I took the fifth and sixth pictures in this photoset of great wooded views along the canal as we walked on I have loved taking in beautiful woodland views a lot this weekend. I also enjoyed seeing the varied daffodils nestled in the woods the other side of the canal which I took the seventh picture in this photoset of. A beautiful scene and one of a few beautiful flowers it was great to take in today it really was a good walk for flowers. I took the eighth picture in this photoset of some coltsfoot which I loved seeing, very kindly identified during #Wildflowerhour’s #WildflowerID for me on Twitter tonight after I couldn’t quite seem to make it match on the PlantNet app as I continue to learn flowers. The coltsfoot glowed, shone and looked very beautiful in a touch of sunshine they are such beautiful and quite glossy flowers, similar in appearance to the familiar dandelion. I had seen some two weeks ago Tuesday at the fairly similar habitat wise river Itchen where I found them so beautiful and striking too so it was great to see them again. I saw and photographed as I tweeted nice nettles here today too.

We walked on and the threatening dark clouds passed over us, not bringing (in the most part anyway) the not so expected rain but the even less expected (by me anyway) snow shower which really did immerse us. I saw a little bit of light snow at Lakeside last Tuesday but nothing like this for how heavy it was, its the first serious snow I’ve ever known in April my Mum does always say it can snow in April thinking back to her childhood more and its been proved that it still can happen this year. It really was such a breathtaking and memorable scene I just knew whilst I was getting my camera safely back into the dry of my backpack I just had to capture this too so I did get it back out for a few photos as the shower really engulfed us this included the ninth picture I took today in this photoset. A stunning and memorable moment.

After the shower we were thrilled to see another snipe in soggy grass behind the fence which I took the tenth and final picture in this photoset of. Seeing two seperate snipes in a day that were clear and long enough views for a photo was smashing stuff and quite something I loved seeing them. I had only taken a handful of pictures of snipe before not so many at all. This was a great moment too and behind the snipe were two gigantic by comparison Canada geese with some of the other side of the canal from here too which was quite interesting to see with them flying around too and it was these birds and the snipe we showed them they had seen the geese which prompted the conversation with two of the wonderful people we talked to today. I took a picture of a snipe at Titchfield Haven nearby in 2016, its where I have taken and possibly over my life seen most snipes, and around that time I created a new playlist for music I listen to. The time I listen to music most is on car journeys so I have a few playlists named after the places we are going or animals/species, I have New Forest and as we go there so much an Alternative New Forest playlist for example. So inspired by the recent experience then I named that one my snipe playlist which is one of the ones I use when we travel east from home as this is where Titchfield Haven is and I was listening to it today on the way there and back so it was fitting I had a smashing day for snipes.

As the sun re-emerged we left feeling very satisfied by another brilliant and quite packed day of birdwatching, wildlife and photos on a really good walk. We did get a brilliant moment seeing swallows so clearly right over our heads getting cracking views of these wonderful spring migrants. By the Posbrook flood area earlier on as we did on Monday we saw lots of swallows and a sand martin flying over which was great. I saw and photographed great birds, flowers and sky scenes at home today too as I tweeted on Dans_Pictures tonight it was great seeing a house sparrow on a hanging basket in the garden I’d not seen any perch on one of these before. Today brought to an end another brilliant and relaxing weekend, I hope you all had a good one.

Wildlife Sightings Summary at the Titchfield canal path: My first of one of my favourite birds the barn owl this year, three more of my favourite birds the buzzard, shelduck and little egret we saw them well today too, shoveler, gadwall, mallard, black-tailed godwit, redshank, moorhens seen very nicely, black-headed gull, lesser black-backed gull, magpie, woodpigeon, blue tit, long-tailed tit, great tit one of the birds of the tit species nearly flew right into me at one point too another great intimate wildlife moment today, robin, great view of a dunnock, wren, swallow, sand martin and I heard another of my favourite birds the green woodpecker.

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sataniccapitalist · 5 years

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FEBRUARY 18, 2019

31 Actual National Emergencies

by PAUL STREET

A Wannabe Strongman’s Brown Menace Straw Man

Everyone with five functioning gray cells knows that the aspiring fascist strongman Donald Trump’s Declaration of a National Emergency on the U.S.-Mexico border is absurd.

There is no “national security crisis” of illegal immigration on the southern United States border.

Illegal crossings are not at “emergency” levels; they are at a fifty-year low.

Undocumented immigrants are not a crime and violence threat. They are less likely to commit crimes, violent ones included, than naturalized U.S. citizens.

Drugs come into the U.S. not through gaps in border fencing but primarily through legal ports of entry.

There is no big call for a completed U.S.-Mexico wall on the part of U.S. citizens on the southern border.

The United States military has not been “breaking up” and blocking “monstrous caravans” of illegal immigrants trying to harm the U.S.

The only crisis at the border is the humanitarian one created by Trump’s war on asylum-seekers and legal as well as technically illegal immigrants. The wannabe strongman has set up a ridiculous brown menace strawman in an effort to take an unprecedented step. He wants to use the National Emergencies Act to fulfill a ridiculous campaign promises to his white-nationalist base. He wants to make an end run around Congress to spend federal taxpayer on a project that lawmakers chose not to fund – a political vanity scheme that is opposed by 60 percent of the U.S. populace.

Actual National Emergencies

An irony here is that the United States today is in fact haunted by many actual and interrelated national emergencies. Here below are the top thirty-one that came to the present writer’s mind this last weekend:

1. Class Inequality. America is mired in a New Gilded Age where economic disparity is so extreme now that the top thousandth (the 0.1 percent, not just the 1 Percent) possesses more wealth than the bottom U.S. 90 percent and three absurdly rich U.S.-Americans – Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett – possess more wealth between them than the bottom half of the country.

2. Poverty. The nation’s 540 billionaires (Trump is one of them) enjoy lives of unimaginable opulence (Trump flew off to one of his resorts to play golf after declaring his “national emergency” – an “emergency” he foolishly said he didn’t actually have to declare) while 15 million children – 21% of all U.S. children – live in families with incomes below the federal poverty threshold, a measurement that has been shown to be drastically below the minimally adequate family budgets families require to meet basic expenses.

3. Plutocracy. “We must make our choice,” onetime Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandies wrote in 1941. “We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can’t have both.” Consistent with Brandeis’s warning, the leading mainstream political scientists Benjamin Page and Martin Gilens find through exhaustive research that “the best evidence indicates that the wishes of ordinary Americans actually have had little or no impact on the making of federal government policy. Wealthy individuals and organized interest groups – especially business corporations – have had much more political clout. When they are taken into account, it becomes apparent that the general public has been virtually powerless…Government policy,” Page and Gilens determined, “reflects the wishes of those with money, not the wishes of the millions of ordinary citizens who turn out every two years to choose among the preapproved, money-vetted candidates for federal office.” Economic power is so concentrated in the US today you can count on one hand and one finger the multi-trillion-dollar financial institutions that control the nation’s economic and political life: Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and Morgan Stanley. “You have no choice,” George Carlin used to tell his audiences earlier this century, “You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the state houses, the city halls. They got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies, so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear.”

4. Bad Jobs. Trump boasts of American job creation and low official unemployment rate (real joblessness is a different story) while deleting the fact that tens of millions of the nation’s workers struggle with jobs whose pay lags far behind employment growth thanks to declining unionization (down to 6.5% of the private-sector workforce due to decades of relentless employer hostility), inadequate minimum wages, globalization, automation, and outsourcing. A third of the nation’s workers make less than $12 an hour ($24,960 a year assuming full-time work) and 42% get less than $15 ($31,200 a year). Good luck meeting a family’s food, rent, childcare, medical, and car payment (car ownership is often required in a nation that lacks adequate public transportation) costs on those kinds of returns on labor power. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York recently reported that a record 7 million U.S.-Americans are three months or more behind on their par payments. As the Washington Post reports: “Economists warn this is a red flag. Despite the strong economy and low unemployment rate, many Americans are struggling to pay their bills. ‘The substantial and growing number of distressed borrowers suggests that not all Americans have benefited from the strong labor market,’ economists at the New York Fed wrote in a blog post. A car loan is typically the first payment people make because a vehicle is critical to getting to work, and someone can live in a car if all else fails. When car loan delinquencies rise, it is a sign of significant duress among low-income and working-class Americans.”

5. Corporate Media Consolidation is so extreme in the U.S. now that just six corporations – Comcast, FOX, Disney, Viacom, CBS, and AT&T – together own more than half of traditional U.S. media content print, film and electronic. The Internet giants Google, Facebook, and Amazon rule online communication and shopping. (It is isn’t just about “news and information” [Carlin], by the way. The corporate-owned mass media probably spreads capitalist, racist, sexist, authoritarian, and military-imperialist propaganda more effectively through its entertainment wing than it does through its new and public/political affairs wing. A movie like “American Sniper” beats CNN reporting bias when it comes to advancing the U.S. imperial project [see #s 28 and 29 below]. A film like Clint Eastwood’s “Gran Torino” beats the evening news when it comes to advancing racist mass incarceration and racial segregation [see #s 6 and 9 below]).

6. Racial Disparity and Apartheid. The U.S. Black-white wealth gap is stark: 8 Black median household cents on the white median household dollar. Equally glaring is the nation’s level of racial segregation. In the Chicago, New York, Detroit, and Milwaukee metropolitan areas, for example more than three in every four Black people would have to (be allowed to) move from their nearly all-black Census tracts into whiter ones in order to live in a place whose racial composition matched that of the broader region in which they reside. These two statistical measures are intimately interrelated since housing markets distribute so much more than just housing. They also distribute access to jobs, good schools, green spaces, full-service groceries, safety, medical services and more that matters for “equal opportunity” and advancement.

7. Gender Inequality. Among full-time U.S. workers, women make 81 cents for every dollar a man is paid. The gap is worse in part-time employment since women more commonly work reduced schedules to handle domestic labor. Women ‘s median retirement savings are roughly one third of those of men. Households headed by single women with children have a poverty rate of 35.6 percent, more than double the 17.3 percent rate for households headed by single men with children. Women comprise just 27 percent of the nation’s top 10 income percent, 17 percent of the upper 1 percent, and 11 percent of the top 0.1 percent. By contrast, women make up nearly two-thirds (63 percent) of U.S. workers paid the federal minimum wage.

8. Native American Poverty. Thanks to the savage white-“settler” ethnic-cleansing of most of North America from the 16th century through 1900, Indigenous people make up just 1 percent of the U.S. population. The Native American poverty rate (28%) is double that of the nation as a whole and is particularly high in most of the commonly isolated and high-unemployment reservations where just more than a fifth of the nation’s Indigenous population lives. Native American life expectancy is 6 years short of the national average. In some states, Native American life expectancy is 20 years less than the national average. In Montana, Native American men live on average just 56 years.

9. Racist Mass Arrest, Incarceration, and Criminal Marking. The U.S. has the highest incarceration rate in the world, fueled by the racially disparate waging of the so-called War on Drugs. The racial disparities are so extreme that 1 in very 10 U.S. Black men is in prison or jail on any given day. One in 3 Black adult males are saddled with the permanent crippling mark of a felony record – what law professor Michelle Alexander has famously called “the New Jim Crow.” Blacks make up 12% of the U.S. population but 38% of the nation’s state prison population.

10. Trumpism/Fascism. The U.S. mass media focuses so heavily on the seemingly interminable awfulness of the creeping fascist Donald Trump (whose hideous nature is a ratings bonanza at CNN and MSNBC) that it is easy to lose sight of the fascistic horror of his authoritarian and white-nationalist supporters – roughly a third of the nation. The best social and political science research on Trump’s base reveals a fascist-like movementseeking a “strong” authoritarian “leader” who will rollback civil liberties and the gains won by women and racial and ethnic minorities since the 1960s. Trumpism wants to Make America more fully white-supremacist, patriarchal, and authoritarian (“great”) Again. Herr Donald’s disproportionately armed throng of die-hard devotees backs their Dear Leader no matter how terribly he behaves. It is a grave, creeping fascist threat to democracy.

11. The War on Truth. The aspiring fascist leader Trump made on average 15 false statements per day in 2018. He had stated more than 7,600 untruths as president by the end of last year. Trump lies constantly about matters big and small. He is a practitioner of what Chris Hedges calls “the permanent lie.” It is no small matter. In his description of this as “the most ominous threat” posed by Trump, Hedges quotes the philosopher Hannah Arendt. “The result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth,” Arendt wrote in her classic volume The Origins of Totalitarianism, “is not that the lie will now be accepted as truth and truth be defamed as a lie, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world—and the category of truth versus falsehood is among the mental means to this end—is being destroyed.” Trump is only the most extreme and egregious wave of fabrication in a vast sea of national deception. U.S.-Americans, once accurately described by Alex Carey as “the most propagandized people in the world,” are surrounded by duplicitous and misleading information and imagery. This constant barrage of falsehood – examples include the thoroughly untrue notion that the U.S. possessed a “great democracy” for the Trump campaign and Russia to (supposedly) “undermine” in 2016 – threatens to exhaust our capacity to distinguish fact from fiction.

12. Gun Violence. Fully 40,000 people died from shootings in the American “armed madhouse” in 2017 (we are still waiting for the grisly statistic for 2018). The U.S. was home to 322 mass shootings that killed 387 people and injured 1,227 in 2018. Twenty-eight mass shootings, killing 36 and wounding 92, took place in January of this year. A mass shooting killed five workers in Aurora, Illinois, on the very day (last Friday) that Trump declared his fake national emergency.

13. Sexual Violence. One in 5 women and 1 in 71 men will be raped at some point in their lives in the U.S.

14. Illiteracy and Innumeracy. More than 30 million adults in the United States cannot read, write, or do basic math above a third-grade level.

15. Manufactured Mass Ignorance and Amnesia. Thanks to corporate control of the nation’s media and schools, U.S.-Americans are shockingly ignorant of basic facts relating to their own history and society. White U.S.-Americans are mired in extraordinary denial about the level of Black-white inequality and the depth and degree of discrimination faced by Black Americans today. U.S.-Americans in general know next to nothing about the criminal and mass-murderous havoc U.S. foreign policy wreaks around the world. This renders them incapable of understanding world politics and woefully vulnerable to nationalistic propaganda and militarism. Eleven years historian Rick Shenkman wrote a book titled “Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth About the American Voter.” Shenkman found that a majority of Americans: didn’t know which party was in control of Congress; couldn’t name the chief justice of the Supreme Court; didn’t know the U.S. had three branches of government; believed George W. Bush’s argument the United States should invade Iraq because Saddam Hussein had attacked America on 9/11. Ask an average U.S.-American when the American War of Independence or the Civil War or WWII were fought and why, what the Bill of Rights was, what fascism is past and present, or what the Civil Rights Movement was about, and you will get blank stares and preposterously wrong answers. A people that doesn’t know its history wanders without a clue through the present and stumbles aimlessly into the future. Real historical knowledge is a great democratic people’s weapon and it is in perilously short supply in the U.S. today.

16. The Israel and Saudi Lobbies. Israel’s power in U.S. politics and political culture is so absurdly exaggerated that a freshman Muslim U.S. Congressional Representative (Ilhan Omar) was recently subjected to a massive and bipartisan political assault absurdly charging her with “anti-Semitism” for daring to Tweet seven words suggesting the elementarily true fact that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) – a deep-powerful, deep-pockets public relations and lobbying organization committed to the advance of Israeli state interests – exercises money-lubricated influence on U.S. politics and policy. To visibly raise the question of Palestinian rights and Israel’s horrendous treatment of Arab peoples is to invite an onslaught from the Israel Lobby’s vicious and powerful attack-dogs. They’ve even been known to strip professors of tenure. Meanwhile, the despotic Saudi regime, possibly the most reactionary government on Earth, continues through money and other means to exercise huge influence on U.S. politics even as it senselessly crucifies the people of Yemen (with direct U.S. military assistance), cultivates terrorism across the Muslim world, and vivisects dissident journalists in its foreign embassies.

17. Neo-McCarthyism. The original Orwellian-American and Russia-mad McCarthyism of the late 1940s and 1950s has been resurrected in the post-Soviet era with a curious partisan twist. Anti-Russian hysteria has been picked up by the Democratic Party, which has been eager to blame its pathetic failure to defeat Trump on Russia’s supposedly powerful “interference in our [unmentionably non-existent] democracy” in 2016 – and to deny its politicos’ role in provoking any such relevant Russian interference as may have occurred. On the Republican side, Trump (who was mentored by Senator Joe McCarthy’s onetime chief counsel Roy Cohn!) and other GOP leaders now routinely follow in the footsteps of Joe McCarthy by calling even cringingly centrist corporate-neoliberal Democrats and everything they propose “socialist.” One of the most horrific moments in Herr Donald’s sickening State of the Union Address came when the Orange Mother of all Malignant Assholes (OMoAMA) told the assembled federal officials to “renew” the nation’s “pledge” that “America will never be a socialist country.” Numerous Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy “We’re Capitalist and That’s Just the Way it is” Pelosi (net worth $71 million) and “progressive” U.S. Senator and presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren ($11 million) joined the GOPers in attendance in applauding that “pledge.” McCarthyism was always and remains a richly bipartisan disease.

18. Health Care and Health. The United States’ corporate-owned/-managed for-profit health care system is the most expensive in the world but ranks just 12th in life expectancy among the 12 wealthiest industrialized countries. The U.S. spends almost three times more on healthcare as do other countries with comparable incomes. Reflecting poor, commercialized and corporate-imposed food systems and lethally sedentary life styles, 58 percent of the U.S. population is overweight, a major health risk factor.

19. Bad Schools. The nation’s expensive but very unequally funded schools deliver terrible outcomes. Among the world’s 34 ranking OECD nations, U.S. schools are the fifth most expensive, but the U.S. ranks scores far below average in math. It ranks 17th among in reading and 21st in science.

20. Child Abuse. Childhelp reports that “Every year more than 3.6 million referrals are made to child protection agencies involving more than 6.6 million children. The United States has one of the worst records among industrialized nations – losing on average between four and seven children every day to child abuse and neglect…A report of child abuse is made very ten seconds.”

21. Depression and Substance Abuse. The United States, once described by onetime U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson as “the beacon to the world of the way life should be” (in a speech supporting the Congressional authorization of George W. Bush to invade Iraq) has the third highest rates of depression and anxiety and the second highest rate of drug use in the world. “One in five adults in the U.S. experiences some form of mental illness each year,” according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. That estimate is certainly absurdly low.

22. Immigrant Workers Without Rights. Undocumented immigrants make up 55% of hired labor on farms, 15% of laborers in construction, and 9% in both industry and the service sector. “These workers,” CBS reported earlier this year, “play vital roles in the U.S. economy, erecting American buildings, picking American apples and grapes, and taking care of American babies. Oh, and paying American taxes.” Their technically illegal status makes them easily exploited by employers and undermines their ability to organize and fight for decent conditions both for themselves for other workers.

23. The Dreamer Nightmare. Eight hundred thousand people living in the U.S. were brought to the country as children by parents without U.S. citizenship. These “Dreamers’” legal status is stuck in limbo. They are not allowed to vote. They live in the shadow of possible future deportation, with their legal status treated as a partisan political football.

24. Vote Suppression. State-level racist voter suppression and de facto disenfranchisement is rife across the United States. Among other things, this has contributed significantly to the Republicans winning the presidency in 2000, 2004, and 2016. A “gentleman’s agreement” between the two reigning political parties pushes this critical problem to the margins of public discussion. (The Democrats have widely ignored the matter while they have obsessed for two years plus about Russia’s real or alleged role in the last election. Moscow’s influence was likely small compared to American-as-Apple Pie racist voter suppression in electing Trump.) “The United States,” political scientist David Schutlz noted on Counterpunch last year, “is the only country in the world that still does not have in its Constitution an explicit clause affirmatively granting a right to vote for all or some of its citizens.”

25. The Absurdly Archaic U.S. Constitution. Popular sovereignty, also known as democracy was the late 18thcentury U.S. Founders’ ultimate nightmare. They crafted an aristo-republican national charter brilliantly crafted to keep it at bay – in the darkly ironic name of “We the People.” Two and a third centuries later, their handiwork continues to do its explicitly un- and anti-democratic work through such openly authoritarian mechanisms as the Electoral College, the apportionment of two Senators to every U.S. state regardless of population, the distant time-staggering of elections, the lifetime presidential appointment and Senate approval of Supreme Court justices. The preposterously venerated U.S. Constitution is an ongoing 232-year old authoritarian calamity in dire need of a radical and democratic overhaul. It is long past time for the populace to declare a national emergency and call for a Constituent Assembly to draft a new national governing structure dedicated to meaning popular self-rule.

26. Trump and the Imperial Presidency. The OMoAMA (Trump) is by all indications a demented and malignant narcissist, a pure sociopath, and a creeping fascist. But the fact that someone as twisted, venal, sexist, and racist as Trump can pose dire threats to humanity in the first place is in no small part a function of the extreme powers that have accrued to the United States constitutionally super-empowered executive branch over the many decades in which the U.S. has reigned as the world’s most powerful state. The absurdly vast and authoritarian powers of the imperial presidency are an on ongoing national and global emergency.

27. Election Madness/Electoralism. In the early spring of 2008, the late radical American historian Howard Zinn wrote powerfully against the “Election Madness” he saw “engulfing the entire society including the left” in the year of Obama’s ascendancy. “An election frenzy seizes the country every four years,” Zinn worried, “because we have all been brought up to believe that voting is crucial in determining our destiny, that the most important act a citizen can engage in is to go to the polls. …” Zinn said he would support one major-party candidate over another but only “for two minutes—the amount of time it takes to pull the lever down in the voting booth.” Then he offered sage counsel, reminding us that time-staggered candidate-centered major party electoralism is a very weak surrogate for real popular sovereignty, which requires regular grassroots organization and militancy beneath and beyond what his good friend Noam Chomsky has called“the quadrennial electoral extravaganza”: “Before and after those two minutes, our time, our energy, should be spent in educating, agitating, organizing our fellow citizens in the workplace, in the neighborhood, in the schools. Our objective should be to build, painstakingly, patiently but energetically, a movement that, when it reaches a certain critical mass, would shake whoever is in the White House, in Congress, into changing national policy on matters of war and social justice. … We should not expect that a victory at the ballot box in November will even begin to budge the nation from its twin fundamental illnesses: capitalist greed and militarism. … Before [elections] … and after … we should be taking direct action against the obstacles to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. … Historically, government, whether in the hands of Republicans or Democrats, conservatives or liberals, has failed its responsibilities, until forced to by direct action: sit-ins and Freedom Rides for the rights of black people, strikes and boycotts for the rights of workers, mutinies and desertions of soldiers in order to stop a war. Voting is easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens.” The reigning “mainstream” US media and politics culture is fiercely dedicated to advancing the hegemony of the major party candidate-centered election cycle, advancing the deadly totalitarian notion that those two minutes in a ballot box once every four years – generally choosing among politics vetted in advance for us by the nation’s unelected and interrelated dictatorships of money and empire – is the sum total of “politics” – the only politics that really matters. Since the hidden corporate control of the US electoral politics on behalf of the center-right ruling class rules out victory for candidates who accurately reflect majority left-progressive public opinion, these ritual exercises in fake democracy deeply reinforce the fatalistic and false belief that most Americans are centrist and right-wing. The 2020 Democratic Party presidential candidate Iowa-New Hampshire circus is already sucking up vast swaths of cable news coverage and commentary while numerous pressing matters (like most of what is listed in the present essay) is largely ignored. It’s pathetic.

28. Guns Over Butter. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. rightly preached that the U.S. could not end poverty or escape “spiritual death” as long as it diverted vast swaths of its tax revenue to a giant war machine that “draw [s] men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube.” Just over half a century after King said this, the United States gives 54 percent of its federal discretionary to the Pentagon System, a giant subsidy to high-tech “defense” (war and empire) corporations like Raytheon and Boeing. Six million U.S, children live in “deep poverty,” at less than half (!) the federal government’s obscenely inadequate poverty level, while the U.S, government maintains 800 military bases in more than 70 countries and territoriesaround the world (Britain, France, and Russia together have a combined 30 foreign bases) and accounts for nearly 40 percent of all global military spending. It is deeply offensive that the progressive-populist (fake-“democratic socialist”) U.S. Senator and presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has repeatedly cited Scandinavian nations as his social-democratic policy role models without having the elementary Dr. Kingian decency to note that those countries dedicate relatively tiny portions of their national budgets to the military. It is disturbing but predictable that most Congressional Democrats voted for Trump’s record-setting $700 billion Pentagon budget last year. U.S. Americans must choose: we can have democracy, social justice, guaranteed free health care, well-funded public schools, and livable ecology or we can have a giant global war machine. We can’t have both.

29. Doctrinal Denial of U.S. Imperialism. Across the U.S. “mainstream” political and media spectrum, it is beyond the pale of acceptable discussion to acknowledge that the United States is a deeply criminal and imperialist power. The examples are endless. It is normative for U.S. cable talking heads, pundits, and politicians to discuss Eastern Europe or East Asia as if the Washington has as much right to influence developments there as Moscow and Beijing, respectively. Terrible developments in the Middle East and North Africa are routinely discussed by “mainstream “U.S. politicos, talking heads, and pundits as if the United States had not wreaked nearly indescribable havoc on Iraq and Libya and the broader Muslim world. Migrants seeking asylum from Central America are regularly reported and discussed with zero reference to the fact that the United States has inflicted massive and bloody devastation on that region for decades – and without mentioning the Obama administration’s support of a vicious right-wing coup in Honduras in the spring of 2009. Reporting on the current political crisis in Venezuela comes with complete Orwellian deletion of the United States’ role in crippling the nation’s democratically elected socialist government on the model of the Nixon administration’s campaign to undermine Chile’s democratically elected socialist government in the late 1960s and early 1970s. No serious discussion is permitted of the historical context of Washington’s longstanding intervention and regime-change operations across Latin America. The reigning Empire-denial is absurd.

30. Amazon. Google (lol) up its mind-boggling and many-sided monopolistic reach and then thank the New York City Left for stopping this public-subsidy-sucking, zero tax-paying corporate monstrosity from setting up its headquarters in the nation’s largest city.

31. Last but not at all least, Ecocide. The climate catastrophe poses grave existential threats to livable ecology and all prospects for a decent human future. It is a national and global emergency of epic proportions. It is the single biggest issue of our or any time. If this environmental calamity is not averted soon, nothing else that progressives and decent citizens everywhere care about is going to matter all that much. The United Nations Panel on Climate Change has recently warned that we have a dozen years to keep global warming to a maximum of 1.5C, beyond which true cataclysm will fall upon hundreds of millions of people. Under the command of capital, we are currently on a pace to melt Antarctica by 2100. The unfolding climate disaster’s leading political and economic headquarters is the United State, home to a super-powerful fossil fuel industry with a vast, deeply funded lobbying and public relations apparatus dedicated to turning the planet into a giant Greenhouse Gas Chamber.

Towards a Green New Deal

If a vicious and moronic creeping fascist like Donald Trump can declare a fake national emergency over a non-existent crisis in order to build a political vanity wall rejected by Congress and 60 percent of the population, perhaps a future decent and democratic government sincerely committed to the common good could declare a national emergency to address the all-too real climate crisis by moving the nation off fossil fuels and on to renewable energy sources while advancing environmentally sustainable practices and standards across economy and society. A properly crafted Green New Deal would also and necessarily address other and related national emergencies including the crises of financial oligarchy, bad jobs, inequality, poverty, plutocracy, racial inequality, mass incarceration, untruth, inadequate health care, fascism, poor schooling, mental illness, substance abuse, gun violence, militarism-imperialism, gender disparity, spiritual death, and much more. I plan in a future essay to elaborate on what it is meant by a “properly crafted Green New Deal.”

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