2021 archive
Deformation 0
I was raised Southern Baptist, back when the Southern Baptist Convention was a Protestant denomination, before it became a political cult.
Aside:
I will say that the little Southern Baptist church in which I grew up did very much its own thing (a central Baptist tenet is priesthood of the believer–the other is baptism of the believer–and in accordance thereunto believers sometimes choose to ignore the hierarchy). They were quite willing to ignore the SBC if they thought it was, as my old boss used to say, in error.
I remember that, after I was well into adulthood (at least, chronologically) and had long since moved away in search of gainful employment, a black couple from up North (as we used to say) moved into the area, sampled many churches, black and white, and eventually joined the little all-white church that I grew up in as being the one where they felt most comfortable.
And the congregation was proud that they did.
When I last had contact with that church, they were still going their own way.
Spin City 0
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Gene Collier tries to pick the Republican talking point of the week and finds it a challenge.
QOTD 0
Anthony Bate, in the voice Dr. Sardon:
My dear child, there is no such thing as a perfectly decent human being.
Extra-Special Bonus QOTD 0
A well-turned phrase, from The Eye of Osiris, by R. Austin Freeman:
. . . wiping his hands off, with an air of finality, on the posterior aspect of his trousers.
Tilting at Windy Mills 0
At Above the Law, Joe Patrice explains why Florida’s new law forbidding private entities, particularly “social” media such as Google and Facebook, from banning political candidates and “journalistic enterprises” from their platforms in empty kabuki theater, and like pricey theater at that. Here’s a bit of his post (emphasis added):
Because while private entities like Twitter and Facebook banning users is entirely constitutional, forcing those private actors to broadcast particular users over their platforms is absolutely not constitutional. And yet here we are in up-is-now-down-land.
Follow the link for the rest.
The Transformation 0

Thanks to Richard Nixon’s odious southern strategy, the Republican Party has transformed itself into the Party of the Secesh, and, like the Secesh, would rip asunder the nation.
Image via Balloon Juice.
Campus Cancel Culture, Republican Style 0
Will Bunch reports who’s actually doing the cancelling on campuses.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
First, a shot and beer. Then, a beer and a shot.
They Can’t Handle the Truth . . . 0
. . . so they want to make it go away.









