Life under the Regency category archive

From the Times-Dispatch:

Not far from here is a street named Witchduck Road. The name comes from a witch trial (Massachusetts was not the only colony with witch trials):

The farmer’s wife knew a little too much about herbs, was a little too pretty and wore clothing that was a little too tight, according to local historians. So they accused her of witchcraft. (See Note–ed.)

A judge ordered Sherwood to be tried by ducking. So on July 10, 1706, with her thumbs tied to her big toes, Sherwood was ducked in the Lynnhaven River.

The street leading to her ducking spot now carries her legend as Witchduck Road.

Our attorney-general is repaving and widening the road for more duckings:

An investigation by Ken Cuccinelli of a climate scientist who was caught up in last year’s “Climate-Gate” flap is being likened to a “witch hunt” — even by global warming skeptics.

More at the link.

Kook-kook-a-choo.

_____________________

Note: “. . .little too pretty and wore clothing that was a little too tight.” I made a study of the witch trials when I was a student. Sex, sexual fantasies, and weird repressed sexual desire were a significant aspect of them.

On the part of the inquisitors, not on the part of the accused.

Backing up, but not backing all the way down. Most of them are saying they now favor a delay and studies (emphasis added):

Some Virginia leaders are reconsidering their support for drilling off the state’s coast after a fatal well accident in the Gulf of Mexico, even as Gov. Bob McDonnell continues to lobby aggressively to set up platforms to drill for oil and natural gas without delay.

(snip)

The last study of the Atlantic Ocean by the federal government, conducted two decades ago, estimated that at least 130 million barrels of oil and at least 1.14 trillion cubic feet of natural gas could be off Virginia’s coast. That’s equal to the amount of oil used in six days and the amount of gas used in less than a month in the United States.

As several persons have pointed out (see the previous post), no one and nothing has been harmed if the wind blows out at a wind farm.

Much more at the link.

No more CSA Virginia State Seal.

Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli issued a statement this afternoon indicating he will discontinue future use of a lapel pin distributed to members of his staff in recent weeks that featured the torso of the female character on Virginia’s state seal, the Roman goddess Virtus, covered with an armored breast plate.

Kook-kook-a-choo.

Addendum, Later that Same Evening:

Field comments. He has not heard about the reversal yet, but his post is worth a visit. A nugget:

Just because he couldn’t control his sexual urges whenever he walked into the office and saw the state seal, this clown actually ordered his staff to cover up the Roman goddess.

Tom Levenson reports about Cuccinelli’s attack on science. A nugget:

Seriously, no snark at all: science has certain norms. High, really chief among them, is the commitment to free enquiry.

The reason is, or should be obvious: once you start telling folks which answers are acceptable and which are not, you’ve just told those scientists under your power that they can’t think without thinking first whether those thoughts are acceptable.

And another thing: Cuccinelli may think he’s just stuffing climate change back in a box where it belongs. He may actually hope that hounding Mann may scare others off from daring to probe temperature records, or increasingly detailed global models or what have you.

He probably has, in fact, at least in VA. As noted above why would any atmospheric scientist, any geologist any planetary scientist whatsoever want to risk the career trashing experience of a full-on state-sponsored attack on your work, your records, your colleagues and students — just the time, years perhaps, lost to demonstrating to the political officer the orthodoxy of your views would be intolerable.

Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli apparently isn’t fond of wardrobe malfunctions, even when Virginia’s state seal is involved.

The seal depicts the Roman goddess Virtus, or virtue, wearing a blue tunic draped over one shoulder, her left breast exposed. But on the new lapel pins Cuccinelli recently handed out to his staff, Virtus’ bosom is covered by an armored breastplate.

Words fail me. (But they didn’t fail this guy.

Stupid, silly, puerile, and disrespectful. Giggle giggle point point.

Addendum:

Waldo Jaquith looks at the history of the state seal.

Not Larry Sabato advises Virginian women to buy their burqas now.

Gov. Bob McDonnell said yesterday that he will urge Obama administration officials to proceed with plans to drill for oil and gas off the Virginia coast, despite growing concerns about a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

No matter how much oil is found, it is unlikely to make much difference in the long run, whereas seriously developing alternative sources of energy will help now and later.

Read further down and the Regent is all about using off-shore oil to get revenue for the state, even though there is currently no revenue sharing for off-shore drilling. By canonizing the belief that taxes are inherently evil, Republicans have made themselves prey to trying to pay for legitimate government services in questionable ways.

It’s analogous to Pennsylvania Governor Rendell’s notion that more casinos would solve everything (Rendell is a Democrat).

That’s not working out so well either.

A degree from Regent University was a tell.

Smart players never miss a tell.

Drill here. Drill now.

Nothing beats being visible from space.

Time is running out as a huge slick with a 600-mile (965-kilometer) circumference has moved within 21 miles of the ecologically fragile Louisiana coast despite favorable winds. Photos released by U.S. space agency NASA revealed the spread had become so great, it was visible from space.

Waldo Jaquith has more.

Radio Times looks at the history of the Confederate States of America and its symbolism in contemporary American politics.

Natch, the Regent’s ignoring black folks was the lead in to the discussion. . . .

From the website:

We’re coming into the 150th anniversary of the American South’s first organized attempt to secede from the Union. Our guest, University of Pennsylvania professor of history STEPHANIE McCURRY, looks at the Confederate War through the experience of the South’s women and slave struggles in her new book, Confederate Reckoning. We’ll talk to her about how women and slaves influenced the demise of the Confederacy, including how they took on the Jefferson Davis government on government enlistment, and tax and welfare policies.

Follow the link to the website to listen or listen here (mp3).

The Regent expects obedience. Hence, the Virginia State police supported raising the maximum speed limit and remained silent on gun control issues.

They were doing as they were told:

The shift in position (on speed limits–ed.) followed instructions from Gov. Bob McDonnell’s administration to the law enforcement agency that a public endorsement was expected, according to a government source with knowledge of the conversations who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Administration officials made it clear to the state police that it was expected to back the speed limit change, which McDonnell supported, and remain silent on some gun measures, the source said. The state police offered testimony on at least one gun proposal this year – defeated legislation to require criminal background checks on certain private gun sales – before being hushed on others, the source added.

Turn your back, get stabbed in it.

A good citizen votes because he or she must, not because he or she wants to.

Embed from TPM via Not Larry Sabato.

The Philadelphia Inquirer discusses the Regent’s Confederate History Month Proclamation, the Texas School Book Massacre, and other such malefactions. The excerpt below suffers much snippage; follow the link to read the whole thing–it’s worth two minutes of your time.

McDonnell, who said he issued the proclamation at the request of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, a group that would love to rewrite history from its perspective. . . .

Only after the Sons group said it wouldn’t mind slavery being mentioned in the proclamation did McDonnell rewrite it . . . .

But not all attempts like McDonnell’s to rewrite history are thwarted. Concerned about what it perceived to be a liberal bias in textbooks, the Texas Board of Education has ordered up a different version of events from book manufacturers. . . .

And what will the books say? Well, a tip of the hat to the conservative political movement will include Phyllis Schlafly and the Heritage Foundation. A focus on the Confederacy will include side-by-side comparisons of speeches by Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln, as if they were equals.

That will surely make the Sons of Confederate Veterans proud. Revisionist history is what they’re all about, but someone has to stand up for the truth.

It has been a long time since I read the Richmond Times-Dispatch (in my younger days known as the “Trash Disgrace” for its solid adherence to the “Lost Cause” and segregation) with any regularity, but, in responding to the Regent’s declaration last month of Christian Heritage Week, they got one right:

McDonnell’s language is typical. Paragraphs opening with a “whereas” include statements many construe as indicative of America’s status as a Christian commonwealth. Franklin, Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Henry, and Mason are cited to support the proposition. Several entries specifically refer to Christianity; other quotations mention God or “righteousness.” The latter, of course, could be employed to say the U.S. is a Jewish nation, or a Muslim one, or a nation built by generic believers.

The faith of the Founders eludes definition according to the standards of our day. Jefferson indeed would not qualify as an orthodox Christian, or perhaps even as a heterodox one. His version of the Bible omits the very things that make the New Testament a declaration of Christianity. Jefferson’s architectural masterpieces — the Rotunda, Monticello, and the Virginia Capitol — manifest soul craft. They resemble neither cathedrals nor kirks but classical edifices redolent of Greece and Rome. Franklin, too, is hard to classify. Church attendance is not an accurate gauge of devotion; Franklin’s participation alternated between steady and sporadic. He harbored persistent doubts of Christ’s divinity, however. He is not to be mistaken for Mike Huckabee.

(snip)

The Founders drew their ideals and their practical solutions from numerous sources. Christianity inhabited the minds of many. Inspiration also came from the ancient world, as well as from philosophers associated with the Enlightenment.

Christianity’s role in American politics and culture cannot be denied. Nevertheless, Christian Heritage Week and similar assertions seldom serve as examples of historical scholarship or, for that matter, of creedal exactitude. Religion in general and Christianity in particular are diminished by attempts to conform the Founders to our world.

The Founders were certainly influenced by the philosophy of thinkers within the context of a Christian Europe. It was the world they knew.

So too were they influenced by Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Aristotle, and others who were in no way Christian, though they were in the great stream of European philosophical and legal thought (which has also helped shaped Christianity).

Most of the Founders–with the possible occasional exception of Jefferson–cannot be considered philosophers in any sense. They were practical men concerned with what works, not with internally coherent theories to explain causality, being, and knowledge.

But in no way did the Founders wish to establish a theocracy; those who today claim that they did are at best deluded, at worst liars.

And I don’t buy the “at best” alternative.

Read more »

Not during, but before and after this meeting, and on both sets of walls. The meeting itself will no doubt be oh-so-proper:

Members of a black fraternity at the College of William and Mary plan to meet with Gov. Bob McDonnell to discuss the contentious issue of Confederate History Month.

The Williamsburg college’s Alpha Phi Alpha chapter cited McDonnell’s proclamation that April is Confederate History Month in declining to attend an awards ceremony. McDonnell honored several recipients of statewide community-service awards at Thursday night’s event.

Chapter President William B. Morris III said Friday that fraternity members were honored to be among the winners of the Governor’s Volunteerism and Community Service Awards for their work as mentors of underprivileged middle-school students. But he says they respectfully chose to sit out the ceremony because McDonnell’s decision to honor a cause that harmed black people is insulting and improper.

Underlying the whole thing is generations of white folk who want to return to a time that is gone with the wind, not realizing that that time never existed except in Southern wishful thinking–wishful thinking to deny that the “Cause” of the “Lost Cause” was chattel slavery.

Full disclosure:

When I attended that college back in the olden days, there were not enough black students there to make up a fraternity.

Ruben Navarrette, Jr. in the San Jose Mercury-News:

As someone who writes often about immigration issues, I’m accustomed to hearing readers complain about those who insist on looking backward and obsessing over their heritage. They have little tolerance for those who seem intent on separating themselves from the rest of us by defiantly maintaining their culture and customs rather than blending into the mainstream. And they have even less patience with those who would dare wave a foreign flag in public — especially if it happens to be the colors of a republic that was, just 150 years ago, literally at war with the United States.

I have to agree. All of which leads me to ask: When exactly are Southerners going to assimilate?

Not anytime soon if Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell has anything to say about it.

Via Kiko’s House.

The Regent doesn’t like getting noticed. From TPM:

Was the news about Virginia governor Bob McDonnell’s move to make it harder for felons to vote all just a big misunderstanding? That’s what he’s now claiming.

A spokesman for the governor, a Republican, told the Washington Post that letters sent to over 200 felons, telling them that they would now have to submit an essay as part of the application process — a process that previously had been almost automatic — were sent in error, and that the essay idea was just a “draft policy proposal.”

More at the link.

Aside: This “I didn’t mean it like that” thing is getting to be a habit.

And all that time I’ve spend composing a post in my head was just rendered, as the Brits say, “redundant.”

Via Not Larry Sabato, a home run. Click the link to chase the ball.