First of all, I want to address my lack of posts the past 3 weeks.
Shortly after my last post, my wife and I came down with the virus.
Four of our children are in Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina. In late August, two of them caught the virus. Given their ages, they were considered low risk and after a few bad days they recovered and are now back at work and in class. My daughter, who had it pretty bad, is now playing soccer along with her twin sister who did not catch it even though they were all in the same room and, later, in the same apartment with utmost proximity. My other son did not catch it either.
Shortly thereafter, I flew to Texas and met my wife there, where it became our turn to deal with it. In my and my wife’s cases we both felt pretty bad including nausea and fever. Our son, daughter, and granddaughter were in the same house with us but they had natural immunity, having recovered from the virus previously. Actually, my daughter has not officially confirmed that she has had it, but believes she did, given the symptoms she suffered over a year ago.
Our eldest son, his wife, and our other daughter in Texas caught it separately and have recovered.
My wife and I were blessed to be in touch with doctors who are willing to treat this virus, which treatment we underwent. In addition, another son made an appointment for us to get a monoclonal infusion (antibodies). For what it’s worth, there were four of us in the room for infusion. The two others had been vaccinated, yet also caught the virus and their doctors had recommended the infusion. Given their ages, I was glad they had doctors who were willing to treat their patients.
Lillie and I are recovering well. We have been working in the farm and although we are more easily fatigued than before, each day our strength, endurance, and focus improve. At this rate, we should be back at 100% in the next week or two.
We thank all those who have prayed for our recovery.
Conclusions (strictly layman observations!):
If young (under 45), you will most likely be fine, unless you have comorbidities. This observation is repeated in many publications and even the CDC morbidity data reflects it (although I trust the CDC about as far as I can throw it). However, there is over the counter treatment for you as well, which will help you in your recovery.
If older (over 45), you are blessed if you are in touch with doctors who will treat you. Many doctors have rejected the CDC and other bureaucrats’ directives and have treated their patients with effective protocols. Several have testified their consternation as to why the medical profession in general blindly follows the CDC or Mayo or Hopkins, who have not issued their own protocols for treatment. Instead, they will instruct sick folks to rest and hydrate and if breathing becomes belabored, to go to a hospital (where the majority of the virus-related deaths have occurred). No treatment.
I have since learned that I am not the only one who thinks this is crazy.
The CDC’s own data tell us that survival rates for 0-19 age group is 99.9973%. For ages 60-69 it is 99.41%. The fact that our media refuses to report this doesn’t make it any less true.
This virus is a challenge but treatment is available and we urge you not to ignore that, should you get sick. Especially if older you are.
We wish the very best of health to you and yours.
Yuri Bezmenov
It is time to repost a 6-minute excerpt of an interview with Yuri Bezmenov (1939 – 1993), a KGB defector who after years of work with the Communist regime in the Soviet Union during which he grew to love the liberty of the West, defected in 1970, disguising himself as a hippie. His comments address the strategy of our enemies to demoralize us by creating chaos in our thinking and questioning our moral foundations.
The interview took place in 1984 and speaks to us today.
For those who are interested, I have also posted, further below, the full interview, which is well worth the time.
Aldous Huxley (1894 – 1963)
The next and final link is an interview of Aldous Huxley by Mike Wallace in 1958. Although I do not at all agree with Mr. Huxley’s fear of “overpopulation”, this disagreement does not blind me to his other observations, which are very prescient, as any reader of Brave New World will attest.
Major takeaway: Bureaucracy, state and/or corporate, will propagandize people to voluntarily give up their liberties.
Huxley believed that the “brave new world” that he wrote about can and will “come to these shores.” Even in 1958, considering the technological advances of that era, he is asked by a seemingly incredulous Wallace, “Why is it that you think that the wrong people” will use these instruments for evil ends? Although an atheist, Huxley’s reply comes close to the Calvinist understanding.
There is much more in the interview and it is healthy to challenge yourself to listen to a man and go through the exercise of refuting his errors while agreeing with some of his insights. Somewhat like the Apostle Paul when he quoted a pagan poet in Acts 17.
It is also bracing to hear Mike Wallace speak of the Soviet Union in 1958 as a “successful society” despite its lack of freedom. There was plenty of alternative reporting back then which, had Wallace been a bit more curious, would have disabused him of the deception of Soviet “success”.
In his letter to George Orwell in 1949 congratulating him for his book, 1984, Huxley wrote:
“Within the next generation I believe that the world’s leaders will discover that … conditioning [is] more efficient … than prisons, and that the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience.”
You may have seen the news recently that, after legal battles culminating with a unanimous ruling from Spain’s Supreme Court, Spain’s Socialist government will proceed with the exhumation of the body of General Francisco Franco. Having lost their efforts to prohibit this action, General Franco’s family had requested the body be buried next to his daughter in Madrid. The Socialists have also rejected this and will bury him in a state cemetery outside the city.
According to the New York Post (link below), the Socialists want to convert this site into a memorial to victims of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939).
That’s very thoughtful.
Except that, it is a memorial to the fallen, as witness the very name of the site: Valle de los Caídos (Valley of the Fallen). Anyone who has visited and studied up on it a bit, fully understands that. Unless, of course, the Socialists plan to define “victims” differently. An altogether predictable expectation.
If you read the article about the site, you could be forgiven if you did not know that:
It was built without state monies. It was built with mostly free labor, but also prison labor; the prisoners were paid the same rate as the free. Some prisoners, after completing their sentence or buying their freedom, voluntarily continued to work at the site. Political events are prohibited but it is freely available for religious and cultural research. There is a monastery on the site. There is no separation between Nationalists and Republicans in the cemetery; the men are buried as brothers. Many bodies were transferred from hastily dug mass graves which made it impossible to properly identify them.
The key to the monument is reconciliation, hence, the site is dominated by a large Christian cross: the means of reconciliation between God and man and between men themselves.
Now, I have dear childhood friends who, to this day, are very passionate about General Franco, whether pro or con.
I remember having visited the Valle de Los Caídos in 1987 and then visiting a Spanish childhood acquaintance and her family some time later. During the course of our conversation I mentioned my visit to the valley and, let us say, she was not pleased that I had gone. What struck me most was her rapid-fire declaration of “facts” about the site and about the war that simply were not true, however strongly she believed them to be. Seeing it would not have been productive to engage in an argument, I let it pass, mumbling something about agreeing that the war was a terrible event. Thankfully, the rest of the afternoon’s atmosphere had a chance to improve!
I also recall running into some pro-Franco folks who were vigorous defenders of Franco and whose passion led them to label anyone opposed to him as a Communist. Which would have come as a shock to my childhood friend.
However, it is true that, in 1944, General Franco warned the West about the dangers of Communism and offered to mediate between Axis and Allied Nations as a check against the occupation of Eastern Europe and Germany by the Soviet Union’s Red Army. He believed that if nothing were done, such a take over was inevitable because of the vacuum which would ensue given the Allied demand for unconditional surrender.
Franco was spurned and ridiculed and the news was leaked so as to add insult to injury. A mere 3 years later, in 1947, Winston Churchill delivered his famous “Iron Curtain” speech which, in effect, affirmed Franco’s warning, only in this case it was after the fact. Churchill was hailed as a great statesman. Maybe he was; but Franco foresaw this years earlier, when it might have been prevented, yet was never credited for it.
Referring to this incident, the Christian Science Monitor of November 10, 1961, provocatively reported, “Generalísimo Francisco Franco recently castigated the tendency abroad to identify authoritarian Spain with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ‘without taking into account our own characteristics. In the same way,’ he said, ‘we could tar as Communist the countries of the West which allied themselves with the Soviets in the last conflict and contributed greatly to their power.'”
It was clear during my visit that unreconciled partisanship did not allow folks to reasonably discuss the roots of the terrible conflict, the atrocities, and its aftermath. And to mention, let alone seek to discuss, the Republicans’ anti-Christian hatred was a non-starter, unless you were prepared to do so behind some strong body armor.
(The intense hatred against Christianity in that war has been described as “the greatest clerical bloodletting Europe has ever seen,” with mass tortures and murders and graves emptied and corpses mocked and mutilated. This was also seen in the French Revolution, likewise characterized by mass clerical tortures and killings and hundreds of burned and desecrated churches and monasteries. The “left” in both conflicts was characterized by the same anti-Christian animus. Some might object by noting that the opposition was only against the Roman Catholic Church, not Christianity. After spending time seeing countless photos and reading hours of narratives, I have to disagree. We might develop this in another post.)
Socialist policies may sound good in the abstract; however, their incompatibility with man’s sinful nature has always been their Achilles heel and, hence, has led to totalitarianism, as, witness: Venezuela, for instance. Socialism requires compulsion; it is incompatible with liberty. It requires perennial enemies, be it the church in the wars of France and Spain or be it the United States in the case of Venezuela. It requires ongoing vengeance, even reaching into graveyards if necessary.
This is something George Orwell, an otherwise brilliant man, failed to recognize given his sincere anti-Stalinism coupled with his equally sincere and persistent adoration of Socialism. It was the Socialists who were hunting him down in Spain when he escaped by the skin of his teeth. Unsurprisingly, he chalked it all up to Stalinists. His experiences in Spain and in the Soviet Union gave us both Animal Farm and 1984, books worthy of reading, along with Huxley’s Brave New World. Unsurprisingly, Huxley also supported the Loyalists, although, unlike Orwell, he did so long distance.
About fifteen years ago, the BBC produced a surprisingly objective 6-part series on the Spanish Civil War. The link is below and I would encourage all with even a passing interest in that awful event to parcel out the time to watch it. The attitudes, arguments, passions, and hatreds you see reflected in the documentary are very “20th-century-like” and they are with us today.
As witness, the Memphis city council’s unanimous vote to exhume the bodies of Nathaniel Bedford Forrest and his wife, Mary Ann. They plan to remove them from a public park. They also voted to remove the statue of the General, which deed was done illegally, under cover of night. Litigation is currently ongoing but the spirit of the exhumation forces is similar to that which animates the Socialists in Spain. “It is no longer politically correct to glorify someone who was a slave trader, someone who was a racist on public property,” said City Council member Myron Lowery.
Mr. H. K. Edgerton, a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, strongly opposes the exhumation as well as the removal of the statue. He and his organization strenuously object to the misinformation promoted about General Forrest.
Mr. Edgerton is an African American. You would be forgiven if you did not know that.
You would also be forgiven if you did not know that:
General Forrest did not start the Ku Klux Klan. In 1871, Congress itself exonerated the General of having anything to do with the Klan. He called on it to disband. He challenged one of the “liars” to a duel to defend his name.
Union General W. T. Sherman admitted that General Forrest had done nothing wrong in the “massacre” at Fort Pillow. Here again, the abolitionist-dominated Congress absolved him from any wrong-doing. General Forrest demanded, in writing, that the Union General at the time clear his name.
General Forrest had one of his slaves, Napoleon Winbush, serve as Chaplain for his troops. The Union Army would never have allowed such a thing. Chaplain Winbush’s grandson is a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.
General Forrest enlisted 45 of his own slaves to fight with him, and freed them 18 months before the war was over because he was afraid he would be killed in battle and wanted to make sure they were free. Of the 45, 44 of them stayed with him.
But there is even more to his life.
General Forrest began attending church with his wife at the Court Avenue Presbyterian Church in Memphis. The minister was Reverend George Stainback. Late in 1875, Forrest heard Stainback preach from Matthew 7 and after the service, “Forrest suddenly leaned against the wall and his eyes filled with tears. ‘Sir, your sermon has removed the last prop from under me….I am the fool that built on sand; I am a poor and miserable sinner.'”
Shortly before his death in October, 1877, he told his lawyer, General John T. Morgan, a U. S. Senator:
“General, I am broken in health and in spirit, and have not long to live. My life has been a battle from the start. It was a fight to achieve a livelihood for those dependent upon me in my younger days, and an independence for myself when I grew up to manhood, as well as in the terrible turmoil of the Civil War. I have seen too much of violence, and I want to close my days at peace with all the world, as I am now at peace with my Maker.”
Fast forward 142 years and, instead of peace, we are faced with a powerful propensity to destroy or mutilate, a ghoulish yen that reaches for even the long-buried dead, who are grotesquely slandered.
Nevertheless, as with Forrest, the story of Franco is far richer and more complex than the cartoonish characters foisted upon us.
The fervor for exhumation, the clamor for punishing folks who have died decades, centuries, and millennia ago, and who cannot defend their name against attacks today, does not lead us to reconciliation and understanding.
It leads us to new wars.
In closing this post, it is instructive to quote Abraham Lincoln who, in 1864, presciently said, “Human nature will not change. In any future great national trial, compared with the men of this, we shall have as weak and as strong, as silly and as wise, as bad and as good. Let us therefore study the incidents in this as philosophy to learn wisdom from, and none of them as wrongs to be avenged.”
Valle de los Caídos (Valley of the Fallen)Famous photograph of felled Loyalist militia, taken by Robert Capa.
The Republican forces and supporters, also known as Loyalists, desecrated many churches and monasteries and tortured and killed many thousands of clerics and nuns. They went on to desecrate graveyards and to mock the dead. Their anti-Christianity was well known and feared. The yen to desecrate is with us today.
The Spanish Civil War attracted men and women from many western countries, including England (above, on the Loyalist side) and Ireland. United States citizens also came, most famously, The Lincoln Brigade, also on the Loyalist side.General Franco, center, during the war.General Nathan Bedford Forrest, circa 1865.General Forrest statue in Memphis. It was removed by the city council at night, in defiance of state law.
Brigadier General Nathan Bedford Forrest III and his wife, Frances. He was a great-grandson of the Confederate General and the first general to be killed in action in WWII. He is mentioned here simply to note that he, fully reconciled, fought for the “Union” less than a century after his great grandfather had fought for secession.
Countless United States Civil War veterans’ reunions were celebrated for many years after the terrible war. Above photos were taken in the early 20th century.
Above two photos are of Henry Albert Woolson, Union Army. Top photo was taken during the war; second was taken in the 1950’s. He, the last Civil War veteran, passed away in 1956.
H.K. Edgerton is a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. Many African Americans fought on the Confederate side. Mr. Edgerton strongly opposes the exhumation of General Forrest and his wife and also opposed the removal of the statue.
Nelson W. Winbush, grandson of Napoleon Winbush, who was appointed by General Forrest as chaplain for his troops. Mr. Winbush, born in 1929, is also a proud member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and a courageous opponent of the destruction of Confederate monuments and flags.
Above scene from She Wore A Yellow Ribbon reflects a time (movie was made in 1949) when we could honor both sides of a very bloody conflict. At about the 1:30 minute mark Ben Johnson and John Wayne approach “Trooper Smith”, who calls for Captain Tyree (Johnson), of the Confederate Army. Tyree remains silent, not wishing to disrespect Captain Brittles (Wayne). But Brittles commands Tyree to answer the dying Trooper. The music in the background is Dixie.
Above is the final 4 minutes of She Wore a Yellow Ribbon. At about the 58 second mark, Captain Brittles (Wayne) reads that he’s received a coveted appointment. In the minute that follows, Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, and Lee are all mentioned. With honor. That’s what reconciliation does. The fact that such scenes would be unthinkable in a Hollywood film today is not comforting.
It is composed of snippets that, although not directly about Venezuela, they do apply in that they reflect thinking that takes hold on societies that lose their moorings.
The first link is to a 6-minute excerpt of an interview with Yuri Bezmenov (1939-1993), a KGB defector who after years of work with the Communist regime in the Soviet Union during which he grew to love the liberty of the West, defected in 1970, disguising himself as a hippie. His comments will not surprise you but will, nevertheless, disturb you as he details the focus of our countries enemies to demoralize us by creating chaos in our thinking and questioning our moral foundations.
The next link is an interview of Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) by Mike Wallace in 1958. If you sit through the entire thirty minutes you will, first, in today’s sensitive era, be a bit amazed at an interview where the host is smoking a cigarette; second, you will appreciate the superior intellectual conversation that was not only tolerated a generation ago, but encouraged and enjoyed; and, third, you will also see that men who were not easily pegged as conservative or liberal, nevertheless saw the direction we as a free people were taking: a direction to slavery by bamboozlement. He believed that the “Brave New World” that he wrote about can and will “come to these shores.”
That world arrived in Venezuela, with a vengeance. But we are not immune to it. “Why is it that you think that the wrong people” will use these instruments for evil ends? Huxley’s reply comes close to the Calvinist understanding. Yet, he was an atheist.
There is much more in the interview and it is healthy to challenge yourself to listen to a man and go through the exercise of refuting his errors while agreeing with some of his insights. Somewhat like the Apostle Paul when he quoted a pagan poet in Acts 17.
It is also bracing to hear Mike Wallace speak of the Soviet Union in 1958 as a successful society despite its lack of freedom. There was plenty of alternative reporting back then which, had he been a bit more curious, would have caused him pause before declaring the Soviet Union a success.
In his letter to George Orwell in 1949 congratulating him for his book, 1984, Huxley wrote:
“Within the next generation I believe that the world’s leaders will discover that infant conditioning and narcohypnosis are more efficient, as instruments of governments, than clubs and prisons, and that the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience.”
And the last link is a reenactment of a lecture given by C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) on the BBC in 1941. He went on to give lectures on the BBC for about three years, during a time when the city of London was being bombed. Civilians and soldiers looked forward to these lectures because, as many of them expressed it, they gave them a sense of order and meaning at at time when it was easy to believe all was chaos. Pubs would suddenly come to a hush, when Lewis came on the radio. These lectures became the foundation for his great book, Mere Christianity.
This first lecture is about right and wrong. And, if you find it compelling, I would recommend reading Lewis’ The Abolition of Man where he develops these thoughts into a challenging and rewarding read.
Contrary to Huxley, Lewis was a Christian. One thing they had in common was that they both died on November 22, 1963. Their deaths were overshadowed by the death of another famous man on that same day: John F. Kennedy.
I believe you will find these three links to be challenging yet engaging and provocative. I recommend you set times aside throughout this coming week to listen to each. They not only help us understand what has been, and what is happening in Venezuela, but also what has been happening in the United States for generations now.
