Who should run NASA: a scientist or a bureaucrat? I don't have the answer, but I will share a little vignette from history (because I'm an historian) that I think is interesting and relevant... Please read on!

The Administrator typically changes with each President, usually to be politically in-line with the administration. When Kennedy took office, he wanted Jim Webb for the job.

Jim Webb arrived in Lyndon Johnson’s office on Jan. 30, 1961. The lawyer turned lobbyist and businessman who had been head of the Bureau of the Budget and as under-secretary of state during the Truman administration was wary of taking the job. NASA was considered a boondoggle.

Space stations and lunar missions were on the books for 1970 or later, so in the meantime, whoever ran the agency would have to stand up to the military trying to wrest control of space activities while managing an agency that might kill an astronaut in front of the whole world.

Not to mention, belief in Washington was that the country would lose interest soon enough. When the glamour of space faded, it would take its administrator down with it. It was, in essence, a career killer.

Roger Froikin @rlefraim wrote, "IRELAND AND ISRAEL. — WHAT MAKES NO SENSE.
1)

1. My recommendations of great adventure novels that all boys should read. These books will instill in them a love of travel, a sense of daring, a respect for tradition, and a boldness of nerve. It will also impart a lifetime love of reading. So here we go.

2. H. Rider Haggard:

King Solomon's Mines (This book changed the course of my life)

She

Allan Quatermain

3. H.G. Wells:

The Time Machine

The Invisible Man

4. Robert Louis Stevenson:

Treasure Island

Kidnapped

5. Arthur Conan Doyle:

The Lost World

THREAD on Strauss’ Epilogue: I promised awhile ago a thread on why one should read Leo Strauss. I’ll probably make a more general thread on that, but 1st, here is one on “An Epilogue”—an essay Strauss wrote for an edited volume called “Essays on the Scientific Study of Politics”

This essay is Strauss’ critique of contemporary political science. Why’s that important for anyone outside the university? Because how we study political phenomena determines how we judge, and ultimately act, on political things.

What Strauss does here is comparable to Schmitt’s Concept of the Political. Schmitt shows how the modern liberal order attempts to conceal and abolish the essence of the political. Strauss shows that it also distorts the study of political things.

First, Strauss describes the old political science, the kind that prevailed from Aristotle to the end of the 19th c. The old pol. sci. (which was not distinguished from political philosophy) was a practical science. It’s purpose was architectonic—to order all other arts.

This pol sci depends on man being a political and rational animal. He is fundamentally different from other animals because he is receptive of praise and shame. He knows, to a greater or lesser degree, something about right and wrong beyond mere self preservation and breeding.

After a visit to the archives last week I came across an interesting order in relation to 'Burials'. Issued to the 27th Armoured Brigade ahead of Operation Overlord, section 29 lists the conditions for the burial of the dead.

1. Burial site for those killed on beaches and in assembly areas will be reserved by Beach Sub area immediately inland of beaches.

Two examples of these areas that spring to mind is one a hundred yards to the east of Montgomery's statue on Rue de la Mer, Colleville-Montgomery. The other close to Canada House in Bernieres. The men buried there would be moved at a later date during grave concentrations.

2. Units may arrange temporary cemeteries in case of need, but isolated site are to be avoided. Whenever possible enquiry should be made of the nearest formation H.Q with a view to use of a site already established.

An isolated site can be seen here on June 7th. Trooper Barton, 1st East Riding Yeomanry had been killed in action on D-Day. The crew returned to the tank the next day, sadly they had to cut him into two with a knife to remove him. Harrowing but the reality of what the men faced.

My thread yesterday about Hitler, his knowing that he would have to be a Christian hypocrite for political advantage, would also need influential Christian leaders to succeed. For Hitler, this was Gerhard Kittel, the German theologian. He proposed extermination of the Jews.

I briefly mentioned Jerry Falwell. Far right conservative activists Ed McAteer and Paul Weyrich we’re regarded as radicals. There group was to change the existing power structure, but they wanted to change what conservative meant. Weyrich was the man with the vision. He was

known as the “evil genius” of the 1980 manifesto “The New Right: We’re Ready to Lead.” They would establish themselves first as the opposition, then the alternative, finally the government. They would weaken existing institutions and eventually destroy them. First they would

maintain a constant barrage of the left, a constant attack on the legitimacy of the left, “we will not give them a moments rest, we will use guerrilla tactics to undermine all legitimacy of the left. Weyrich stated that he wanted a country and voting changed “I don’t want

everybody to vote.” Continuing “As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.” The core of the concerns was the perception that American capitalism was under threat from internal and external enemies. The civil rights

"I could paint for a hundred years, a thousand years without stopping and I would still feel as though I knew nothing."

"The awareness of our own strength makes us modest."

~ Paul Cezanne 💎 #Botd 1839

Cézanne is said to have formed the bridge between late 19th-century Impressionism and the early 20th century's new line of artistic enquiry, Cubism... Both Matisse and Picasso are said to have remarked that Cézanne "is the father of us all".

In "Cézanne's Doubt",Merleau-Ponty discusses how Cézanne gave up classic artistic elements such as pictorial arrangements, single view perspectives, and outlines that enclosed color in an attempt to get a "lived perspective" by capturing all the complexities that an eye observes.

Ultimately, he [Cezanne] wanted to get to the point where "sight" was also "touch". He would take hours sometimes to put down a single stroke because each stroke needed to contain "the air, the light, the object, the composition, the character, the outline, and the style".

... A still life might have taken Cézanne one hundred working sessions while a portrait took him around one hundred and fifty sessions. Cèzanne believed that while he was painting, he was capturing a moment in time, that once passed, could not come back. ...

Some thoughts on #OneStruggle stemming from observing arguments between @urbanartshop and those who are offering their rebuttals.

@NotoriousTreyK

Sometimes it seems as though these circles are populated, to a person, by individuals who recognize how terrible and historically

unfortunate WWII was. As @anti_contard recently noted, it is breathtaking to consider how many Whites (and people of all groups) perished in the industrialized carnage of that conflagration. The war’s effects have been vast, from geopolitics to informing the West’s post-1945

mythology (and those have frequently been intertwined). Overwhelmingly, “our guys” correctly point to the war’s awful legacy for our people.

Yet many of the same people who excoriate the crimson harvest of WWII and its consequences seem to be mired in a chauvinistic mindset when

it comes to something like 19th century colonialism. This tends to bubble to the surface as almost guttural riposte to the armies of the Woke, who seek to exploit the darker aspects of the history of European imperialism and colonization to shame and bully Whites. Whites have

become conditioned to fall into two camps today when confronted by these elements, both of which are counterproductive. The first camp is insufferable: Woke or liberal “White Saviorists” to use Matt Parrott’s term, people who typically use their status as the enlightened of their

200 followers special!

WORLD AT WAR

#WorldWar2 key events and their timeline with visual references.

Long 🧵

@ForumStrategic @SierraDeltaPk @Corpor8Xploiter @AhmAdTipu7 @Thunder07101 @WPCPSFION @ZA1N87 @ali_zarwan @schaheid @ainakhalid801 @AScf90

November 11, 1918
WORLD WAR I ENDS

Britain, France, the US, and other allies defeat Germany, bringing an end to World War I, billed as “the war to end all wars.”

January 30, 1933
HITLER APPOINTED GERMAN LEADER

Adolf Hitler becomes chancellor of Germany and later assumes dictatorial powers. German rearmament takes off.

September 1, 1939
WORLD WAR II BEGINS

Germany invades Poland, inciting Poland’s allies Britain and France to declare war on Germany.

September 17, 1939
SOVIET UNION INVADES POLAND

Working in concert with Hitler, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin orders the invasion of Poland, securing a share of Polish territory.

When Nazis Took Manhattan : Code Switch : NPR

Riots erupted between anti-Fascists and Blackshirts (British

The spread of fascism in the 1920s was significantly aided by the fact that liberals and mainstream conservatives failed to take it seriously. Instead, they accommodated and normalised it.

Why we have to cut off the head of fascism again and again.

Seriously. Look at the image.

American Nazis in the 1930s—The German American

Radio silence for 1 hour, binge-watching cartoons for over an hour and other #Christmas memories from my childhood – a thread to the past in Iceland and Christmas there in the countriside #isolation in the 1970’s where Radio and TV played a key role.

I grew up on a farm just outside the village of Vopnafjörður northeast-Iceland. The village with ca 600 people is surrounded by a few farms like ours but the next living soul is more than 40 km away! It is one of the most isolated places in Iceland (8 hours from Reykjavik).

Back in the 1970´s the roads out of Vopnafjörður were frequently closed for weeks, even months. So apart from flying in or out (not cheap!) via the airport, our only connection to the outside world was the radio and the TV. But until the mid 1980´s Iceland had one radio station!

This sole station is still known as RUV @RUVohf an abbreviation which stands for the State Radio! And there was only one TV station – you guessed it, the State TV, established 1966 (available in colour from 1977).

The radio and TV were operated by the State to provide news and useful information and to promote culture (particularly Icelandic) to the public. The idea of “fun” was pretty low on the priority list. Being State owned meant also the State Employee Rep. Union had a strong say.

The Indo-Greeks were on decline & the grounds were fertile for yet another invasion of #India. This time it was the Yuezhi tribe of Gansu from #China. They established the #KushanEmpire.

This #thread is about Kushans & how they became Indianised, unlike later Islam!c invaders.

The Kushans started to establish themselves as a major power around 30 CE with Kujula Kadphises forming a confederacy of various tribes from China.

They adopted Greek as their court language, which was soon replaced by Bactrian, the popular local language.

They also adopted #Buddhism & #Hinduism as their religion. They issued coins with Hindu Gods like Shiva with a trishul & Buddha in Abhaya mudra.

This was unlike the later Islam!c invasions where the invaders would try to obliterate local languages and religions.

The Kushans were heavily influenced by the prevalent Greek culture, especially in sculpture. The Kushans expanded their territories & ruled with two capitals, one in Gandhara & one in Mathura. This also established the Gandhara & Mathura School of Kushan arts.

Kushans also introduced the first human form of Buddha who was previously depicted with symbols like a throne, a wheel or a peepal leaf.

They patronised trade & sent Buddhist monks to #Tibet, #China, #Korea & #Japan. Lokaksema went to China & translated Buddhist texts in Chinese

Before the 76th anniversary of the liberation of #Auschwitz we bring together the most important facts about the last stage of the operation of this German Nazi camp. See the rest of this [THREAD] below. 1/11 #Auschwitz76

At the beginning of 1945, there were around 67,000 prisoners in the Auschwitz camp system. On 12 January 1945, the Soviets started their offensive. In mid-January head of the SS in the region, Ernst Schmauser gave the order to evacuate Auschwitz. 2/11

The final evacuation began on 17 January 1945. Around 58,000 prisoners were evacuated from the Auschwitz camp system. Columns of prisoners were leaving the camps and subcamps between 17 and 21 January. 3/11

On January 20 the SS blew up the buildings of gas chambers II (📷) and III. On January 25/26 SS units entered the camp to destroy the last one - gas chamber and crematorium V. 4/11

Some 9,000 prisoners were left by the SS in the camps. The last SS guards left the camp most probably on January 21, but there were still some SS and Wehrmacht units coming in and out. 5/11

Sofya Kovalevskaya was born #OTD in 1850. She was the first woman to earn a doctorate in mathematics in modern Europe, be appointed to a university chair, and join the editorial board of a scientific journal. She also won the Prix Bordin from the French Academy of Science.

Sofya, who also went by Sonya, was born in Moscow. Her father was a nobleman who took the family from the city to a country estate.

She has quite an origin story: The family ran out of wallpaper, so they papered her room with calculus notes from her father’s time at university.

"These sheets, spotted over with strange incomprehensible formulae, soon attracted my attention. I passed whole hours before that mysterious wall, trying to decipher even a single phrase, and to discover the order in which the sheets ought to follow each other."

As a child she was given a physics book by a family friend. It required trigonometry, which she figured out on her own. The family friend, amazed by her ability, convinced Sofya’s father to arrange a private tutor.

She excelled at mathematics, but women were barred from Russian universities at the time. So she entered into a marriage of convenience with a young geology student and went with him to Heidelberg. She couldn’t enroll there either, but at least she could attend lectures.

Who died last year...before #Event201 #Covid911

Kary Banks Mullis (Dec 28, 1944 – Aug 7, 2019) was an American biochemist. In recognition of his invention of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique, he shared the 1993 Nobel Prize in

#PCRTest: A process that's used to make a whole lot of someting out of something.

Kary Mullis. Inventor of the PCR test and Nobel Prize winner: PCR cannot be totally and should never be used as a tool in "The diagnosis of infectious

False-Positives

#covid911 #PRCtest #Pcrgate #lockstep

False-Positives

#covid911 #PRCtest #Pcrgate #lockstep

Portuguese Court Rules #PCRtest As Unreliable & Unlawful To Quarantine People.

#covid911 #PRCtest #Pcrgate #lockstep

Playing a bit of Tower of Druaga, in the Namco Museum collection. Splatterhouse is in there too, and it makes a good comparison, because you know how Splatterhouse's only draw is the hyper-detailed violence? Druaga is like that except the only draw is the hyper-obscure secrets.

But the secrets made it a huge hit in Japan in 1984. This is supposedly the game that created the Japanese arcade culture of players sharing notes, because the only path to success was approaching the game as a community.

Tower of Druaga clearly draws inspiration from Pac-Man (it's a maze chase) and Rogue (the maze isn't randomized, but everything *in it* is, plus you bump into enemies to attack them) and Wizardry/D&D (theming and upgrades).

To advance past each floor, you need to find the key and the exit, dodging monsters. You can also find a secret item on each floor. These "optional" items are crucial, some are literally required to proceed, and the processes you need to guess at to unlock them are *ridiculous*.

A sampling:
- Kill 3 slimes.
- Touch the left and right dungeon walls.
- Don't touch the outside walls for 12 seconds.
- Swing your sword while standing on the exit.
- Press 1P start.
- Kill 6 colored slimes in a specific order.
- Step on 3 unmarked tiles in a specific order.

1/ It really is heartbreaking that so many people are blinded by hate they cannot see the precipice we are careening over. How many times must history repeat itself before humanity truly learns to recognize blind unmitigated hate?

How has being an American patriot become...

2/ ...a “radicalism” or defect that must be snuffed out?

Everyday hostility towards Patriots or MAGA grows. People who love America, freedom, truth, liberty, & being GOOD are increasingly demonized.

How much history has to repeat before we find ourselves on similar trains?

3/ Everyone picks a side of history to be on. What side will you choose?

4/ There is no sugar coating the truth. Mark my words “Cancel culture” is what started the Jewish Holocaust in the 1930’s. Of the slices of history that we know, we know this for a FACT.

5/ “...Kristallnacht marked the transition of the Nazi policy vis-a-vis Jews from social ostracism, abrogation of legal rights and economic boycotts, to organized physical violence including murder.

In June, 1965 a monk in Vietnam hoped to convince Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to speak out for the first time against the US war in Vietnam.

So he sent a letter, and a year later in 1966 he sat with Dr. King as he spoke out against the war.

Here’s what Thich Nhat Hanh wrote...

"The self-burning of Vietnamese Buddhist monks in 1963 is somehow difficult for the Western Christian conscience to understand. The Press spoke then of suicide, but in the essence, it is not. It is not even a protest."

"What the monks said in the letters they left before burning themselves aimed only at alarming, at moving the hearts of the oppressors and at calling the attention of the world to the suffering endured then by the Vietnamese."

"To burn oneself by fire is to prove that what one is saying is of the utmost importance. There is nothing more painful than burning oneself. To say something while experiencing this kind of pain is to say it with the utmost of courage, frankness, determination and sincerity."

"During the ceremony of ordination, as practiced in the Mahayana tradition, the monk-candidate is required to burn one, or more, small spots on his body in taking the vow to observe the 250 rules of a bhikshu..."