Could Vaccine Resisters be WACOed?

Posted on April 12, 2021 by leslie

David Koresh, RIP, credit Wikipedia

Could Vaccine Resisters be WACOed?

by Ilana Mercer

Because of the natural mutation the clever little RNA strand undergoes—it is clear to anyone with a critical mind that the Covid vaccines will go the way of the flu vaccines: an annual affair if one chooses to make it so. Choice, alas, is quickly becoming a quaint concept in Covid-compliant America.

Vaccine Passports

The possibility of a vaccine passport, a “certification of vaccination that reduces public-health restrictions for their carriers,” has been floated. Unfinessed, it amounts to, “Your Papers, bitte!” While Fox’s Tucker Carlson did term the idea an Orwellian one—it took civil libertarian Glenn Greenwald, the odd-man-out among the authoritarian Left, to place the concept of a vaccine passport in proper perspective. The popular TV host (and perhaps the only good thing on Fox News) had asked Greenwald if he felt a vaccine passport “would work to convince more Americans to get vaccinated.” Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

History Debunked

Posted on April 11, 2021 by leslie

Jean-Léon Gerôme, The Slave Market, credit Wikipedia

History Debunked

The Forgotten Slave Trade: The White European Slaves of Islam, Simon Webb, 2021, Pen & Sword, reviewed by Ed Dutton

At time when British people are being increasingly instilled with a sense of guilt about the “slave trade” – which the British, anyway, led the way in abolishing – what an important book Simon Webb’s The Forgotten Slave Trade is. It is also marvellously well-written, incredibly detailed, and brimming with fascinating, and once widely known, facts.

Mr Webb is acutely concerned with “historical erasure,” whereby political ideologues  cause us to forget aspects of history that might make us wary of, in this instance, Multiculturalism or the white guilt that is key to sustaining this. He thus begins by explaining that until quite recently the term “The Slave Trade” did not refer exclusively to the Triangular African slave trade between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries. Almost all historic civilizations have pursued slavery, whether the Israelites, the Greeks and Romans, the Saxons, or the Islamic world. Around 10% of English people, in 1066, were slaves. Apparently, 25% of Ancient Greeks were slaves and the scale of this slave trade dwarfed the mere 10 million blacks that were enslaved in the 350 years of the Triangular Trade. The conditions of these forgotten white slaves were also far worse. And this was also dwarfed by the Black enslavement of their own and of the other races of Africa from 2500 BC onwards as the Bantu (Blacks) expanded out of Nigeria and Cameroon. The other races with whom they came into contact, the Pygmies and the Bushmen, were duly enslaved. Indeed, slavery was so accepted in Africa that the colonial British were compelled to tolerate it to “keep the peace” with African natives. Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Treason and Patriotism in Postmodern Society

Posted on April 9, 2021 by leslie

Jacques-Louis David, Oath of the Horatii

Treason and Patriotism in Postmodern Society

by Mark Wegierski

Traditional notions of treason and patriotism have long been important in Canada but have been subject to enormous pressure since the beginning of the twentieth century. English-Canadian identity was ever bound up with the profession of loyalty to the Sovereign or Monarch. A person who failed to profess loyalty to the Sovereign or Monarch was deemed disloyal to Canada. On a number of occasions in recent Canadian history, Québécois nationalists in particular have been accused of treason. What follows is an examination of these accusations in the light of current thinking about what constitutes treason, in Canada and elsewhere.

Ideas of treason and patriotism seem to be most pronounced in traditional societies. The manifest showing of disloyalty to a country or nation, or its chief symbols, has often been met with severe censure or punishment. At the same time, making common cause with one’s nation’s enemies, typically in the forms of espionage, sabotage, or extremely vocal agitation, was often considered “high treason,” punishable by death or long and harsh prison terms. But looking at the history of the second half of the twentieth century and the first two decades of the twenty-first, it is clear that, for Western societies at least, “treason is not what it used to be.” Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Shielding

Posted on April 8, 2021 by leslie

Badge of an LAPD Officer

   Shielding

    by Bill Hartley

The Shield, which ran for seven series as long ago as 2002-8, is deeper than the standard police drama. It explores the nature of corruption, together with the leadership meant to prevent it happening. It is this combination which makes it a cut above the rest, allowing us to see the structural weaknesses in an organisation. Interestingly, whilst it won several awards at the time, it has since been overshadowed by The Wire which on release attracted far less positive critical attention.

The Shield is based on a real life police scandal. Back in the 1990s, Los Angeles police set out to combat a rise in gang crime. They set up Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums, better known as ‘CRASH’, an acronym which was a hostage to fortune. What followed became known as the Rampart Scandal. Seventy officers were investigated for robberies, murder, drug dealing and other crimes. As someone observed, ‘far from dealing with gang crime the LAPD succeeded in creating the most dangerous gang in the city’. It was to cost the city $125 million in damages. Against this background, nothing seems exaggerated about the activities of Vic Mackey and his ‘Strike Team’ in The Shield.

With outstanding characterisation, The Shield poses probing questions about corruption, exploring the term in a range of facets. Vic, the one obvious leader, has succeeded in building a tight knit band of brothers and getting them to accept his warped ethics, where the end justifies the means and often includes a cut of the proceeds. As the series progresses, the viewer realises that whilst Vic’s corruption is clear and unambiguous there are subtler versions to be found. Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Virgiliana

Posted on April 6, 2021 by leslie

Doré Woodcut, Divine Comedy, credit Wikipedia

Virgiliana

The Cambridge Companion to Virgil (2nd Ed.), edited by Fiachra MacGorain and Charles Martindale, Cambridge University Press: 2019. Pp. i-xvi,1-549, reviewed by Darrell Sutton

Arguably the most illustrious writer of Latin literature, Virgil’s classic, the Aeneid, is central to studies of ancient epic. The popular words arma virumque cano (I sing of arms and the man) resonate in every generation. Many people have been to war but few combatants composed melodies depicting their adventures. Other than Homer, had anyone sung of conflict like Virgil? Homer became Virgil’s model centuries later when he composed his Roman tale of quest and conquest, one filled with Gods who proved to be both baneful and benevolent in their dealings with mankind.

The lifeblood of warriors was poured forth in line after line of the Aeneid. It tells of Rome’s history. Although her legends and myths are rendered in an unfinished account, the Aeneid’s rhythms have been scrutinized countless times by expert and layperson alike. Virgil produced other literary creations. Some writers in the past believe he authored Appendix Vergiliana; some do not (see S. Mcgill’s skeptical but erudite paper (chapter 4) on all the pseudepigrapha).

Virgil was grateful to Augustus for restoring to him his lands. And the Bucolica show his gratitude and his interest in pastoral landscapes. Several poems are dedicated to individuals who were of significance to Virgil. The shepherd’s vocation is extoled; the Muse’s love of woodlands is noted at Ecl.I.2. However, some still believe that his Georgics are the best work that he composed, dealing with various departments of farming. Didactic in style, these four poems shine a light on the technics of organic production in bygone days. Daily chores that relate to crop farming, vine plants, herds and bees are described in technical language. Everywhere some type of symbolism finds expression in the poems. Richard F. Thomas averred that “the Georgics is perhaps the most difficult, certainly the most controversial, poem in Roman Literature…” (Virgil: Georgics, Vol.1, Cambridge Press: 1988; p.16). Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Canadian Conservatism, a Coroner’s Report

Posted on March 31, 2021 by leslie

Janus, credit Wikipedia

Canadian Conservatism, a Coroner’s Report

by Mark Wegierski

Canada today, despite its great over-all wealth, is a society of contrasts. While the problem of Quebec separatism which was so central in Canadian history since the 1960s may be fading, new challenges are arising. While Canada is still, to a large extent, a more pleasant place to live than the United States (especially when one compares life in the two countries’ large cities), there are issues looming on the horizon which could present severe challenges to a safe, civil, prosperous life – the permanence of which all too many Canadians today take for granted.

There are a number of significant differences between the Canadian and American societies today, which may have a profound impact on the type of future the countries will have. In the years 2006 to 2015, Canada had a federal Conservative government, while during most of that time, Obama was President of the United States. This was a fairly unusual situation whereby the U.S. arguably had a more left-liberal government than Canada. The comparative fiscal discipline of the Harper Conservatives was striking, when viewed against the fiscal profligacy of the Obama Administration. Liberal Justin Trudeau has been Prime Minister of Canada since 2015, whereas Donald Trump was President of the United States from 2016 to 2020. There appears to be very little prospect of a Trump-like figure arising in Canada. The victory of Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential election created enormous volatility and unpredictability in U.S. politics. However, he was defeated in 2020, in an election that was extremely close in the crucial battleground states. Now that Joe Biden is President, an attempt to enact a revolutionary transformation of America that will forever keep the Republicans out of power at the federal level may be in prospect. Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

American Foreign Policy Destroyed South Africa

Posted on March 29, 2021 by leslie

Edmund Burke, studio of Sir Joshua Reynolds, oil on canvas, (1767-1769)

American Foreign Policy Destroyed South Africa

by Ilana Mercer

Certain national-conservative governments in East Europe should be natural allies to conservative policy makers, stateside, if such unicorns existed. Vladimir Putin’s, for example. Before his death, from the safety of exile, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, one of Russia’s bravest and most brilliant sons, praised Putin’s efforts to revive Russia’s traditional Christian and moral heritage. For example:

In October 2010, it was announced that The Gulag Archipelago would become required reading for all Russian high-school students. In a meeting with Solzhenitsyn’s widow, Mr. Putin described The Gulag Archipelago as ‘essential reading’: ‘Without the knowledge of that book, we would lack a full understanding of our country and it would be difficult for us to think about the future.’ …

If [only] the same could be said of the high schools of the United States. (Via The Imaginative Conservative.)

The Russian president patiently tolerates America’s demented, anti-Russia monomania. And, as America sinks into the quick sands of Cultural Marxism, Putin’s inclinations are decidedly reactionary and traditionalist. He prohibited sexual evangelizing by LGBTQ activists. He comes down squarely on the side of the Russian Orthodox church, as when Pussy Riot desecrated the cathedral of Christ the Savior. The Russian leader has also welcomed as refugees persecuted white South Africans, whereas America’s successive governments won’t even officially acknowledge that they’re under threat of extermination. Also, policies to stimulate Russian birthrates have been put in place by the conservative leader. Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

ENDNOTES, APRIL 2021

Posted on March 27, 2021 by leslie

Monet, landscape on the Île Saint Martin

ENDNOTES, April 2021

In this edition: Robin Holloway and Peter Seabourne, Piano Trios, Symphonies by Robert Simpson, reviewed by Stuart Millson

Met Stars in Concert, soprano Sonya Yoncheva, streamed from the Baroque library at the Schussenried Cloister, Ulm, Germany, 27th February 2021, reviewed by Leslie Jones 

Peter Seabourne’s Piano Trio of 2018, newly recorded by the Sheva label, is an impressive, challenging, yet ultimately tonal piece of contemporary music – a work of bright, open soundscape, a piece that sits perfectly alongside the music of his teacher, Robin Holloway, whose Piano Trio (2017) also makes a thrilling addition to this new CD. The mysterious solo violin which opens the first movement (first of a series of undivided movements) grips the listener with its noble, distant beauty. The destiny of these two composers seems somehow intertwined, as if they had founded their own ‘school’.

Peter Seabourne began life as a modernist but a moment of re-evaluation and redirection led him to return from the world of the tone-shattering avant-garde to the sound-world of Britten, Tippett and Daniel Jones (the prolific mid-20th-century Welsh composer of string quartets) thence to the studio and composing-room of Robin Holloway and that region of modern music, always connected to the continuum of a recognisable Englishness. Accessible and atmospheric, Seabourne’s trio abandons complicated markings, for movements that are clearly, simply described. The third movement is just ‘Tender and poignant’, a sense of memory and of love beneath an alabaster sky, with the third movement, ‘Fast, joyous, dancing’,  the composer explaining:

‘A coda sees the reappearance of the lyrical passage from the scherzo, transformed (transfigured even) into a majestic hymn. The dance resumes and everyone scampers off over the hill.’

Continue reading →

Posted in QR Home | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

L’heure espagnole

Posted on March 25, 2021 by leslie

El Greco, View of Toledo

L’heure espagnole

Reviewed by David Truslove

‘My only mistress is music’, Maurice Ravel once remarked. Considering he was a private, even secretive composer who avoided relationships, his comic opera L’heure espagnole, with its central good-time girl, offers a rare glimpse into the composer’s humanity. The work’s sophisticated integration of Hispanic influences illustrates an affinity with Spain – inherited from his Basque-born mother. Perhaps the bawdy humour of Franc-Nohain’s 1904 play appealed to him. Whatever the attractions for Ravel, he created a wonderfully entertaining one act opera that has been superbly fashioned into a film by Grange Park Opera.

First performed at the Opéra-Comique in 1911 and originally set in 18th century Toledo, L’heure espagnole has been artfully relocated to London’s Church St. Kensington thanks to the initiative of Grange Park Opera and the ever-resourceful Wasfi Kani. She’s even provided the English surtitles. [Indeed, this work is the latest of fifty-one free to view on-line events presented by GPO in the past year.] No less enterprising is opera director Stephen Medcalf, whose film circumnavigated lockdown restrictions to enable singers to record their parts at the Wigmore Hall before miming them on location at the upmarket Howard Walwyn’s Fine Antique Clocks. Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Matters, QR Home | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Home is over Jordan

Posted on March 25, 2021 by leslie

Colin Jordan and Françoise Dior, credit National Vanguard.org

Home is over Jordan

Failed Führers ; A History of Britain’s Extreme Right, Graham Macklin, Routledge, London & New York, 2020, reviewed by Leslie Jones

Introduction

Failed Führers presents portraits in writing of ‘six principal idealogues and leaders’ from an evolving British Fascist tradition, namely, Arnold Leese (1878-1956), Sir Oswald Mosley (1896-1980), AK Chesterton (1899-1973), Colin Jordan (1923-2009), John Tyndall (1934-2005) and Nick Griffin (1959-). Graham Macklin thereby highlights the pivotal role of key individuals who enabled the far right to adapt to changing historical circumstances. For as Professor Macklin contends, there has been ‘continuity and change within the British fascist tradition’. Both pre and post war British fascists posited the preordained role of the white race and a Jewish conspiracy to engender white racial defilement. Mass immigration from the West Indies (100,000 in 1960 alone) only increased the salience of anti-black racism in neo-fascist ideology. Then in response to mass immigration from the Indian sub-continent, the BNP under Nick Griffin grafted anti-Muslim populism onto a pre-existing racial nationalist ideology.

Compared to a more conventional chronological or thematic historical perspective, Macklin’s ‘collective biographical’ approach or ‘prosopography’ has its downside. The careers and lives of his six key figures overlapped, so there is some repetition of material. Continue reading →

Posted in Book Reviews, Current Affairs and Comment, QR Home | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments