Pope meets real Catholic woman.

We was asking him while he made a deal with the Chinese government to allow them to appoint the bishops of the Church in China. Why he abandoned those that were imprisoned and persecuted for their faith.



Happy New Year to the Devils messenger on Earth.

"Two Baltimore cops charged in death of Freddie Gray sue prosecutor for defamation"

Daily Mail:  The officers allege in their suit that Mosby, who announced charges on May 1 of last year, knowingly made false statements when she alleged wrongdoing on the part of the officers.

The suit cites statements Mosby made that Porter and White knew Gray was in distress when they checked on him in the back of the transport wagon, but ignored his cries for help and did nothing to administer aid.

'These statements were defamatory because they exposed Plaintiffs to public scorn, hatred and contempt, and thereby discouraging others in the community from having a favorable opinion of, or association with, Plaintiffs,' the lawsuit says.

The Lion sleeps tonight....but in Baltimore the beat goes on....because "Black Lives Matter."

There were 42 homicides so far in the month of July in Baltimore. That matches the figure for May which they can still beat if they put their minds to it. Baltimore police have reported 185 homicides in 2015 which is a 60% increase since last year.

Baltimore has fired it's police commissioner and is prosecuted several cops who as you know were involved in the Freddie Grey case. The mayor says that the police department is much more "nimble" which means that they are much better at jumping over the pile of bodies to be found on the streets after they were pulled back by the politicians.

There is no real coverage of the ongoing events in Baltimore. Other than the local paper. You don't see it on MSNBC or CNN or any of the other usual suspects. The police are not involved in any of these deaths other than for sanitation purposes. It is strictly youte vs youte so to speak. The States Attorney can not be reached for comment as she is busy preparing her case against the police officers she indicted last month. President Obama is playing golf. The new attorney general is worried about prosecuting the whistle blowers who taped the ghouls in Planned Parenthood.

Oh yeah somebody killed a lion.

Plus Ça Change, Plus C'est La Même Choisi

link to source

As 1967 drew to a close there seemed little indication that the required massive efforts from the total American society would be toward meeting the Negroes' demands for full equality and participation, and a decent life, in an affluent society. Rather, it seemed more probable that the violent unrest in the black ghettos would be met with even more stringent police action designed to maintain 'law and order' and 'national security.' It seemed a pity that all concerned could not heed what might have been a warning by the late George Bernard Shaw. 'Security, the chief pretense of civilization, cannot exist where the worst of dangers, the danger of poverty, hangs over everyone's head,' Shaw wrote. 'All other crimes are virtues beside it...It degrades the poor and infects with its degradation the whole neighborhood in which they live. And whatever can degrade a neighborhood can degrade a country and a continent and finally a whole civilization.' Hoyt W. Fuller, The Black Temper (1968)

Fuller, who was black, wrote that piece about American race riots up to 1967, the year before Time's chosen date of similitude, 1968. The unrest did get worse the next year but then it got better.

Fuller quotes George Bernard Shaw, from a play called Major Barbara. The play is a polemic, and probably relevant today, especially for those arguing for a general redistribution of wealth, like George Bernie Sanders. The fuller Shaw quote is:

Security, the chief pretence of civilization, cannot exist where the worst of dangers, the danger of poverty, hangs over everyone's head, and where the alleged protection of our persons from violence is only an accidental result of the existence of a police force whose real business is to force the poor man to see his children starve whilst idle people overfeed pet dogs with the money that might feed and clothe them. Link

I had the oddest thought while reflecting on this. Most of the nation's worst race riots have occurred under  Democratic Administrations: the 1943 riots in Detroit; the 1964 riots in Harlem; the Watts riots in 1965; the Chicago and Cleveland riots in 1966; the Boston, Newark, and Detroit riots in 1967; and finally, riots in the aftermath of MLK's assassination. To borrow a page from the President's approach to Cuba:

In the most significant changes in our policy in more than fifty years, we will end an outdated approach that, for decades, has failed to advance our interests, and instead we will begin to...

Relieve Tension, Three Times Daily

The month of May is here. We didn't always call it that though:

May corresponded with Anglo-Saxon Ðrimilcemonað, 'month of three milkings'. "So called because in this month the cattle were milked three times a day,' comments Bede, 'such was the fertility of Britain or Germany, from whence the English nation came to Britain.'

Parsing the word Ðrimilcemonað is easy in German: Drei/Milche/Monat => three/milk/month

Speaking of cows and milk, EBL's blog has a great round up of Baltimore-related links, including the legal blogs.

EBL's masthead is an H.L. Mencken quote:

I write in order to attain that feeling of tension relieved and function achieved which a cow enjoys on giving milk. 

H.L. Mencken was of course closely associated with Baltimore and its greatest newspaper, The Baltimore Sun.

[Added] The faces of the accused at EBL.  More than three milkings per diem!

KLEM FM

Curtis Mayfield's "Freddie's Dead:"

link in case the video doesn't load

Too soon?