Dog Days

According to the National Weather Service: The “dog days of summer” is a phrase used to describe the hot and humid days of summer. It can be traced back thousands of years to the days of the Roman Empire. It refers to the dates from July 3 through August 11, which is 20 days prior and 20 days after the star Sirius rises and falls in conjunction with the sun. Sirius was known as the “Dog Star,” because it is the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major (Large Dog).

The name Sirius comes from an ancient Greek word for “scorching” or “glowing.” Plus, Sirius is the brightest star visible from Earth, and it’s visible from both hemispheres. Also, it’s the brightest star in the evening sky during the Northern Hemisphere winter... Sirius is behind the sun as seen from Earth during the Northern Hemisphere summer. Then, in late summer, it appears in the east before sunrise, near the sun in our sky. ... And then, it traveled across the sky with the sun all day. Thus, early stargazers might have imagined a double-whammy from Sirius and the sun caused the hot weather.

The Best Laid Plans Oft Go Awry

The plans have long been laid, even wiki shines a weak light...
Wolfowitz Doctrine is an unofficial name given to the initial version of the Defense Planning Guidance for the 1994–1999 fiscal years (dated February 18, 1992) published by U.S. Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Paul Wolfowitz and his deputy Scooter Libby. Not intended for public release, it was leaked to the New York Times on March 7, 1992, and sparked a public controversy about U.S. foreign and defense policy. The document was widely criticized as imperialist, as the document outlined a policy of unilateralism and pre-emptive military action to suppress potential threats from other nations and prevent dictatorships from rising to superpower status.

What the Folk?

I'm off at a Georgia State Park with some music buddies. Our focus in this gathering is singing. If you know lots of songs, you have to play and sing them regularly in order to keep them resident in your mind. However, it is easy to lose some over the years, so our goal is to reclaim those songs and reinforce the songs we do know. People like to classify music based on genre. I've been called an old time, bluegrass, country, and folk musician. I prefer the folk label which is so broad as to include a variety of music.

Paris Burns and the West Wanes

Seems to me the western system is in absolute collapse. The corrupt deep state has failed to control and rule the world despite their best (and continuing) efforts. The Ukraine grift machine keeps on churning...money in and paybacks out...the big guy gets 10% after all. New evidence of China/ Biden crime family payouts are mounting. Meanwhile Europe is in chaos with protests in many countries besides France. My guess is we'll throw Europe under the bus as we often do our allies.

Macron was actually dancing at an Elton John concert rather than fiddling while Paris is burning.

Patriotism?

What is patriotism? The standard dictionary definition reads “love of one’s country.” However, it seems that patriotism is often confused with nationalism.

Nationalism is about power: its adherent wants to acquire as much power and prestige as possible for his nation, in which he submerges his individuality. While nationalism is accordingly aggressive, patriotism is defensive: it is a devotion to a particular place and a way of life one thinks best, but has no wish to impose on others (Orwell 1968, 362)

Based on Orwell's definition, the US is full of nationalists rather than patriots. I like the idea of loyalty to place. I think America the Beautiful would be a better national anthem celebrating our natural beauty rather than our bombs bursting in air.

America
A Poem for July 4.
1904 version

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!

The Culture of Incompetence

It seems to me that incompetence reigns supreme across the government, corporate, and economic spectrum...at least here in the western world. The sad state of the US with its crumbling infrastructure, the mass of homeless people camping on urban outskirts, overcrowded prisons swelled beyond their capacity, schools more concerned with identity issues than education, (and I'm sure you can add to the list)...all as we send our wealth over seas to feed failing war(s) and the unquenchable MIC. The post WWII industrial powerhouse has been shipped out of the country, a deal sealed by Clinton's NAFTA. Ross Perot was right about the "giant sucking sound" NAFTA would create. I remember just a couple of decades ago it was easy to find a carpentry crew, mechanics, welders, and other skilled trades people, but not today. It seems we no longer train craftsmen and women.

Cointelpro Continues

On March 8, 1971, a cab driver, a day care provider, and two professors broke into an FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania, and stole more than 1,000 classified documents that they then mailed anonymously to several U.S. papers. They were members of the Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI. They selected the night of the “Fight of the Century,” the boxing match between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier, when most people would be glued to their radios. The documents revealed the FBI’s Counter Intelligence Program — COINTELPRO — which was a series of covert, and often illegal, activity. The FBI conducted surveillance, infiltration, discreditation, and the disruption of domestic political organizations — including actions that led to murder.

The FBI began COINTELPRO—short for Counterintelligence Program—in 1956 to disrupt the activities of the Communist Party of the United States. In the 1960s, it was expanded to include a number of other domestic groups, such as the Ku Klux Klan, the Socialist Workers Party, and the Black Panther Party.
Recently we've had the revelations of the Twitter files and the role of the FBI, CIA, etc in the Censorship Industrial Complex, the Durham report which makes clear the collusion between the DNC and FBI, and now the testimony of FBI whistleblowers in Congress describing FBI involvement in the Jan. 6 incident (and more). Sure seems to me Cointelpro 2.0 is alive and well.

But the Globalist Grab Continues

The bulk of the analysts I respect blame Ukraine for the dam destruction. Col. Macgregor suggests it was the result of collective damage from Ukrainian shelling and a natural failure. I'll post the various views below the fold. However, everyone is in agreement that the Russians are wiping out the counter offensive troops, arms, and equipment in massive attacks. Russia has taken the gloves off, and the west has run out of replacements, but not arrogance. The globalist grab continues along many dimension from Kerry calling for a reduction in cattle farming to the EU and WHO planning on requiring digital ID's and passports. And finally we have Trump's indictments on charges identical to what Biden has been caught doing storing classified documents in various unsecured locations (like his garage). Do these idiots not understand turn about will be fair play and the Biden crime family will be next?

Creating (Evermore) Control

There's a power grab in plain sight...easy to see for those who look. There's the rapid move toward government controlled digital currency to track your every purchase. TPTB are passing "no protests allowed laws" in some countries. The UN is creating a preponderance of new health regulations in addition to their "Pandemic Treaty". The so called "Green Movement" has become yet another means of control as they require the sale of farmland, dictate the car you can drive, and want to corral you into "15 minute cities". All the levers of control are being driven by a complicit media propaganda megaphone. The Censorship Industrial Complex silences those who reveal their lies with Julian as the most obvious case, and many other examples we'll discuss below fold...

I'm in Florida at the nation's longest running state folk festival. It is held at Stephen Foster State Park in White Springs on the Suwannee River.

The Florida Folk Festival began with the music: It was 1953, and Pete Seeger and the Weavers had a big hit with Leadbelly’s “Goodnight, Irene.” Folk music was exploding with acoustic guitar, coffee houses, banjos, beatniks and sing-alongs. Now some 70 years later, the Florida Folk Festival is still held every Memorial Day weekend, and you’re sure to hear plenty of folk music. But the event has broadened to celebrate Florida’s land, people and diverse cultural heritage. In addition to a full schedule of performances, you’ll find plenty to amuse and educate. The festival focuses on traditional crafts — everything from split rail fences to henna tattoos. And the food is not the same-as-everywhere festival food. Look for blue crab burritos, Jamaican patties, shrimp gumbo or Beulah Baptist Church’s chicken and dumplings dinner.

This year's schedule at the link.