```

```

~~ French Fries

July 13, 1854 was the Battle of Guaymas wherein Mexican forces stopped a so called Filibuster by a freebooter named Gaston de Raousset-Boulbon. Like William Walker this guy was just a brigand, pirate or freebooter. Somehow these jackasses came to be called Filibusters: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filibuster (military)

A filibuster or freebooter, in the context of foreign policy, is someone who engages in an (at least nominally) unauthorized military expedition into a foreign country or territory to foment or support a revolution. The term is usually used to describe United States citizens who fomented insurrections in Latin America, particularly in the mid-19th century (Texas, California, Cuba, Nicaragua, Colombia). Filibuster expeditions have also occasionally been used as cover for government-approved deniable operations.
Filibusters are irregular soldiers who normally act without official authority from their own government, and are generally motivated by financial gain, political ideology, or the thrill of adventure.

What this really means is that they are technically Brigands or Outlaws (homo sacer), so beyond the pale that "every man's hand shall be raised against them". From Roman common law up through the so called laws of warfare, they have no rights under any laws anywhere at any time. That is, unless they live in lawless states which turn a blind eye on their depredations abroad in the hope that they may acquire colonies or vassal states without having to stage an invasion of their own, like occurred in Hawaii.

Unfortunately, since the forties, they are all too often CIA agents, operatives or assets, US Presidents, and other disreputable people who are nonetheless granted covert protection by the US government and who may even be given overt protection by the US government.

On this day in history:

587 BC – Babylon's siege of Jerusalem ended after the destruction of Solomon's Temple.

1787 – The Continental Congress enacted the Northwest Ordinance setting governing rules for the Northwest Territory. It also established procedures for admitting new states .

1793 – Jean-Paul Marat was assassinated in his bathtub by Charlotte Corday

1830 – The Scottish Church College, was founded by Alexander Duff and Raja Ram Mohan Roy, in Calcutta, India.

1854 – In the Battle of Guaymas, Mexico, General José María Yáñez stopped a freebooter invasion led by Count Gaston de Raousset-Boulbon.

1863 – In New York City, opponents of conscription begin three days of rioting which would be later regarded as the worst in US history in the Treaty of Berlin

1878 – The European powers redrew the map of he Balkans. Serbia, Montenegro and Romania become completely independent of the Ottoman Empire.

1919 – The British airship R34 landed in Norfolk, England, completing the first airship return journey across the Atlantic in 182 hours of flight.

1956 – The first conference on artificial intelligence took place at Dartmouth.

1962 – Harold Macmillan dismissed seven members of his Cabinet

1973 – Alexander Butterfield revealed the existence of a secret Oval Office taping system to investigators for the Senate Watergate Committee.

1985 – The Live Aid benefit concert took place

1985 – Vice President George H. W. Bush became the Acting President for the day when President Ronald Reagan had surgery to remove polyps from his colon. Sadly, they left his head up there.

2011 – Mumbai was rocked by three bomb blasts during the evening rush hour

Some people who were born on this day:

Convenience is the American way.

~~ Cheech Marin

100 BC – Julius Caesar, politician and cutlery collector
1527 – John Dee, mathematician, astronomer, and astrologer
1579 – Arthur Dee, physician and chemist
1607 – Wenceslaus Hollar, painter and illustrator
1756 – Thomas Rowlandson, artist and caricaturist
1793 – John Clare, poet and author
1863 – Margaret Murray, archaeologist, anthropologist, historian, and folklorist
1892 – Léo-Pol Morin, pianist, composer, and educator
1900 – George Lewis, clarinet player and songwriter
1908 – Tim Spencer, country & western singer-songwriter and actor
1913 – Dave Garroway, journalist and television personality
1915 – Kaoru Ishikawa, author and educator , quality circles & fishbone diagrams
1918 – Ronald Bladen, painter and sculptor
1918 – Marcia Brown, author and illustrator
1923 – Ashley Bryan, children's book author and illustrator
1928 – Al Rex, musician
1934 – Wole Soyinka, author, poet, and playwright,
1936 – Albert Ayler, saxophonist and composer
1940 – Paul Prudhomme, chef and author
1942 – Roger McGuinn, singer, songwriter, and guitarist
1946 – Cheech Marin, actor and comedian
1948 – Catherine Breillat, director and screenwriter
1954 – Louise Mandrell, singer, songwriter, and actress
1956 – Mark Mendoza, bass player and songwriter
1960 – Ian Hislop, journalist and screenwriter
1962 – Rhonda Vincent, singer, songwriter, and mandolin player
1964 – Paul Thorn, singer, songwriter, and guitarist
1965 – Eileen Ivers, fiddler
1966 – Gerald Levert, singer,songwriter, producer, and actor
1974 – Deborah Cox, singer,songwriter, and actress
1984 – Ida Maria, singer, songwriter, and guitarist
1988 – Tulisa, English singer, songwriter, and actress
1989 – Leon Bridges, singer, songwriter, and record producer

Some people who died on this day:

The most important thing for everyone in Gringolandia is to have ambition and become 'somebody,' and frankly, I don't have the least ambition to become anybody.

~~ Frida Kahlo

1628 – Robert Shirley, soldier and diplomat
1762 – James Bradley, priest and astronomer
1893 – Young Man Afraid of His Horses, Oglala Lakota chief
1896 – August Kekulé, chemist and academic
1921 – Gabriel Lippmann, physicist and academic,
1934 – Mary E. Byrd, astronomer and academic
1946 – Alfred Stieglitz, photographer and curator
1949 – Walt Kuhn, painter and academic
1951 – Arnold Schoenberg, composer and painter
1954 – Frida Kahlo, painter and educator
1960 – Joy Davidman, poet and author
1974 – Patrick Blackett, Baron Blackett, physicist and academic,
1979 – Ludwig Merwart, Austrian painter and illustrator
2003 – Compay Segundo, singer, songwriter, and guitarist
2010 – Manohari Singh, saxophonist and composer
2017 – Liu Xiaobo, literary critic, human rights activist, and philosopher

Some Holidays, Holy Days, Festivals, Feast Days, Days of Recognition, and such:

It is National French Fries Day.
It is also National French Fry Day (one french fry? who does that?)
Beyond that, it is Gruntled Workers Day, and, coincidentally enough
Fool's Paradise Day

Today's Tunes

Live Aid

George Lewis
```

```
-

Al Rex
```

```
-

Albert Ayler
```

```

Roger McGuinn
```

```
-

Louise Mandrell
```

```
-

-
Rhonda Vincent
```

```
-

Paul Thorn
```

```
-

Eileen Ivers
```

```

-
Ida Maria
```

```
-

Leon Bridges

```

```
-

Compay Segundo
```

```
-

Manohari Singh

-
```

```

-

-

Ok, it's an open thread, so it's up to you folks now. What's on your mind?

Cross posted from http://caucus99percent.com

open thread, french fries, live aid, Rofer McGuinn, Louise Mandrell, Compay Segundo