One more thing



And one more thing:

Quisquis huc accedes
Quod tibi horrendum videtur
Mihi amoenum est
Si dilectat maneas
Si taedat abeas
Utrumque gratum


You who come here
Whoever you are
What may seem horrible to you
Is fine for me
If you like it stay
If it bores you go
I couldn’t care less.


(From the inscription that appears in Latin on a marble plaque at the entrance to Cardinal Chigi’s 17th century Villa Cetinale, at Sovicelli in Tuscany, discovered and translated by John Julius Norwich in “Still More Christmas Crackers – 1990-1999,” [Viking, Penguin Group UK]).




Sunday, March 13, 2016

IS = Ignoble Savages



                                                  Let IS stand for Ignoble Savages

             
 The vast majority of Muslims who abhor the behavior of the so-called Islamic State must be horrified -- as everyone should be --that the jihadists are allowed to call themselves the Islamic State or that leaders of the so-called civilized world legitimize the rude misnomer by calling the group the Islamic State. In the U.S. the difference is only that the government insists on calling it the Islamic State in the Levant (ISIL) and others call it the Islamic State in Syria (ISIS).
 So here’s an idea: Keep the acronyms ISIS and ISIL but let IS stand for something more accurately reflective of the barbarity of these men who are murderers and rapists, pillagers, plunderers and desecraters. Let’s say that IS stands instead for Ignoble Savages – Ignoble Savages in the Levant and Ignoble Savages in Syria, Ignoble Savages, pure and simple. That’s what they are wherever they are.

Thursday, March 10, 2016

A Mencken Song



     After my Mencken column appeared in The Baltimore Sun February 19, I received a message from Christine Lavin, a New York based folk singer who shared with me her song based on some Mencken quotes all relevant to this year’s political campaigns. Great song, great video.
As follows:


Christine’s website is: