Today -100: April 9, 1911: Of non-dancing rabbis and dancing nihilists

At the annual encampment (reunion, I guess) of the G.A.R. (Grand Army of the Republic), Dept of the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida, now taking place in Georgia, three black attendees were dragged from their hotel by a mob in the middle of the night, whipped and made to leave town.

Three black men are lynched in Georgia in one incident, and one in another.

Lots of competition for Headline of the Day -100: “Rabbis Condemn Dancing.” “Nihilists Dance to Aid Refugees.” “French Now Drink Tea.” “‘I Shave Myself,’ Says Taft.” “Queen Forbids Kissing.” (The queen of Spain doesn’t want her children, or anyone else’s, kissed, on hygienic grounds.)

Headline of the Day That Sounds Dirty But Isn’t -100: “DETECTIVE DONS SKIRTS.; Zavat, Disguised as a Woman, Traps a Black-Hander.”

Today -100: April 8, 1911: Of dinner at the White House

“President Taft has adopted a unique method of meeting the new members of the Senate.” He will have them all over for dinner. Trust Taft to come up with a food-based solution to a logistical problem.

Remember Caleb Powers, the new Republican member of Congress from Kentucky who was elected in 1910 despite his involvement in the assassination of Gov. William Goebel in 1900? Well, the 9 Democratic congresscritters from KY are all refusing to serve alongside him on any congressional committee, effectively keeping him off any committee of interest to his constituents.

Today -100: April 7, 1911: Of peace talks, women on planes, the 9th Cavalry, and a non-lynching

Peace talks in the Mexican Revolution break off. Pres. Díaz refused to resign.

For the first time ever, an airplane carries not one but two women passengers.

There’s been much confusion about orders for those negro 9th Cavalry troops. For now they’ll be staying in San Antonio, after vigorous protests from various towns they were going to be coming through and forcible representations to Pres. Taft by local congresscritter John Nance Garner (FDR’s vice president). One of the towns objecting to the proposed deployment was Brownsville, where there was a similar incident with black troops in 1906. Just as these 1911 reports of running battles in San Antonio seem to come down one actual incident of a black soldier punching a street car conductor and running off, hugely exaggerated by panicky white folks, in 1906 in Brownsville, hostility between townspeople and black troops culminated in the former claiming the troops had shot up the town and planting spent shells as evidence. When none of the troops ‘fessed up, because they hadn’t done anything, Pres. Roosevelt dishonorably discharging all 167 troops in an impetuous act of collective punishment.

A White Plains, NY policeman saves a black man who slashed a trolley conductor during a fare dispute from being lynched, holding off a mob of 200 with his gun.

Daily Telegraphy: gay cavemen and fascist cakes

Telegraph Headline of the Day: “First Homosexual Caveman Found.” (A Czech archaeologist is over-interpreting her evidence, if you ask me).

Poor Baby of the Day: “Nick Clegg: I Cry to Music and Even My Sons Ask Why Everyone Hates Me.”

Note to Antonio, Alberto and Miguel Clegg: because your father is a git.

Confectionaries of the Day: “Nazi Cakes Cause Outrage.” A bakery in Austria makes them:



Always trying to take over the Sudetenmuffins.

Today -100: April 6, 1911: Justice McKenna’s potty mouth

The first Socialist member of Congress, Victor Berger, introduces a resolution calling for Taft to submit to Congress all reports, papers etc on which he based the order for troops to be mobilized on the Mexican border, and calling for their withdrawal.

Scenes from the Supreme Court -100: a lawyer was trying to explain to the justices what a railway conductor meant when he told an engineer, “Oh, h--, back up.” Associate Justice Joseph McKenna enquired, “Did he mean what was once expressed by the slang phrase, ‘Oh, cheese it’?” “Exactly,” the lawyer replied.

Headline of the Day -100: “Aroused About Pussy.”

No finger pointing

Obama, asked who the American people should blame ifwhen there is a government shutdown: “I don’t think the American people are interested in blaming somebody.” He don’t know us very well, do he?

WHAT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE AREN’T INTERESTED IN: “They’re not interested in finger pointing and neither am I.”


WHAT HE’S NOT WILLING TO DO: “But what we’re not willing to do is to go out there and say we’re going to cut another 60,000 head slot starts -- Head Start slots.” Now I’m going to be worried the rest of the day about those 60,000 head slot starts.

Today -100: April 5, 1911: Of new speakers, insurgents, socialists, and the 9th Cavalry

The new Congress convenes. The D’s, now in charge of the House, elect a new Speaker, James Beauchamp “Champ” Clark of Missouri. The 1912 presidential election is well and truly under way, since Clark will do his best to derail Taft’s legislative agenda while attempting to make himself the leading D candidate (and coming fairly close). For example, this is a special session, called by Taft for the sole purpose of passing his tariff reciprocity treaty with Canada, but Clark, giving a speech on his plans for the session, failed even to mention reciprocity, instead talking about lowering tariffs, popular election of senators, statehood for Arizona and New Mexico, etc etc.

Insurgent Republican senators demand from their party leadership, and get, ¼ of the Republican seats on all important Senate committees, with those members decided not by the party but by themselves. This means that if insurgents join with Democrats, they will be able to outvote the old guard Republicans (there are 50 R’s and 41 D’s in the Senate).

In local elections in Milwaukee, which has been run by Socialists for a year now, the Catholic Social Union fields candidates for the school board, though less Catholic than anti-socialist (there’s only one actual Catholic among the Catholic Social Union candidates who win 3 of the 5 contested seats). Women’s votes were evidently instrumental in the Socialist defeat, and for that of the socialists in Wichita.

On the other hand, Socialist John Menton is elected mayor of Flint, Michigan, and other socialists are elected aldermen, supervisors, and to other city positions there.

The Standard Oil Company issues a denial that it is financing the revolt in Mexico.

John Trower, reputed to be the richest negro in America, dies, purportedly leaving an estate of $1.5 million.

The Massachusetts Legislature defeats women’s suffrage by 161 to 69.

The Army is claiming that the decision to send the 9th Cavalry to patrol the desert had nothing to do with any fights with conductors over San Antonio’s Jim Crow laws. But another racial problem has developed: one of the colonels in the Illinois National Guard contingent of the border buildup is a... wait for it... negro. However, “Illinois Guardsmen are loyal soldiers, and despite their heart-burnings at having a colored man accompany them as their ranking office they gave no outward evidence of their chagrin.” What stoicism. Privately, some of the white Illinois officers said “that Gov. Deneen made a diplomatic mistake” in choosing him. Col. John Marshall, who was born a slave, was the first black colonel in the US Army, serving in the Spanish-American War, when his presence also pissed off white officers.

A NYT editorial blames the kerfuffle in San Antonio on white people selling whisky to black soldiers, but also on the incongruity between Jim Crow laws and soldiers “entitled to the respect deserved by one trained and ready to sacrifice his life in the defense of the Nation”. The obvious solution, the Times suggests, is to get rid of... negro soldiers. What, you thought they were going to say the Jim Crow laws? “They are good soldiers, as everybody admits, and as they have many times proved in both peace and war, but somehow they do not fit in well with the Nature of Things as They Are.”

Funny names and sport killing

An Army investigation has conveniently concluded that no one high up is in any way responsible for the “kill team” that murdered Afghan civilians for shits and giggles and gruesome souvenirs, not even the brigade’s commander, a Col. Harry D. Tunnell IV, and... okay, I’m not even gonna try to hide that one reason I’m blogging this is because of my, you know, moral outrage and whatnot, but the larger reason is that I find the names of pretty much everyone involved so darned entertaining, starting with Spc. Jeremy “The plan was to kill people” Morlock, who has already been convicted for his role.

Anyway, Harry Tunnell the Fourth was known, well before he was sent to Afghanistan, when the unit was training in the States under... wait for it... Brig. Gen. Randy Dragon, for his contempt for the Army’s stated policy of protecting civilians and winning hearts & minds™, preferring a policy of “search and destroy.” But the investigation, led by one Brig. Gen. Twitty, could find “no causal relation” with the fact that his men went out and did exactly that. Nevertheless, Harry Tunnell the Fourth is getting a jolly stern letter of admonition. His boss, Brig. Gen. Frederick Hodges (who somehow escaped being assigned a Wodehousian name) says, “I should have specifically told him that MG Carter and I had lost confidence in his ability to command from his failure to follow instructions and intent.” You know what would better than specifically telling someone that you have no confidence in their ability to command because of their failure to follow instructions? Not leaving them in charge of a bunch of heavily armed hash-smokers in a foreign country.

Oh, and that MG Carter was the commander of allied forces in southern Afghanistan, Major General Nick Carter, detective.

Today -100: April 4, 1911: Of disgraces, DMV lines, loyal resolutions, and Jim Crow Texas-style

Teddy Roosevelt gives a speech in Reno, attacking Reno. He calls the divorce colony there a disgrace.

NY gets its first DMV offices (previously, you had to send to Albany for automobile registration). On the first day, it took 15 minutes on average.

Mexican Vice President Ramon Corral requests a leave of absence so he can go to Europe. For his health. Yeah, that’s it, for his health.

Oh, okay, I’ve looked it up and he had pancreatic cancer.

King George will be visiting Dublin soon. The Corporation of Dublin considered adopting a loyal resolution to mark the occasion, but decided not to.

Headline of the Day -100: “Taft Orders Negroes Out of San Antonio.” Specifically, the Ninth Cavalry, a negro regiment. Evidently they’ve been resisting the Jim Crow laws segregating street cars. The Ninth will be sent to patrol the Mexican border. In the desert. As far from cities as possible.

Great theological debates of our times

Pastor Terry Jones “promised in September not to set fire to the book, then he and his congregation discussed shredding, shooting, or dunking it in water instead.”

Wherein is revealed what no religion tolerates

Obama condemns Pastor Terry Jones’s burning of a Koran: “The desecration of any holy text, including the Koran, is an act of extreme intolerance and bigotry.” Intolerance and bigotry, yes, and I would add willful ignorance and dickishness, but the disposal of a, you know, book doesn’t seem to enter “extreme” territory, which is firmly held by the Afghans busy slaughtering actual humans others (with a little side-trip to a girls’ high school, which you will no doubt be surprised to hear was burned).

Obama condemns that as well: “No religion tolerates the slaughter and beheading of innocent people,” adding, “unless they’re a witch or a heretic or a Jew or something, but those people aren’t innocent according to those religions, because they’re witches or heretics or Jews or something.”

Today -100: April 3, 1911: Of ambushes and race wars

In French Guinea, a force of French soldiers sent to capture the Sultan of Goumbra to stop his anti-French activities and, allegedly, to suppress slavery, is ambushed, with 14 killed. They respond with machine guns, killing 300. Always nice to see a humanitarian mission in action.

Some sort of ongoing race war in Laurel, Delaware, no idea why.

Francisco Madero says he doesn’t trust President Díaz’s promises and that the insurrectos will not lay down their arms until the 1910 elections are declared void and new, free elections, with no literacy requirement, have taken place. He says he really doesn’t want American military intervention but trusts that it will never happen: “I have too high an opinion of the United States government to fear an unjust war.” Isn’t that just adorable?

Daily Telegraphy: Poetic justice

A quote I didn’t expect ever to see: “There is a very moral code in prison when it comes to poetry”. A prisoner at Her Majesty’s Prison Norwich submitted a Philip Larkin poem as his own work to the prison magazine’s poetry contest.

Another Telegraph story featured this oddly unthreatening quote: “I’m just going to go in and hit anyone who comes in my way.” Today was International Pillow Fight Day (motto: The first rule of International Pillow Fight Day is you do not talk about International Pillow Fight Day).

Zamkowy Square, Warsaw:


Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall, Taipei:


Sofia:


São Paulo:


Zurich:


Union Square, NY:


Brandenburg Gate, Berlin:

Straight Line of the Day

Libyan government spokesmodel Moussa Ibrahim rejects the idea of a cease-fire, saying, “If this is not mad, I don’t know what it is.”

Today -100: April 2, 1911: Of brigandage, dry Indians, and census boycotts

Canada has sent immigration agents to the Caribbean to recruit servants. However, “negresses” at $5 a month is one thing. African-American farmers who said fuck it to Jim Crow laws in Oklahoma and tried to move to Canada are evidently another thing entirely and have been turned back on spurious grounds.

Beleaguered Mexican President Porfirio Díaz makes a speech to Congress promising various reforms, including no reelection of current high officials (his term has only 5 years and 9 months left in it, by which time he’ll be 86), land reform, an independent judiciary, etc. He says the rebellion is confined to three states and the disorder elsewhere is mere “brigandage.”

Conflict of interest rules not so strict in 1911: Ohio Governor Judson Harmon will appear as a private lawyer before the Supreme Court on behalf of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad Company in a lawsuit he was involved with before taking office.

The District of Columbia’s excise commissioner orders that liquor not be sold to Native Americans unless they can prove they are American citizens.

British suffragettes plan to boycott the 1911 census.

Achieving unity in South America

Hugo Chavez went to Bolivia yesterday. When he arrived, he only looked a little bit silly.


That would never do.

Chavez said, “I take the opportunity to reaffirm the determination, which grows stronger every day, of achieving unity in South America.” For example, here he is achieving unity with Evo Morales.


What do you have to chew to be able to wear such an outfit in public? Coca leaves.


Lots of coca leaves.

Way to stick it to the man

Barbara Boxer and other Senate D’s are sponsoring a measure to ensure that if the government shuts down, members of Congress and the president are not paid their salaries. Sigh.

This same provision was included on a ballot proposition here in California in November, the faux populist sauce to make passing a budget by a mere majority in the Legislature more palatable to sceptical Californians. Here was my argument against: This is precisely the same thing, morally speaking, as offering legislators a bribe in a brown paper bag in a parking garage: it is an economic incentive to vote a certain way. Any politician this would work on is not worthy of holding public office. It would put a coercive weapon in the hands of obstructionist wealthy legislators to use against any of their brethren who might actually need their pay. Do we really want to drive out of politics everyone who isn’t a multi-millionaire?

(Also, it would be unconstitutional: the Constitution says the pay of a president cannot be altered during his term, and the 27th Amendment says the same for Congress.)

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Ten UN workers massacred in Afghanistan (and 5 Afghans). It’s Pastor Terry Jones’s fault. Just had to burn a Koran. Jones denies any culpability.

Today -100: April 1, 1911: Of Ringlings

Otto Ringling, one of the circus brothers, dies. What a great name. Say it out loud with me: Otto Ringling Otto Ringling Otto Ringling.

Also, some stuff happened in Mexico but I don’t know what and the NY Legislature finally named a new senator but I don’t know who because the NYT scans were totally unreadable.

It’s a very problematic situation

The US issues a warning that it will bomb anyone in Libya, government or rebel, who kills civilians. Or as a spokesmodel puts it, “whether pro-Qaddafi or pro-opposition.”

“Pro-opposition?” Don’t the positive and negative in that phrase cancel each other out?

And we will do so because UN Security Council Resolution 1973 applies to both sides. Of course so does Resolution 1970, the arms embargo on Libya, but we’re still planning to arm the rebels (I assume we actually already are).

But who counts as a civilian? In the past, ambassador to the UN Susan Rice refused to say whether rebels were civilians or combatants. And it’s not like there’s an official rebel army that people enlist in, put on a uniform, and serve in for the duration (when such un-uniformed irregulars fight American forces in Iraq or Afghanistan, we call them “unlawful combatants”).

And on the other side, the Libyan government is handing out assault weapons to pro-Qaddafi civilians, further confusing the definition of “civilian,” which some might consider a problem, since the only stated rationale for Operation Turd Sandwich is the protection of civilians. Obama in his speech Monday said that our military activities (i.e., blowing shit up) have no broader goals. An anonymous “legal adviser to the military campaign” says that Libyans “are so intermixed that it is not feasible to discern where the boundary between the civilians and opposition forces lie”. “There are also those civilians entitled to protection that may be armed in order to protect their families, homes, businesses, and communities. Other civilians may join the rebels at certain stages, becoming armed combatants, and then decide to return home for whatever reason, thus transitioning back to civilian non-combatants.” General Carter Ham, proud possessor of the WASPiest name in all Christendom, said “it’s not a clear distinction, because we’re not talking about a regular military force — it’s a very problematic situation.” These are admissions that the just-protecting-civilians rationale is effectively meaningless.

And what does it mean for the Libyans? Basically, if civilians and combatants are mixed together, as they are everywhere, neither side can attack territory held by the other side without fouling afoul of Resolution 1973. So stalemate forever, and effective division of Libya, is that our policy?

(Update: IOZ notes the natural extension of threat to bomb anyone who kills civilians.) (Belgium has it coming; I’ve always said so.)

(Update updated: Glenn Greenwald comment on Twitter: “We sit in the sky, over Libya, threatening to shoot lighting bolts at anyone who sins.”)

Today -100: March 31, 1911: Of arbitration, funerals, Christian names

German Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg says that universal arbitration and universal disarmament are impossible ideals.

NYC Mayor Gaynor decides that the city will bury any unclaimed Triangle fire bodies. The Women’s Trade Union League and the Waistmakers’ Union have each been trying to claim them. The union also wants a parade. Er, procession.

The mother of one of the dead girls claims that $1,600 was robbed from her daughter’s body (okay, that seems like a lot, but most of these immigrant girls had never heard of banks and did carry their savings hidden on their persons).

The Russian Orthodox Church issues a ban on Jews having Christian first names.