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Commenter Lord Jeff Sessions writes:
The Zeroth Amendment was carved into our constitution in 1789 by founding father Emma Lazarus. It also has a commemorative plaque on the Statue of Immigration (original name: Liberty Inviting the World).
BTW, here is Thomas Bailey Aldrich’s very iSteveish poem from the Atlantic Monthly in 1892:
WIDE open and unguarded stand our gates,
Named of the four winds, North, South, East, and West;
Portals that lead to an enchanted land
Of cities, forests, fields of living gold,
Vast prairies, lordly summits touched with snow,
Majestic rivers sweeping proudly past
The Arab’s date-palm and the Norseman’s pine—
A realm wherein are fruits of every zone,
Airs of all climes, for, lo! throughout the year
The red rose blossoms somewhere—a rich land,
A later Eden planted in the wilds,
With not an inch of earth within its bound
But if a slave’s foot press it sets him free.
Here, it is written, Toil shall have its wage,
And Honor honor, and the humblest man
Stand level with the highest in the law.
Of such a land have men in dungeons dreamed,
And with the vision brightening in their eyes
Gone smiling to the fagot and the sword.Wide open and unguarded stand our gates,
And through them presses a wild motley throng—
Men from the Volga and the Tartar steppes,
Featureless figures of the Hoang-Ho,
Malayan, Scythian, Teuton, Kelt, and Slav,
Flying the Old World’s poverty and scorn;
These bringing with them unknown gods and rites,—
Those, tiger passions, here to stretch their claws.
In street and alley what strange tongues are loud,
Accents of menace alien to our air,
Voices that once the Tower of Babel knew!O Liberty, white Goddess! is it well
To leave the gates unguarded? On thy breast
Fold Sorrow’s children, soothe the hurts of fate,
Lift the down-trodden, but with hand of steel
Stay those who to thy sacred portals come
To waste the gifts of freedom. Have a care
Lest from thy brow the clustered stars be torn
And trampled in the dust. For so of old
The thronging Goth and Vandal trampled Rome,
And where the temples of the Cæsars stood
The lean wolf unmolested made her lair.This would be a great poem to have on the Trump wall.
The last four lines presumably refer to Edward Gibbon’s view that the key mistake leading to the Fall of Rome was the Emperor Valen’s Merkel-like decision in 376 A.D. to let refugees cross the Danube.
OT:
The story of the Holomodor is being made into a movie. It would have been the perfect vehicle for drumming up anti-Russian sentiment during a Hilary presidency.
Just googled and both my hunches are correct: 9% on Rotten Tomatoes, and the entire budget of $21 million was put up by Ukrainian-Canadian first-time filmmaker Ian Ihnatowycz.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-m-francis/film-russia-ukraine_b_8288514.html
Great poem Lord Sessions. But this particular line caught my eye:
Flying the Old World’s poverty and scorn;
Note the reference to the Old World. As a kid I always learned that we in the Americas were the New World. Our inhabitants created new nations from the ground up which would not be held back by the problems cooked into the cultures of the Old World. Yet I find it very odd that our number one immigrant group consists of people from the New World.
Is there anything that better exclaims failure than people fleeing a New World nation?
My comment from the other thread:
The 19th-century nativists did, due to their own ignorance of HBD, sort of screw us by providing a very convenient strawman effective for getting white Americans to identify with “immigrants.” Teutons? Seriously? Even in 1892 they settled themselves in rural parts, lived perfectly respectable lives and voted Republican.
Nowadays, you cannot find any Americans who are as “xenophobic” as Thomas Bailey Aldrich. Even David Duke is not as xenophobic as Thomas Bailey Aldrich. If David Duke were President instead of Donald Trump, Thomas Bailey Aldrich would still think that the gate is being left unguarded.
The story of the Holomodor is being made into a movie. It would have been the perfect vehicle for drumming up anti-Russian sentiment during a Hilary presidency.Replies: @snorlax, @DJF, @Anonymous Nephew
It’s about time (although my ideal would be a sort of reverse Schindler’s List with Walter Duranty as the villain protagonist). I saw the trailer; it looked pretty dire, with awful dialogue that was ironically reminiscent of Communist propaganda. It (the trailer) also had too low-budget a look to be a Hollywood production, so my guess is it’s a labor of love by some eccentric emigre millionaire.
Just googled and both my hunches are correct: 9% on Rotten Tomatoes, and the entire budget of $21 million was put up by Ukrainian-Canadian first-time filmmaker Ian Ihnatowycz.
The Iroquois Nation is called the Defenders of the Western Gate. See what happens when you don’t shut and lock the gate.
There's the problem right there. Most of us came in through the Eastern gate.Replies: @Buffalo Joe
might want to edit that bit about going smiling to the fagot, before putting it on the wall
I think Steve should bring up his great idea of immigration insurance again. Let anyone immigrate who can find a citizen sponsor, but let the sponsor incur liability for any costs that the immigrant imposes on other citizens and that the immigrant cannot cover himself. Then allow a free insurance market so potential sponsors can get policies to cover liabilities. That should price out the worst immigrants.
The 19th-century nativists did, due to their own ignorance of HBD, sort of screw us by providing a very convenient strawman effective for getting white Americans to identify with “immigrants.” Teutons? Seriously? Even in 1892 they settled themselves in rural parts, lived perfectly respectable lives and voted Republican.
Nowadays, you cannot find any Americans who are as “xenophobic” as Thomas Bailey Aldrich. Even David Duke is not as xenophobic as Thomas Bailey Aldrich. If David Duke were President instead of Donald Trump, Thomas Bailey Aldrich would still think that the gate is being left unguarded.Replies: @Jenner Ickham Errican
You doth protest too much. Aldrich had the right general instinct. Maybe his inclusion of Teutons was Franklinesque, or maybe it was a concession to old-timey PC, sort of like proposing a present day immigration moratorium against all nations to avoid charges of discrimination.
19th-century nativists also having been 19th-century Northern WASP Republicans, their far bigger sin with respect to their present-day legacy was of course their invention of and fanaticism for anti-racism. They just love love loved the blacks at the same time as they hate hate hated the Teutons and Kelts; again, ignorance of HBD.Replies: @syonredux, @Jenner Ickham Errican
South African police break up anti-immigrant protests
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-safrica-xenophobia-idUSKBN1631D9
Rome abandoned and ruined is a strong image. At the peak of the empire it likely had more than 2 million people, which fell to as low as 15,000 in the Dark Ages.
This should not be all blamed on the Germanic and Hunnic invaders, but on the 500 years of wars between them, the Byzantines, and Arabs over Italy after the fall of the Western Empire.
Ok, but the combined efforts of Aldrich and others mean we get silly Budweiser ads nowadays. Of course, the main way the 19th century nativists screwed us is by losing. But that’s partly the same issue; I suspect they might’ve fared a little better had they not deliberately worked to alienate natural allies (c.f. https://www.numbersusa.com/about/no-immigrant-bashing ).
19th-century nativists also having been 19th-century Northern WASP Republicans, their far bigger sin with respect to their present-day legacy was of course their invention of and fanaticism for anti-racism. They just love love loved the blacks at the same time as they hate hate hated the Teutons and Kelts; again, ignorance of HBD.
19th-century nativists also having been 19th-century Northern WASP Republicans, their far bigger sin with respect to their present-day legacy was of course their invention of and fanaticism for anti-racism. They just love love loved the blacks at the same time as they hate hate hated the Teutons and Kelts; again, ignorance of HBD.Replies: @syonredux, @Jenner Ickham Errican
Actually, lots of abolitionists hated slavery because it was the reasons why Blacks were brought to Anglo-America in the first place.
No, those were the free-soilers, which was a different ideology from abolitionism. Many of the free-soilers quickly became abolitionists during or shortly before the Civil War (indicating they’d made those arguments disingenuously), while the true believers among them, like Andrew Johnson, were expelled from the GOP.
As long as there is only one “g,” it means the bundle of sticks.
19th-century nativists also having been 19th-century Northern WASP Republicans, their far bigger sin with respect to their present-day legacy was of course their invention of and fanaticism for anti-racism. They just love love loved the blacks at the same time as they hate hate hated the Teutons and Kelts; again, ignorance of HBD.Replies: @syonredux, @Jenner Ickham Errican
I understand your greater point about the importance of contemporary HBD considerations (whites vs. the rest, or at least NAMs). I don’t know Aldrich’s thoughts on American blacks, but regarding immigration, he was right to be leery of recent European newcomers of different nationalities.
It’s hyperbole to say that WASPs of that time hated Teutons and Kelts (so melodramatic!)—I think it was wariness of Continentals and disdain for the Irish that best describes exclusionary WASP sentiments of the time. The Boston WASPs may have been onto something regarding the Irish—think of Ted Kennedy and present day horror shows Maura Healy, Ed Markey and Marty Walsh.
Rome fell because the Romans were more interested in spending the bounty of military contest on triumphs, temples and land than advancing scientific knowledge. Their track record compared to the Greeks was abysmal, it would be hard to think of a single Roman mathematician, natural philosopher or scientist of note (with the possible exceptions of Galen and Ptolemy) and certainly none that compared to the likes of Pythagoras, Euclid or Archimedes. If they had been of that vein, they could have conquered the world and mankind may have reached the moon by 969, not 1969. Hard to blame them for that given the link between pure scientific inquiry and technological development was not really developed by the Greeks. And they were undoubtedly among the best engineers the world has seen.
By not innovating and allowing German auxillarires into the army, they eventually lost their military edge and were overwhelmed by the superior numbers of multiple non-existent Roman foes. See Leonard Mlodinow’s book Euclid’s Window for more on this.
Rome fell because they ran out of Romans.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-safrica-xenophobia-idUSKBN1631D9
“South African police break up anti-immigrant protests”, Reuters, Feb 24, 2017:
University students everywhere must protest these xenophobic attacks in South Africa.
Although nowhere near as sophisticated as Steve’s idea, Singapore requires all employers of foreign domestic workers (i.e. maids) to put up a $5000 bond which is forfeited if the worker skips, overstays, gets pregnant or breaks the law. The employee is also required to buy the worker a ticket home and see them off to the airport personally if they fire the worker and the worker does not find another employer to take on the responsibility. A couple of decades ago, I had the unpleasant task of doing this myself when PiltdownWoman and I figured out that the nanny we had hired was moonlighting at a strip club, possibly as a hooker.
Fall of Rome caused by Arabs …not the Hun!
“During the 1920s Belgian historian Henri Pirenne came to an astonishing conclusion: the ancient classical civilization, which Rome had established throughout Europe and the Mediterranean world, was not destroyed by the Barbarians who invaded the western provinces in the fifth century, it was destroyed by the Arabs, whose conquest of the Middle East and North Africa terminated Roman civilization in those regions and cut off Europe from any further trading and cultural contact with the East.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_To-cV94BoReplies: @Clyde, @Hippopotamusdrome
Which is also called “fasces” among other fun things. Oh where would we be without etymology?
By not innovating and allowing German auxillarires into the army, they eventually lost their military edge and were overwhelmed by the superior numbers of multiple non-existent Roman foes. See Leonard Mlodinow's book Euclid's Window for more on this.Replies: @Kyle McKenna, @iffen
And ya gotta love any contribution which begins “Rome fell because…”
I’d never heard of that poem, but these two tongue-in-cheek classics came to mind:
https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/talking-and-singing-of-the-nordic-man/
https://www.flashlyrics.com/lyrics/flanders-and-swann/a-song-of-patriotic-prejudice-05
“Fagot” and “faggot” obviously share a root word, but I think that “fag” as used by Brits for “cigarette” has a different etymology. I also think that either the former porn star, Marilyn Chambers, or the former Red Star activist and tortured, conflicted faggot, Whittaker Chambers, wrote, “It is idle to talk about preventing the wreck of Western civilization. It is already a wreck from within. That is why we can hope to do little more now than snatch a fingernail of a saint from the rack or a handful of ashes from the faggots…”
https://www.amazon.com/Mohammed-Charlemagne-Revisited-History-Controversy/dp/0578094185
"During the 1920s Belgian historian Henri Pirenne came to an astonishing conclusion: the ancient classical civilization, which Rome had established throughout Europe and the Mediterranean world, was not destroyed by the Barbarians who invaded the western provinces in the fifth century, it was destroyed by the Arabs, whose conquest of the Middle East and North Africa terminated Roman civilization in those regions and cut off Europe from any further trading and cultural contact with the East."Replies: @Clyde
I have seen this theory before presented on you tube by Bill Warner/ a scientist/ who has been investigating Islam since 911. I must run so will post the absolute correct link later. The theory is that the rise of Islamic Jihad disrupted European trade and communication in the Northern Mediterranean. Travel by water was the easiest ways to get around at that time. Easier than overland and the Muslims mostly prevented this by raids and warfare and gaining their favorite booty of capturing European slaves and sex slaves.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPAwgclKAXw Islam and its captured booty of sex slaves bonus link :)Replies: @Steve Sailer
If we could only have latter-day Saracens with stealth missle ships dominating the Mediterranean, making refugee transport across the impossible. They could also patrol the Rio Grande.
The story of the Holomodor is being made into a movie. It would have been the perfect vehicle for drumming up anti-Russian sentiment during a Hilary presidency.Replies: @snorlax, @DJF, @Anonymous Nephew
A truthful account would not focus on Russia but instead the Soviet Union. Many of the guilty were not Russian, Stalin of course being Georgian, while others were of Ukrainian or Jewish heritage. Yes Russians were involved but they too suffered from being in the Soviet Union.
The Iroquois Nation is called the Defenders of the Western Gate.
There’s the problem right there. Most of us came in through the Eastern gate.
By not innovating and allowing German auxillarires into the army, they eventually lost their military edge and were overwhelmed by the superior numbers of multiple non-existent Roman foes. See Leonard Mlodinow's book Euclid's Window for more on this.Replies: @Kyle McKenna, @iffen
Rome fell because
Rome fell because they ran out of Romans.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_To-cV94BoReplies: @Clyde, @Hippopotamusdrome
The slam dunk link (first link 45 minutes) where Physicist Bill Warner explains how the rise of Islam lead to the latter fall of the Roman Empire and the Dark Ages due to Muslims controlling the Mediterranean Sea which was the European road for greater communication and trade. That “The Huns” and Visigoths were a secondary cause of Dark Ages.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPAwgclKAXw Islam and its captured booty of sex slaves bonus link 🙂
There's the problem right there. Most of us came in through the Eastern gate.Replies: @Buffalo Joe
iffen, Very well said, but I went back to my sources and sure enough “Defenders (or sometimes Keepers) of the Western Gate is what the Senecas are called. Senecas are part of the Iroquois Federation.
Maureen Dowd, Joe Biden, Paul Ryan…
The estimable H.L. Mencken was the grandson of a German immigrant. H.L. made it plain in his diary and his public writings that he despised WASPs and more or less hated the US. At the end of his writing life, he wrote in his diary that he had a basically unhappy life because his grandfather came to the US. Even Teutons don’t necessarily “melt” even in two or three generations. St. Thomas Aquinas said 3 generations before granting citizenship.
Cf Steve’s in-law who died with the words “God damn Christopher Columbus” on her lips.
The Wikipedia page of Aldrich, the poem’s author, notes that during his tenure at The Atlantic, he published works by Charles Chesnutt, an African-American “political activist…best known for his novels and short stories exploring complex issues of racial and social identity”.
Apparently, Chesnutt was the Ta-Nehisi Coates of his day.
Here is a photo of him, that I am guessing many iSteve readers will find immensely amusing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benny_L%C3%A9vy
Piltdown, I am dense, please explain what your problem was with the nanny-stripper-hooker.
The story of the Holomodor is being made into a movie. It would have been the perfect vehicle for drumming up anti-Russian sentiment during a Hilary presidency.Replies: @snorlax, @DJF, @Anonymous Nephew
I see on PuffedHo it’s already described as being about “Russia’s mass-murder of Ukrainians”, not “Communist mass-murder of Ukrainians”. Stalin wasn’t Russian IIRC.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-m-francis/film-russia-ukraine_b_8288514.html
Aldrich? Thomas Bailey Aldrich didn’t like Krauts nor Micks? I like them. I definitely have Irish ancestry, and family trees suggest I have German ancestry as well. Krauts make good beer and Micks know how to drink it.
Aldrich reminds me of that rancid dirtbag Aldrich Ames. This rat Aldrich Ames was a CIA agent who should have been executed. I think he’s still rotting in prison. Aldrich Ames was a treasonous rat who sold us out to the USSR. Aldrich Ames is a perfect representative of the human intelligence side of the US national security state.
The CIA is infested with treasonous rats and scoundrels. They have attacked President Trump. There are many good people who work in the signals intelligence portion of the national security state. President Trump should immediately fire all human intelligence agents and allow the signals intelligence agents to take their place. Remember, the guys who run the computers, the satellites, and all the other electronic gear are the ones with the real brains.
President Trump should fire every damn one of those sleazy bastards in the human intelligence “community.”
LOL. Twenty years ago, when our children were small, we employed two nannies that became strippers after leaving our employ. They knew each other and the younger one got the idea from her predecessor. The latter was startlingly attractive and later worked in Manhattan clubs, sometimes making $1,000 a night. She bought herself a house in NJ and a BMW. Now married to a lawyer and has children. A very sweet person, too!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_To-cV94BoReplies: @Clyde, @Hippopotamusdrome
It also cut off the inflow of slaves (cheap labor) from the Middle East that were displacing the native Latins. For example 100,000 Jewish slaves were imported to build the Colosseum in the city of Rome, which had a population of 350,000.
If we could only have latter-day Saracens with stealth missle ships dominating the Mediterranean, making refugee transport across the impossible. They could also patrol the Rio Grande.
More like he was the Rachel Dolezal of his day.
Byzantium lasted several hundred years longer than the Western empire. It is interesting that the assertion of State authority over that of the Church (ie Byzantine Iconoclasm – “relics thrown into the sea … Monks were apparently forced to parade in the Hippodrome, each hand-in-hand with a woman, in violation of their vows”) came after major reverses at the hands of Islam. They also had a very big wall.
How many layers of irony is The Onion on now? More than they can count?
And H.L. Mencken was perhaps the most famous and influential private citizen high brow in America, so America been berry berry good to him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPAwgclKAXw Islam and its captured booty of sex slaves bonus link :)Replies: @Steve Sailer
Okay but the barbarian refugees being invited across the Danube was in 376 AD, Rome was sacked in 410 AD, and the last Western Roman Emperor was in 476 AD. The Muslims didn’t come out of Mecca until after Muhammad’s death in 632.
It’s quite possible that the rise of Islam prevented the Eastern Roman Empire from reconquering the barbarian overrun old Western Roman Empire sometime after, say, 650 AD, the way Justinian had won back footholds in Italy in the 500s. Or maybe the newly Christianized barbarians of the West would have been able to learn faster from their more sophisticated co-religionists in the East if not for Muslim pirates blocking easy communications in the Mediterranean.
But the Roman Empire in the West had suffered 275 years of trouble and decimation before the Muslims reached the Mediterranean.
“Rome fell because the Romans were more interested in spending the bounty of military contest on triumphs, temples and land than advancing scientific knowledge… If they had been of that vein, they could have conquered the world and mankind may have reached the moon by 969, not 1969.”
This is a Carl Saganism. It is extremely doubtful except in the most abstract sense. The Romans were very respectful of Greek knowledge and learning, up-and-coming young men were often sent to be educated in Greece. Would the Renaissance have happened without printing? To some degree, wasn’t printing eventually developed from Roman wine press technology?
“And they were undoubtedly among the best engineers the world has seen.”
Yes, the Romans had to develop a lot of engineering basics, such as Roman concrete:
Check these pages out:
Roman engineering.
Roman technology.
Roman metallurgy:
The Romans apparently were the first civilization in which “hand calculators” were widespread:
Here’s a pretty Roman bridge around 2000 years old that is still in use: (Roman Bridge at Vaison-la-Romaine). And a picture.
This is a Carl Saganism. It is extremely doubtful except in the most abstract sense. The Romans were very respectful of Greek knowledge and learning, up-and-coming young men were often sent to be educated in Greece. Would the Renaissance have happened without printing? To some degree, wasn't printing eventually developed from Roman wine press technology?
"And they were undoubtedly among the best engineers the world has seen."
Yes, the Romans had to develop a lot of engineering basics, such as Roman concrete:Check these pages out:
Roman engineering.
Roman technology.
Roman metallurgy:The Romans apparently were the first civilization in which "hand calculators" were widespread:Here's a pretty Roman bridge around 2000 years old that is still in use: (Roman Bridge at Vaison-la-Romaine). And a picture.Replies: @Steve Sailer
It appears that the Roman conquest of Greece (c. 187 BC) and its Hellenistic offshoots undermined Greek scientific dynamism, perhaps through undermining the Greeks’ nationalistic self-confidence. The Romans complimented the Greeks a lot, but the brute fact that the Romans were in charge may have undermined Greek creativity.
Or something.
“It appears that the Roman conquest of Greece (c. 187 BC) and its Hellenistic offshoots undermined Greek scientific dynamism…”
It sure didn’t help that the libraries, one way or another, seem to have ended up destroyed:
Library of Alexandria:
Library of Pergamum:
Perhaps the same happened on smaller scale in many places.
Some Greek academics continued to work in the Roman world. A famous Greek mathematician that lived in Roman times was Diophantus of Alexandria: