history

November 5, 2020

Blind Eye (DOG EAR)

Here’s one: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” -George Santayana And here’s another: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” -Joseph Goebbels nd that’s what pisses me off these days. Things that are known facts are distorted by lies. History that should NEVER be repeated, such as the Holocaust (Goebbels had his fingers all over this one) and the Chinese Cultural Revolution (where Mao and his communist cronies waged full ideological war on political rivals, intellectuals and scientists) suddenly are distinct possibilities. And that’s […]
November 10, 2022

Word of Mouth (DOG EAR)

aybe this is one of the reasons the world is so fucked up. Oral histories. And their demise. It used to be, well before the 1920s, that people would get their opinions and world views from two places; books and word of mouth. If they knew anything about, say, World War One, they’d either read it (such as All Quiet on the Western Front) or directly hear it (possibly from Uncle Frank, who’d served with the American Expeditionary Force). They would get their insights either from an author (backed by his editor and publisher) or an uncle. Stories and accounts […]
March 23, 2023

Out of Time (DOG EAR)

n Google Maps, look up “Colonial Photo & Hobby” (in Orlando). The street it’s on (on the east face) is 17-92, or Mills Avenue. On a day too cold to ride a bike, I put on my walking shoes and my floppy hat and walked a section of it- I had an errand to run (north of there) and something to get at that hobby shop. Also, there is coffee on the return trip (Frameworks, on 17-92 and Lake Highland, about a mile north). So I had to walk down and then back up 17-92. First off, it’s pretty much […]