Michael Bates: June 2022 Archives
Today's extraordinary New York Times piece on cannabis and psychosis
Alex Berenson quoting the NYTimes: "In addition to uncontrollable vomiting and addiction, adolescents who frequently use high doses of cannabis may also experience psychosis that could possibly lead to lifelong psychiatric disorder, an increased likelihood of developing depression and suicidal ideation, changes in brain anatomy and connectivity and poor memory." Berenson's comment: "Too many parents have seen the truth. Nice woke parents who let their children use cannabis - 'We're closer now' - and now see those kids's lives going, well, up in smoke."
Gender and Identity - YouTube - Ligonier Ministries
"We're living in days of widespread confusion about gender and identity. How should Christians navigate these challenging times?
"Recently, Dr. Rosaria Butterfield joined Ligonier Teaching Fellow Dr. Burk Parsons and Ligonier President Chris Larson to discuss the Bible's teaching about our identity in Christ and God's unchanging design for gender and sexuality. Watch now as they encourage us to stand for the truth out of devotion to God and love for our neighbors."
Old Brisbane Album | Gateway Bridge and Queensland corruption | Facebook
A fascinating post and comments from April 12, 2022, in a Facebook group called Old Brisbane Album. The item is a magazine ad highlighting the opening of the Gateway Bridge in 1986, which spans the Brisbane River near its outlet in Moreton Bay and is high enough to allow large cruise ships to pass beneath to the cruise port at Hamilton. The bridge also allows through traffic to bypass Brisbane. The ad depicts Russ Hinze, Minister for Local Government, Main Roads, and Racing for the State of Queensland. The comments on this item, about Hinze, popularly known as "the Minister for Everything," and the political machine run by his boss, longtime Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen, are fascinating. Bribery, kickbacks, selective law enforcement, drugs, prostitution -- all from professed conservatives -- and yet some express nostalgia for a government that could "get things done." As with Oklahoma turnpikes, the toll bridge was promised to be free when the bonds were paid off, and there is still a toll today.
RELATED: ABC News interviews a woman who, as a prostitute in the early 1970s, helped uncover "The Joke" -- the massive, long-running system of illegal prostitution protected by corrupt policemen from the commissioner on down. It was 15 years later before the Fitzgerald Inquiry brought down Bjelke-Petersen and his government.
(339) Haskell State School of Agriculture | lost-colleges
One of six agricultural junior colleges authorized by the first Oklahoma legislature, but defunded in 1917, the campus sat at the east end of College Ave. in Broken Arrow, and the main building was used by the school district until demolition in 1989. The home of college president J. S. Esslinger, which also served as a girls' dormitory, stood on the SE corner of 5th and College until 2018. LostColleges.com covers 11 schools in Oklahoma and hundreds nationwide, describing the history of each school and the status of any brick and mortar remaining. Essays on the site describe the ripples of loss to a community emanating from the closure of a small college and the stages of decay of a campus's physical remnants. The site is curated by Paul Batesel, an emeritus professor of English at Mayville State University in North Dakota. His introductory essay describes his motivation and where he searches for information.
Before satellites, TV networks used coax cables and microwave links to relay programming from station to station across the country. This map shows lists TV stations in 1955 and shows the routes that programming followed. A trunk line snaked its way west, roughly parallel to I-70 to Kansas City, then followed the Kansas Turnpike to Wichita and I-35 to OKC and Dallas, with a branch from near Stillwater to Tulsa. At this time, Tulsa had two stations (KOTV 6, KVOO 2), while Muskogee's KTVX 8 would later move to Tulsa as KTUL, while Enid's KGEO 5 would move to Oklahoma City to become KOCO. But stations in Ada (KTEN) and Lawton (KSWO) would remain independent. The number of UHF stations (channels 14 and higher) are surprising.
Bulkes: The "Greek Republic" that "Never Existed"
This is a fascinating case of a place that existed briefly and within living memory (just barely) being deliberately forgotten. A Twitter reference to "wells" (πηγάδες) as a threat made by Greek Leftists against their adversaries (throwing them down a water well to die) led me to the story of Bulkes, a town in Serbia settled by Germans during the Austro-Hungarian Empire, emptied of Germans after World War II, and offered by Tito in 1945 as a haven and training camp for Greek Communists escaping setbacks in the Greek Civil War. The community, which operated as a near-autonomous community in Yugoslavia with its own schools and currency, split over the break between Stalin and Tito, and a civil war with great bloodshed broke out within the community. Yugoslav authorities intervened and the community was scattered, as people returned to Greece or headed to exile elsewhere in Yugoslavia or in the USSR. Yugoslavia, estranged from the USSR and in need of friends, sought rapprochement with Greece, and the Bulkes Republic was swept under the rug. The town was resettled in the 1950s by Serbians from Bosnia and renamed Maglić. In this article, Alexander Bilinis delved into the story in 2016, tracking down filmmaker Alexis Parnis, who had been a young man in Bulkes, writing propaganda plays that were performed at the community theater on Sundays. A film called "Operation Bulkes" by Sinisa Bosancic is in pre-production, featuring interviews with some who lived there.
RELATED: An excerpt from the book Eleni by Nicholas Gage. Gage's mother was tortured to death by Greek Communists; her sacrifice allowed her children to escape.
Abarim Publications: Is "uncovering his feet" a euphemism?
Did Naomi tell Ruth to seduce Boaz? This article says no. The website features lengthy articles on Hebrew and Greek words and names. Not sure how reliable it is, but worth bookmarking.
