Forward, Into The Past! 2026-04-25

     (Thank you, Firesign Theater, for anticipating this need.)

     Quoth Matt Walsh:

Matt Walsh “Almost all of the arrests that happen in a given year are from like 5% of the population”

“Cause you take out the 70% who are never arrested, you take out the 25% who are arrested one time in their entire life, and you're left with 5% of the entire population that's… pic.twitter.com/NnTeztc84n

— Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) April 24, 2026

     Yes, those are valid statistics. They may mix misdemeanors with felonies, but I’m unable to resolve that at this time.

     Time was, there were “three strikes” provisions on the law books in several states. Those laws constrained the sentencing practices of judges: a criminal convicted of a third felony offense was automatically sentenced to life without parole. For a while, those states locked up felony recidivists permanently; the public was permanently protected from their proclivities.

     I’m not sure what happened to those three-strikes laws. This article sheds some light, but not enough to be sure that the three-strikes provision is still enforced. Among the facets of criminal law that would bear on this is the propensity of judges and prosecutors to alter an indictment on their own authority. A judge who dislikes the three-strikes provision might unilaterally dismiss a felony indictment to keep an accused criminal from suffering permanent incarceration.

     There is also the racial aspect to consider. If we go by national demographics, American prison populations already overrepresent blacks and Hispanics. The implications are not hard to grasp. Neither is the message a further concentration of imprisoned blacks and Hispanics would send to the White majority.

     The hawkers of “diversity, equity, and inclusion” are violently hostile to an accurate representation of blacks and Hispanics among felonious criminals. It’s the statistic they dislike most. So they screech about “social justice” and “the legacy of slavery,” as if those were valid justifications for allowing habitual felons to continue to prey on the rest of us.

     However, another statistic is on my mind this morning: the population of these United States. That’s estimated at 330 million persons. If we were to imprison 5% of that number, that’s 16.5 million permanently incarcerated persons. I don’t know if enough prisons could be built and staffed to accommodate that many permanent residents. A far smaller number of persons are imprisoned today – about 1.25 million – and cries of “prison overcrowding” already resound nationally.

     An old friend, a far harsher person than I, advocated not lifelong incarceration for the habitual felon but execution: “Three strikes and you’re dead.” Given the way the death penalty is treated today, that wouldn’t relieve the pressure on our prisons. But Tom is a forthright fellow; he envisioned the application of the penalty to occur immediately after the third conviction.

     That calls to mind a scene from Neal Stephenson’s early novel The Diamond Age:

     “Congratulations, Bud, you're a pa,” Judge Fang said. “I gather from your reaction that this comes as something of a surprise. It seems evident that your relationship with this Tequila is tenuous, and so I do not find that there are any mitigating circumstances I should take into account in sentencing. That being the case, I would like you to go out that door over there”—Judge Fang pointed to a door in the corner of the courtroom—“and all the way down the steps. Leave through the exit door and cross the street, and you will find a pier sticking out into the river. Walk to the end of that pier until you are standing on the red part and await further instructions.”
     […]
     The pier did not turn red until the very end, where it began to slope down steeply toward the river. It had been coated with some kind of grippy stuff so his feet wouldn't fly out from under him. He turned around and looked back up at the domed court building, searching for a window where he might make out the face of Judge Fang or one of his gofers. The family of Chinese was following him down the pier, carrying their long bundle, which was draped with garlands of flowers and, as Bud now realized, was probably the corpse of a family member. He had heard about these piers; they were called funeral piers.
     Several dozen of the microscopic explosives known as cookie-cutters detonated in his bloodstream.

     Efficient, yes, but I’m fairly sure our anti-death-penalty activists would disapprove, to say nothing of the social-justice crowd.

     Still, that 5% statistic has considerable power. If it were to get the right amount of airtime and column-inches, who could say what might follow? The conversion of Manhattan Island into a giant, open-air prison camp, perhaps?

     Just an early-morning thought.

Imperfections

     Among the things that tire me most severely are comments to the effect that this, that, or the other thing “isn’t perfect.” Given the general lack of understanding of what constitutes “perfection,” I’m tempted to launch into a lecture about the speaker’s choice of words and the failure of comprehension they reveal. But in these later years of life, I restrain myself, so as not to add to my already unfortunate “body count.”

     One observation, pithily phrased by the late, great C. Northcote Parkinson, puts the whole subject to bed:

     Perfection is finality, and finality is death.

     It seems that too few persons are sufficiently acquainted with the Great Lawgiver to have encountered that one, so here we are.

     Just this morning – yes, I know it’s early – a French commenter at X, in the midst of a spirited defense of market capitalism, said this:

     Market capitalism isn’t perfect.

     That lit my boiler, and moved me to resurrect the following piece from 2015. But don’t hurry away if you remember it, for I have a trailing comment to make.

---

     No doubt every Gentle Reader has encountered, at least, someone who constantly and vociferously denounces the status quo for some perceived flaw. Such a person will be known to complain constantly about his personal lot in life, as well. It won’t matter how well off he is, or how well supplied with friends, lovers, opportunities, or comforts. The comparison of his situation to that of far less fortunate others will not affect his malaise. Anything he perceives as a defect, whether in his circumstances or “The System,” will be enough.

     To which the recently deceased Lawrence Peter “Yogi” Berra, he of the ten World Series rings and endless records, deposeth and sayeth:

     If the world were perfect, it wouldn't be.

     Many people have chuckled over Berra’s supposed malapropisms, thinking only that the Yankee great had intended to say something plain and obvious, but that it was muddled by his low facility with the English language. For my part, I find an immense practical wisdom in many of them. The above is a case in point.

     There are two piercing insights to be had here. The first is the more general of the two. That which is perfect is finished, complete, at the terminus of its evolution. It cannot be improved. It requires no changes. Indeed, it tolerates no changes, for any change rendered to a perfect thing or context would destroy its perfection.

     Therefore, if “the world” were perfect, it would deny Man any latitude for action. Any sort of change at all would deface it. Since Man, as Loren Lomasky has put it, is a “project pursuer,” a “perfect world” would destroy a fundamental requirement of human life: opportunities for action in pursuit of improvements to oneself or one’s condition. A “perfect world” would find Man intolerable. We would shortly be extinct.

     The second insight is more personal. It’s highly unlikely that any two persons would agree on what constitutes a “perfect world.” Our personal priorities and preferences vary too greatly for that. Indeed, for some of us, “perfection” equates to absolute hegemony over others. But what of the others? Are they to be allowed no say in the matter?

     The old pastimes “What would you do with a billion dollars?” – yes, it used to be a million, but prices are higher these days – and “What would you do if you were king?” cast additional light on Berra’s truth. Your billion would not be mine; your monarchy would limit my sphere of action. Your use of either of those things would deprive me of something I value: in the first case, the ability to afford whatever pleasure or luxury you’ve gobbled up, thus raising the price above my means; in the second, the freedom to live and act as I see fit, without a requirement for anyone’s permission or approval.

     And so, if “the world,’ however conceived, were “perfect,” however conceived, it wouldn’t be. Quod erat demonstrandum.

     I find it fitting that such wisdoms should have come from Yogi. Perhaps the American Philosophical Society should confer an emeritus membership upon him. By the way, does anyone know when they hold the balloting for the Philosophy Hall Of Fame?

---

     A nice trip down Memory Lane, wouldn’t you say, Gentle Reader? But wait: there’s more! For we see defenders of the free market say it “isn’t perfect” with appalling frequency. That raises two questions:

1. Why do they do it?
2. What usually follows?

     The answer to the first question is that the speaker feels compelled to admit that free markets don’t solve all the problems of the world. Now, if you’re of a rational but sarcastic bent, as is your humble Curmudgeon, you might say “Well, what would?” But that is exactly what the Leftist dueling with you wants you to say. He has this “solution,” you see…

     That’s the answer to the second question. Admitting that there are imperfections in the world provides an entering wedge the Leftist can use to go on the attack. The Left strives always to be on the attack. (Note how vituperative Leftists become when forced onto the defense.) Any admission by a Rightist that there are “problems” gives him an opportunity to mount an offensive against “the System.”

     Never mind that the Left’s prescriptions have always produced poverty, oppression, and hopelessness. Leftists don’t want to address the record of socialist and communist systems. Force them to do so and their mildest rejoinder will be to call you “heartless.” (That usually follows their perennial deflection: “That wasn’t real socialism.”) Their whole aim is to attack freedom’s “imperfections” and claim that they can be remedied by their methods.

     Don’t fall into their trap. Free markets don’t exist to fulfill Utopian objectives. They can’t; nothing can. The existence of marginal people, less well off than the rest of us, does not indict capitalism. Nothing but copious charity could raise their lot to that of an American middle-class wage earner… and we have learned the limits of large-scale charity:

     We shall not get rid of pauperism by extending the sphere of State relief...On the contrary, its adoption would increase our pauperism, for as is often said, we can have exactly as many paupers as the country chooses to pay for. – Thomas Mackay, Methods of Social Reform

     So have done with the “capitalism isn’t perfect” crap.

Going Your Own Way

     Yes, yes, yes: My “output” is declining. But then, so am I, and not slowly. Please bear with me. These days it takes a lot more effort for me to produce something worth my Gentle Readers’ time and attention.

     Nevertheless, if you’ll keep reading, I’ll keep trying.

* * *

     Just this morning, I encountered this on X:

When training for a mission in space, people are judged on their psychological ability to work as a team. They can hardly afford someone who is not part of the team and wants to do it their way only. That could spell disaster for a mission in space. Yet here we are on spaceship…

— SpiritsofIdaho (@SpiritsofIdaho) April 22, 2026

     The “spaceship Earth” motif isn’t new, of course. The conception of Earth as a vessel rather than a static environment goes back several decades. While it can be used tendentiously, as it is above, there’s also some value in it for directing one’s attention.

     One of Earth’s features that spaceships lack is room. The land area of Terra is about 50 million square miles. Every one of those square miles enjoys a breathable atmosphere. While some of those square miles are less hospitable than others, there are at least 25 million square miles of land surface that are habitable, or can be made so with time and effort.

     If we approximate Earth’s current population as 8 billion souls, the average human density of our world is no greater than 320 persons per square mile. 320 persons per square mile does sound ominous. It becomes less so when we figure human density per acre.

     There are 640 acres in a square mile. Thus, that 320 persons per square mile figure equates to two acres of land per person.

     Have you ever had to mow a two-acre plot? I have – and with a push-mower, at that. You don’t want that experience; trust me on that.

     Humans prefer to cluster at far greater densities than one every two acres. Consider Manhattan: an island of 22 square miles with a population of about 2.2 million persons. That’s 100,000 persons per square mile, If we figure Manhattan’s human density per acre instead of per mile, we get approximately 160 persons per acre. Roomy? No, yet the great majority of Manhattan residents live there by choice.

     The most densely populated major nation, India, has approximately 1.4 billion residents on approximately 1.2 million square miles of land. That’s still only about 1200 persons per square mile: less than two persons per acre. The great majority of Indians live in population centers much denser than that.

     Consider SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule, which usually carries a four-person complement. I don’t have exact figures, but I’d be shocked to learn that there’s 100 square feet of floor space in that capsule. I doubt the crew holds any cha-cha contests in there. That 100 square feet figure would give the Crew Dragon, as it’s normally manned, a human density of 1600 persons per acre. In all probability, it’s higher than that.

     Therefore the Crew Dragon, when manned, is at least ten times as dense as Manhattan Island. The astronauts are all there by choice. There’s no “astronaut draft,” at least for the moment.

     In nearly every case of social, economic, or political importance, we choose to cluster with others.

* * *

     There will probably never be a “vessel” as roomy as “spaceship Earth.” Yet people do complain about crowding. Rush-hour traffic congestion, retail stores during major holidays, even the construction of new housing in relatively sparse districts draw muttered forebodings about “running out of room.” But the complainers seldom seem inclined to move to more spacious environments. The reasons are many, but nestled among them is this one: We like one another’s company, as long as we can take it or leave it at our personal whim.

     Granted, some of us prefer to be alone. There are also some people no one wants to be around. Still, they’re not the products of intolerable crowding. As long as each of us has a place of our own to which he can retreat at need, undesired and undesirable company isn’t an “issue” that demands a “solution.”

     The need to cooperate with others – colloquially speaking, to get along – arises from the need to be with others. When there is no such need, the imperative of cooperation vanishes. This has two implications above others.

     First, the preservation of privacy depends on the preservation of private property as Americans understand it. For the principal feature of private property is that its owner has the legal and moral right to exclude others. That has always been the basis every kind of property, real or movable.

     Second, individual mobility must be preserved at all costs. He who can “get away” has the power to seek refuge from others, at least for a time. That idea is of course violently opposed by the promoters of “15 minute cities” and similar chimeras. For individual mobility means that you can get away from them. No would-be dictator, determined to decree every last aspect of others’ existence, can abide that.

     Watch for the doom-shouters of “overpopulation.” Their arguments don’t matter. Their enemy is privacy itself. They are uniformly hostile to private property and to the ability to “get away” at will via individual mobility. Only when privacy has been effectively eliminated can they rule us absolutely, with no escape possible.

     Orwell knew it:

     The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it, moreover, so long as he remained within the field of vision which the metal plaque commanded, he could be seen as well as heard. There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live — did live, from habit that became instinct — in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.
     […]
WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH      He took a twenty-five cent piece out of his pocket. There, too, in tiny clear lettering, the same slogans were inscribed, and on the other face of the coin the head of Big Brother. Even from the coin the eyes pursued you. On coins, on stamps, on the covers of books, on banners, on posters, and on the wrappings of a cigarette Packet — everywhere. Always the eyes watching you and the voice enveloping you. Asleep or awake, working or eating, indoors or out of doors, in the bath or in bed — no escape. Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimetres inside your skull.

     Be vigilant.

Companions

     Today, the Third Sunday of the Easter season, is the day Catholics read about the encounter on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus:

     And behold, two of them went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know him.
     And he said to them: What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?
     And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to him: Art thou only a stranger to Jerusalem, and hast not known the things that have been done there in these days? To whom he said: What things? And they said: Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; And how our chief priests and princes delivered him to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we hoped, that it was he that should have redeemed Israel: and now besides all this, to day is the third day since these things were done. Yea and certain women also of our company affrighted us, who before it was light, were at the sepulchre, And not finding his body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that he is alive. And some of our people went to the sepulchre, and found it so as the women had said, but him they found not.
     Then he said to them: O foolish, and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them in all the scriptures, the things that were concerning him.
     And they drew night to the town, whither they were going: and he made as though he would go farther. But they constrained him; saying: Stay with us, because it is towards evening, and the day is now far spent. And he went in with them.
     And it came to pass, whilst he was at table with them, he took bread, and blessed, and brake, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew him: and he vanished out of their sight.
     And they said one to the other: Was not our heart burning within us, whilst he spoke in this way, and opened to us the scriptures?
     And rising up, the same hour, they went back to Jerusalem: and they found the eleven gathered together, and those that were staying with them, Saying: The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon. And they told what things were done in the way; and how they knew him in the breaking of the bread.

     [Luke 24:13-35]

     What a good thing it was that they were two together! For miracles that occur in the presence of a single witness are easily waved away. But when two or more give witness an event, it becomes harder for others to doubt it. It’s still possible, of course, but disbelievers’ accusations must change from hallucination to conspiracy.

* * *

     I have no quarrel with sola scriptura Christians. After all, the Church’s proper authority depends upon the Gospels, so he who prefers his own interpretation of Christ’s words is welcome to it. However, the sola scriptura Christian is frequently alone. That can be an uncomfortable condition.

     Those of us who occasionally entertain doubts are comforted by the knowledge that we’re not alone in our beliefs. Really, how many Christians are there who never have a moment’s doubt? After all, the key events are far back in time. Surely it’s possible that the history is inaccurate, as histories have sometimes been. And there’s always the (remote) possibility that it’s pure fiction – that Jesus of Nazareth was an ordinary man like ourselves, or even that He never existed at all!

     Doubt can creep into any man’s soul. Pope Benedict XVI was unabashed in admitting that doubt had sometimes afflicted him. In his book Introduction to Christianity, he declared doubt an unavoidable part of human existence. I feel that he is correct. Moreover, doubt can work most powerfully upon one who is alone in his faith.

     What really holds faith fast is the determination to go on living it:

     Gavin extracted himself from his bed and plunged into his Sunday morning ritual. When he'd buckled himself into the passenger seat of his father's car, and Evan had backed them out of the driveway and onto Kettle Knoll Way, he said, "Dad? Do you ever...doubt?"
     "Hm? Our faith in God, you mean?" Evan kept his eyes on the dark ribbon of road unwinding before them.
     "Yeah." Gavin braced himself for the answer. What he got was not what he expected.
     "Now and then," his father said. "It's hard not to doubt something you can't see or touch. But faith isn't about certainty. It's about will."
     "So you...will away your doubts?"
     Evan chuckled. "That would be a neat trick, wouldn't it?" He pulled the Mercedes Maybach into the small side parking lot of Our Lady of the Pines, parked and killed the engine. "No, I simply command myself to do as I know I should do. Faith is expressed just as much by our deeds as by our words. As long as I can consistently act from faith, I can keep my grip on it, regardless of my doubts." He nodded toward the unlit church, barely visible in the darkness. "You might say that's why we're here."

     [From this short story.]

     But even that determination can falter in the face of severe temptation – and never doubt this, at least: it’s the best among us who are most severely assailed by their tempters.

     A companion in faith is a kind of armor against doubt. If you have one, you can’t doubt your own intellect or sanity without doubting his as well. Cleophas and his companion on the journey to Emmaus saw the same thing: the risen Christ, briefly revealed to them in His glory. Neither doubted for that same reason.

     Perhaps you don’t have a companion in faith. Perhaps you don’t feel you need one. But if there’s room in your life, why not see about making the acquaintance of someone like yourself who’s willing to talk about his faith now and then? He’ll be a fallible human believer, who’s subject to doubt from time to time. But at such times he’ll have you, and vice versa. Each of you, in living your faith, will help to protect the other.

     May God bless and keep you all.

The Best We Can

     Good morning, Gentle Reader. I sense that this will be a special day, here at the Fortress. Unusually for these latter years, there are no irritating home-maintenance issues to labor over or spend on. The routine chores have all been addressed; nothing lingers. We have adequate supplies of everything that should be kept in stock. And – thank You, God – there’s no customer-assembled furniture to build or fix.

     It’s that rarest of all jewels, a completely free day!

     So I thought I might talk about ideology.

* * *

     The word ideology has an irritating etymology. Given its roots, it “should” mean “the study of ideas.” But of course, it doesn’t. Rather, it’s a categorizing term that’s used to answer questions such as “What is Marxism?” or “What is Islam?”

     Here’s what the nice folks at Merriam-Webster have to say about ideology:

     Ideology has been in use in English since the end of the 18th century and is one of the few words whose coiner we can identify. The French writer A. L. C. Destutt de Tracy proposed it as a term to designate the “science of ideas,” and in that sense the word was quickly borrowed into English. Though ideology originated as a serious philosophical term, within a few decades it took on connotations of impracticality thanks to Napoleon, who used it in a derisive manner. Such connotations are still present in some contexts, but the word today is largely used neutrally, most often to refer to a systematic body of concepts, and especially to the set of ideas and beliefs held by a particular group or political party.

     Several political stances are routinely referred to as ideologies. Others tend to avert that categorization, though the reasons are often unclear. For example, while Marxism is called an ideology, capitalism doesn’t wear that label. Libertarianism, which is a relatively systematized ideology focused on freedom, does bear the label.

     Regardless of what ideas or attitudes we may discuss, and whether or not they qualify as ideologies, one set of questions stands above all others. For any Idea X:

1. What are Idea X’s goals?
2. Has it ever achieved them?
3. If so, what are its requirements?

     Every idea that aims at achieving some goal will have requirements: a set of conditions that must be met for that idea, when put into practice, to have a chance of success. Absent those conditions, the idea will fail, or will be irrelevant.

     Those conditions are called the idea’s domain of applicability. Within its domain, the idea will be effective. It will work, given some expenditure of time, money, and effort. Outside its domain, the idea is irrelevant, if not destructive.

     One of the best examples of the importance of such a domain is the nuclear family. A family cannot be operated along capitalist lines. Demanding that minor children pay for what they need is pure madness; so also with a dependent housewife. The breadwinner must practice a kind of Marxism within the family: “To each according to his needs.” Else the thing flies apart, with much destruction and sorrow.

     But when a nation-state tries to apply Marxian socialism nationwide, poverty and oppression follow. You cannot bind millions of people to one another by the bonds of love and mutual responsibility that occur within a (healthy) family. The nation-state is outside Marxism’s domain.

* * *

     To limit the destructive potential of ideology – don’t kid yourself; your ideology can be just as destructive as any other – we must illuminate and emphasize the concept of domain of applicability. Of course, that demands that we put in the effort required to understand why Idea X succeeds in this case but not that one, and why Idea Y, which fails in the former case, succeeds brilliantly in the latter. And that demands that we be unsparing of ourselves and others in asking “What are you trying to achieve?” and “How will you know when you’ve succeeded or failed?”

     The great Thomas Sowell has proposed three questions for us in the Right to put to those on the Left when one of their proposals comes up for discussion:

1. Compared to what?
2. At what cost?
3. What hard evidence do you have?

     Sharp questions such as those clarify an idea’s proper domain of application. They can put an end to a lot of nonsense, especially the sort of starry-eyed Utopianism that propels so many fanatical evangelists. Mind you, I’m not talking here about “proving” or “disproving” particular ideologies. I merely seek to limit their power to cloud men’s minds. Proof and disproof have their own requirements, none of which are found in common discourse about ideologies and their implementations.

     We can only do the best we can.

A Quick Survey

     I don’t have it in me to produce an essay today. However, I have something developing that will probably be of interest to a great many people. To get a sense for its impact, I’d appreciate it greatly if my Gentle Readers, and anyone else they can rope in, would answer a few questions about “the oldest funny subject:” sex.

     I’ve written many pieces concerned with sex. Thirty-six of them adorn this site. Though I’m a Catholic, my views on sex differ rather sharply from the teachings of my Church. I’ve been called a “cafeteria Catholic” for that reason. But I maintain that there are good reasons to dispute Church doctrine on this subject.

     So, if you’re willing to help me with my project, please read and answer the following questions, preferably in an email:

1. Are you male or female?
2. Are you currently married?
3. Have you had sex outside of marriage?
4. Do you regard sex outside of marriage as sinful?
5. Do you regard parasexual conduct (e.g., “oral sex,” “heavy petting,” etc.) as morally equivalent to sex?

     That’s all. It’s just a survey, conditioned by gender and marital status. I’d like it to be answered widely enough to be statistically significant, though given the sensitivity of the subject, I’m not hopeful that it will be. I don’t need to know your name, your age, your religious affiliation, or any other details about you. So please don’t include any such details.

     Thank you for considering responding to this request. This post will be at the top of the blog for the rest of the week. Look below it for new material.

All my best,
Fran

The Felony Of Life (UPDATED)

     Great age tends to diminish the energies required for certain activities, such as fulminating about injustices. Even so, there are some discoveries that still light my boiler and turn it up to 11.

     This is one such:

     WASHINGTON — The Department of Justice under former President Joe Biden “withheld evidence” and approved “aggressive arrest tactics” when targeting pro-life defendants — and then slapped them with longer prison sentences than pro-abortion ones, according to an explosive internal review released Tuesday.
     The DOJ revealed the stunning abuses in a nearly 900-page report after examining more than 700,000 records related to the Biden administration’s prosecutions under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act.
     The 1994 law was passed to protect access to houses of worship, religious institutions, abortion clinics and pregnancy resource centers.
     But the Biden DOJ was found to have engaged multiple times in “biased enforcement” of it — while also collaborating with and even seeking to fund pro-abortion groups, according to the DOJ Office of Legal Policy report.

     The article is long, but it’s eminently worth your time, regardless of your opinions about abortion. I thought I was past taking umbrage at the Biden Administration. I was wrong.

     Rather than froth at the mouth over this, I’ll simply point out that Joe Biden is, nominally at least, a Catholic. A plurality of seriously active pro-lifers are Catholics. So a Catholic president presided over a Justice Department that pursued and prosecuted Americans for their Catholic affiliation. When the prosecutors were able to secure a conviction under the notoriously vague “FACE Act,” they exhorted the sentencing judge to be far harsher toward the convicted pro-lifer than toward a pro-abortion defendant convicted for the same offense. So much for Catholic politicians taking orders from the Vatican.

     Meanwhile, we have violent offenders – assaulters, rapists, kidnappers – being given light sentences because of their “religion:” Islam. A number of such criminals, here and in Europe, have been able to avert punishment by pleading that their “religion” commands that they do as they did. Given the propensity of Muslims to riot over cartoons and such, I doubt that requires a great deal of explanation.

     Could it be clearer that the First World, these United States in particular, need a clarification of what constitutes a valid religion protected under the First Amendment? Could it be clearer that religious affiliation must be excluded from decisions to prosecute, from sentencing decisions, and from peremptory challenges during the voir dire? Could it be clearer, given the events of the Mark Houck incident, that the “FACE Act” must be repealed, or failing that, heavily revised to make absolutely objective and indisputable what constitutes an offense?

     “The law is a ass—a idiot,” wrote Charles Dickens in Oliver Twist. Sometimes, definitely. Especially when it’s made by villains with an axe to grind, and enforced by others who seek to ply that tool against the necks of disfavored persons and groups.

     UPDATE: I've just learned that Mark Houck has won a $1,000,000 award from the FBI for the tactics it used against him. I can't think of anyone who would deserve it more.

Sophie

     Her life started in circumstances unknown to me. All I know of her first two years is that she was neglected. Her humans sent her out to forage for her meals. They left the back door to their house open at all times, so that they didn’t have to be bothered walking her or taking her out to eliminate.

     That family was pure trash. Why they wanted a dog in the house is unclear, considering how little attention they paid her. They had to haul stakes and leave town quickly when their 14-year-old daughter got knocked up by a member of MS-13. They drove off in a big hurry and left Sophie behind them. I’m told she chased their rented truck for a couple of miles before giving up on them.

     A friend of ours who’s involved in rescue work found her and took her in. She told us almost offhandedly about the two-year-old German Shepherd / Husky mix she’d just taken in. I immediately told her we’d take Sophie. My wife Beth gave me one of those looks; I shut her down on the spot.

     Sophie was ours a few days later. She had a little trouble settling in: learning not to pee or poop in the house; adjusting to Rufus, our Newf; learning not to eat the cats’ food; and so forth. But from the start she was as affectionate as if she’d been with us from birth.

     That was the late summer of 2012. Sophie hung on through a lot of changes. We lost Rufus in 2017, to lymphoma. We lost Precious, our Pit Bull Terrier, in 2023, to an untreatable abdominal tumor. We lost several cats. Sophie took that hard. She loved the cats.

     Sophie was my dog. Beth has always been more partial to Newfs. That didn’t bother Sophie. It certainly didn’t bother me.

     Dogs do get old. They do deteriorate and die. But their humans are never really ready for it. I certainly wasn’t.

     For nearly fourteen years I had her companionship and affection. She’d sit in my home office while I worked. I’d take her on walks around the neighborhood, or out in the back yard, where she’d romp around with our other dogs, and sometimes with a neighbor dog. I had her on the sofa beside me, her head in my lap, while I read or watched some sporting event on the idiot box.

     These past few months, Sophie’s joints and nervous system started to degenerate. She lost control of her back legs and her sphincters. As of early in March, she could no longer deal with stairs, even the two steps from our deck to the back yard grass. I told myself she could still get over it. Even if it was against the odds, she still might recover. I knew better, of course.

     Sophie died today, at 12:35 PM New York time. Her breathing stopped and didn’t resume, and that was that. We can’t be sure of her exact age, but our best guess is that she was sixteen years old.

     I’m 74 years old. My age and heritage suggest that I shouldn’t adopt another dog. I don’t suppose I will. I’ll be in mourning for Sophie for quite a while.