Who Was the Hater?

This Sunday's and next Sunday's book review feature detective stories written by a retired Christian minister, about Christian characters. The author of these stories, Charles Merrill Smith, had written several "serious" nonfiction books for Christians. He was one of the leaders of the "liberalizing, ecumenical" movement in the church, way back when it was fresh.

I didn't realize, until I looked up his last and most obscure novel on a search engine, that a minister like Sheldon Emry--who was NOT the "liberalizing, ecumenical" type--had actually enjoyed Smith's book, How to Become a Bishop Without Being Religious, in a snarky way, and sold it to those of his flock who had indicated an interest in buying full-length books.



Let's just say that although there are a few millionnaires in my family, my parents were not them. I grew up with very nice stuff, yes, and with a lot of privileges...and with a constant daily awareness that we were the poor relations. My parents were, like, actually trying to make a living by farming. Granola Green organic farming.

My father didn't usually bother trying to enlighten ministers who asked for money during church services, but he delivered very long lectures, at home, on the theme that Preachers Who Ask For Money Are False Teachers Whom We Should Not Support.

Meh. Ministers have to live too, and I'm not sure that, as Dad used to claim, they need to be "examples of doing without" material goods. Sometimes the fundraising is done in aid of good causes. I respect, but don't share, Dad's lifelong rule that if an offering plate is passed during a service he wasn't going to sit through that service. I've even been known to put money in the plate...though not often, because I have found that, in churches that pass the plate, often there is what the Bible calls "respect of persons."

Being landed poor, a poor relation, gave me a unique window into this dynamic of social psychology in the church. As a young churchgoing introvert I learned that I was seen as having completely different personalities depending on whether a church group perceived me as coming from a have-more family or a have-less family (not that I'd lived long enough to have developed any personality of my own yet).

Basically, I learned that, when a group of people believe that you have less money than they have, you can't do anything right. If you do happen to do something better than they do, those people are going to resent you. If you do it about equally well, or less well, they're going to despise you. As John Santrock reported in his book, popularity in middle school is fairly well tied to having rich and indulgent parents. This situation becomes less dynamic but more rigid for less wealthy adults. In churches, introverts are attacked for being "snobs" if perceived as rich, for being "withdrawn" and "sullen" and "bitter" if perceived as poor--but it's much less unpleasant to be perceived as rich.

This is a fact--as solid a fact as anything in social psychology is ever likely to be. It has no more to do with anybody's feelings, or even their beliefs, than the temperature has. However, those who feel guilty when it's mentioned tend to identify themselves by "crybullying" about how the person who mentions it is aaaangry and meeeean, and they're probably hurrrt too.

Possibly because Dad might have noticed this first...we didn't attend church often when I was growing up. Dad didn't approve of very many ministers, even if they were his cousins. For a few years he showed some respect for Herbert W. Armstrong. Then HWA died and we were a family without a church. Then Dad took some interest in Sheldon Emry's radio broadcasts, which echoed the Worldwide Church of God's debunking of Christmas rituals, and we joined the Lord's Covenant Church for a few years.

Was Pastor Emry a "white supremacist" as many claim? He overtly preached to North Americans of British descent that following the whole Bible was especially important to the Saxon and Celtic "races" because they were physical descendants, and heirs, of the promises made to the descendants of Abraham, along with the "true Hebrews" (Sephardic Jews) as distinct from "them which say they are Jews, but are not" (Ashkenazic-Russian Jews, thought to be the remnant of the extinct Euro-Asian Khazar tribe). (Dad warned us not to put much importance on this aspect of LCC doctrine because it will never be proved--even though it can't be completely disproved either.) Pastor Emry also preached that Christians should know, distrust, and be prepared to defend ourselves against enemies--including enemy nations, most especially that bad old Soviet Union, our great enemy in those days.

He did not, however, preach that any nation had been created just to fuel the Eternal Fire. The doctrine of the Lord's Covenant Church was that, if and whenever the English-speaking nations committed themselves to following the teachings of the whole Bible, then God had promised equal--though longer delayed--blessings to the other nations of the world. Meanwhile, it was possible that a few righteous "foreigners," like Ruth and the Ethiopian courtier in the Bible, might be sincere believers who could be "adopted into Israel," which is what most Christians believe non-Jewish Christians have been, in any case.

I read several of Pastor Emry's shorter books, and I will say that they show a learning process over the years. When reading his work (some of which is now available in PDF form online, at a memorial site for Pastorsheldonemry.com) you have to brace yourself. Remember at all times, first of all, that these are the words of an old man who grew up with the idea that he was supposed to speak out boldly, talk tough, and denounce evil, rather than smoothing things over or being tactful, as most Christians expect ministers to do now. Remember, also, that many of those documents were written in a climate of real fear, when Americans expected the evil Soviet Union to drop bombs on us any day. One of the book titles was Russia Will Invade America and Be Defeated. (It's not available on Amazon; it's available at the memorial site.) I knew the man well enough before he died to believe that he didn't write as a real hater--often I suspect he wrote out of fear, whistling in the dark--but he certainly did write some hateful words.

I will say, though, that as a minister Sheldon Emry both baptized and ordained people who were not English, Irish, or "pure Aryan" types; I'm not sure how the Lord's Covenant Church attracted any Black members, but it had a few. My father had true "Red" skin; although my brother and I didn't inherit that trait, out West people generally expected us to be Mexican. I have read Christian literature that claims that the Cherokee and other Native Americans were punished by God for their especially wicked ways. It did not spew out of the Lord's Covenant Church.

But a minister's acceptance of my father as a congregant involved more than just not hating his complexion. Dad was the sort of Christian who, when he did listen to a sermon, believed it was his duty not only to ask the minister to explain parts he wasn't sure about, but to call out the minister on any points where Dad thought the minister was in error. Though younger than Pastor Emry, Dad had the same "talk tough, and fight it out if necessary" approach to disagreements. Anyone whose church we attended had to be prepared for serious head-butting and horn-locking.

This was especially true if a minister ever had to mention, even in a printed newsletter that was distributed to people who'd requested it, that reprinting and tape-recording sermons cost money. The Lord's Covenant Church didn't ask for more than the cost of printouts or tapes, so far as I've found. When possible the church did distribute these items free of charge. Dad's contribution to the church was to share them liberally with friends. When it became necessary for Pastor Emry to mention that the stock of pre-paid tapes was running low and the church needed a dollar for this or that sermon, and Dad started ranting, "Just another preacher who's after money...I'm not going to share any more of his rubbish...the people I've been sharing my copies with can buy their own copies if they want to, but if they listen to me they won't," etc. etc. etc., I realized that Pastor Emry had stopped preaching his (more unusual and controversial) doctrines (to attract attention) and started practicing genuine Applied Christianity.

So apparently did Dad, because, even after Mother, my brother, and I had been baptized in a Seventh-Day Adventist church and I'd gone off to that S.D.A. college, Dad did continue to buy, save, and share Pastor Emry's literature.

Well, that sort of vigorously confrontational, yet respectful, relationship may have been possible only for men born before, I don't know, 1930 or 1940 or thereabouts. I don't think I've seen it among my own generation. But it needs to be taken into account by anyone reading the more offensive things Pastor Emry said. He didn't believe he was supposed to sound friendly or hand out warm fuzzies--or even show a snarky sense of humor in sermons, although it came out when he talked or wrote letters. He didn't preach "hellfire," but he'd learned his preaching style in that school. Sermons were for strong, bold denunciations. He expected to be challenged in equally strong terms; he would, occasionally, even back down.

Neo-Nazi? No. The type of Christian whom some sort of neo-fascist movement might have been able to exploit, if Pastor Emry's vision of World War III had come true in the way he apparently expected it to do? Possibly. I'm glad we'll never know.

Time passed. That generation passed. I lived in a city and attended mainstream churches, often more than one of them, every weekend. I learned "Placater Mode verbal abuse" as a dialect, from church people, then unlearned it. I learned that, although of course some churchgoers aren't verbal bullies looking for a fight, the vast majority of the ones who do the vast majority of the talking are. To avoid verbal abuse and hostility, I found it helpful to avoid churchgoing; as an adult I rarely visit any church.

I have always said that, if ever it comes to pass that, on the six days of the work week, I find myself working with, for, and among people who all attend the same church, I'll join that church. (I did say "church." Muslims do have that kind of loyalty; my definition of "church" does not include mosques.) It's never happened. I don't usually talk or write about church, nor do I usually talk or write about money.

As regular readers know, I was pushed over the brink, when it comes to talking about money, last winter. I was living on less than Republicans typically spend on their dogs and I was getting e-mails, hourly, from various Republicans (or maybe from Democrats trying to turn people against the Republicans?) asking for money for various Republican presidential candidates. Oh, fear it not, there were e-mails from Democrats too--but on a weekly rather than hourly basis. I started asking people for money. Anyone whose e-mails asked me for money, or who started "following" me from a web site that did, began to get an e-mail from me, worded differently according to the words they used, but telling them how much money I've (not) been earning lately and suggesting that they support my project so that I can eat regularly, and, if they do, assuring them that I'll endorse their projects as at least showing sincerity in whatever religious, political, or humanitarian ideals they've claimed.

I sincerely hope that Candidates Trump, Sanders, and Clinton have received, and will continue to receive, the kind of response I got from you, Gentle Readers.

Such that today, yesterday, and on Sunday, I didn't eat any solid food. So far the Portal Paper has brought in $7; $3 of that was for the cats.

I hear you loud and clear, Gentle Readers. You're saying, "We have no use for you, the writer known as Priscilla King. If you'd rather die than try to adopt an immoral lifestyle at this point in your life, then die. We want your stuff anyway." I hear that message coming from you, and I reflect it back to you. If you want your life or death to mean anything to me, get that $100 into my hands now. If you want to go on spending all your money on beer and cable television and unnecessary driving, then...I'm not a violent person, but the funerals of people with that kind of priorities do a great deal to improve this world.

One of these alleged e-friends, to whom I'd mentioned a religious experience, did reply, in a way.

What I said was that "in 2006 I received a very vivid mental impression--it didn't look like a "real" sight or sound like a "real" sound, but I seemed to see Jesus as a very sick patient trying to press the button to summon the nurse and not being able to move His hand, and the words passed through my mind, "The church is the body of Christ." The meaning was clear. My prayers can be answered only if real Christians start paying me for what I do."

What the alleged Christian e-friend said was a classic piece of churchy verbal abuse, actually including a phrase I'd hoped might have died from overwork around 1989: "I don't know who or what has hurt you so bad to sound so bitter and angry, but I will not allow you to take it out on me."

You asked someone who has less than you have for money, Stupid One. Own your stupidity instead of compounding your offenses with verbal abuse. All this guy needed to say was, "I don't send out money online." I don't either, and I understand; if you've not been following a writer for years you have no way of knowing whether any of your e-friends actually exists as an individual, much less as the sort of individual s/he seems to be on the Internet. Or he could have done another version of that tired old whine about not having any money to spend, personally, and being accountable to spend funds he raised according to the policy of his church, which is also normal. This glutton-for-punishment has a real emotional need to insult people.

He represents himself as the pastor of a church--not in a neighborhood where anybody I know in real life has recently been. If that's true, he probably has a lot of "depressed" parishioners who don't know why, when everything they hear coming from him sounds so bland and nice and warm and fuzzy and even chummy (he probably says things like "I love you, brother" and "I'm praying for you, sister" a lot), they leave the church building feeling so much worse than they felt when they got up in the morning.

At this guy's site there's no overt mention of "enemies," no attention to Bible prophecies about wars or economic crises or even natural disasters. Everything looks nice and smooth, as long as nobody ruffles the surface.

Well, there is no shortage of people to follow in cyberspace. One more or less will hardly be missed, or even noticed. I might have forgotten this jerk by now if, when I was looking up one of Charles Merrill Smith's titles on Bing, I hadn't come across a site where somebody complained to somebody else that How to Become a Bishop had been "endorsed by a white supremacist hater like Sheldon Emry."

The contrast blazed up in my mind. Pastor Emry, a great American eccentric preaching primarily to an earlier version of the more extreme types of "preppers" and Tea Parties, responded to angry, Blamer Mode verbal abuse--from a congregant who didn't even look White, mind you!--with the stiff courtesy and ongoing good will of his and Dad's generation. Pastor One-of-a-crowd-of-fools-and-hypocrites responded to a very plain statement of fact, made without emotion or accusations, with a spew of putrid hate.

Who's the hater? Not Emry--whom I wouldn't have asked for money, because he didn't ask people for money without a straightforward accounting of what he wanted it for and why. Mr. Goodygoody Mealymouth is the hater.

And although the real hater might deserve to be called out by name, I don't want to do that now because there are thousands of him in these United States today. I want you readers to ask yourselves whether he's one of the so-called Christians you know...and feel free to denounce the "Christian" verbal abusers you know for being him, if you think that may help anybody.

People whose religion is all about warm fuzzy feelings, not about doing what Jesus actually did, are the haters we should be most concerned about in the Christian church. People who project their own hate onto you if you call attention, even inadvertently, to the hollowness of their feel-good babble, are the ones who "crucify our Lord afresh and put Him to an open shame." People who bustle around inviting the rich (or rich-looking) people to take the best places, tucking the poor (or shabby-looking) people out of sight, and simpering at anyone in real need, "Depart in peace! May you be warmed and fed--somewhere else!" are the ones who are doing nothing for Christ. Whether they affect the full-blown Universalist creed and try to avoid mentioning Christ so as to be more inclusive of those who prefer to worship Ishtar or Diana in the church, or whether they take the Fundamentalist tack and denounce "New Age" fluff as "of the devil"...their "religion" is as false and fluffy, and as much "of the devil," as anything in the "New Age."

God hates you, Preacher Goodygoody Mealymouth. The Bible never denies that God hates things, or suggests that we shouldn't hate them. The Bible tells us that God, not willing that anyone should perish, lets evildoers (like Preacher Goodygoody Mealymouth) go on polluting this world on the chance that some of them may repent. The Bible tells us to be as merciful as God is but it does not tell us to continue to support these evildoers' evil work. In fact, if evil work (such as verbal abuse being spewed at those who have less) is going on in a church, the Bible tells us to help those evildoers toward repentance and forgiveness--by walking out of that church, shaking its dust off our feet as a witness against them, and withholding all funding or moral support from that church or those people. To that extent, in King James English (which was often more picturesque than most modern dialects of English), the Bible commands us to hate the real haters in the church...just as God hates them.

This is not, of course, to be confused with the kind of hate that spews out of terrorists, or even the terribly confused "Westboro Baptists." The Bible at least gives us the example of people who concentrate on positively preaching what they do believe, rather than wasting much time denouncing what they don't believe. Still, from time to time it is necessary to rebuke people, to help them repent. Cutting off any donations of money that you might have been making to a church is an excellent way to correct a preacher.

I Was a Victim of Legal and Legitimate "Discrimination" (Edited)

(This post has been edited to remove un-auntly language.)

First the apology: This post cites a comment that, although justification for blocking a troll from my Google + page, made me laugh. The troll had referred to a florist refusing to create bouquets for a same-sex wedding as the "crime" of "discrimination." Since I can remember genuine discrimination (jobs closed to women, schools closed to students with physical disabilities, homosexuality as grounds for involuntary institutionalization and suspected homosexuality as a barrier to employment, and worse things were illegal but still going on when I was a child) I find this ludicrous, and said so. The troll then said "You were a victim of discrimination but you still support discrimination?"

And then he worked himself up into a real hatespew and got himself blocked from my Google + page. Like I'm so sorry about the hypertensive headache he's probably brought on himself. Not.

Actually I'm even wondering, since I've contacted Google repeatedly about blocking a rich and famous hater from my page, whether the troll was deliberately invented as a little tutorial about how to block trolls. Is it really that easy to push real trolls completely over the edge? Without even trying?

But here's the story, in case any real people want it.

I've been a victim of genuine discrimination that did me harm, yes; most recently ageist bigotry in hiring, and there was also one memorable weekend in Washington when I was refused taxi service on the Saturday night for being White and then cursed, long and loudly, on the Sunday afternoon for not being White. I wouldn't call that sort of thing a crime to be compared with the crime of letting a patient die from loss of blood because he was the "wrong" color for the only hospital within a hundred miles. I laughed at it, at the time. But I don't like it or support it, at all.

I've also been a victim of the kind of social rejection the troll had in mind. It's even documented on this web site, at greater length than I now think it deserved:

http://priscillaking.blogspot.com/2012/07/olivers-was-hijacked.html

There were sequels; the jerk Thomas was quite a character during his short time in my town, good for more drama and gossip even than Two-Dollar Mary. He approached and quarrelled with the town's most visible left-winger, who is not-my-brother-I-don't-know-some-sort-of-cousin and who has been threatened with violence for uttering liberal views on homosexuality in public. He sank a lot of money in a store, created an extravagant window display that wasn't for sale, and lost his entire investment. He got into a screaming rage with the older lady who had taken him on as a partner and, when his clamor attracted attention, threw a large metal sign at another storekeeper--I was an eyewitness when the police arrived. He was easily the most gossip-worthy topic in town before the great car chase, and I'm not sure of any reason to doubt anything that was said about him, except the other rumor that linked my name with his. It is not true that I ever said that Thomas would look good tied to the back of a truck. I can imagine no circumstances whatsoever under which Thomas would look good.

In any case, you will perceive, much more hate coming from a homosexual man (making a bid to take over someone else's store) than from a Christian woman (doing what she believes to be her duty to tell a couple of younger women she believes they're doing something wrong). More violence. More harm to others as well as the self.

And, yes, I think that kind of social "discrimination" is well within the constitutional rights of individual freedom of speech. Thomas was stupid and self-destructive and obnoxious. But nobody else has the ability to change that; the Creator gave Thomas a certain right to be stupid, self-destructive, and obnoxious--at least as much right as the Creator gave Thomas to feel whatever he felt toward his late lamented boyfriend.

Everybody does not like everybody else in this world. Some people do not have the mental capacity to appreciate us. Some people actually do us less harm by expressing their hostility to us, openly, than they might do if they were forced to deny it (or were mentally sophisticated enough to conceal it). So long as their hostility is limited to verbal or social demonstrations that hurt our feelings, as distinct from doing us any material harm, they have a right to be as hostile as they are. By and large that's their loss not ours.

For the more emotional, melodramatic, and immature among us, anyway, it's possible that some people aren't even hostile to us, but sincerely want the best for us when they say things we don't want to hear. I don't believe that two women who want to claim to be married to each other are doing the best thing for each other. I believe they are supporting a view of marriage that is inherently discriminatory to people--almost certainly including one of them--and unbiblical and un-American, and nobody should support that view of marriage. I know of no reason why anyone would imagine that a meddling older woman in a flower shop, refusing to make a bouquet for them, would change their view of marriage or their intentions toward each other. The woman's meddling can reasonably be described as stupid. But I'm hard pressed to imagine any rational basis for describing it as criminal; even if the couple weren't able to buy a floral bouquet across the street, has anyone ever suffered any material harm from not having a floral bouquet?

There's no way to keep people from having emotional feelings about each other, for any reason or none, based on a rational objective consideration of someone's public behavior or based on a hallucination or whatever else. Someone who's not already taking my money is entitled to say, purely because he's insane, that he doesn't want my patronage for his business. In fact, even someone who has taken my money to do a job is entitled to return the money and reject the job--as it might be a dentist who insisted, twenty-five years ago, that my wisdom tooth was beyond his capacity to treat and had to be surgically removed by a specialist. In fact, much as I didn't like having to suffer with that wisdom tooth until the specialist could deal with it, I actually prefer that that dentist "discriminate against" my teeth, rather than try to do something he wasn't qualified to do, do it wrong, and do real harm to me. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that kind of "discrimination."

There is something profoundly wrong with comparisons between social "discrimination" and the kind of oppression of which "discrimination" against some groups of people has been a part. The problem was not that Hitler looked at the ugly old Jew and felt revulsion, as Hitler described in Mein Kampf; the problem was that Hitler later ordered the murder of millions of Jews. The problem was not that John Adams feared that "on the day women are our equals, they will be our masters"; the problem was that women weren't allowed to vote, own property, attend schools, or practice trades. The problem was not that ancient British writers defined ugliness in terms of typically West African physical traits; the problem was that people of West African descent were enslaved. That rich White male homosexuals have the gall to compare people's refusal to celebrate their weddings to the Holocaust or the Trail of Tears is obviously not a problem of the magnitude of the Holocaust or the Trail of Tears, but neither is it something society ought to tolerate.

So yes, trolls, if you really think you want to call social rejection "discrimination," I've been a victim of "discrimination" that was legitimate and legal. And I'm glad. Nyah nyah nyah. And, by the way, I reserve the right to discriminate against trolls. And, as mentioned on my Google + page...people who confuse social rejection with material harm annoy me; my web site hereby defines those people as trolls, and reserves the right to treat them as such.

Tia, Tamera, Hate, and Waffles

Unfortunately it was only after reading a gross-out report about the hatespews Tamera Mowry has received that I learned that Tia & Tamera Mowry have a web site. I'm sure this is so not news to serious TV-star followers. Readers who watch prime-time TV have probably been following the sisters' site for years.

What's news is that when I tried to show support by adding their site to the list of web sites I follow, I got a message that "the site's security certificate has expired" and the site may have been hacked. Which happens to a lot of TV and movie stars' web sites, because they're so popular, and is especially likely to have happened to Tamera Mowry's, because of the hate.

Well...the computer didn't report a problem with the really interesting post here:

http://tiaandtameraofficial.com/blog/post/fresh-easy-breakfasts-in-a-snap

...and the quinoa waffles sound delicious...but I recommend setting your computer for maximum security before using this link.

What I hate is the way lousy creeps systematically try to hack into nice people's web sites. Like the scugs who tried to link Grandma Bonnie Peters' e-mail to a porn site. Porn viewers would probably be angrier about that than GBP was!

Was Trayvon Martin a Communist?

It seems unlikely that Trayvon Martin belonged to the Communist Party, but Terresa Monroe-Hamilton has documented that some of the old White guys currently claiming to "be Trayvon" did...

http://noisyroom.net/blog/2013/07/29/communist-race-baiting/

And why is that bad? Why was the Communist Party ever a threat to national security, when so many Americans liked some of their ideas? Because the Communist Party openly favored force and violence, and wanted to foment dissent that would lead to violent crime and open the door to a violent revolution. And apparently some of those guys are still spoiling for a fight.

Hence events like this weekend's mugging, in which three Black goons told the White man they attacked that they were beating him up and stealing his money "for Trayvon." Ohhh be still my heart; I'm sure the Martin family felt sooo proud. (Not!)

TMH's e-friend Trevor Loudon can fairly be described as a McCarthyite...but it seems that, although the original ideals of Marxist "Communist" Parties worldwide are as dead as Lenin, we still need a few McCarthyites to help diagnose more current manifestations of violent insanity.

If I felt moved to do something in memory of Trayvon Martin, here are a quick few ideas I'd consider that would actually honor the young man and his family: Send his siblings, cousins, friends, or neighbors (as many of them as funds allowed) to college. Make a memorial donation to his school, or to a charity (was he even old enough to have had a favorite charity?). "Adopt" a highway or a park bench in his name. Light a small, cheap candle in his name and stand around it holding hands and eating Skittles. Compose a song for people to sing while doing any of these memorial rituals, or any other memorial ritual that may occur to them.

But do not start a color war in which more young people, including children younger and smaller and more innocent than Trayvon Martin, will be hurt. That is absolutely the worst memorial Martin could possibly have.

Europe Contemplates Criminalizing Natural Gardening

Make no mistake: this is where the Food Safety Act is leading in the U.S., too. It is not about preventing enemy countries from poisoning processed food (which is still possible, although, like most crimes and terrorist acts, illegal). It's about keeping farm families from preserving heirloom strains of fruits and vegetables...think blue corn, pink-center tomatoes, Vidalia onions, morel mushrooms, pawpaws...anything that Monsanto, AstraZeneca, or some other monster corporation isn't trying to sell at the moment.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/05/08/bureaucracy-out-of-control-eu-proposes-limiting-seed-plantings-to-government-approved-list/

Why file this under "hate"? Because it's obviously the work of someone who hates people.

The Hate Crime That Wasn't In the Newspaper

Gary DeMar reports:

http://politicaloutcast.com/2013/04/church-defaced-by-homosexuals-gets-little-news-coverage/

Bombers and Terrorists Repeat U.S. History

Those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it...as I read reports like Madeleine Morgenstern's, I find myself remembering a bit of history that's often overlooked because it is, let's face it, unflattering to Anglo-Americans. Not too flattering to any Caucasians actually.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/17/dem-senator-says-his-michigan-office-received-a-suspicious-looking-letter/

Namely: When the first Anglo-Americans came to this continent, they were few, poor, and puny. They had survived long sea voyages that had left them half-starved and losing whatever immunity they had inherited or built up to the infections they brought here. Most of them weren't especially popular or powerful back in England; in fact many were "remittance men," if not convicts, who wouldn't be welcome at home if they survived a return trip. They were very, very polite to the alien nations who were already living here. If they'd come here as a war party, they would have had less chance than the proverbial snowball in Hell...in July.

So how could they end up becoming the dominant ethnic group? Superior technology--no, that came much later. Those infectious diseases were probably the primary reason why we're now an English-speaking country. Whatever else you may say about the British they had built up extraordinary collective resistance to an extraordinary variety of often-fatal diseases.

But also...when Native Americans did notice that (a) one or two members of a group of immigrants looked unhealthy, and (b) after getting within ten feet of these sick people their spokesmen would bring back infections that would wipe out most of the village, they weren't all that peaceable or all that stupid. They would start issuing strong hints that the British should take their germs back to wherever they'd come from. And then the British would try European-style diplomacy. Having determined that there were different nations on this continent, they would start rumors going among each group that the other group was planning to attack them. Very often this would start a war, and then the warriors in each group would be too busy fighting serious enemies to worry about a few pathetic immigrants who seemed likely to die, anyway, if left alone. And meanwhile the British would be gathering reinforcements...and we all know the rest of the story.

Is this bit of history being repeated? Look at these news stories. A bomb for Sheriff Joe Arpaio, the well-known conservative. Bombs at the Boston Marathon, a non-political event known to attract brave, strong, public-spirited people. A poison letter for a Republican in the U.S. Senate. A poison letter for President Obama, whose position is way out to the left of "Democrat" or even "progressive." A "suspicious" letter for a Democrat. And look at all the rumors...we hope a White man did it, or we hope a Black man did it, or maybe (I know this came from the Clintons) some sort of premature anniversary of the Waco holocaust, or maybe a leftie who hates Sheriff Joe or a right-wing nut who hates the President.

Why am I thinking that, before this round of attacks is over, we'll have heard them blamed on every demographic group in this country?

Whatever demographic group or groups the bombers and poisoners belong to is probably irrelevant. All they need to have in common is that they are evildoers. They are also despicable vermin who deserve neither quick humane executions nor long prison terms at the taxpayers' expense, but that's not the main point of this post. The point here is that these United States are facing another kind of invasion, again from the overcrowded "Old World" side of the planet. If we unite in opposition to U.N. power grabs, as this web site recommends we do, can we be induced to turn against one another and destroy ourselves, making things easier for our real enemies? Can people who wouldn't dream that they stood a chance in an overt war with the U.S. create enough internal chaos to...hey, it worked once, it just might work again.