I don’t hear or read much about William Penn among Friends these days. It appears he has been canceled and erased, wiped away in the Great Dismantling. (Indeed, Penn seems to get the most attention today from ultra-right wing activists, who are busy trying to turn him into an avatar of their drive to turn … Continue reading October 16 Was William Penn’s Birthday. I’ll still celebrate it, even if others won’t.
[The most revealing analysis of the mythic underpinning of the authoritarian upsurge I’ve seen points straight to the “restoration” of a zombie version of white Jim Crow Dixie culture, circa 1920-1950. This survey bolsters that impression. Progressives who want to push back effectively against this drive need to get over the tendency to ignore this … Continue reading MAGA & Neo-Confederate Racism, By the Numbers
On this day [Sept. 22] in 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed his preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, a document that put the Confederacy on notice of his intention to free their slaves. They had until January 1, he said, to lay down their arms; after that, any slave within a rebelling state would be “then, thenceforward, and … Continue reading Quote of the Day — Lincoln & Emancipation: The First Version
The Secret Service has to secure similar events every week, sometimes every day. So maybe this was a piece of cake for them. Compared to their skill, our mornings walks near Dr. King now seem utterly, almost comically amateurish.
But even so, somehow we came through it. Dr. King wasn’t called on to preach at our funerals. Instead, we lasted long enough to hear others preaching at his.