compromise their principles has lost very freedom of conscience
Adapted from the passage in the book, Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy (New York: Harper & Brothers. 1055), where the author writes:
These, then, are some of the pressures which confront a man of conscience.
He cannot ignore the pressure groups, his constituents, his party, the comradeship of his colleagues, the needs of his family, his own pride in office, the necessity for compromise and the importance of remaining in office.
He must judge for himself which path to choose, which step will most help or hinder the ideals to which he is committed.
He realizes that once he begins to weigh each issue in terms of his chances for re-election, once he begins to compromise away his principles on one issue after another for fear that to do otherwise would halt his career and prevent future fights for principle, then he has lost the very freedom of conscience which justifies his continuance in office.
But to decide at which point and on which issue he will risk his career is a difficult and soul-searching decision.
Lets say that one sentence again.
He realizes that once he begins to weigh each issue in terms of his chances for re-election,
once he begins to compromise away his principles on one issue after another for fear that to do otherwise would halt his career and prevent future fights for principle,
… then he has lost the very freedom of conscience which justifies his continuance in office.
Lets go that one part.
Once he begins to compromise away his principles on one issue after another …
Then he has lost the very freedom of conscience which justifies his continuance in office.
this didn’t open my eyes – his words had drawn me into his madness
“In the spring of 1937,” he [Albert Speer] said, “Hitler said something to me that should have made me realize the extent of his megalomania.
He came to my Berlin showrooms to look at the seven-foot-high model of the stadium.
Talking about the Olympic Games, I pointed out to him that the athletic field did not conform to the proportions prescribed by the Olympic Committee. ‘
That’s immaterial,’ said Hitler.
‘In 1940 the Games will be held in Tokyo, but after that, for all time to come, they will take place in Germany, in this stadium.
And then it is we who will prescribe the necessary dimensions.’
“Thinking of this later, it was almost incredible to me that this didn’t open my eyes.
I was after all a sportsman, passionately interested in the Olympic Games since childhood, and I knew perfectly well that the whole universal concept of the event presupposed a change of venue every four years.
How could he have thought he could bend the powerful world of sports to his will?
How could he have wanted it?
How could I not have realized that day that he was mad?
Well, I didn’t;
I can almost still see myself smiling in admiration at his prophetic words.
He had drawn me into his madness.”
From Albert Speer: His Battle with Truth by Gitta Sereny (Knopf: New York, 1995).
Albert Speer – The good Nazi
To repeat, “How could I not have realized that day that he was mad? Well, I didn’t; I can almost still see myself smiling in admiration at his prophetic words. He had drawn me into his madness.
Sounds like a lines from a whole batch of upcoming explain-it-all biographies that will be written in the next 10 to 20 to 30 years.
After the war, Speer was among the 24 major war criminal defendantscharged by the International Military Tribunal for Nazi atrocities. He was found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, principally for the use of slave labor, narrowly avoiding a death sentence. Having served his full term, Speer was released in 1966. He used his writings from the time of imprisonment as the basis for two autobiographical books, Inside the Third Reich and Spandau: The Secret Diaries. Speer’s books were a success; the public was fascinated by the inside view of the Third Reich he provided. He died of a stroke in 1981.
find a crystal sea ran along with skip jump at random, fancy-free
Always the world has ever been A fairy-land to me. No road was just a common road No tree a common tree.
Each road was an enchanted trail To find a crystal sea I ran along with skip and jump At random, fancy-free.
About each tree-trunk hung a spell Whose pebbles, bits of glass In hidden nests were images To bring my dreams to pass.
I never went a-journeying But that I ended lost, For I sped down the avenue A-flame and fancy-tossed.
Ah me! my life has ever been A fragment from a jest Torn from the tangled web of dreams That gossamer my breast.
Dream Life by Georgia Douglas Johnson as published in The selected works of Georgia Douglas Johnson by Georgia Douglas Johnson (New York: G.K. Hall, 1997).
According to Wikipedia: Georgia Douglas Johnson (September 10, 1880 – May 15, 1966), was an American poet and playwright. She was one of the earliest female African-American playwrights, and an important figure of the Harlem Renaissance.
Throughout her life, Johnson wrote 200 poems, 28 plays and 31 short stories. In 1962, she published her last poetry book, entitled Share My World, the poems in which reflect on love towards all people and forgiveness, showing how much wisdom she has gained throughout her entire life.
after horse is gone or when the steede is stolne shut the stable durre
Out walking on the Island with my wife took the path that runs along the cross island parkway to the bridge over Broad Creek.
For sometime I have noticed that at one point, we walk through a gate in the fence that lines the parkway.
The other day, I looked a little closer and noticed we weren’t walking through a gateway in the fence along the parkway but through a fence that seems to have been set up so there could be a gate.
If ever, and we have never seen it closed, the gate where to be closed, it would be a matter of 4 or 5 feet to walk around the gate.
I wondered why out loud and my wife pointed out that maybe it was to block access to path if you had a vehicle of some sort.
I agreed that that would work but to someone who was going to drive a bike or ATV or something that fit on the path, the closed gate would not be much a deterrent.
From a point of law I guess, if one were asked was the gate closed, and it was, then it should be understood that access was restricted and those who continued around the gate would be understood to be in violation of whatever reason the gate was closed.
Still its a gate that doesn’t close anything or offer passage to anyway.
In 2012, much was made of the Governor of Alaska and they she fought for funding for a ‘Bridge to No Where’.
At the time I pointed out that didn’t bother people in Michigan as Michigan built a Bridge to No Where in 1957.
Still I stand in front of my open gate and I walk around to see what would happen if the gate might be closed.
What came to mind was the old saying of closing the barn door after the horse has left and if you this set up for your barn, closing the barn door before the horse has left wouldn’t make much difference which led me to search out the orgins of the phrase about the horse and the barn door and that led to a feller name John Heywood who put pen to paper back in the Henry 8th era.
And boy did Mr. Heywood put pen to paper.
He recorded a lot of things that we say and whether or not he SAID them first, he wrote them down and published them first in his book, The Proverbs of John Heywood, Being the “Proverbs” of that Author (Printed in 1546).
The way he put it was When the steede is stolne shut the stable durr.
Other thoughts in his book include:
But better late then never to repent this.
And while I at length debate and beat the bush, There shall step in other men, and catch the birds, And by long time lost in many vain words.
Wedding is destiny, And hanging likewise.
A hard beginnyng makth a good ending
Two heddis are better then one
And also I shall to reueng former hurtis, Hold their noses to grinstone, and syt on theyr skurtis.
The nere to the churche, the ferther from God.
Be they wynners or loosers, … beggers should be no choosers.
A man maie well bring a horse to the water, but he can not make him drinke without he will.
According to Wikipedia, John Heywood (c. 1497 – c. 1580) was an English writer known for his plays, poems, and collection of proverbs. Although he is best known as a playwright, he was also active as a musician and composer, though no musical works survive. A devout Catholic, he nevertheless served as a royal servant to both the Catholic and Protestant regimes of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I.
Boy Howdy! But anyone who served Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I and survived deserves to have also said If you can keep your head when all about you, but he didn’t.
(It seems Mr. Kipling did.)
Mr. Heywood did say I know on which side my bread is buttered, but he didn’t say why toast always falls buttered side down.
A lot of goofiness for a goofy gate in one essay.
I try to chronicle words, word usage and witty word play but what it comes down is what it says in the Bible.
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
have smart president whereas in the past we have had dumb presidents …
Adapted from the opinion piece How Much Humiliation Can JD Vance Take? By Dana Milbank (April 7, 2026 NYT) Where Mr. Milbank writes:
While anonymous White House officials let it be known that the vice president was skeptical about the war in the lead-up to the invasion, Mr. Trump has cut off that route of escape, saying Mr. Vance was “maybe less enthusiastic about going, but he was quite enthusiastic.” Mr. Vance is reduced to maintaining that war is OK now because “we have a smart president whereas in the past we’ve had dumb presidents.”
Mr. Milbank is referring to a scene in the Oval Office that was reported in Buzzfeed by Curtis Wong who writes:
The heated exchange between Vance and RealClearPolitics reporter Philip Wegmann went down at an Oval Office press event, during which Wegmann pointed to reports of the vice president’s skepticism on Operation Epic Fury while asking if he was “completely on board with the current war” in Iran.
“Look, I think that I know what you’re trying to do, Phil, you’re trying to drive a wedge between members of the administration, between me and the president,” Vance said. “What the president said consistently, going back to 2015, and I agreed with him, is that Iran should not have a nuclear weapon.”
“We have taken this military action under the president’s leadership,” he continued. “I think all of us, whether you’re a Democrat or Republican, should pray for success and pray for the safety of our troops.”
When Wegmann pointed to Vance’s “past statements,” however, the vice president doubled down.
“I think one big difference, Phil, is that we have a smart president, whereas in the past we’ve had dumb presidents,” he said. “And I trust President Trump to get the job done, to do a good job for the American people and to make sure that the mistakes of the past aren’t repeated.”
It should be understood that when the current vice president said this, he was standing next to the current president.
You can’t make this stuff up.
The current vice president is a relatively young man.
No Haiku For You 