"Don't Give Up the Ship"

a motto for the ages

This title came to me yesterday as I walked around downtown after lunch at Jake’s Diner. Our City has an edifice at the base of State Street known as the Soldiers and Sailors Monument, and quite frankly I have never taken a really close look at it before. So on the beautiful sunny day before the snowstorm, I spent time reading everything carved into the granite. Later, of course, I looked it up on my phone and confirmed all the details. The phrase from this monument that I’m quoting as my title is attributed to a Naval hero called Captain James Lawrence and comes from his remark during the War of 1812 against the British Empire. Anyway, what struck me about the inscriptions was the fact that one of them says the following:

In Memory of New London’s Soldiers and Sailors who fought in defence of their country. Erected on the site of her first fort fortified 1691 — Dismantled 1777

I have highlighted what was curious about this inscription. In fact, I had to fight whatever force is working behind the scenes as I type because autocorrect changed the spelling to defense. I have now confirmed that the “c” is the British spelling while the “s” is American, a distinction which remains to the present day. When I’m looking for a fun project, perhaps I’ll research when the American spelling changed and perhaps even find out why.

But the important thing today is that American democracy is under attack and we need to remember the fact that the War of 1812 was fought to get out from under the King’s rule. America was founded as a Democratic Republic with the people electing representatives to govern, while Britain remains a Constitutional Monarchy (where the monarch is head of state but Parliament is responsible for making and passing laws and the monarch’s role is largely ceremonial).

The current administration is attempting to execute what is known as the “unitary executive theory” which has been promoted since the Reagan era and is currently being pushed by the Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation. In fact, all those Executive Orders in their fancy binders that appeared magically on the first day in office of the latest President were probably prepared well in advance by those two organizations. And they have been hiring young people and grooming them to step into government jobs, which is why we are witnessing the ridiculous “cleansing” of bureaucrats. Who knows where the Musk Boys came from, but it’s a sure bet that some may have been recruited for a particular purpose.

And now I have to stop, because my own little domain is the only place where I can achieve any sense of normalcy. The snowstorm seems to have interrupted my paper delivery (although it could be buried out there somewhere), so instead of reading it on line which I do not enjoy particularly, I am going to research acrostics so that I can try a different type of puzzle to distract me.

Besides “Stayin’ Alive in 2025”, we have also now adopted “Hangin’ Tough” to cover the additional adversity we all now face.

RESIST ALWAYS

TTFN