U.S. Capitol For A Day, Part 2

As mentioned in Part 1, Brookeville, Maryland has conducted a festival during the past two days to commemorate the brief stay of President James Madison, after he fled Washington, D.C. during the War of 1812.  In the center of town is Brookeville Academy, which started out as a one-story building, before being expanded over the years.

These horses and their buggy gave some people a ride.

Here's another equine team and its wagon.

In a reenactment, Secretary of State James Monroe (center) rides into town.

Three more horses and their riders, two of whom pass in front of an era-appropriate flag having 15 stars and 15 stripes.

In this reenactment, President James Madison (below the flag) announces that the British have left Washington.

Before leaving, I took a swing over to nearby Oakley Cabin, and took this pic.

U.S. Capitol For A Day, Part 1

As I mentioned a few posts ago, when the British burned government buildings in Washington DC during the War of 1812, President James Madison fled into Virginia and the Maryland, to arrive at Brookeville.  Yesterday and today, Brookeville has commemorated Madison's arrival with a festival.  He spent the night at this house on Market Street.

Behind the house was a staging area for some historical re-enactors, both human and equine.

This lady demonstrates how cooking was done back then.

Here's another tent, whose environs were unoccupied.

These two musicians led a singalong.  The keyboard instrument is a celestina, similar to a celesta but smaller.  The audience sat on bails of hay, such as the one partially shown in the foreground.

Two more musicians played the violin and piccolo (or maybe a fife).

Three human re-enactors and their equine partners ride down the street.

That's all for Part 1.  More people and horses will be in Part 2.

Two Days After Crash, Fallen Pilot Identified

This past Wednesday, around 9:00 a.m., an F-15C fighter jet crashed near Deerfield, Virginia, a small town located in a mountainous part of Augusta County.  After two days of searching, investigators have determined that the pilot, Lt. Col. Morris Fontenot Jr. of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, did not eject and was killed in the crash.  He had been a "squadron commander at multiple locations" and had served in "numerous deployments to the Middle East", before joining the Massachusetts ANG this past February.

Read the story at News Leader and WDBJ.

Ukrainian Officer: Russia Has Invaded

Will anyone who said "war is not the answer" when the United States invaded Iraq make any protests in front of the Russian embassy?  I won't hold my breath.  From CNN:

A top Ukrainian army officer said a "full-scale invasion" of his country was under way Thursday, as a U.S. official said up to 1,000 Russian troops had crossed Ukraine's southern border to fight alongside pro-Russian rebels.

U.S. officials said Russian troops were directly involved in the latest fighting, despite Moscow's denials.

Rebels backed by Russian tanks and armored personnel carriers fought Ukrainian forces on two fronts Thursday: southeast of rebel-held Donetsk, and along the nation's southern coast in the town of Novoazovsk, about 12 miles (20 kilometers) from the Russian border, said Mykhailo Lysenko, the deputy commander of the Ukrainian Donbas battalion.

Read the full story and watch the video:

A Second American Dies Fighting For ISIS?

From USA Today:

The Obama administration is investigating reports from Syria that a second American was killed over the weekend while fighting alongside Islamist State extremists.

The news comes a day after U.S. officials confirmed that 33-year-old Douglas McCain, who had lived in Southern California and Minnesota, died in a battle between the Islamic State and other Syrian opposition groups.

The other American was not identified.

Both McCain and this second as-yet-unidentified fighter reportedly died in the vicinity of Aleppo.

Read the full story.

UPDATE:  According to Fox News, sources have identified the second American as Abdirahmaan Muhumed, of Somali origin, who lived in Minnesota.

American Dies Fighting For ISIS In Syria

An American named Douglas McArthur McCain (whose name is just dripping with historical irony) was killed in Syria while fighting for ISIS against another rebel group, the Free Syrian Army.  McCain, who called himself "Duale ThaslaveofAllah", was born in Illinois, grew up in Minnesota, and later moved to California.  According to his Twitter feed, he converted to Islam in 2004.

Read the story at NBC News.

New Florida College Gets Library Without Books

It may seem like a contradiction, but bookless libraries do indeed exist.  Earlier today, Florida Polytechnic University, the newest college in the state, opened for its inaugural class of students, who will be able to access over 135,000 ebooks on their electronic devices.  They will be able to print material from the ebooks, but are "discouraged from using [the library's] printers too much".

Read the story at MSN News.

200 Years Ago, Washington Burned By British

On August 24, 1814, during the War of 1812, British forces marched into Washington, DC and burned down the White House, Capitol and other government buildings, after defeating American defenders at Bladensburg, MD.  President James Madison, after convening a war council near the Navy Yard, had armed himself with two pistols and rode out to Bladensburg, but after the battle fled to Virginia before turning northward back into Maryland, staying the night at Brookeville.  First Lady Dolly Madison rescued a painting of George Washington from the White House.  The city's defenders burnt the Navy Yard to keep its ships and supplies from falling into British hands.  A British naval force made its way up the Potomac, but instead of attacking Washington from the river, captured and occupied Alexandria, VA before leaving a few days later.  The fires set by the British burned though the following night, but a rainstorm the next day helped put them out.

The above is but a brief summary of the day's events.  Read more at The Washington Post.

Washington Post Editors To Avoid The Name "Redskins"

First, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office cancelled the Washington Redskins' trademark registration.  Then, the University of Minnesota, whose stadium will host Minnesota Vikings football games until the NFL team's new stadium is completed, decided "to keep the Washington Redskins’ name from being used when the two teams play on campus in November."  (No word on whether the Vikings' name, which like "Redskins" has ethnic overtones, will be permitted.)  Now, The Washington Post editorial board has decided not to use the name "Redskins", "except when it is essential for clarity or effect".  The paper's news-gathering operation, which is separate from the editorial board, will continue to use the name.

Read the full story.

Friday Links

As we approach the last weekend before college football season, here are some things in the news:

From CNS News, General Martin Dempsey, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warns that our open borders make ISIL (a.k.a. ISIS or Islamic State) an imminent threat.  (via Weasel Zippers)

From GOP USA, Michele Malkin tells us about a jihadi serial killer right here in the U.S.

From Fox News, Hamas kills 18 people suspected of being informants for Israel.

From Haaretz, a rocket fired by Hamas hits a synagogue in Ashdod, injuring three people.

Gatestone Institute asks if CAIR lied about a rally for Hamas.

From Catholic News Agency, the Christians in Iraq stay strong in their faith despite persecution from ISIS.

From The Daily Caller, how Northern Illinois University restricts Internet use by its students.

From The Washington Free Beacon, Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) stands by his president.

From Premium Times, two more cases of ebola have occurred in Nigeria, where five people have already died from the disease.

From UPI, Maersk Oil plans to lay off about 50 employees in Houston.

From The Blaze, a secular group is upset about a policy used to select people who give invocations.

From Politico, only four Democrats who voted against Obamacare are still in the House.

From Fraud Of The Day, a frozen meals delivery company is being sued for allegedly making fraudulent claims through Medicaid.  (via Watchdog)

From Campus Reform, a student at Clemson University launches a campaign against what he sees as his school's insufficient acknowledgement of it past ties to slavery.

And from Taki's Magazine, Gavin McIness tells us "how to be fired".

Magnetic Bacteria Could Fight Cancer

The normal treatment for cancer is some combination of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy.  A new so-far experimental treatment is called "magnetic hyperthermia", which involves sending iron nanoparticles into a patient's bloodstream to arrive at the cancerous tumor, followed by heating the particles with an MRI machine.  According to Newsweek, there is a problem with this method, and a new proposed solution which uses magnetic bacteria.

Iron nanoparticle injections move throughout the body’s bloodstream and become diluted, making it difficult to build up the iron levels needed to destroy the tumors.

So researchers from the University in Granada, Spain, designed digestible magnetic bacteria that could leak through the lining of the stomach in order to quickly fill local stomach tumors with iron. Patients would only have to eat yogurt or other foods laced with probiotic bacteria, and wait three hours for it to digest, to get the first step of the treatment out of the way.

Read the full story.

Student Allegedly Suspended For "Bless You"

(H/T Missy Whittington)

As reported by CBS Charlotte,

A high school student was allegedly suspended after breaking a class rule of saying “bless you” after a classmate sneezed.

If this report is accurate, this would be a case of taking separation of church and state to a new extreme.  The student did not even say "God bless you", a common and polite way to respond to someone else's sneeze, but merely "bless you".  Will "gesundheit" now be the only permitted on-campus response to a sneeze?  The story also includes this paragraph:

The girl’s parents were told by school leaders that their daughter shouted “bless you” across the room and that it was a classroom distraction.

If the problem was the volume and not the words per se, that would be more understandable.  It's been a while since I was high school, but I remember that shouting across the classroom was generally frowned upon.  On the other hand, I have given and received "God bless you" more times than I can remember, and have never seen anyone get in trouble for that particular phrase.

Whatever you think about this, read the full story.

Railroad Museum Of Pennsylvania

The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania is located just east of Strasburg, Pennsylvania, across the road (state highway 741) from the Strasburg Rail Road.  It includes retired rolling stock from various times in the state's railroad history, in both a large indoor exhibit and an outdoor yard.  In front of the museum are these old locomotives and coal tenders.  To the right is the museum's sign.

I took a few pictures inside the exhibit hall from an upper observation walkway.  Here are some steam locomotives, which appear to be from different time periods.

The diesel-electric locomotives Conrail 2233 and Pennsylvania 4465 each occupy a track, along with some other equipment.  A young boy seems to be fascinated with 2233's front coupling mechanism.  The smokestack of the old steam locomotive above is in the foreground.

In front of Pennsylvania 4465 is the electric locomotive Pennsylvania 4935.

In the outside yard, several freight cars and a yard engine are mounted on short tracks connected to a turntable.

This Lehigh Valley passenger coach is listed in the museum's roster as Parlor Lounge No. 1552.

This is the steam locomotive Pennsylvania 6755, which has a 4-8-2 configuration, with its coal tender.

Finally, here are Pennsylvania 520 (2-8-2) and its tender.

The U.S. Buys Border Fence Material - For Ukraine

From World Net Daily:

The U.S. Department of State recently purchased 2,500 spools of Concertina razor wire to complete a border fence that online distance calculators determine is over 6,600 miles away from the Rio Grande.

Instead of completing the still unfinished border fence dividing Mexico from the United States, the $435,000 contract is designated to purchase fencing for the border between Ukraine and the Crimean Peninsula.

To those who oppose protecting our border from illegal entry, if fences don't work, why are we helping Ukraine construct one?

Read the full story.

Strasburg Rail Road

The Strasburg Rail Road, located just east of downtown Strasburg, Pennsylvania on state highway 741, features 45-minute rides on old-fashioned coaches pulled by a steam locomotive.  The train reverses direction at the nearby town of Paradise, within sight of mainline tracks that run eastward to Philadelphia.  While I waited for my ride, I took this pic of two rows of SRR's coaches occupying tracks parallel to where passengers board the train.

The Strasburg station includes a play area for young children, including a set of hand-powered "cranky cars", which move along a scaled-down track.

The station has a miniature steam train, which runs from one end of the publicly open area to the other.

Here's the locomotive, pulling the (full-size) train into the station.

On the return from Paradise, passengers have the option of getting off at Groff's Picnic Grove and catching a later train back to Strasburg.

The train passes by Cherry Crest Adventure Farm, of which this is merely a part.

After returning to Strasburg station, everyone leaves the train.  The tracks for the miniature train are separated from the platform by a fence.

"We Don't Want Illegals," Say......Mexicans?

Via Weasel Zippers:

A Catholic priest in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas, with the help of some "international donors", tried to open a shelter for people trying to enter the United States, but was prevented from doing so by local residents.  It thus appears that opposition to illegal immigration is not confined to white-skinned "gringos".

Read more at Breitbart's Big Government, and even more at Milenio(dot)com if you can read Spanish.

Grand Jury Indicts Governor Perry

Governor Rick Perry (R-TX) has been indicted by a grand jury on counts of abuse of official capacity and coercion of a public servant, stemming from a threat to veto funding for a public integrity unit run by the Travis County District Attorney's Office, allegedly to coerce the District Attorney, Rosemary Lehmberg (D), into resigning.  She was arrested for drunk driving in 2013, but remains in office.

Perry has already decided not to run for re-election, but the indictment will almost certainly have a negative effect on his presidential aspirations for 2016, even if he is acquitted.

Read the story at KTRK, KXAN, Fox News, Chron and CNN.

Hamas: The Living Dead?

Via Israpundit and Monkey in the Middle:

The bodies of some Hamas fighters, wrapped in burial shrouds, show a bit of animation.  Are these guys turning into something like zombies or vampires?

NGA Sculpture Garden, Part 2

Continuing with my self-guided tour of the National Gallery of Art sculpture garden, at the south entrance facing Madison Drive is Cubi XXVI, made of metal whose surfaces produced some interesting reflection patterns.

In the middle of the garden is the pool, which is used as an ice skating rink during the winter.  Behind it is the National Archives building.

Near the northwest entrance, facing Constitution Avenue, is Typewriter Eraser, Scale X.

Lurking in the mists and shadows is Spider.

This shot includes Untitled to the left and Aurora to the right, separated by a hedgerow.

That's all for the sculpture garden, whose works are listed here.  Later on, I wandered over to Freedom Plaza and took a picture of this statue of Kazimierz Pułaski (Casimir Pulaski), the Polish general who fought in the Revolutionary War and died after being wounded in the Battle of Savannah.

NGA Sculpture Garden, Part 1

The National Gallery of Art maintains an outdoor sculpture garden on the north side of the Mall in Washington, DC.  I recently had a chance to take a few pictures of the sculptures and of some other things in the general area.  On the way to the sculpture garden was this statue of Civil War General George Meade, accompanied by a group of symbolic figures, in front of the Department of Labor building.

Down on the Mall, this is the Smithsonian "Castle", with trees and a merry-go-round in the foreground.  Toward the left, you can see a jet coming from Washington Ronald Reagan Airport.

Around 10:00 a.m., the sculpture garden opened.  Near the southeast entrance is Four-Sided Pyramid.

Continuing westward, I walked past Moondog....

....and Cheval Rouge (Red Horse).

Partially seen in the background of Cheval Rouge is Graft, a tree made of stainless steel.

For more on the garden and the specific sculptures, go here and here.

Attempt At Human Smuggling Results In Two Deaths

From seattle pi:

U.S. authorities on Wednesday filed smuggling charges against the driver of a car carrying two Mexican men found dead inside the trunk after it was inspected at a San Diego border crossing.

Nicholas George Zakov admitted trying to bring the men into the country illegally and told officials he was to be paid $3,500 for the job, according to the complaint filed in U.S. District Court in San Diego.

Not only is crossing the border illegally through the southwestern desert dangerous, and sometimes even fatal, but so is being smuggled.

Read the full story.

Indonesia Bans Support For ISIS

If anyone starts wondering, "Where's the Muslim opposition to ISIS?", he/she only needs to look at the world's most populous Muslim country.  From The Christian Post:

The nation with the largest Muslim population in the world has officially banned support for the terrorist group the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which is responsible for mass killings of religious minorities in Iraq that has forced the U.S. government to respond with air strikes.

Indonesia, whose citizens comprise over 10 percent of the global Islamic population, recently announced the ISIS ban in response to ISIS recruiting efforts.

Read the full story.

Robin Williams 1951-2014

Actor and comedian Robin Williams, known for playing the alien Mork on the TV show Mork and Mindy, and for roles in numerous films, died today at his house in Tiburon, California.  Emergency personnel had responded to a 9-1-1 call, but he died soon after their arrival.  His death is suspected to be a suicide by asphyxiation.

Robin McLaurin Williams was born in Chicago and graduated from high school in San Francisco.  He attended Claremont Men's College, the College of Marin, and The Julliard School in New York.  He worked in a bar and an ice cream store before becoming successful as a comedian.  Williams was nominated four times for an Oscar and won best supporting actor for Good Will Hunting.

Read more at The Hollywood Reporter, NBC Bay Area, Variety, USA Today and Entertainment Weekly.  The Hollywood Reporter states that Robin Williams was born in 1952, but other outlets say that he was 63, which would mean that he would have been born in 1951 at the latest.  (UPDATE: THR now indicates that Williams was born in 1951.)

Hamas Reported To Have Executed Tunnel Workers

From The Jewish Press:

Over the past few weeks, Hamas executed dozens of tunnel excavators, according to a Mako report.

A source in Gaza, familiar with the tunnel industry, told Mako that Hamas suspected these tunnel diggers had information on the location on the tunnels, including their entrances and exits. Hamas was afraid the diggers could have passed the information on these tunnel to Israel.

In other words, not only did Hamas employ children in the construction of their tunnels, resulting in about 160 children dying (as noted in an earlier post), but they also deliberately killed other workers, just to keep them quiet.  

Read the full story at the above link.  You can also read the Mako report, if you read Hebrew.

Hawaii Governor Loses In Primary

Incumbent Hawaiian Governor Neil Abercrombie has lost in the Democratic gubernatorial primary to David Ige, currently a State Senator, thus losing a chance for a second term.  The primary race for U.S. Senator, between current Senator Brian Schatz, who had been appointed by Abercrombie to replace the late Daniel Inouye, and current U.S. Representative Colleen Hanabusa, is reported to be too close to call.

Read the story at Yahoo News and Reuters.

Mistakenly Buried WWII Soldier On His Way Home

Via Rare:

World War II soldier Lawrence S. Gordon was born in Eastend, Saskatchewan, Canada; moved to Wyoming to work on a ranch; and then enlisted in the U.S. Army.  He served in a reconnaissance company, but became the only soldier in the company who wasn't accounted for after the war.  But thanks to some diligent work by the grandson of a sergeant who served with Lawrence, and some DNA testing, Lawrence's remains were located - in an above-ground crypt at a German cemetery.  He will be returned to his birthplace and reburied there.

Read the story at Stars And Stripes.

Airstrikes And Humanitarian Aid Start In Iraq

NBC News reports that American naval jets have bombed ISIS positions near the Iraqi city of Erbil

The United States dropped laser-guided bombs on ISIS artillery in Iraq on Friday, the Pentagon said - the beginning of airstrikes threatened a day earlier by President Barack Obama.

The bombs, 500 pounds each, were dropped by two Navy F-18 fighter jets near Erbil, the strategically important city that serves as the Kurdish capital, and where the United States has a consulate. ISIS was using the artillery to shell Kurdish forces defending Erbil, the Pentagon said.

The report also indicates that President Obama has authorized drops of food and water to refugees trapped on a mountain by ISIS.  These would be the Yazidis, who are a religious minority.

Meanwhile, BBC News reports that planes from the United Kingdom will drop "emergency aid supplies", including water, lights and tents.

Snowden Granted Three More Years In Russia

Via UPI:

Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor accused of leaking classified material, has been granted a three-year residence permit by the Russian government.  His original grant of asylum had expired on July 31.  He will be allowed to travel freely within Russia and to travel outside the country.

Read the story at BBC News.

Wednesday Links, Again

The middle of the week is again a convenient time to post a bunch of stories in the news.

From Breitbart London, a Spanish priest infected with ebola will be repatriated.  (Via I'm 41)  UPDATE: From MSN News,  Liberia shuts the hospital where he was infected.

From The Daily Telegraph, eight drunken men attacked children on an Australian schoolbus.  (Via Legal Insurrection)

From International Business News, a case of rats on a plane.

From CNET, the British government will assess the role of Bitcoin in the country's economy.

From CO2 Science, a study on 3000 years of solar activity.

From Bloomberg, Sprint ends their attempt to acquire T-Mobile and names a new CEO.

From Canada Free Press, Canada tightens its requirements for new would-be citizens.

From UPI, assessing the death toll in Gaza is difficult because of different numbers from different sources.

From Fox News, a Navy veteran, after accidentally cutting off four of his fingers, makes his own prosthetic with the help of a friend.

From The Telegraph, commuters in Australia lift their train to free a man's trapped leg.  (Via the New York Post)

In Townhall, Jonah Goldberg opines that liberals are "late to the pot party".

In Yahoo Finance, Liz Peek opines about why President Obama wants amnesty for illegal aliens.

And from Reuters, a Swiss parliament employee has been found Tweeting naked selfies from her office.

This Could Stink

(H/T Missy Whittington)

There's an old saying that politicians are like diapers, because they need to be changed often and for the same reason.  Thanks to a newly proposed law, the California state legislature may have found a way to prove the saying true.  From Fox News:

Assembly Bill 1516, written by Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, a Democrat from San Diego, would create the taxpayer-backed program within the state's existing welfare network, called CalWORKs (California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids). Families that qualify for CalWORKS could be eligible for $80 a month to buy diapers for children under the age of 2.

Read the full story.

Former Hokie David Wilson To Stop Playing Football

Former Virginia Tech football player David Wilson, known for performing backflips and catching a rabbit on campus, was drafted by the New York Giants in 2012 after three years of playing tailback and returning kickoffs for the Hokies.  He suffered a neck injury during the 2013 season, after which he underwent an operation to fuse two vertebrae.  He had been practicing with the Giants when he suffered another neck injury, after which two doctors advised him to stop playing football.

Read the story at CBS Sports, ESPN and the NY Giants website.

Ebola In Virginia - 25 Years Ago

In October 1989, the Reston Primate Quarantine Unit, located near Reston, Virginia, received a shipment of 100 monkeys from the Philippines.  By the end of the month, 29 of them were dead.  The cause of death was said at first to be "simian hemorrhagic fever", but electron microscope tests indicated that they died from the Ebola Zaire, the deadliest strain of Ebola.

To find out what happened, read the story at Canada Free Press.

Woman Dies After Flying From Africa To England

A woman flying from Sierra Leone collapsed after walking off a Gambia Bird airliner that had just landed at London's Gatwick airport, and later died in East Surrey Hospital in Redhill.  She was reported to have been vomiting and profusely sweating, before she collapsed.  The plane was quarantined, since Sierra Leone is undergoing an outbreak of ebola, but tests on the woman's body turned out negative for the virus.

Read the story at Mirror and The Telegraph.

11 Countries Close To Bankruptcy

(H/T Aggedor)

As reported by Yahoo Finance, there are 11 countries which are close to going bankrupt.  After stating that Argentina recently failed make bond payment and thus defaulted on its debt, Yahoo notes:

Argentina is not the only country that has struggled, or even failed, to pay its debt in recent years. It is hardly the only country with a severely impaired credit rating either. Alongside Argentina, Moody’s currently lists 10 other countries with a rating of Caa1 or worse. A Caa1 rating is several notches below Ba1, which still carries substantial credit risk. Based on ratings from Moody’s Investors Service, these are the 11 countries at risk of default.

Read the full story.

Just One More Reason To Oppose Illegal Immigration

I believe that there are many legitimate reasons to oppose illegal immigration, starting with the fact that entering a country without being checked at a port of entry is illegal.  But let's forget for a moment, about the law.  Let's forget about how condoning illegal immigration is unfair to legal immigrants.  Let's forget about the risk of being caught by the Border Patrol.  Let's forget about the risks inherent to trespassing on private property.  Let's forget about the dangers of being used as a "mule" by drug smugglers.  If we ignore all of this, there is one more reason to oppose and discourage illegal entry, the danger coming from the land itself.  With notable exceptions such as Brownsville and El Paso in Texas, Nogales and Yuma in Arizona, and San Diego California, along with the adjacent Mexican cities on the other side of the border, much of the border is barren and remote from urban areas.  Crossing from Mexico into the United States can involve a journey tens of miles long on foot across forbidding desert, and for the part east of El Paso, a wade or swim across the Rio Grande.  During the warm part of the year, the southern border area can get very hot, adding to the dangers.  As a result of all this, some migrants do not survive the journey.  This is one more reason I oppose illegal immigration.  In addition to the harm done to Americans, there is the harm, sometimes fatal, to the illegal immigrants themselves.  For some more of what I mean, read this article in the Mail Online.

No Arms, No Problem

Via The Daily Caller:

Baseball players whose throwing arms aren't that great have sometimes been derided as figuratively having "no arm".  Tom Willis, however, literally has no arms, but it doesn't stop him from throwing out the ceremonial first pitch, which he has done at no fewer than 22 Major League stadiums.  Here he is in Kansas City: