History
For an American coming of age in the last third of the nineteenth century, one of the surest ways to gain prominence or to secure it was to become a fine public speaker. Oratory was an indispensable element in both politics and religion, on every public holiday and anniversary, at
History
If the empire had been afflicted by any recent calamity, by a plague, a famine, or an unsuccessful war; if the Tiber had, or if the Nile had not, risen beyond its banks; if the earth had shaken, or if the temperate order of the seasons had been interrupted, the
History
President Bush carried every state of the old Confederacy in 2004, most by substantial margins. White people in those states have generally supported the President's Iraq policies by greater margins than people in the rest of the country. Which is odd, because most white Southerners are familiar with
History
A minor buzzword on the right wing of the blogosphere has been "Jacksonian", used to describe populists who support the occupation of Iraq. But anyone who is familiar with Andrew Jackson will know how bitterly he resented the British occupation of his native South Carolina during the Revolutionary
History
[Christians] refused to take any active part in the civil administration or the military defense of the empire. […] This indolent, or even criminal disregard to the public welfare, exposed them to the contempt and reproaches of the Pagans, who very frequently asked, what must be the fate of the empire,
History
How often is it the interest of four or five ministers to combine together to deceive their sovereign! Secluded from mankind by his exalted dignity, the truth is concealed from his knowledge; he can see only with their eyes, he hears nothing but their misrepresentations. He confers the most important
History
California has had two major riots in the last 50 years: * The Los Angeles riots of 1992, when 53 people died, 26 of them in a single day. * The Watts riots of 1965, when 34 people died. In Iraq, death tolls larger than these have been happening almost every single
History
An excerpt from a letter written by President Theodore Roosevelt to U.S. Ambassador to Italy Henry White, dated September 13, 1906: Just at the moment I am so angry with that infernal little Cuban republic that I would like to wipe its people off the face of the earth.
History
Western Union no longer delivers telegrams. (Link courtesy of Steve Goddard.)
History
In 1970, President Nixon secretly ordered the Air Force to bomb North Vietnamese supply lines running through Cambodian territory. When news of the bombing was published in the American press, the Nixon administration accused the press of harming national security by publishing secret information. But to whom was the bombing
History
The distortion of Soviet intelligence analysis derived, at root, from the nature of the one-party state and its inherent distrust of all opposing views. The Soviet Union thus found it more difficult than its Western rivals to understand, and therefore to use, the political intelligence it collected. Though the
History
The State and Revolution The Sword and the Shield