About

"The trouble with Jeff is that he lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech."

George Bernard Shaw, paraphrased

Stop Fascism

We need Democratic Governors to form a coalition immediately—it’s our best chance to stop creeping fascism.

Democratic states control 70% of U.S. GDP. This is our best leverage to push back against authoritarian overreach.

Call or email your Governor NOW—demand they form a Blue-State Emergency Coalition.

MESSAGE TEMPLATE

Dear Governor [Your Governor],
I urge you to lead a coalition of Democratic Governors to counter the growing threat of federal overreach. Elon Musk now controls the U.S. Treasury payment system, giving him dangerous influence over federal funding. If we do nothing, critical programs could be sabotaged at his whim.
We need a unified Blue-State Emergency Coalition to: Coordinate legal challenges to block unconstitutional federal actions. Declare a collective State of Emergency to protect state resources. Refuse cooperation with unlawful federal directives.
This is not about partisanship—it’s about defending democracy and economic stability. We must act before it’s too late. You have the power to make this happen. Will you take action?
I look forward to your response.

[Your Name] [Your Contact Info]

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No, That Is NOT a Confederate Flag

I posted briefly about this when I saw it earlier, but I wanted to provide a little more context now that I’m in front of the PC and able to do a longer-form commentary on it.
Of late, I’ve seen people sharing an observation about the tiny US flag icon on the upper left corner of the us.gov website. It’s this little dude right here:

Embiggen it to full size and you get this:
Nine stars, eleven stripes. OK, great. That is indeed incorrect for the full presentation of the US national colors, which has 13 stripes– one for each of the original 13 colonies, and 50 stars for the 50 current states.
But the meme spreading around is suggesting (a) that this is a doing of the fascist-in-chief since his inauguration, and that (b) it is the First Confederate National flag.

Both these statements are empirically untrue.

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RPGs Against the Reich… er… Right!

Consider this a heads-up from me to you.

I’m a huge fan of games where the little people make impossible stands against incredible odds. I love games where the authoritarians and fascists get their teeth kicked in by the forces of good and equality. I can’t say I’ve played any of these before, but I own one and it is interesting, and I feel like pushing cultural narratives against the right wing, while it may be a little echo chamber-y, is well worth it.

I expect if I can find a muse, I’ll be running one or more of these games in my future.
And in yours, if you’re down.

The Bundle of Holding can be found at this link.

Moving Off Whats App

If you’ve been in contact with me via text or Whatsapp, be advised that as a result of ditching Meta, I’ll be off that too.

I’m moving most communications to Signal, an open source encrypted software. Join me there.

Let’s switch to Signal: https://signal.org/install

Worse and Better Days Ahead

In 1857, the Dred Scott v. Sandford decision was issued by the SCOTUS, with the majority decision being penned by Chief Justice Roger Taney. It stated in no uncertain terms that people of African descent could not be citizens of the United States, that they were property, and that Congress had no authority to regulate such property in the northern reaches of the Louisiana Purchase.

On January 1, 1863, a mere six years later, President Abraham Lincoln issues the war measure known as the Emancipation Proclamation that legally freed all slaves in states in rebellion. While it did nothing to aid the plight of those black people in border states like Maryland and Delaware, and was symbolic in nature since the states in rebellion were not under Federal control as of the date of the act, it set the stage for Thirteenth Amendment, ratified in 1865, that made slavery illegal throughout all of the United States.

Eight years.
Eight years span the difference between the Dred Scot decision marking black people as property and the Thirteenth Amendment that granted full emancipation across the United States, and the amendments that followed granting suffrage to all males and specifically including black men, and established equal protection under the law.

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States’ Rights and the Lost Cause Piffle

(Ed: This is a repost of a little thing I wrote way back on August 15, 2013. I reference it quite a bit, so I think it makes sense that I revive it like I revived this whole blog. I feel it bears additional mention in this burgeoning era of extreme right-wing activity, include neo-Confederatism.)

Something those of us involved in Civil War reenacting and living histories hear quite a bit from the

secessionist reenactors is the old chestnut that “The war wasn’t about slavery. It was about States’ Rights / tariffs/ Northern Aggression / some-other-twaddle.”  Sure, the principle of tariffs were bound up in the whole ordeal, but there was really only one “State’s Right” that the secessionist leaders in Montgomery, or Mobile, or Richmond were really interested in: Their perceived rights to own slaves as human chattel.  The typical “not about slavery” statement, while well-loved by those that choose to wear the grey, is pure, unadulterated tripe; and does a grave disservice to the actual history; and their presentation of it to the public does a grave disservice to those that they share their revisionist history with.

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It’s Alive! My Creation! It’s Alive!

This post will be reproduced in the About section for the future, but every blog has to start with one, and the journey of a thousand leagues begins with a single step.

Hi there!

I’m Jay Law. This is my blog. You’re soaking in it.
It’s been forever since I first set this thing up in the early 2000s, and with the growth of social media, I let it fall by the wayside, and eventually dropped it entirely. All the cold content is gone. No matter. It’s a different world now, ain’t it?

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