Mid-June Potpourri

Etc.

A diarist/Substackist/essayist seeking to produce one worthwhile offering a week is often confronted with one of two problems. The first is the presence of simply too much source material from which to choose, and the second is plain old writer’s block. The answer to either is the potpourri, which is what this is. I will leave to the reader which of the two maladies is in play.

Pope-pourri

The election of an American Pope and the sense of great civilizational hope attending thereto have already been treated here, and it is fair to say that longing for his impact on this nation and its fractured people have (has?) only increased. Americans are a wounded and wandering people, and the Pope’s words—delivered to us in our own language with the authority of 2000 years—are striking. The video above is worth seven and a half minutes of your time.

I Love A Parade

The United States Army should be proud of its great quarter millennium of excellence, and sharing some of that pride with the people who pay the bills strikes me as a wonderful means of connection. Yesterday’s parade in Washington can and should be seen as just such an effort, and it is a shame that crowds were considerably more sparse than most had anticipated. That the parade had become a political football was terribly unfortunate, but such are the consequences of our political choices. I am deeply involved in Rik Atkinson’s second volume of his Revolutionary War series (it is wonderful), and the slow development of the Army as an effective fighting force under its great and flawed commanding general is particularly well treated.

No Kings

Having paid less attention to the world recently than usual, the “No Kings” phenomenon came as a surprise driving from acupuncture to pool chemical purchase midday Saturday. An enthusiastic throng had formed along one of the major arteries of our minor town, with signs and flags and a great deal of energy. Upon the realization of what was afoot, a sense of dread and foreboding grew, as whatever good was happening undoubtedly would be destroyed by miscreants engaging in what seems to pass these days as publicly acceptable anti-Semitism. None was to be found, but there were plenty of calls to follow the Constitution and to observe the rule of law, both of which are foundational conservative principles that we can all get behind. Between the Army parade and the No Kings protests, yesterday must be chalked up as a win for America.

Israel and Iran

When one country is dedicated to the destruction of another, and that country publicly espouses and supports such destruction, it must be regarded warily by not only the threatened nation, but the world. When the aggressor nation approaches operational nuclear weapons capacity, wary regard is insufficient. Israel’s actions in the past few days are right and proper, adding much needed heft behind the wisdom of what the kids say is the concept of “FAFO”.

There have been stories of lukewarm support for Israel on this front focusing mostly on the lukewarm support for Israel (or more properly, the lukewarm condemnation of Iran) of our Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge “Bridge” Colby, who continues to monomaniacally focus on the China threat without the considering the truth of an interconnected world. Colby sees continuing material support for Ukraine and Israel as reductive to his effort to contest the great white Chinese whale, when in truth, hobbling of America’s #2 and #3 adversaries overwhelmingly by proxies (see Ukraine, Israel) is about the most effective strategic approach we could take at this point. The only thing missing is, you know, actual re-arming and preparation for a China contingency. Colby would have us believe we cannot afford such preparations, and that we must therefore reduce our support for trusted friends and allies while continuing to fecklessly muddle along in moving to wartime production.

Of course, I disagree. We must do both—prepare by rearming and act as an arsenal to those fighting wars in which we have a great deal of interest in the outcome.

The Great Crab Taste Test

Having lived here in crab central for the better part of 18 years, imagine the surprise of discovering this weekend that there was an East-Coast-West-Coast-Rap-Like controversy surrounding crabs harvested from the Miles River vs. those harvested from the Choptank River. The precipitating event in this discovery was the hosting of Catherine’s brother Johnny for an evening of crab picking before he headed back home to South Carolina. In the back and forth between them during the ordering process, reference was made to not only this distinction but in there being a price premium for the Miles River crabs. See the map below for further insight:

Living on the Miles River demanded loyalty to our local blue crabs (although the interwebs does a good job in pointing out that there is no biological difference between those of the South (Choptank) and those of the North (Miles River)) but the question arose as to whether or not the difference (size, taste, density) was worth the extra $25 a dozen. The order placed called for one dozen of each, and the fair Catherine created the conditions for a blind taste test, in which she (without looking) removed the labels from the two bags of crabs and crumpled them up, placing them nearby. We each then grabbed a crab from the two bags and began the test. After those first two, two more were consumed. Although it was a small sample size, you get the point.

After my four crabs, there was a clear victor, as one bag produced crabs that were larger, more densely packed, and “sweeter” (Johnny’s word, and he knows these things). The lesser bag’s crabs were tasty, mind you (Catherine, the contrarian, found these superior), and ordinarily, had they been consumed alone, would have been considered a feast. Suffering by comparison however, Catherine uncrumpled the labels to reveal the great victory of the Miles River over the Philistine Crustaceans to the south. Now—the important question—were the Miles River crabs worth the extra money? In my view, yes. I had a total of ten crabs, five of each, and I would have paid another ten dollars to just eat the Miles River version. Here is a little more on the subject.

All of this is important, as the Great Annual Patrick and Bryan Crab Feast is just two weeks away. You see, seven years ago, the fifth of Julie and Jim’s children (Patrick) turned fifty years old, without the fourth of their children (Bryan) having recognized the great milestone. Upon confrontation with the facts of this great snub (and the general mortification that followed), recompense was offered up in the form of an annual crab feast for the remainder of their lives.

And so to honor the life of Brother Pat, Miles River crabs only will be on the menu in two weeks.