Judge Dee in the Infested City

Finished reading the Willow Pattern mystery, where the Emperor and its court abandoned the city and left Judge Dee in charge. The common people  hides in their houses and bands of scavengers in black hoods collect the corpses and rob anything not nailed down. The Judge says it is necessary to repress in the bud all disorder and beheads four for molesting a streetwalker, and an unknown number for disrespectful words against the absent Emperor. He accuses them of organizing an uprising and using Chinese torture, identifies the infiltrated leaders. As usual in Van Gulik mysteries, prostitutes play a central part in the intrigues. In Van Gulik's China, prostitution is regulated,  work in licensed houses and pay taxes. The girls are peasant class, sold into the trade by indebted families. Elderly millionaires use to purchase the girls for legal wives, and prostitution can be a road to social advancement, as it carries no moral stigma. Judge Dee has three wives, and number one wife manages the household. Some wives are jealous and will not agree with sharing, forcing the husband to maintain a separate home in a nearby village. 

Recurring Dream

In  the dream, I realize I am almost forty and have to marry. I am in a summer camp and consider the girls available. Some of them I have known before. I wake up without a solution. 

Judge Dee Doling Justice in the Epidemic Ravaged Capital

I am reading a topical gong'an novel by Robert van Gulik, set in the Tang Dynasty. The Emperor and his court had abandoned the capital for fear of the epidemic, leaving Judge Dee as supreme authority of the diseased city. As usual, mysterious assassinations occupy Judge Dee's mind, while directing the washing out of the rat-infested sewers and repressing with deadly barbed iron arrows the famished populace assaulting the City Granary. Over this background, three decadent clans are entangled in fierce rivalry over Porphyry, a "virgin" prostitute. In the strictly policed Imperial China, carrying firearms and cutting weapons is prohibited, girls carry hidden iron balls on chains, 流星錘 , which they use with mortal effect. I have not finished yet, so cannot reveal who is the assassin and its motive. I am looking forward to learn the refined torture methods applied by Judge Dee to the suspects. 

P.S.: Happy End. All the rich people involved and their wives have been decapitated by Judge Dee and their fortunes divided between the Tribunal, the Judge and his faithful assistants. The rain washed off the capital's dirt, the epidemic disappeared and the survivors returned to their former business. 

How is that no one is destroying statues in Israel?

This destructive question is discussed in a full page by the fishwrap HaAretz and offers an illustrated list of candidates that, according to the left, should be eliminated from Israeli history books and streets. Who are they?  "Gandhi", for example, an Iraqi Jewish patriot, who was murdered by Palestinian terrorists. Yair Stern, the  founder of the Irgun, the forerunner of the Likud party now in power, who was shot in cold blood by the British Colonial Police. (left: 1000 pounds prize offered for his head). And other patriots like them. HaAretz anti-Jewish paper would love to provoke fire and chaos like the Blacks are causing in America. Apparently they imagine that a civil war in Israel would result in their benefit. 

If you google Yair Shtern, you will be surprised to be shown many Black women with flowers.  

Epidemic in the United States

40 526 new cases today in America, according to the WHO. The stress on the society's fabric must be enormous. Hope the American society is robust enough to survive without lasting damage. Anatoly Karlin thinks that  the US is now destroying itself on account of some crazed leftists exploiting invented minority grievances, and the likely election of Biden – who is less economically progressive than even HRC in 2016 – promises renewed infighting between the neoliberal/centrist Dem elites and socialist insurgents, as conservatives skunk away to the corner. The chaos isn’t going to end any time soon. Not good.

Steven Hsu Recants

I am disappointed with Prof. Hsu's reaction vis-a-vis his accusers. He writes in his blog:

The trouble began June 10, when MSU’s Graduate Employees Union composed a lengthy Twitter thread denouncing Mr. Hsu as, among other things, “a vocal scientific racist and eugenicist.” The union claimed Mr. Hsu believes “in innate biological differences between human populations, especially regarding intelligence.”

Hsu's reaction:

[ THIS IS OBVIOUSLY A VERY SERIOUS ACCUSATION. IT IS CONTRADICTED BY PUBLIC REMARKS I HAVE MADE IN MULTIPLE INTERVIEWS OVER THE YEARS, AS WELL AS IN BLOG POSTS. ]

and so and so. Having followed Hsu for decades, it is obvious that he knows (and he may be among the best informed) about IQ differences among populations. Why is he denying the obvious? Moreover when he is right and he knows it. 

He is a rich man and could afford losing his position of tenured professor. What is to be afraid of? He could have counterattacked and accuse the Graduate Employees Union to be after his job or for substituting him by a corrupt/corruptible/flexible administrator that would fear and favor the accusers. 

I know, it is easy for me to speak when I am not in his shoes. Pic.: Galileo recanting at the Inquisition. He did not want to be an Heretic and burned. It is vexing that this is happening today and in an American university. 

El Negro: A Stuffed African exhibited in European Museums

The story of El Negro begins with Jules Verreaux, a French dealer in "naturalia", who in 1831 explored the African interior. With the help of metal wire acting as a spine, wooden boards as shoulder blades, and stuffed with newspapers, Verreaux prepared and preserved the body of the warrior. Then he shipped him to Paris, along with a batch of stuffed animals in crates. In 1831 the African's body appeared in a showroom at No 3, Rue Saint Fiacre.

In a review, the newspaper Le Constitutionnel praised the fearlessness of Jules Verreaux, who must have faced dangers "amid natives who are as wild as they are black". This article set the tone, and the "individual of the Bechuana people" attracted more attention than the giraffes, hyenas or ostriches. "He is small in posture, black-skinned, and his head is covered in woolly frizzy hair," the newspaper said.

More than half a century later, El Negro popped up in Spain. In the world exhibition in Barcelona in 1888, the Spanish vet Francisco Darder presented him in a catalogue as "El Betchuanas", complete with a drawing in which he is seen wearing raffia finery and holding a spear and a shield. Only recently was recognized that he is a real human being and was returned to his homeland.