Johann Sebastian Bach's Oster-Oratorium Performed by Collegium 1704, Conducted by Václav Luks

Happy Easter (Egg Roll)!

An image from the peaceful, prosperous, free days of our second best president, according to this list — “Recarving Rushmore” Reranks American Presidents.

John Dowland's "Flow My Tears" Performed by Ryan de Ryke & Brandon J. Acker

Secular, yes, but appropriate, perhaps, for Holy Saturday:

Flow, my tears, fall from your springs!
Exiled for ever, let me mourn;
Where night's black bird her sad infamy sings,
There let me live forlorn.

Down vain lights, shine you no more!
No nights are dark enough for those
That in despair their last fortunes deplore.
Light doth but shame disclose.

Never may my woes be relieved,
Since pity is fled;
And tears and sighs and groans
My weary days, my weary days
Of all joys have deprived.
From the highest spire of contentment
My fortune is thrown;
And fear and grief and pain
For my deserts, for my deserts
Are my hopes, since hope is gone.

Hark! you shadows that in darkness dwell,
Learn to contemn light
Happy, happy they that in hell
Feel not the world's despite.

Hark! you shadows that in darkness dwell,
Learn to contemn light
Happy, happy they that in hell
Feel not the world's despite.

Managing Male Melancholy

The last in the "Leashing the Black Dog" series — A Realistic, Encouraging, Compassionate, No-Nonsense, Research-Backed, Action-Oriented Guidebook to Managing Your Depression.

Jacob Collins

An American artist "who has built a life out of the premise that the twentieth century nearly ruined art" — The New Old Masters. Says the artist, "My general feeling in terms of art making is the train got off the rails in the 1860s and 1870s, and my practical instinct is to go back to where it was, try to put it back, fix it up, and start going again." He continues:

Our culture has inherited the idea that if artists are not avant-garde they cannot have a significant role. That’s a fallacy we’ve inherited from some Parisian nut-job radicals. The rejection of beauty is so accepted. It’s high time that we as a culture attend to our beauty position.

Amen. Below, good examples of the "beauty position" he talks about are his "Young Woman in Bed" (2004) and "Reclining Nude" (2006):

Neoconservativism 101

Jim Lobe instructs — Neoconservativism in a Nutshell. The "couse" began at "the Institute for American Studies in Beijing 12 years ago when Chinese analysts were first trying to fathom why the U.S. had been so stupid as to invade Iraq."

Tomás Luis de Victoria's "First Lamentation for Maundy Thursday" Sung by the Tallis Scholars, Directed by Peter Phillips

Nicolas Gombert's Missa Media Vita in Morte Sumus ("In the Middle of Life We Are Already Dead Mass") Sung by The Hilliard Ensemble

For Brussels.

Diversity Is Strength

And war is peace — ISIS claims credit for terror attacks at Brussels airport, Metro station.

Two Cheers from the Old Right for President Obama

Antiwar.com's Ivan Eland and Gareth Porter give praise where praise is due — Obama’s Historic Visit to Cuba Is the Right Policy and Obama’s Break with the Establishment.

Melania Trump for First Lady!

Señor Cruz might be surprised to learn that "showing a naked Melania Trump, a successful, multi-lingual supermodel and undoubtedly the most attractive first lady America would ever have, is not exactly an attack ad" — Whose Bright Idea Was It To Show A Naked Melania Trump In An Attack Ad?

Thao and the Get Down Stay Down Perform "Hand To God," "Astonished Man," "Guts" & "Nobody Dies"

Tangerine Perform "Wild at Heart," "Tender," "Sunset" & "Sugar Teeth"

Morten Lauridsen's Ubi Caritas et Amor Sung by Taipei Chamber Singers

A documentary on the American composer in the tradition of Holy Minimalism will be screened locally on April 2 — Shining Night: A Portrait of Composer Morten Lauridsen. "Ubi caritas," we learn at Wikipedia, "is a hymn of the Western Church, long used as one of the antiphons for the washing of feet on Maundy Thursday."

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor.
Exsultemus, et in ipso jucundemur.
Timeamus, et amemus Deum vivum.
Et ex corde diligamus nos sincero.
Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
Simul ergo cum in unum congregamur:
Ne nos mente dividamur, caveamus.
Cessent iurgia maligna, cessent lites.
Et in medio nostri sit Christus Deus. Amen.
Where charity and love are, God is there.
Christ's love has gathered us into one.
Let us rejoice and be pleased in Him.
Let us fear, and let us love the living God.
And may we love each other with a sincere heart.
Where charity and love are, God is there.
As we are gathered into one body,
Beware, lest we be divided in mind.
Let evil impulses stop, let controversy cease,
And may Christ our God be in our midst. Amen.

What Would Ivan Ilich Say Today?

If he said the following below three-and-a-half decades ago?

The machine-like behavior of people chained to electronics constitutes a degradation of their well-being and of their dignity which, for most people in the long run, becomes intolerable. Observations of the sickening effect of programmed environments show that people in them become indolent, impotent, narcissistic and apolitical. The political process breaks down because people cease to be able to govern themselves; they demand to be managed.

Quoted by one of Roissy's commenters — I Could Tell You, But You Won’t Like It.

Baseball Diplomacy

I'll be watching this ballgame at the office at 2 pm today, at which time His Excellency President Barack Hussein Obama will throw out the first pitch — Tampa Bay Rays vs. Cuba National Team: How to watch, TV schedule, streaming information, and more.

Birds of Chicago Perform "Real Midnight," "Dim Star of the Palisades" & "Good Dream"

"The Picture of Ethnic Hatred in America"?

That's how a local editorialist describes a scene in which "[a] young white man in a hooded sweatshirt, sneaks up to a small neighborhood store in the dead of night and spray-paints an obscenity and racist message on it" — The Corner Store attack. "Go home, sand niggers," read the message.

Knockout game is a far more accurate "picture of ethnic hatred in America" I would say.

Lisa Hannigan Performs "Knots," "Little Bird" & "Passenger"

"Exuding both musical and personal warmth, the Irish singer mesmerized at the NPR Music offices," in this re-posting of my favorite performance by my favorite colleen.

Protect, Procreate, Provide

A primer — The 3 P’s of Manhood: A Review.

Gaelynn Lea Performs "Someday We'll Linger In The Sun," "Southwind," "Bird Song" & "Moment Of Bliss"

Super Furry Animals Perform "Hello Sunshine," "Slow Life," "Pan Ddwa'r Wawr" & "Run! Christian, Run!"

That last title could refer to the situation in Europe today, huh?

Popes and Mohammedan Invasions, Then and Now

In 1571, "Pope Pius V, whose treasury bankrolled part of this military endeavor [of the combined forces of Naples, Sardinia, Venice, the Papacy, Genoa, Savoy and the Knights Hospitallers against the fleet of the Ottoman Empire], ordered the churches of Rome opened for prayer day and night, encouraging the faithful to petition the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary through the recitation of the Rosary" — Our Lady of the Rosary and the Battle of Lepanto.

In 1683, "[w]hen it became known that no fewer than 300,000 Turks were advancing on the imperial capital [Vienna], Pope Innocent ordered that rosaries be recited in the religious houses and churches of Rome [and] prayers of supplication were offered throughout the [Holy Roman] Empire" — The Battle of Vienna and the Holy Name of Mary.

In 2016, the pope acknowledges that "we can talk about an Arab invasion" and then in the same breath asks Europe not to pray, much less to defend itself, but to "go forward and find itself enhanced by the exchange among cultures" — Pope Francis Refers To `Arab Invasion' as a Social Reality.

Europe's women will surely be relieved to know that their lives are being "enhanced by [this] exchange among cultures" — Migrant rape fears spread across Europe: Women told not to go out at night alone after assaults carried out in Sweden, Finland, Germany, Austria and Switzerland amid warnings gangs are co-ordinating attacks.

In 2012, the last time I remember a papabile speaking honestly to Europe, it was the real non-European whom I was supporting for pope who did so — African Churchman Issues Wake-Up Call to Europe. I was not his only supporter — "Who better to tell white liberal lefties to f*ck off than a black pope?"

No wonder Odinism is regaining adherents in these lands! Our Lady of the Rosary, ora pro nobis.

The Antimiltarist Candidate

Antiwar.com links to Matthew Gault's piece on a candidate who, "[i]n speech after speech, he has called out politicians and defense contractors for colluding to build costly weapons systems at the price of national security" — Donald Trump is right about defense spending – and that should scare you. The author's conclusion:

In a political climate full of fear of foreign threats and gung-ho about the military, it could take a populist strongman like Trump to deliver the harsh truth: When it comes to the military, the United States can do so much more with so much less.

Deep State Planning to Deep Six Trump?

Lew, I've been asking myself this same question — Does a JFK Moment Await Trump?

Frozen-Over Burned-Over District

Above, "a satellite image captured by NASA during the coldest month ever in Buffalo in February 2015 [that] could be the hottest picture caught from space in the agency’s Tournament Earth contest" — Lake Erie image from coldest month ever in Buffalo competes in hot NASA photo contest.

Julia Holter Performs "I Feel You," "Silhouette," "Sea Calls Me Home," "Betsy On The Roof," "Don't Make Me Over" & "City Appearing"

The "Well-merited Death" of "Movement Conservatism"

"Beginning in the 1970s and into the Reagan years, new voices—the self-denominated Neoconservatives—migrated into the movement, and many of these voices came from the Trotskyite Left, many traumatized by the revelations of unspeakable Soviet brutality or anti-semitism," reminds Boyd D. Cathey — Is It Time to Turn Reagan’s Picture to the Wall? He notes, however, one, last hope:

Sometimes it takes a veritable bull-dozer, an unruly wrecking ball, to clear away the detritus, before a real renaissance can occur. In 2016 just possibly that agent of change may be Donald Trump. Trump has taken identifiably Old Right positions on American overseas intervention, Russia and Syria, US trade policies, and immigration, and he knows that his enemies come from the Neocon intelligentsia and their GOP camp followers. None of the other candidates will or can pull off a revolution. It may be a slim hope, but The Donald just might. And if he does that nasty, thankless job, we are willing to forgive him a whole list of personal sins. For the times are truly perilous, and 2016 may well offer our last chance.

M. Ward Performs "I'm Listening (Child's Theme)," "Girl From Conejo Valley," "Little Baby," "Confession" & "Michelle"

Umberto Eco, R.I.P

Of the many unread book and false-starts waiting on my shelf, I picked Foucault's Pendulum, given the author's recent passing. This obituary says "Eco was, first and foremost, an historian railing against modernism in all its forms" — A Rose by Any Other Name: Umberto Eco (1932-2016). "Down-to-earth, not remotely narcissistic, fond of pondering the human side of any artist or intellectual, he’d want us, in his Latin-dripping mind, to ecce homo — 'behold the man,' secular version" — The Irrepressible Lightness of Umberto Eco.