Diamond stars

I'd really like to hear from James whether this is for real or kind of flaky.

Bannockburn, Day II: The Great Battle

Today we celebrate the 700th anniversary of the pivotal battle of the Bannockburn. It turned the course of the Scottish War of Independence against the English for a generation, and set the stage for Robert the Bruce to bring the Scots to full independence before his death. Out of this war would come the Declaration of Arbroath, one of the first times that a people asserted to the Pope that they would insist upon a right of elective kingship: to support the man God sent to be king only so long as he did his duty in protecting their liberty and rights, and to drive him out and choose another if he failed this duty.

The short version of this story is as follows: the English army under Edward II had to relieve Stirling Castle by a certain deadline, or the castle would surrender to the Scottish King, Robert the Bruce. This was not because the castle was starving, or being ravaged by disease. It was a gentleman's agreement to avoid the slaughter associated either with reducing the place by storm, or starving the troops. The keeper of the fortress was a gentleman, and Edward knew he was going to keep his word and surrender if not relieved. So the English army was in a hurry.

Robert the Bruce was there in force, so Edward brought heavy cavalry in large numbers, as well as infantry and longbowmen. The Scottish cavalry was not in any sense the equal to the English cavalry, as you know if you followed last night's link and read Froissart's account of the Scottish way of warfare in the period. The English army was far larger, perhaps as many as ten thousand men larger. Edward intended to force his way to the castle's relief by main strength.

Now Edward I had been a very great king, not just cunning but wise in the ways of strategy and propaganda. His son, Edward II, was not the man his father was. Robert the Bruce had been in this fight since the days of the father, and had developed a keen sense for both strategy and tactics. In addition, as last night's story of his personal combat shows, he was a knight of great personal prowess.

Yesterday's story was about how the English sought to slip a vanguard past the Scottish lines, which would have allowed them to fix the Scottish position so as to allow the English army to cross in safety, and engage the Scots in good order at a place of their choice. The vanguard was repulsed, killed, or captured. The English thus had to try to cross the Bannock Burn without that security. They were fearful about this, because it was in the midst of just such a maneuver that William Wallace had destroyed their army at the Battle of Stirling Bridge.

Edward elected to cross at night, in the hopes that the crossing might be effected before the Scots knew of it. In this he was successful, but a consequence of his success was that his army had to encamp against the river as it crossed. If they had pushed further in, to secure better ground for a stand, they might have alerted Scottish scouts.

Thus on the morning of the 24th of June, 1314, word came to Robert the Bruce that the English had crossed the river and were tightly encamped among the wetlands on the shore. The Scottish King knew his cavalry could not stand against them, but he recognized he had a substantial advantage if he could trap them in that boggy ground. So he ordered the cavalry to find and disperse the English archers, in order to cover the approach of his foot. These were arranged in a kind of infantry formation known as a schiltron, similar in concept to the later Spanish tercio but oval: a formation chiefly of spearmen, to repel cavalry in the way we saw in last night's story, but with some axemen and others who could rush out of the formation and kill downed men.

Advancing these formations to pin the English in the muck, Robert the Bruce was successfully covered in his approach by his cavalry's action against the English archers. The Scots advanced on the English camp, and it was then that Edward saw the formations suddenly stop and kneel. A friar went among them.

"Think you, will these Scots fight?" Edward had asked one of his knights a short time before.

"Ay, that will they," was the reply, "to the last."

But now, seeing them kneel, Edward cried out, "They kneel, they kneel; they ask for mercy."

"They do, my liege," was the answer, "but it is from God, and not from us."

The king ordered one of his Earls, a man he had recently accused of cowardice, to lead a charge to disperse the Scottish formations. The charge ended in the slaughter of the Earl's forces, and the Scots came on against the camp. Edward tried to deploy his longbowmen, which would have allowed him much the same effects we hope to get out of artillery today: to damage the Scottish formations' structure, but also to deny them the ability to advance over certain parts of the terrain that were under the danger of the longbows. Once more the Scottish cavalry, led by Sir Robert Keith, recognized the danger and dispersed the archers before they could form up to take action.

Edward then attempted to send his heavy cavalry, the knights who had accompanied him for this purpose. But in the narrow neck of land, made of boggy ground, the cavalry could not well come together for a charge, and could not well maneuver their heavy horses. When they came against the schiltrons, their unstable formations broke.

As the Scots advanced toward the English camp, news of the initial victories had spread back to the Scottish camp nearby. There bands of Highlanders -- irregular forces that Robert the Bruce did not wish to employ in the battle, because they would cause confusion and disorder -- heard the news that the English were being defeated, and came rushing in great numbers. The English, already discomfited, heard the warcries and saw the onrushing forces, and broke. But there was nowhere to retreat except through the river.

Edward II escaped, with the help of his picked men. He fled to Dunbar castle, where as quickly as possible he took ship for England. His retreat from the battlefield turned the English retreat into a rout. In the wake of the battle, the destruction of England's army in the north not only allowed Scottish raiders into England, but took so much pressure off Robert the Bruce that he was able to stage an invasion of Ireland, hoping to open a second front in the war on the Anglo-Norman kings.

Boom

But you know, he really does look pretty good in sunglasses.  Can't really blame the fanboys in the media.

Gospel music

It's not too early to start putting together our Christmas carol repertoire.  Tell me you can resist the idea of going door to door singing this little number in a quartet:



I've got this song on the indispensable six-CD set "Goodbye, Babylon," but it can also be found on the album "Death Might Be Your Santa Claus," available on iTunes, in case you're looking to spruce up your Christmas music collection.  Who could resist "Papa Ain't No Santa Claus (Mama Ain't No Christmas Tree"?

On a milder note:



And abandoning the carol theme altogether:



And to finish up, something to dance to:



I was going to include "Jesus Dropped the Charges," but really, the title says it all, and the music is almost a disappointment.

Everything is under control

Did the takeover of Mosul come out of the blue?

The Kurds became especially alarmed at signs that ISIS had already formed a shadow government in Mosul, weeks before initiating the carefully planned takeover of the city 10 days ago.  According to the same Kurdish military sources it was accomplished with ease and without serious fighting after local Iraqi commanders agreed to withdraw.

The prime minister of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region, Nechirvan Barzani, says he warned Baghdad and the United States months ago about the threat ISIS posed to Iraq and the group’s plan to launch an insurgency across Iraq.  The Kurds even offered to participate in a joint military operation with Baghdad against the jihadists.

Washington didn’t respond—a claim that will fuel Republican charges that the Obama administration has been dangerously disengaged from the Middle East.  Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki dismissed the warnings, saying everything was under control.

Alternative forms of commerce

I'm all in favor of whatever kind of exchange leaves both parties to the transaction satisfied enough to complete it, but this is a little weird.

"In Fact I'm Glad You Mentioned It."

Apparently prosecutors make good Congressmen sometimes -- especially in the face of corrupt officials. Trey Gowdy raises an important legal point, and then turns the IRS's defense into an invitation to consider what criminal charges ought to be brought against them.



I love hearing an IRS official stating that he doesn't need to know the law, because you can use "common sense" to know what's right. Yes, in theory, that's how it ought to be. The law ought to line up with common sense, such that an ordinary person need not be a lawyer in order to know how to behave in a fashion that is both moral and lawful. That is the only proper way to arrange a state, given the practical need of division of labor in an advanced economy: we can't train everyone as lawyers, because time and money for education are limited and we need most people to do other things. Therefore, the law should accord with the common sense, so that honest people can rely on the resources they can actually expect to have in order to be good citizens and avoid criminality.

Nothing could be further from the actual facts of how our Federal laws and regulations are ordered, however. How charming to see the defense -- which any court would reject were it raised by a citizen without legal training -- raised by a high official of a Federal regulatory agency who is himself a lawyer!

Bannockburn, Day I: The Death of Henry de Bohun

During the events described in the first post below, an English knight named Sir Henry de Bohun broke away from the English vanguard because he saw the Scottish King, Robert the Bruce, and recognized him. The king had come on a palfrey, not a warhorse, to observe the battle and issue orders rather than armed to partake in the battle. This account describes the palfrey as a "pony," which is not I think accurate; but the Scottish horses were generally substantially smaller than the English horses, making them less capable in a heavy charge but better for extended marches and long raids.

Fully armed, riding upon his great war-horse, the English knight came thundering on. Bruce, on his little pony, could have no chance against him. There was a dreadful moment of suspense. The two armies watched breathlessly. Bruce waited calmly, and when Bohun was almost upon him, he suddenly turned his pony aside. Bohun dashed on. As he passed, the King, rising high in his stirrups, brought his battle-axe crashing down upon the knight's head. The steel helmet was shattered by the mighty blow, Bohun fell to the ground dead, and his frightened horse dashed riderless away.

Cheer after cheer rose from the Scottish ranks, and the generals gathered round their King. They were glad that he was safe, yet vexed that he should so have endangered his life. "Bethink you, sire, the fate of all Scotland rests upon you," they said.

But the King answered them never a word. "I have broken my good axe," was all he said, "I have broken my good axe."

"This Is A Totally Dopey Criticism"

Physicist Sean Carroll explains to his colleagues some misconceptions they have about philosophy.

Liberty and education

I realize most people are never going to homeschool, and I'm not going to claim I never disagree with Rand [correction: Ron] Paul, but he speaks to me on education issues:

“The idea that government ‘experts’ can centrally plan a nation’s educational system is just as flawed as the idea that government can centrally plan the economy."

. . . The Ron Paul Curriculum, launched last fall, is designed to be used by homeschoolers, and takes a unique approach to education that reflects Paul’s libertarian-leaning political values.  The Curriculum includes lessons on Austrian economics and libertarian political theory, and teaches students how to start their own business on the Internet.  It almost totally eschews social studies until students are at the high school level, taking the view that early childhood social studies education mostly promotes statism.  The Curriculum also reflects a Christian worldview, with early history education putting significant focus on the Book of Genesis, Biblical Israel and the Reformation.

Paul’s program is also designed to be relatively cheap, as it uses no textbooks and is mostly self-taught, meaning there is little need for costly teachers.  High school learning builds up to students taking CLEP exams that can provide students with college credit, thereby allowing them to graduate earlier and at a lower cost.

Bannockburn, Day I

Here's how Wikipedia describes the first day of the Bannockburn.

Here is the description from In Freedom's Cause:

On the morning of Sunday, the 23d of June, immediately after sunrise, the Scotch attended mass, and confessed as men who had devoted themselves to death. The king, having surveyed the field, caused a proclamation to be made that whosoever felt himself unequal to take part in the battle was at liberty to withdraw. Then, knowing from his scouts that the enemy had passed the night at Falkirk, six or seven miles off, he sent out Sir James Douglas and Sir Robert Keith with a party of horsemen to reconnoitre the advance.

The knights had not gone far when they saw the great army advancing, with the sun shining bright on innumerable standards and pennons, and glistening from lance head, spear, and armour. So grand and terrible was the appearance of the army that upon receiving the report of Douglas and Keith the king thought it prudent to conceal its full extent, and caused it to be bruited abroad that the enemy, although numerous, was approaching in a disorderly manner.

The experienced generals of King Edward now determined upon making an attempt to relieve Stirling Castle without fighting a pitched battle upon ground chosen by the enemy. Had this attempt been successful, the great army, instead of being obliged to cross a rapid stream and attack an enemy posted behind morasses, would have been free to operate as it chose, to have advanced against the strongholds which had been captured by the Scots, and to force Bruce to give battle upon ground of their choosing. Lord Clifford was therefore despatched with 800 picked men-at-arms to cross the Bannock beyond the left wing of the Scottish army, to make their way across the carse, and so to reach Stirling. The ground was, indeed, impassable for a large army; but the troops took with them faggots and beams, by which they could make a passage across the deeper parts of the swamp and bridge the little streams which meandered through it.

As there was no prospect of an immediate engagement, Randolph, Douglas, and the king had left their respective divisions, and had taken up their positions at the village of St. Ninians, on high ground behind the army, whence they could have a clear view of the approaching English army. Archie Forbes had accompanied Randolph, to whose division he, with his retainers, was attached. Randolph had with him 500 pikemen, whom he had withdrawn from his division in order to carry out his appointed task of seeing that the English did not pass along the low ground at the edge of the carse behind St. Ninians to the relief of Stirling; but so absorbed were knights and men-at-arms in watching the magnificent array advancing against the Scottish position that they forgot to keep a watch over the low ground. Suddenly one of the men, who had straggled away into the village, ran up with the startling news that a large party of English horse had crossed the corner of the carse, and had already reached the low ground beyond the church.

"A rose has fallen from your chaplet, Randolph," the king said angrily.

Without a moment's loss of time Randolph and Archie Forbes set off with the spearmen at a run, and succeeded in heading the horsemen at the hamlet of Newhouse. The mail clad horsemen, confident in their numbers, their armour, and horses, laid their lances in rest, struck spurs into their steeds, and, led by Sir William Daynecourt, charged down upon the Scotch spearmen. Two hundred of these consisted of Archie Forbes' retainers, all veterans in war, and who had more than once, shoulder to shoulder, repelled the onslaught of the mailed chivalry of England. Animated by the voices of their lord and Randolph, these, with Moray's own pikemen, threw themselves into a solid square, and, surrounded by a hedge of spears, steadily received the furious onslaught of the cavalry. Daynecourt and many of his men were at the first onslaught unhorsed and slain, and those who followed were repulsed. Again and again they charged down upon the pikemen, but the dense array of spears was more than a match for the lances of the cavalry, and as the horses were wounded and fell, or their riders were unhorsed, men rushed out from the square, and with axe and dagger completed the work. Still the English pressed them hard, and Douglas, from the distance, seeing how hotly the pikemen were pressed by the cavalry, begged the king to allow him to go to Randolph's assistance. Bruce, however, would suffer no change in his position, and said that Randolph must stand or fall by himself. Douglas, however, urged that he should be allowed to go forward with the small body of retainers which he had with him. The king consented, and Douglas set off with his men.

When the English saw him approach they recoiled somewhat from the square, and Douglas, being now better able to see what was going on, commanded his followers to halt, saying that Randolph would speedily prove victorious without their help, and were they now to take part in the struggle they would only lessen the credit of those who had already all but won the victory. Seeing the enemy in some confusion from the appearance of the reinforcement, Randolph and Archie now gave the word for their men to charge, and these, rushing on with spear and axe, completed the discomfiture of the enemy, killed many, and forced the rest to take flight. Numbers, however, were taken. Randolph is said to have had but two men killed in the struggle.

The greater fight was to come.

To Tame A Horse And Ride It To War

The men emerged over the crest of a ridge and guided their horses along a tree line, skirting a wide meadow. They picked their way along narrow trails, climbing higher into the Sierra until a panorama of snowcapped peaks and a broad green valley unfolded beneath them.

The men, Special Forces soldiers dressed in jeans and other civilian clothes, led their horses into a thick stand of pine trees, where they dismounted and let the horses drink from a clear mountain stream before breaking out their own rations.

At this remote training area high in the Sierra, the U.S. Marine Corps is reviving the horsemanship skills that were once a key part of the nation's armed forces but were cast aside when tanks and armored vehicles replaced them. The need to bring these skills back was driven home in Afghanistan in 2001, when the first Special Forces soldiers to arrive found themselves fighting on horseback alongside tribesmen in rugged terrain without roads. Many had never ridden a horse before.

"We don't want to reinvent anything," said Marine Capt. Seth Miller, the officer in charge of formal schools at the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center. "These are skills that were lost."

Marine instructors are teaching the students, most of them Army Special Forces soldiers, how to control horses, care for them and load packs. The students are taught how to calculate routes and distances for rides and what to look for when purchasing horses from locals. For example, checking teeth is a good way to determine age and avoid getting ripped off by a farmer trying to pass off an ancient mule or horse.

In a throwback to the old Wild West days, instructors are considering training soldiers in how to shoot from a moving horse....

There's quite a bit more at the link. We may see a swelling in our ranks.

More on the IRS Email Backup Firm

So apparently the IRS decided not to renew that company's contract to back up their emails, just weeks after Lerner's hard drive crashed... and just weeks before other crashes of drives of involved parties.

So the first question is, what does Sonasoft have? Were they obligated to destroy, or to retain, the records that the IRS had already paid for them to store?

The second question is, did the IRS decide to go with a different firm -- or to stop backing up its emails?

Public Radio Continues to Shine

This week on NPR: 'Speaking of budgetary concerns, a country doesn't really have to have an army, you know.'

Maleficent and Benghazi

Last night I had a date with my one-and-only, and for reasons I won't discuss we ended up seeing this damnable new take on Sleeping Beauty.

Now I wasn't expecting much. What little I see of current Hollywood doesn't leave me impressed with its imagination; and "reimaginings" without imagination don't do much for me. But I walked out of this one spitting mad. Indulge me a moment while I say why.

If you haven't seen it (lucky souls), the concept is perfectly simple. The king from Sleeping Beauty owed a great debt to the "bad fairy," but instead betrayed her to gain power for himself. (The poor thing didn't understand how greedy men were 'til later...her Green credentials are spotless.) It relates to his desire, and his father's, to steal the peaceful woodlands from the magical creatures who inhabit them -- and if they'd only leave them alone, or make amends and give back what they stole, all would be well. The fairy's curse is a burst of understandable righteous anger at the king's perfidy; but he's able to get a measure of mercy out of her just by begging on his knees, that being the right position to check his privilege. And later on the conscience-ridden Maleficent does everything she can to fix the problem. And in the end "true love" is revealed to be, not a romantic attachment between man and woman (which our female lead denies, and she's never proven wrong), but pity and remorse for a victim.

I expected some genuflections to the prevailing orthodoxies of PC and "Cultural Marxism." I didn't expect them to replace the whole story. If you're a civilized ruler under attack...white male type...well, that settles it, you must have provoked it. In a classic heroic fairy tale (or even a healthy cartoon version), there's evil in the world and it's got to be fought, and kings, princes, knights, and soldiers have an especial duty to do so. In this? There's no evil but what you create yourself; no one's out to attack you unless you provoked it; the "victim card" not only explains but excuses every evil; and those who can play it have all the noblest sentiments. In fact, no one except victims has any noble sentiments, not in this film they don't. The story's been rewritten to include hundreds of soldiers, but they're either villains or faceless dragon fodder, and everyone from king to peasant would be better off without them. The cartoon was truer to life.

It seems to me this new take on the classic tale is the same viewpoint that inspired certain parties' incorrect assertions on the subject of Benghazi. I don't think they invented the "video" story out of whole cloth. I think it was their first instinct. Americans under attack by Muslims? It must be our fault. We must have provoked them. Send in the troops? Get our people out at once? Perish the thought -- that might provoke them some more. Better to show an appeasing image. And when the first instinct turned out to be untrue...it was still the natural story to run with. Teach every child that view; then our future leaders are secured.

Apparently now not only our schools and our press, but our fairytales as well, must teach suicidalism.. This civilization's going to be hard to rebuild. I think all that's left for Hollywood is to retell Aesop's fable of the Wolves and the Sheep to explain how it's all the Sheepdogs' fault. Which, come to that, is just what the wolves were saying.

Harvey Mansfield Decides To Retire

At least, I assume so, given his decision to publish this as an employee of Harvard.

Well, the man was born in 1932. It's no surprise he might be ready to "spend more time with his family."

Who embodied evil before Hitler?

Tyler Cowan muses on what historical or literary figure people referred to before Hitler became everyone's stock idea of a villain?  It turns out that Pharaoh and Judas were favorite choices for millennia.  Commenters chime in with nominations for Attila the Hun, Genghis Khan, and other barbarian invaders.  Nero, Caligula, and Domitian fell out of favor a while back.

Once Hitler came along, he really enjoyed a consensus.  This is a Western perspective, of course.

"They Are Excommunicated"

This is perhaps less directed to the ‘Ndrangheta themselves than to the priests who serve in their communities. What the Pope said was not that he was excommunicating the mafia, but that they were excommunicating themselves by their choices of associations and actions, their "adoration of evil and contempt for the common good."

So priests in southern Italy should refuse them Communion, or a Catholic burial should they die without reconciliation.

It's a significant move, and I wonder why it has never been done before.

But this is the same Pope who insisted on ditching the bulletproof glass.

"It's true that anything could happen, but let's face it, at my age I don't have much to lose," he told Barcelona newspaper La Vanguardia in an interview published Friday and reported on in English by Vatican Radio. "I know that something could happen to me, but it's in the hands of God."

So maybe the answer's as simple as that. He is not afraid.

"Lions Ate Him."

Nick at Ranger Up has a good story about the time he was almost eaten by a lion during a college trip to Africa.

Interestinger and interestinger

How would you like to be the CEO of the company to which the IRS outsourced its data backup?

Well, I'm sure it's all a big misunderstanding.  Or else a lot more people are planning to take the fifth soon, and mostly the latter.