This is a warning for all internet users. I don’t guarantee any of this information but it never hurts to be cautious.
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“Internet users scanning their Twitter feeds or Facebook accounts Sunday might want to add one more quick click to check their computer for malware.
Thousands of people around the country whose computers were infected with the malicious DNSChanger software more than a year ago faced the possibility of not being able to get online after midnight EDT.”
Just thought we might give politics a rest and talk of something that will be of interest to all eespecially at this time of the year when corn on the cob is on everyone’s plate. Here is a little video that I think everyone will get a kick out of when thinking of that all-American treat.
When we think of innovations the first thing that comes to mind are our great inventors but ordinary folks do a lot of innovating and very few people give them credit. Here are a few examples of innovative ideas that my niece sent to me in an email. Just simple ideas but ones to make our lives much easier. I’ll bet you’ll find at least one a very useful idea.
“A clever use of a dust pan to get water into a container that is too big for the sink“.
“Placing a rubber band over a paint can to prevent paint from getting everywhere but back in the paint can where it belongs while painting“.
“Putting a wooden spoon over a boiling pot of water to prevent boil over“.
“How to put shoes in the dryer”
Have a good day everyone and nice weekend 🙂
How many times have you been asked about your family health history? Seems like every time a person sees a doctor for the first time a family health history is asked for. Can you be certain that the information you give is correct?
Well here is a government site that might be of help to any family. Any personal experience with this application would be appreciated.
Escaped Slaves
August 7, 1865
To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee
Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin’s to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.
I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month, with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy,—the folks call her Mrs. Anderson,—and the children—Milly, Jane, and Grundy—go to school and are learning well. The teacher says Grundy has a head for a preacher. They go to Sunday school, and Mandy and me attend church regularly. We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying, “Them colored people were slaves” down in Tennessee. The children feel hurt when they hear such remarks; but I tell them it was no disgrace in Tennessee to belong to Colonel Anderson. Many darkeys would have been proud, as I used to be, to call you master. Now if you will write and say what wages you will give me, I will be better able to decide whether it would be to my advantage to move back again.
As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville. Mandy says she would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you. This will make us forget and forgive old scores, and rely on your justice and friendship in the future. I served you faithfully for thirty-two years, and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand six hundred and eighty dollars. Add to this the interest for the time our wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and three doctor’s visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the balance will show what we are in justice entitled to. Please send the money by Adams’s Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little faith in your promises in the future. We trust the good Maker has opened your eyes to the wrongs which you and your fathers have done to me and my fathers, in making us toil for you for generations without recompense. Here I draw my wages every Saturday night; but in Tennessee there was never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows. Surely there will be a day of reckoning for those who defraud the laborer of his hire.
In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up, and both good-looking girls. You know how it was with poor Matilda and Catherine. I would rather stay here and starve—and die, if it come to that—than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. You will also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits.
Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me.
From your old servant,
Jourdon Anderson.
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Letter courtesy of Letters of Note
What say you of this letter?
UPDATE:
BB-IDAHO did some added research on this letter and presented his findings in “Comments”. You might find his added input very interesting. I know I did.
While Christmas is traditionally the day we celebrate the birth of the Christ child we should also remember other significant events that has occurred on this day in history. The first being the crossing of the Delaware by Geo. Washington and his troops as depicted by the famous painting below.
Here is another rendition of that crossing which is said as being a more true to life depiction of that crossing as reported in this story by the
New York Times.
Another significant event that should be an inspiration to all people of differing political ideologies is the truce that two sides agreed upon to celebrate the spirit of Christmas during World war I as commemorated by descendants of the combatants of that great war in the picture below.
We should never forget that Andrew Johnson signed the unconditional amnesty papers for the Confederate soldiers on this day in 1886
For more events that occured on this Special day of the year, visit here
a h/t to my niece, lea
Grandpa took me to the town hall meeting one night and we sat there listening to the procedings for a time. When it was time for people to stand up and have their say grandpa got in line with the rest. When it was his turn at the podium he looked around to all that was there then he spoke up.
“I have a question for anyone to answer if they can. It is a question on economics. It has always been my understanding that economics was economics and the same rules applied to everyone whether it be government, business, charities, families or individuals.
If my presupposition is correct then why do economists look at the debt of the federal government as a proportion of GNP to determine the financial health of the federal government? I could understand its use if we had a socialistic form economic system but we do not. If someone could logically explain this to me I’d really appreciate it.
To me the only value of its use is to create the perception that the financial health of the government is better than it really is. Businesses cannot use it to determine its financial health nor can any family or individual. So, what is it about government that allows it to use different rules of economics than everybody else? Can someone answer this question for me, please?”
a h/t to my friend Ev
Grandpa looked at me as I was doing my chores and asked, “What’s wrong, boy, you’ve been going around all day as if you’ve been carrying Bessie’s new-born calf on your shoulders the whole time?”
“It’s nothing, grandpa. Its just my American history class that is getting me down. I hate it.”
Grandpa just grinned and ruffled my hair as he said,
“Boy, as you have already know I am a man who advocates for free will. In order to be consistent in that principle I must concede that every man possesses that same attribute. Furthermore, if I am a man of free will in all of my deeds then I cannot envision a time or place that anyone else would not apply that same principle. Justice is without meaning or purpose with the concept of determinism.
That means only one thing. I cannot promote any principle that would require that another man abide by my will rather than their own. This applies to politics as well as our private lives. In other words, I cannot vote for someone seeking political office without recognizing that he will act in accordance to his own conscience when he casts a vote in regards to the laws to be enacted.
To declare otherwise is to be an advocate for determinism and that would make me look hypocritical. But more important is the fact that I would be advocating for a dictatorial government by its very concept. And to rid ourselves of this form of governing can be said as one of the reasons for seceding from the mother country in 1776.
One of the things we know of the founding fathers from the study of history is that they were very religious men. A person can see this throughout their correspondences with others. While I cannot prove it I’d say it could easily be assumed that they knew of and accepted the principle that the king ruled by divine right and to secede would be to go against the will of God unless secession could be justified. It would be from this that the founding fathers felt the need for a written Declaration of Independence.
It was within this document that the founding fathers declared their justification for secession It is in this document that the founding fathers declared that it was the king who was not abiding by the will of God, not the colonies. It is within this document we can find the foundational basis that man was created to govern himself with a free will.
Now, through the study of history we can see that not every man accepted this concept at the time. There were some who wanted to set up a government in the form of a monarchy. So, it can’t be said that the idea of a free will was universally accepted principle yet. This very fact leads us to believe this was a whole new way of understanding man and his place in society as well as a whole new understanding of God and His role in the lives of men.
When we look back into history we will see that a religion/state relationship of government in almost every sovereign State. And the choice of religion was determined by the monarch of that State at the time. With a given that each monarch had religious advisers at his command we can see that it created the impression that being in accordance to the will of the monarch was to be in accordance to the will of God. This, to me, was the whole purpose and intent of the religion/state relationship for governing.
Basically, to paraphrase President Lincoln, a religion/state relationship created a situation where the people had a government as determined of God, by God and for God. And to rebel against the State was perceived as rebelling against God. We can know from history that some States still abided by this principle by establishing a church/State relationship. So, we can reasonably assume that the founding fathers recognized that the laws of man did not supersede the laws of God but was meant to be subordinate to the laws of God. The problem lies in the authority of government to mandate.
This power to mandate has an effect on those that occupy the seats of governments. And whether we want it or not it is this power to mandate that leads to a corrupt government. And there is no one in government nor any form of government that is immune to this corruption. Monopoly power and authority to govern assures us of this. Political ideology is the mask that politicians use to hide their corrupt hearts and minds.
And it is from behind this mask of political ideology that politicians can corrupt the hearts and minds of the people, even a people who think that they are protected by the words of a constitution.
The easiest way to corrupt the hearts and minds of a people is to create an interpretation of their constitution that appears to be accordance to the intent of the writers of that constitution so as to allow change in the authority and powers of that government or, as in our case, governments.
This is why it is so important to understand the intent of the writers of that constitution and the limitations placed upon government. History is the best determinant of original intent. For if a people strays from the original intent then history will have a record of it. That is why history is such an important subject in school for without it constitutions are inevitably corrupted by those who seek to change it in order to gain unauthorized power.”
I just nodded and said, “I know, grandpa, but studying history in school is not as much fun as it is when you and I study it to learn what our founding fathers intended.”
The Griper
The Griper's World 
Wisdom of friends