Kildare and Newkirk

 There are two towns in Kay County, Oklahoma which have very historic and Christian-related names. How many citizens from there know the origin of their town name?

            The Gaelic word for church is kirk.  When the Scottish Reformation under John Knox took place it was, as in all countries, part motivated by resentment of the vast lands and taxes of the Roman Church.  Edinburgh, the capital, also welched under the influx of Frenchmen who accompanied Mary of Lorraine who married James V of Scotland in 1538.  James died and Mary became regent queen for her son, James VI.  The clergy supported the French entourage that came with Mary, and obliged with religious processions, in which effigies of the Virgin or saints  were paraded and worshipped.  The practical Scots had ridicule and doubts, and in 1557, a mob seized an image of St. Giles in the Motherkirk (Cathedral of St. Giles) in Edinburgh.  A group of nobles formed a group and signed the First Scottish Covenant, resolving to establish the Reformed church in Scotland.  This inflamed Rome and especially the French Catholics who demanded Mary cut down the Protestants as Mary Tudor had done in England.  But Mary Stuart was not a leader and she merely signed a capitulation. Then she fled for her life or French rescue (which never materialized).  Parliament met in 1560 and accepted the confession of faith of John Knox, a reformed cleric.  But when the nobles proceeded to divvy up most of the land of the church among themselves, leaving only 1/6 of it to the clergy and church finances, Knox got angry and declared a movement and alliance of Scottish Presbyterianism and democracy. That tradition continues to this day. The reorganized church was called Newkirk by the common people.

            The second city named with Christian historic roots is Kildare.  I will let historian Will Durant explain.

            “Only second to him [Patrick] in the affection of the Irish people stands the woman who did most to consolidate his victory.  St. Brigid, we are told, was the daughter of a slave and a king; be we know nothing definite of her before 476, when she took the veil.  Overcoming countless obstacles, she founded the “Church of the Oak Tree” –Cill-dara, Kildare—at a spot still so named; soon it developed into a monastery, a nunnery, and a school as famous as that which grew at Patrick’s Armagh.  She died about 525, honored throughout the island; and 10,000 Irish women still bear the name of “The Mary of the Gael”.  

Studying Kim and Korea

A friend of mine who is Han Chinese explained the East to me years ago and now that I read modern updates on the summit, his words ring truer with each article.  He said this.  Look at the Yellow Sea.  It is entirely encircled by China, Korea and Japan in a small area.  And it was in this area that each country grew from ancient times.  All three different cultures and hold themselves and hold dearly that they are the superior race of the world.  [Hitler!!] China is the big country with many minorities, but dominated by the Han people who look down on the minorities.  Japan differs in language and physically, has a warrior society of great loyalty and is at enmity with the Chinese continurally.  The Koreans are a small country, oft-dominated by the other 2 but have found a niche in being creative and artistic and pugnacious.  They think of the others as dullards.  The Japanese are disciplined and their businesses are always determined to build a better mouse trap—somewhat like the Germans.  The Koreans are like the Hungarians in the middle.  The Chinese who venture overseas are somewhat like Americans in being entrepreneurial.

            Thus Kim Il Sung was a Russian Army volunteer who was installed by the Russians after the War.  They equipped his army heavily and a few years later he tried to take over the democratic South.  Mao intervened to save Kim..  Ever since they look at NK as a buffer state between themselves and the S. Koreans and Japan, backed by USA.  More than anything they want USA to leave.  And they look down on the NK’s as fellow communists but foreigners, like a little step brother.  The Kims and now Kim Jong Un have kept China at arms length as well.  Kim just recently visited China for the first time.  The nukes are part and parcel of Kim showing not just USA but also China and Japan not to mess with him.  China wants him as a satellite in their orbit of control.  So look for Kim to request USA give his country food and business. 

            Yet as this goes on, the NKs do unbelievably pugnacious things.  They have kidnapped about 1500 Japanese and southern Koreans to gain knowledge of the modern world.  Thjey have the world’s 4^th largest military on ready for attack or defense.  They sink foreign ships.  Blast off rockets.  They do nuke tests.  They threaten USA with annihiliation.  There are almost 2 million of the population of 25 million in prisons.  If you do something wrong, your entire family goes to prison with you.  Their population is divided into hostile families, loyal families, and apparatchiks.  The hostile families, about 40% of the people, get menial jobs and starve.  Kim himself is sadistic, roams the countryside with an armored vehicle topped by an antiaircraft machine gun which he uses for sport to kill unsuspecting people for purposes of terrorizing the others. His hackers have shut down Sony, several public utilities in small countries, and could possibly do something similar in USA.  So why hasn’t USA done something about Kim?  It would be the death of Seoul and half of S. Korea.    

            Instead of doing the sanctions as they promised, the Chinese have begun trying to be the supplier of Kim and make him a puppet.  They worry about the summit, being cut out ot the loop. They fear that he goes too far in threats that Trump might just declare war and such a war would not only bring destruction to Korea but also much of China and create an NK refugee problem of 10 million. The Japanese worry that Kim would missile them just as a warning. They swore off war two generations ago but now are warming to the notion of developing their own nukes.  If they do, nobody, even USA can stop them.  They have the expertise   China knows this. And USA knows that the time of dithering and diplomacy has to get serious, very serious, now. And so I pay little attention to all the bullspitters commenting on TV.  Half of them know nothing of the situation. Half are just partisan politics people. 

The New China

It is not the same China you grew up knowing.  The communist government decided to give in to capitalist plants in the country in order to modernize.  That has given way to a new middle class that wants individualism, something totally new to Confuscian tradition and Communist party ideals.  Meanwhile Christianity has spread and become a quiet but important minority while income inequality has skyrocketed in the home of socialism. 

            Let’s take it in order.  1.4 billion Chinese with 800 million Han Chinese are rapidly rising, both as a power, especially with a rising middle class, and yet the ruling Communists find themselves in a fix—how to manage this new bourgeois without suppressing their productivity.  The middle class, now 250 million storng don’t trust their government.  They aren’t about to rebel or even ask for the vote, but they gripe, frustrated with corruption, lack of transparency and accountability of the rulers. Since 1990 the blistering pace of economic growth has been the party’s most important source of legitimacy which supports its most important goal, stability.  But the critical citizens have taken to social media en masse.  The question is what happens after the growth peters out.  It surely will because you can sustain 7-10% growth by copying current technology, but when your nation has to create, entrepreneur, invent on its own you are doing well to get 3%.  Hence the pickle that leaders find themselves in.  The party fears its own people. 

            But how the people have changed.  The old tradition of living in an extended family fell flat as soon as the one-child policy was instituted.  Nowadays people are allowed two, but one child means marriage is no longer for the procreation of family.  And with kids getting educated and moving hundreds of miles from home, the elders aren’t taken care of as in the past.  The grandchildren as sparse.  And the educated kids are individualistic.  They want love instead of arranged marriages.  The older generation can’t quite understand this.  There are marriage “fairs” where brides and grooms advertise for a mate.  He advertizes a salary and position and has a mortgage paid.  She advertizes she is beautiful, decent, quiet, and not fat.  Except that the 20-somethings on the ads didn’t write their own ads.  The parents did, in hopes of arranging a nice marriage.  The kids fight this not wanting any arrangements.  Hence the age-old family system is crumbling, except in rural areas.  And, China will get old before it gets rich because of the one-child policy.  Today 12 workers for every retiree.  2050 will be 2.5. Unlike USA which will arrive at about the same ratio, there is little social welfare (kids are expected to take care of parents), no pensions, and savings in Chinese banks pay less than inflation.  The growing individualism of the youth also has brought about a sexual revolution of shacking up.  58M young people live alone. There is a rank shortage of eligible marriagble women since a lot of male sexual selection took place with the one child policy.

            The elders remember famines, the kids think high speed trains and pork every day. Government encouraged entrepreneurship and thus many Chinese work at small businesses rather than the state factories as in years past.  Yet the Party is nervous about the rise of so many uncontrollable businesses who march to the own drummer.  In the old days, people knew  by face just about everyone they came in contact with.  Strangers were treated with a degree of caution.  This is indicative of the personal networks everyone had.  But today the personal networks have been shredded as is true in western urban areas.  And just as in New York City, people in Beijing see a mugging and stroll right past it. Hence the Party and Chmn. Li have a campaign on to indoctrinate in socialist core values.  These values are diametrically opposite western values of liberty.

            Thus the people have discovered religion.  Buddhism has exploded in membership but since it is so philosophical and most people just do the rituals and not the serious engagement, the Party tolerates this.  Christianity is another thing altogether.  It has grown for ½ million in 1950 to 100 million today--9% compounded annually.  This growth far outstrips any other country or period of Christianity’s development.  It was 2.9% in the first 3 centuries of Rome. Of course Christianity is a true religion which governs hearts apart from politics.  So the government has cracked down but then tolerates it at other times.  Likewise civic clubs and charities would be able to help the government big time—if only the Party weren’t so nervous about groups of people gathering and thinking of things to do without government consent.  Public morality is increasingly at odds with private.

            Inequality in a communist country might seem an oxymoron.  But like Russia, oligarchs were granted an inside edge with the government resources and if they played it right became billionaires.  China has over 500 billionaires, more than USA.  And they cluster in urban areas, as does the middle class who work in their plants.  Less than 10% of rural youths go to senior high school compared to 70% of urban kids.  Income inequality is measured by the Gini coefficient.  China is .49 while USA is .39 and most European countries are about .3.  Another way to look at this is that the top 10% of earners in China make 21 times as much as the bottom 10%.  USA is 6.

            Which means that with pitiful returns available on savings in China’s banks, those who can do invest abroad.  And as the economy slows down, many in the middle see the system as “rigged.” Some government run investment schemes have turned out to be Ponzi schemes benefitting Party members. Owning property is popular.  Now don’t think of this as we do in the West.  People have long tern leases of government apartments.  Yet these are going up astronomically in places like Shanghai and there is a market in trading properties just as if the people owned them.  85% of city folks “own” their homes. Yet any false move by government in the housing market will cost homeowners enormously and a couple of these have occurred.  So people now question whether their assets are secure.  Chinese have little appetite for political change, but security is tantamount.

            As a result, many people want out.  10M have left China in the past two decades not to return.  A poll showed 57% of Chinese would send their kids overseas to study if only they could afford it.  Government charges $11K just for a passport.  Students who come to Canada and USA often are highly serious.  Their entire family depends on them getting a good enough job to import mom and dad and others.  This has bled China of the best and brightest yet the government knows that many will remain.  Cash flows to international markets too as the wealthy establish companies and domiciles abroad. 

            The repression of expression has increased in the last few years, making a slow burning fuse burn faster.  Mr. Xi’s “Chinese dream” a competitor to the American Dream has proven largely empty.  The American ideal is to be whoever they want to be which conflicts with the tightly scripted social and moral codes of the Chinese Communist Party.  And so at some point, another Tianamen, in some other form is likely.

            This article makes much use of plagiarism of The Economist’s Special Report from July 2016.

Oklahoma towns

I read on the internet what they thought were the strangest town names in the world.  Why, Arizona makes it.  So does Dull, Scotland.  Well, Hello!  Have you been to Oklahoma?  We have paired towns like Dinger and Binger. Ringling and Ringwood and Bowring. Bokhoma, Dacoma and Lahoma. Wakita and Vinita  Boggy Depot and Bug Tussle. Bessie and Gerty.  Go down I-35 and find a sign south of Oklahoma City that says Wayne/Payne.  They aren’t far apart either.  Liberty, New Liberty and Freedom. Slapout is a ways from Dibble and Tuttle.

Then there’s my favorite, Nowhere.  Nowhere is between Turpin and Gray along US 83 out in the panhandle. There’s actually a bit of history and politics about this name.  US 83  was known as the highway to nowhere when it was built in 1935 because the eastern press disdained the project as a government boondoggle.  It went from Williston, ND to Dalhart, TX never intersecting a city with more than 15,000 people.  Why build the highway?  Because FDR was trying to retain the farm vote and show confidence in the progress of the Dust Bowl area after committing the gaffe that he thought the whole area should be made a national park and the farmers removed.  So they built the highway to nowhere, and the urban newspapers lampooned it, even though it turned out to be a good truck route.  Since the Democrat party was turning decidedly urban, the controversy only stirred up animosity with the rural folks. 3 different country music songs were written about the “highway to nowhere.” “I’m travellin’ this highway to nowhere / since I can’t find the way to your heart.” And somebody in Oklahoma had the inspiration to put up a sign near a rural elevator, Nowhere, OK.    Eat your heart out, Wappanucka. 

Another favorite is Enid.  (Between Fairmont and Fairview) Sounds common enough.  A woman’s name, right?  Nope.  Originally a small eating joint was located along the Chisholm trail, later US 81.  They put up a big cutout sign that said, DINE, but most people approached it from the other direction where it looked like ENID.  The town was born. 

We also have city names around here just to trap and label you as a foreigner.  Miami is prounounced My am uh.  Prague, a town of Czech settlers, is mysteriously pronounced Pray-g. How about Gotebo? (Goaty Bow) If that doesn’t trip a stranger up, try pronouncing Ochelata or Nelagony which are only 15 miles apart.

Just remember Happyland isn’t far from Oil Center.

Ukraine--what you don't read.

I guess I get this yen to research foreign countries from our keeping of many exchange students in the 90's.  Much of what you read in US press about Ukraine cannot be correct.  This morning AP had a story about how the country was divided in two--Ukrainians and Russians.  But Economist published a map of the 30 or so 'regions' (we'd call them counties) in Ukraine.  In only one, Crimea, are the Russians in the majority.  In the eastern provinces they comprise 25-40%.  In the North and West it is more like 10%. The country has other minorities in abundance as well--Tartars, Moldovans, Poles, Germans. Moldovans are half-German and have asked for independence in the past.  
    Hence to conclude that the nation is simply two countries and must logically be split is about like saying that California needs to be given back to Mexico because it is 40% Mex.  Duh.  What I suspect is that the AP reporters are liberal Dems who want to have an excuse for Obama when he does absolutely nothing in response to Putin.  And so if Putin annexes part of Ukraine, the AP hopes we will all see that as sour grapes.  Russia deserves to get part of the country back. 
    Here's the second fallacy.  It is breathlessly reported that the Russians are all Orthodox and the Ukrainians are Catholic so there is an irreparable divide between them on religion.  If that is true, then why are half the Ukrainians Orthodox?  And why are so many that I have talked to who lived there telling me stories about how in the communist days they never asked whether you were Prostestant, Catholic or Orthodox when they met another closet Christian.  They were just so Glad to find another believer, they rejoiced.  I suspect that it is divided somewhat like Orthodox and Catholic are here.  The Orthodox Church has a dogma that other Christians aren't for real but in practice they love to compare ministries and jokes about 'church'. 
    Kiev is the ancient capital of Russia, so all Ukrainians swear that this is their true capital, both the Russian speakers and the Ukrainians.  But the eastern part of the country is full of coal mines and steel industry while the east is farming almost entirely.  This gives a cultural difference.
    The opposition parties have been led by mamby pamby populists who muffed their rule after the Orange Revolution in 2005.  The Regions party of Yanukovich and Russian interests was oppressive with kangaroo courts and KGB-like tactics.  Apparently a majority of the people want reform.  So the Regions party MPs voted to oust Yanky along with the opposition party folks a couple weeks ago.  This desire for modernism and not "Back to the Soviets" is evidently a strong desire.  If the Russians take over Crimea, they may have problems.  The minority Tartars are violent in culture and strongly opposed to being part of Russia, seeing Ukraine now as their best hope of their own country after centuries of Russian domination.  Look for guerilla warfare. 
   But I would also look for Putin to take what he wants, to try to extort Ukraine for a buffer state, and for Obama to not do jack spit.  Meanwhile the West is faced with  an enormous challenge of helping Ukraine put in place democratic institutions--fair and reliable courts, a somewhat balanced budget, IMF assistance, Western businesses.

History?

I must say that I have noticed things on History Channel which are quite at variance with such noted historians as Will Durant and Paul Johnson. Today I was watching "States" which is an hour program with about 5 states taken one at a time and each is given a history/geographical/cultural tour.

And there was Kansas. I about choked over some of their facts. Now of course in a 10 minute span you have to be brief and that means a quick statement or two. Now of course I could understand if a mistake was made in saying that North Carolina's chief cash crop was, say, cotton instead of tobacco. After all, it isn't the geography channel. But to make a bozo on history!

Ach! Examples. It was stated that Kansas had a rich history in the cattle trail drives when the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railroad shipped cattle from Dodge City. And that the cattle could just as well have been shipped from New Orleans. Hmm. Seems like I remember the Union Pacific and Abilene using the Chisholm Trail was what spawned the cattle drives from Texas. And the reason they weren't shipped out of Ft. Worth or New Orleans was that the rails after the civil war were hideously destroyed. Ever try to drive cattle through LA swamps? Abilene was the first because of a myterious disease in Texas cattle, "Texas Fever" didn't affect the Texas cattle but it killed the settlers' cattle in the North. So KS passed laws forbidding Texas cattle east of certain defined boundaries. Abilene was on the boundary and had the rails completed to that point in 1867. And an Illinois livestock broker who was quite honest offered a fair deal to the Texans. Later the drives shifted up the Texas trail to Dodge City.

Eventually the drives stopped in 1886, the History Channel asserts, because the state of KS passed a law that didn't allow TX cattle. Well, yes the state did extend the boundary to be the entire state in 1887. But trail drives had been in decline after 1880 because the southern railroads were rebuilt. What really ended the drives abruptly was the epic winter of 1886. That was the winter that killed 90% of the cattle in Montana, bankrupted Teddy Roosevelt in N. Dakota and sent him back to NY politics. It had suddenly become apparent to everybody in the livestock business that you had to have barns and hay and fences to raise cattle in winter. After the fact, in 1887, KS passed the ban on TX cattle. We now know that cattle from TX had developed immunity to the ticks that caused Texas Fever. Just dip 'em.

"States" went on to declare that Wichita was the primary hub for early aviation development. There were 11 airports there in 1929. And they said that Kansas was perfect for aviation because it had strong winds. Uh, whoa! So does just about every state from Texas to Montana. What was unique about southern KS was that KS has almost 250 days of fair weather each year, in which a good test flight could be made over flat land around Wichita. Secondly, the best oils, lubricants and high octane aviation fuel was being refined in the crude methods of the day from Kansas and Oklahoma crudes. And finally Kansas at the turn of the century had a very strong reputation for entrepreneurship--Kansas Spirit. Don't tell me to fly a kite, I'll build a plane!

I guess I won't pick at the show just because they point out that the signature crop is wheat but don't explain why. Wheat grows well in dry climates and winter wheat, the original middle Turkish strain does best in a climate zone like Kansas. And was brought to Kansas by German Mennonite immigrants who got run out of Russia in the 1880s. By becoming a state early (1861) Kansas is full of immigrant communities.

But it does make you wonder what else you are hearing on History Channel that is wrong. Maybe they spend too much time looking for Sasquatch and the Abomnible Snowman. I never could see what that had to do with history.