Written by  Father James Thornton Since the end of the Second World War, and especially since the mid-1960s, America has been deluged with seemingly endless stories of the failure of its educational system. Testing reveals that there exists a significant percentage of high-school graduates who cannot identify the Pacific Ocean on an unlabeled map of the world, who do not […]

 “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” Gary Thompson

August 13 is the 225th day of the year (226th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 140 days remaining until the end of the year. Holidays Christian Feast Day: Benedetto Sinigardi Cassian of Imola Clara Maass (with Nightingale Lutheran Church) Florence Nightingale, Octavia Hill, Jeremy Taylor (Anglican Communion) Hippolytus of Rome Maximus the Confessor Pope Pontian Radegunde […]

August 12 is the 224th day of the year (225th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 141 days remaining until the end of the year. It is the peak of the Perseid meteor shower. It is also known as the “Glorious Twelfth” in the United Kingdom, as it marks the traditional start of the grouse shooting season. […]

by P.A. MADISON  |   The Federalist  The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or […]

Herbert Clark Hoover was born AUGUST 10, 1874, in West Branch, Iowa. At the age of 6, he spent eight months on the Osage Indian Reservation in Oklahoma with his Quaker uncle, who was an Indian agent. There he made many Indian friends and attended the “Indian Sunday-School.” Herbert Hoover was the only U.S. President to have lived on an Indian reservation. His Canadian-born Quaker mother, Hulda, taught Sunday School […]

August 10 is the 222nd day of the year (223rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 143 days remaining until the end of the year. The term ‘the 10th of August’ is widely used by historians as a shorthand for the Storming of the Tuileries Palace on the 10th of August, 1792, the effective end of the […]

“You can’t be for big government, big taxes and big bureaucracy and still be for the little guy.” —Ronald Reagan “An unlimited power to tax involves, necessarily, a power to destroy; because there is a limit beyond which no institution and no property can bear taxation.” —John Marshall (1819) The regulatory cuts ordered by President Donald Trump are already saving consumers billions of […]

Good morning, it’s Thursday, August 10, 2017. Sixty-eight years ago today, President Truman signed the National Security Act Amendments of 1949, the law formally creating the Department of Defense and requiring the military service secretaries to report to an overall chief. In a minimalist signing statement released by the White House, Truman groused about “new and cumbersome restrictions” imposed by […]

Good morning. It’s Thursday, August 9, 2018. On this date in 1791, an aspiring American author was putting the final touches on a book that would introduce him to the world as a man of science — and much more. But the budding writer would need help getting his work into print, and so he sent the manuscript — an […]

August 9 is the 221st day of the year (222nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 144 days remaining until the end of the year. Holidays Christian feast day: Candida Maria of Jesus Edith Stein Firmus and Rusticus Herman of Alaska (Russian Orthodox Church and related congregations; Episcopal Church (USA)) John Vianney Mary Sumner (Church of England) […]

Good morning, it’s Wednesday, August 9, 2017. Forty-three years ago today, one U.S. president departed the White House, resigning to avoid impeachment and conviction. Another, a Midwesterner who had never pursued national office, assumed his place. The statements of both men on that somber summer day serve as a reminder that the United States has experienced political turbulence before. We’ve […]

August 8 is the 220th day of the year (221st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 145 days remaining until the end of the year. Holidays Christian Feast Day: Cyriacus Dominic de Guzmán, founder of the Dominican Order. Hormisdas Largus Mary MacKillop Smaragdus (and companions) August 8 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Earliest day on which Children’s Day can […]

In 2007, The Jackson City Council voted (7-1) to donate $50,000.00 to the Jackson Humane Society’s Animal Shelter. The only strings attached: funding from all other sources must come first and that the old building revert to the city. The present building was placed on city property next to the Jones Creek Golf course. The council with the Mayor’s approval failed to accept my recommendation of a member of the Council be admitted to the voting board of the society. I voted no, of course I would have voted no anyway. Councilmen Randy Wallace and Danny Ellis will hopefully obtain what they want. There is no guarantee of the Society’s follow through on their action requests if there is no process to enforce.

August 6 is the 218th day of the year (219th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 147 days remaining until the end of the year. Holidays Christian feast day: Feast of the Transfiguration of Jesus Justus and Pastor August 6 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) H.H. Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan‘s Accession Day. (United Arab Emirates) Independence Day […]

Good morning, it’s Monday, August 5, 2019. Seven years ago today, regular Sunday activities were getting started at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin, located in the normally peaceful Milwaukee suburb of Oak Creek. Although worship services weren’t set to begin until 11:30 a.m., some congregants were already gathered in the main temple. In the basement kitchen, women were preparing roti […]

August 5 is the 217th day of the year (218th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 148 days remaining until the end of the year. Holidays Christian feast day: Abel of Reims Addai Afra Albrecht Dürer, Matthias Grünewald, and Lucas Cranach the Elder (Episcopal Church (USA)) Cassian of Autun Dedication of the Basilica of St Mary Major […]

Good morning, it’s Friday, August 4, 2017. Today is Barack Obama’s birthday. The former president came into the world, as the local newspaper noted, at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children, Honolulu, Hawaii, on this date in 1961. Those details are probably better known than those surrounding most presidential births, at least in part because of the dubious efforts […]

August 4 is the 216th day of the year (217th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 149 days remaining until the end of the year. This date is slightly more likely to fall on a Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday (58 in 400 years each) than on Sunday or Monday (57), and slightly less likely to occur on […]

Good morning, it’s Friday, August 3, 2018. On this date in 1981, America’s 13,000 air traffic controllers went on strike. Four hours later, Ronald Reagan walked into the Rose Garden flanked by Attorney General William French Smith and Secretary of Transportation Drew Lewis to announce that any controller who did not return to work in 48 hours would be fired. […]