OK, OK, I put the mustache in. I couldn’t resist.
In Great Britain, the enlightened isle that has never quite embraced the concepts of “freedom of speech” and “freedom of association,” is putting four neo-Nazis in jail for being “active members” of the banned group National Action (NA).
Alice Cutter and her former partner Mark Jones, along with Garry Jack and Connor Scothern, appeared at Birmingham crown court, where they were convicted of being members of the group. NA was banned in December 2016 after a series of rallies and incidents that included praising the murder of the MP Jo Cox. Not killing her, mind you. Praising her murder.
Cutter denied that she was an active member of the group as the prosecutor had argued to the court. True, Jurors were shown messages in which she joked about gassing synagogues and using a Jew’s head as a football. Joke! She was joking! But I’d say where she really ran into trouble denying that she was a Neo-Nazi was the fact that she competed in the “Miss Hitler” beauty pageant. Cutter entered the pageant under the catchy name “Buchenwald Princess.”
Führer ? What Führer ?
Ethics Alarms 
I think Medeline Kahn deserves a spot along side, “You know, Assholes.” and “Authentic Frontier Gibberish.”
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=i%27m+tiered+blasing+saddles&docid=608029358705607663&mid=E6462EDD3FA3BA0FC64BE6462EDD3FA3BA0FC64B&view=detail&FORM=VIRE
Wait, wasn’t the House of Windsor the House of Coberg Saxon until that pesky war broke out in 1939?
Philip “Mountbatten” was originally a “Battenberg”.
Actually the last Battenberg in the UK was Louis of Battenberg, born a German prince in Austria, distantly related to the Saxe-Coburg-Gotha dynasty that later became the House of Windsor. He joined the Royal Navy as a midshipman at 14 and never looked back. In 1912, after about 40 years of service, characterized by more by intellect and invention than decisive action, he became First Sea Lord, the UK equivalent of Chief of Naval Operations. A combination of factors: crippling pain due to gout, pressure from other officers, notably “Jackie” Fisher, somewhat uncertain actions when everyone could see WWI was about to break out, plus the fact that he wasn’t really up to the task of being a wartime commander, and the fact that his heritage caused the press and the upper class to vilify him as a German who couldn’t be trusted, led to Churchill (yes, THAT Churchill, who was then First Lord of the Admiralty, the equivalent of Secretary of the Navy) to force his resignation in October 1914, though he remained officially an admiral. He anglicized his name to Mountbatten, renounced his German titles, and dropped out of sight for the rest of the war.
Although promised he would be given a command again post-war, once anti-German sentiment died down, the incumbent First Sea Lord (Rosslyn Wemyss, an officer known only to naval history buffs, who deserves to be better known) wrote him a letter shortly after the Allied victory informing him that would not be possible and asking him whether he might not consider retiring officially to facilitate the promotion of younger officers. He knew it was a termination, veiled by proper British language, and retired January 1, 1919, since he would have reached 65 and had to retire that year anyway. The end of his life was tragic, as the part of his fortune invested in Russia was seized by the Bolsheviks, the value of his German properties collapsed, and he had to sell the few remaining properties of value he owned just to stay afloat. He owned not much more than his British titles and his honor when he fell victim to the last stages of the Spanish Flu pandemic in September 1921. His son, also named Louis, but referred to among the family as “Dickie” came back from this, though, and became Lord Mountbatten, arguably one of the greatest military heroes of the 20th century (although he had some help from Bill Slim in WW2). Unfortunately his life also ended tragically in an IRA assassination.
I should have been more specific in that it wasn’t Philip who changed the family name (although he’s the one more people will recognize).
Oddly we’ve accidentally been to his gravesite (Louis’, not Philip’s 😉 ), and it’s much less impressive than one might imagine for someone of his background. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/6139607/louis-battenberg
A few years back, we took our rental car on the ferry to the Isle of Wight, with the intent of seeing Victoria’s cottage there, and a few other things. Unfortunately, it was a Saturday, the boat was loaded with cyclists, and the idiot ferry operators let them all off before the autos. This created huge road-clogging groups of bikers backing up the small (and few) roads through and beyond the ferry dock’s village.
Attempting to find a detour around this mess, we took off on a side road out into the countryside and soon passed a small but attractive stone church that was a bit fancier than what is usually seen in such rural settings. We turned around and went back to take a look. There was only one car in the parking area, and it turned out that the building would normally be closed, but a “church lady” happened to be there getting things ready for a Christening later in the day. As happens with those types of encounters, she became our eager “guide” for the site, which turned out to be the chapel for Victoria and family when they were in residence there, and was, in part, a little museum for them, with some members (like Louis) buried in the graveyard. Her tour included his grave, and a little rundown on how/why the Battenburgs became Mountbattens.
It was actually the house of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha until WWI until it was changed due to the family’s German roots and blood relation to the Kaiser (George V and Wilhelm II were first cousins). Well before WWII.
Should have looked it up before hitting enter. Laziness.
Forgive me a small correction, Jack. Jo Cox, the murdered MP, was a woman.
I’ll fix that. I should have known.
When in doubt, use “them.”
The jury in the trial of four people, including a couple from Calderdale, alleged to have been members of a banned neo-Nazi terrorist group has been discharged after failing to reach verdicts.
Prosecutor Barnaby Jameson QC told Birmingham Crown Court the CPS would be seeking a retrial.
Strange. It would seem that even in England, it’s difficult to prosecute someone for criminal intent when the alleged intent doesn’t precede a crime. No doubt the next legal innovation will iron out that flaw. I wonder how many realize this is just a dress rehearsal for our future political persecutions. Maybe many would say that England has a different judicial makeup than the US and that foreign judicial proceedings have no bearing here. With staged demonstrations taking place all over the world regarding the death of a criminal in Minneapolis, those many are still somehow deluded by a mindset which regards global political conspiracies as absurd.
I’m still waiting for a decent historian to reinterpret the recent past in light of what’s now glaringly obvious, perhaps sifting through the conspiracy theories of yesteryear and presenting the ones which hold up to current-year results. We could then extrapolate a line and begin where McCarthy left off in his well-meaning but ham-fisted zeal. Well, if there’s a “we” large enough and with the will to do anything at all.
I’ve been reading about the strategies used to distort the Church. In the most prominent game, a radical progressive makes loud, indefensible demands, and then a staged “conservative” “negotiates” and accedes to a few “compromises”. No doubt our new, enlightened hero could find a number of subversives in our conservative party as well. Maybe it’s subversives all the way down!
In the most prominent game, a radical progressive makes loud, indefensible demands, and then a staged “conservative” “negotiates” and accedes to a few “compromises”.
That really does seem to be the way it is played.
His name is Romney
That may be England but we are but one step away from legislated oppression when the culture will seek to destroy you for thoughts you express.
There is a dangerous notion that free speech does not mean freedom from consequences. When one’s livelihood is destroyed or the person must relocate for safety concerns we no longer have freedom of speech. The Brown Shirts have arrived on our shores and invaded our psyche. They no longer need to use torches to commit arson on your business or family.
We deserve the servitude to those we place ourselves under.
And let’s not forget Basil Fawlty’s contribution to the discussion: