The image above is The Nativity by early American painter John Singleton Copley, circa 1776. On religious holidays—Christmas, Hanukkah, Easter—I like to use an equally religious image to go along with my wishes for others on the day. Over the years, I’ve learned to use search terms such as sacred rather than religious and specify painting when I want a painting rather than simply art, and to specify the century and country. This year, 2023, I wanted an American painting rather than my usual choice of something European. I began with the 18th century and found very few which made me drop the century. Better, but I found that most tend to be impressionistic, though this comes from someone with limited art skills and knowledge. If you know anything about how Warren Beatty made Dick Tracy using only primary colors, you know how I ahem, artistically operate. The difference being that Beatty and his team purposely styled the movie to look like a comic strip rather my drawings where trees are brown, the sky is blue, and the sun yellow. Saves on crayons, anyway.
So I settled on Copley’s painting which is quite lovely and in keeping with the reverence I’m looking for today, the day we celebrate the birth of our savior, Jesus Christ. It goes well with the music I’m listening to which is my Pandora station built from George Winston’s version of Carol of the Bells from his magnificent December album. The slow piano of most songs beautifully captures the mood I feel on this holy day when it’s still dark and I am alone with my thoughts about God, family, and life.
I have touched on this topic before in a previous article called Do You Hear What I Hear? where I contemplated the meaning of the Christmas carols we cherish and how they came about. No need to go over that ground again. Instead, I’m moved to consider the current state of the world and the devolution to complete incivility and worse in the name of equity and justice. It seems minor in the scheme, but there was a story in the NY Post about pro-Palestinian protesters and their campaign of “No celebration, ’til liberation” which includes disrupting the annual Christmas caroling in NYC’s Washington Square Park.
We are a lot farther than just 110 years from the Christmas true of 1914 when some troops observed a ceasefire during WWI to observe the day including a few instances where both sides got together. What is happening now is a constant agitation to build on the attention following the October 7 massacre of close to 1,500 Israelis by Hamas. Neat trick, huh? The Palestinians torture, rape, and murder people, take hundreds hostage, and then get professional protestors and mindless dupes around the world to plead the Palestinian case for so-called justice. Pushing the wrong way isn’t going to work.
It’s more than just the Palestinians and their hordes from hell supporters. We now have a full-blown campaign in multiple states to keep Donald Trump off the ballot by claiming he’s ineligible due to the insurrection clause (Article 3) of the 14th Amendment despite that there was no insurrection, no one has been charged with insurrection, and the legal applicability of the clause to a sitting President. Naturally, there has been a response by Republicans to bounce Joe Biden off ballots. The Supreme Court needs to settle this, at least on the legal front, and eliminate the mess created by the Colorado Supreme Court in terms of the 14th Amendment.
What the Supreme Court will not be able to do is put an end to the destruction of our institutions that has been going on for the past few years. That is only up to our society to fix, but too many people and too many leaders are hellbent on forcing change by tearing down what we currently have. The idea is to make things so bad that people will say, “There has to be a better way,” and in they will step with a better way that is not our current form of government. It has a name and its name is the Cloward-Piven Strategy named after two socialist professors, Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven, who outlined how to implement socialism through a four step plan that begins with overloading systems.
Well, you can see it at work whether it’s the open southern border, bail reform and non-prosecution of criminals in big cities, political prosecutions and favoritism, and continual questions about election integrity. It’s also larger because in the past few years we’ve had the concerted campaign of social unrest by BLM which spilled into sports and combined with Antifa to inflame cities. When athletes began kneeling at sporting events, many fans were faced with a choice: stop watching because they were offended or continuing to watch which signified support of the kneeling. Either way, the Cloward-Piven forces undermined the institution of sports and it continues through today.
Not a very cheery set of thoughts on this most joyous of holidays. Exactly what Cloward-Piven aims to do if we let it. I will not. What I’m thinking and writing are not how I feel about today. They are how I feel today, at this moment, when I think of these things.
How I feel about today is the tree in my living room, the lights on the railing, and the American flag flying in front of my house. It’s the lovely Christmas music I’m listening to and the thoughts of how excited my grandchildren are to dive under the Christmas tree where their presents await. And it’s these words in the Gospel of Luke.
And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,
“Glory to God in the highest heaven,
and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”
When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”
Merry Christmas to all.
Early Morning Christmas 2023 Thoughts
The image above is The Nativity by early American painter John Singleton Copley, circa 1776. On religious holidays—Christmas, Hanukkah, Easter—I like to use an equally religious image to go along with my wishes for others on the day. Over the years, I’ve learned to use search terms such as sacred rather than religious and specify painting when I want a painting rather than simply art, and to specify the century and country. This year, 2023, I wanted an American painting rather than my usual choice of something European. I began with the 18th century and found very few which made me drop the century. Better, but I found that most tend to be impressionistic, though this comes from someone with limited art skills and knowledge. If you know anything about how Warren Beatty made Dick Tracy using only primary colors, you know how I ahem, artistically operate. The difference being that Beatty and his team purposely styled the movie to look like a comic strip rather my drawings where trees are brown, the sky is blue, and the sun yellow. Saves on crayons, anyway.
So I settled on Copley’s painting which is quite lovely and in keeping with the reverence I’m looking for today, the day we celebrate the birth of our savior, Jesus Christ. It goes well with the music I’m listening to which is my Pandora station built from George Winston’s version of Carol of the Bells from his magnificent December album. The slow piano of most songs beautifully captures the mood I feel on this holy day when it’s still dark and I am alone with my thoughts about God, family, and life.
I have touched on this topic before in a previous article called Do You Hear What I Hear? where I contemplated the meaning of the Christmas carols we cherish and how they came about. No need to go over that ground again. Instead, I’m moved to consider the current state of the world and the devolution to complete incivility and worse in the name of equity and justice. It seems minor in the scheme, but there was a story in the NY Post about pro-Palestinian protesters and their campaign of “No celebration, ’til liberation” which includes disrupting the annual Christmas caroling in NYC’s Washington Square Park.
We are a lot farther than just 110 years from the Christmas true of 1914 when some troops observed a ceasefire during WWI to observe the day including a few instances where both sides got together. What is happening now is a constant agitation to build on the attention following the October 7 massacre of close to 1,500 Israelis by Hamas. Neat trick, huh? The Palestinians torture, rape, and murder people, take hundreds hostage, and then get professional protestors and mindless dupes around the world to plead the Palestinian case for so-called justice. Pushing the wrong way isn’t going to work.
It’s more than just the Palestinians and their hordes from hell supporters. We now have a full-blown campaign in multiple states to keep Donald Trump off the ballot by claiming he’s ineligible due to the insurrection clause (Article 3) of the 14th Amendment despite that there was no insurrection, no one has been charged with insurrection, and the legal applicability of the clause to a sitting President. Naturally, there has been a response by Republicans to bounce Joe Biden off ballots. The Supreme Court needs to settle this, at least on the legal front, and eliminate the mess created by the Colorado Supreme Court in terms of the 14th Amendment.
What the Supreme Court will not be able to do is put an end to the destruction of our institutions that has been going on for the past few years. That is only up to our society to fix, but too many people and too many leaders are hellbent on forcing change by tearing down what we currently have. The idea is to make things so bad that people will say, “There has to be a better way,” and in they will step with a better way that is not our current form of government. It has a name and its name is the Cloward-Piven Strategy named after two socialist professors, Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven, who outlined how to implement socialism through a four step plan that begins with overloading systems.
Well, you can see it at work whether it’s the open southern border, bail reform and non-prosecution of criminals in big cities, political prosecutions and favoritism, and continual questions about election integrity. It’s also larger because in the past few years we’ve had the concerted campaign of social unrest by BLM which spilled into sports and combined with Antifa to inflame cities. When athletes began kneeling at sporting events, many fans were faced with a choice: stop watching because they were offended or continuing to watch which signified support of the kneeling. Either way, the Cloward-Piven forces undermined the institution of sports and it continues through today.
Not a very cheery set of thoughts on this most joyous of holidays. Exactly what Cloward-Piven aims to do if we let it. I will not. What I’m thinking and writing are not how I feel about today. They are how I feel today, at this moment, when I think of these things.
How I feel about today is the tree in my living room, the lights on the railing, and the American flag flying in front of my house. It’s the lovely Christmas music I’m listening to and the thoughts of how excited my grandchildren are to dive under the Christmas tree where their presents await. And it’s these words in the Gospel of Luke.
And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,
“Glory to God in the highest heaven,
and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”
When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”
Merry Christmas to all.
Mark Ricci
December 25, 2023
Commentary