"I have often said that the sole cause of man’s unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room.” — Blaise Pascal b. 19 June 1623

Frederick Douglass: No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man w/o at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck. Juneteenth doesn’t mark the emancipation of the enslaved, but emancipation of the US. We shld all rejoice & work twd our mutual liberation.

"No one recovers from the disease of being born, a deadly wound if there ever was one". —Emil Cioran E. M. CIORAN Died on this day, in 1995

#BlackMusicMonth Esther Phillips backed by King Curtis, Cornell Dupree and Jimi Hendrix (1966)

Maria Callas sits on the ancient Theater of Delphi in 1959. Perhaps hearing Medea's poignant words echoing among the stones: "My passion for you was greater than my wisdom"

“If you're lonely when you're alone, you're in bad company.” ... Jean-Paul Sartre in Venice, Italy 1951 #BOTD

Jean-Jacques Schuhl : « La vie n’est pas réservée à ceux qui s’agitent. Il y a aussi les autres ».

New: AG Merrick Garland says SCOTUS overturning Roe v Wade has eliminated a fundamental right — adds “the FDA has approved the use of the medication Mifepristone. States may not ban Mifepristone based on disagreement with the FDA’s expert judgment about its safety and efficacy.”

🔹AMBROSE BIERCE Born on this day, in 1842 "War is God's way of teaching Americans geography."

Did you know? When SCOTUS said in 1937 that the Social Security Act was “unconstitutional”, President Roosevelt didn’t ask people to vote harder in the next election, he told the Supreme Court he’d add more justices until they backed off, which they did. — We can still do that.

REMINDER: The Women’s Health Protection Act, which codifies Roe into federal law, has already passed the House thanks to Democrats. It’s only languishing in the senate because of two Democratic senators who have been bribed to protect the filibuster instead of Americans’ rights.

Mona Eltahawy

This is Alice Tan Ridley singing Midnight Train to Georgia. You see the utter shock on people’s faces as they listen to her voice? It’s magical. Oh, and she’s also the mother of famous actress Gabourey Sidibe.

He was so fun.

To The States, or any one of them, or any city of The States, Resist much, obey little; Once unquestioning obedience, once fully enslaved; Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city, of this earth, ever afterward resumes its liberty. –WALT WHITMAN in Leaves of Grass

for #theloveoffootnotes: Sigmund Freud, in a footnote of “Civilization and its Discontents:” “Goethe, indeed, warns us that “nothing is harder to bear than a succession of fair days.” “But this,” Freud comments, “may be an exaggeration

“The greatest threat to freedom is the absence of criticism.”—Wole Soyinka, playwright, poet, Nobel laureate (b. 13 Jul 1934) #BOTD #WoleSoyinka

“It is a little embarrassing that after forty-five years of research and study, the best advice I can give people is to be a little kinder to each other.” Aldous Huxley b. 26 July 1894-22 November 1963

Yeah ok, Roberto Bolaño

Nothing can bring to man so much of happiness or so much of misery as man himself. Today he exalts himself to heaven by his virtues and achievements; tomorrow he smites with sadness and pain, by his crimes and follies. Frederick Douglass, “Self-Made Men 1872”