MAGAWeek2021: The Battle of Sullivan’s Island

7 July 20216 July 2021 The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

This week is MAGAWeek2021, my celebration of the men, women, and ideas that MADE AMERICA GREAT! Starting today (Monday, 5 July 2021) and running through this Friday, 9 July 2021, this year’s MAGAWeek2021 posts will be SubscribeStar exclusives. If you want to read the full posts, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for as little as $1 a month. You’ll also get access to exclusive content every Saturday.

For all the talk of the American Revolution’s origins in Massachusetts with Lexington and Concord in 1775, the war was largely won in the South. Indeed, Cornwallis’s forces surrendered to Washington at Yorktown, Virginia, in 1781. Washington was able to trap Cornwallis at Yorktown, however, due to earlier victories in South Carolina and North Carolina.

One of the earliest such victories was mere days before the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the Battle of Sullivan’s Island. Fought on 28 June 1776, the battle is well-known to South Carolinians, as spongy palmetto logs were used to construct the fort. British cannonballs harmlessly socked into the logs, and the treacherous sandbars forced some British ships aground.

This battle secured South Carolina against British invasion until 1780. The victory routed the British naval assault, leading the British to move their fleet northward, to New York.

The battle also immortalized the palmetto tree as a symbol of South Carolina, which joined the liberty crescent on the Moultrie Flag.

To read the rest of today’s MAGAWeek2021 post, head to my SubscribeStar page and subscribe for $1 a month or more!

Summertime Schedule Begins

8 June 20218 June 2021 The Portly Politico4 Comments

After a long school year and a whirlwind trip to Universal Studios, I am finally settling into my summertime schedule. My History of Conservative Thought course did not “make” this summer, as I only had one student enroll (the course really needs a minimum of three students to work well), but my dance card is full enough with lessons and other obligations and engagements.

Next week I’ll be running my first ever “Rock and Roll Camp” at my little school. It will essentially be a condensed version of the Music Ensemble class I run throughout the school year, squeezed into four three-hour days. The plan is to end the final day with a short concert. I’m waiting to hear back on who is enrolled and what kind of instrumentation we have, as that will determine the song selections, but I think it will should be a fun camp.

After that it’s the return of Minecraft Camp, a perennial favorite. At last count I have either ten or eleven campers signed up for that camp, which is quite good. Minecraft Camp is the most lucrative camp of the summer, and accounts for a good chunk of my supplemental income this time of year. I missed out on it last year, as I was very sick, so here’s hoping I’m good to go this summer.

Backroads Exploration: Una Adventure

19 March 202114 March 2021 The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

As I recently detailed in the post “Routine Maintenance,” I managed to get my old 2006 Dodge Caravan running again thanks to an $80 battery. I finally hooked up the battery maintainer, too, so hopefully the old girl won’t drain down due to neglect.

After installing that battery, it reminded me of how fun driving a busted up minivan can be. Readers might scoff at that notion, but that van and I share an intimate connection (well, at least I do with it—it can’t really think about who is driving it). After fifteen years, I’ve learned that machine inside and out. Sure, after driving my tiny Nissan it takes some adjustment (I still reach for the gear shifter in the wrong place occasionally, and briefly forget where the lights are), but it’s surprisingly nimble.

Aside from the maintainer, I’ve been taking the van for weekly drives to keep the battery up. My girlfriend and I took it to Lee State Park a few weekends ago, loading our small bit of supplies and her faithful German Shepherd into the cavernous interior. Since then, I’ve only done a few small jaunts with it, with the exception of last Thursday night.

SubscribeStar Saturday: Myrtle Beach

6 March 20215 March 2021 The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

Today’s post is a SubscribeStar Saturday exclusive. To read the full post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more. For a full rundown of everything your subscription gets, click here.

This weekend I’m down in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, with my family. With the exception of last year, we visit Myrtle Beach every March because it coincides with the Myrtle Beach Marathon, which my older brother flies down to run (after running the full marathon one year and starving while we waited for lunch at Sea Captain’s House, he has since decided that the half-marathon is a more reasonable distance).

Even before my brother’s career as an amateur long-distance masochist, we have been visiting Myrtle Beach as a family. We used to come every summer for a big South Carolina Public Works convention, so Myrtle Beach’s tacky neon charm holds a certain nostalgia for me. These annual visits are not just a wonderful opportunity to spend time with family, but to relive the glow of childhood nostalgia.

The rest of this post may be delayed, as I am—as the preview noted—in Myrtle Beach with family. Don’t worry, subscribers, I should have it finished soon. —TPP

To read the rest of this post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.

Midweek SubscribeStar Exclusive: Sloshing through Lee State Park

3 March 20211 March 2021 The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

Today’s post is a SubscribeStar exclusive for $5 and up subscribers. $5 and up subs periodically enjoy bonus content, in addition to Sunday Doodles every Sunday. They also gain access to SubscribeStar Saturday posts like $1 subscribers.

With the warm weather and sunshine this past weekend, my girlfriend and I decided to check out Lee State Park. Lee State Park is just ten miles up the road from Lamar, and while I’ve driven on Lee State Park Road numerous times heading to the Interstate, I’d never visited the park.

Lee State Park was constructed in 1935 as a Civilian Conservation Corps project during the Great Depression. It is bounded on the west by the Lynches River, and features a number of easy-to-moderate hiking trails, as well as several equestrian trails. Most of the park’s 2839 acres is hardwood forest wetlands, and the park features four artesian wells that flow continually.

To get to the park, we loaded into my ancient, busted up 2006 Dodge Caravan—now with a fresh battery!—and buzzed up there with the windows down. My girlfriend’s German shepherd seemed to enjoy the ride, and turned out to be a real trooper on what turned into an unexpectedly arduous adventure.

When we got to the park, we grabbed a trail map, and merrily headed into the forest, attempting to follow the white-labeled Floodplain Trail, a five-mile, moderate hike. Unfortunately, the Floodplain Trail does not make a neat loop, and we headed towards the shorter end, which overlaps with the orange equestrian trail.

That decision would ultimately result in soggy, sloshing bit of amateur trailblazing through some of the muddiest terrain in Lee State Park.

This post is a $5 and up SubscribeStar exclusive. To read the rest of this post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $5 a month or higher.

Victory for Life

24 February 202123 February 2021 The Portly Politico3 Comments

Last week life found a way when Governor Henry McMaster signed the Fetal Heartbeat Bill into law. The Heartbeat Bill is a major victory for the protection of unborn lives.

The Last Day of Freedom?

19 January 202118 January 2021 The Portly Politico7 Comments

Here we are, 19 January 2021—the last day of basking in liberty before Biden the Usurper assumes the throne. For all his personal foibles and occasional missed opportunities (while acknowledging, of course, his many achievements), President Trump at least fought to ensure that Americans could enjoy freedom and opportunity. Under progressive rule, no such guarantees exist.

But rather than look about gloomily at what is to come, I’d like to offer some words of exhortation. Times will not be easy for conservatives and Christians over the next four years, but I’m trying to embrace this new progressive era with some cautious, small-scale optimism.

For one, I think the whole sordid election fraud, as well as the bipartisan effort to impeach President Trump for—if we’re honest about it—discouraging violence and encouraging peaceful protest—has confirmed for many of us that the elites of both parties are against us. As such, effecting change at the national level seems increasingly futile.

That might sound discouraging, but consider it from another angle: if we can’t make much of a dent at the national level, then why waste the energy? Instead, let’s focus our efforts locally.

Mask Mandates Come for Lamar

8 January 20217 January 2021 The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

I know, I know—everyone wants to read and talk about the storming of our metaphorical Bastille. I’m going to cover that in-depth in this weekend’s SubscribeStar Saturday post, not because I know it is the event of the decade—and will therefore crassly milk it for subscribers—but because my own observations are so tantalizingly spicy, I have to hide them behind a paywall. Believe it or not, $1 is apparently a major hurdle.

Instead, I’m going to focus on a bit local draconianism that I will hopefully soon be able to address head-on: my small town of Lamar has adopted a mask ordinance. Given our current Town Council, I’m surprised it took this long.

The ordinance, dated 14 December 2020 and effective 4 January 2021—but only received in water bills on 7 January 2021—is entitled “REQUIRING INDIVIDUALS TO WEAR FACE COVERINGS IN RETAIL AND FOODSERVICE ESTABLISHMENTS, AND MATTERS RELATED THERETO.” It features a number of “WHEREAS” justifications, mostly the “recommendations of public health experts.” It then lists the “Use of Face Coverings” in Section 1, detailing that face coverings must be worn indoors at stores and restaurants, etc., with plenty of opportunities to not wear a mask listed in Section 2, “Exemptions”—religious reasons, dental cleanings, etc.

The penalties for infractions—detailed in Sections 3 and 4—are $25 for individuals and $100 for businesses that fail to require employees to wear masks. Section 3 seems laughably unenforceable in a town that has maybe three police officers—and just a recipe for another unpleasant interaction between otherwise law-abiding citizens and police. Section 4 is particularly onerous, though, as it forces private companies to force their employees to wear masks, or face daily $100 fines.

Granted, most business establishments have already bent the knee and have bought into the mask hysteria. In my mind, though, that makes the mask mandate even more unnecessary: if Dollar General is making me wear a mask to buy a $1.26 loaf of bread-based loaf product anyway, why does the Town Council need to ladle an extra dollop of self-righteous scolding?

The Virus and Live Music: The Story of The Roasting Room Lounge

11 December 202011 December 2020 The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

Christmastime always puts me in a musical mood, as blog posts this week suggest. Christmas is the perfect season to illustrate the power of music, as so much wonderful music has been written about Christ’s Birth.

In The Before Times, in the Long, Long Ago, before The Age of The Virus, it was also a lucrative season for musicians. Other than wedding gigs (a market I haven’t managed to crack into yet), nothing pays better than a Christmas party. They’re fun, full of free food, and they pay well. The spirit of free-flowing generosity (and the generosity of free-flowing spirits) results in some warm winter paydays.

Of course, this year has been particularly tough for musicians, as I’ve detailed many, many times before. Revenues from private lessons and gigs seem to be bouncing back (at least for me), and the struggles of The Virus brought forth a burst of generosity. Bandcamp Fridays really helped inject some much-needed cash into the coffers of independent musicians (myself included).

Musicians have also had to get creative. That’s why I hosted my annual Spooktacular from my front porch. Venues are constrained by various local and State laws (and sometimes dictatorial edicts) limiting their capacities, and many eateries have been slow to resume live shows. That’s created real limitations on venues and artists, but it’s also opened up opportunities. My Spooktacular was mildly profitable, but it also brought people together for desperately-needed fun and camaraderie (and put a few bucks into the pockets of the musicians involved). I don’t know if that model will endure once The Virus is defeated, but it’s something for musicians to consider in this strange new world.

But for all I’ve written about the damage The Virus has caused to musicians’ finances, I haven’t looked at the impact on venues at all. That’s an unfortunate oversight on my part, because a venues’ success or failure can directly impact that of an artist. Many musically-inclined venues are coffee shops or small restaurants, so they largely cut live music as they went to take-out-only and delivery formats.

SubscribeStar Saturday: Rule of Law Matters

24 October 202024 October 2020 The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

Also, the delayed Universal Studios post is now available to subscribers: “Universal Studios Trip No. 3.”

During the recent incarnation of the domestic terror organization Black Lives Matter, a group of BLM organizers in Florence, South Carolina received permission to paint a “Black Lives Matter” mural on a section of street in downtown Florence. The mural is meant to depict various scenes from African and African-American history, including some Egyptian elements.

The mural itself was a community effort, and took around three or four days to paint. In all fairness, it was a peaceful project with the full support of the City of Florence, and seemed to be an expressive way for the black community to participate in a project that isn’t overtly destructive. Creating art—even historically inaccurate, propagandist art—is generally preferable to looting stores.

However, the City of Florence has decided to remove the mural. Naturally, it’s resulted in a lot of weeping and gnashing of teeth from blacks and gentry white liberals in Florence, who are accusing Mayor Wukela—a red-diaper baby and progressive Democrat—of racism, of suppressing black voices, and the usual litany of complaints.

Of course, that has nothing to do with why Florence City Council—which is overwhelming Democratic and heavily African-American—is removing the mural.