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There may have been something approaching a “whimsical cast” to these summer proceedings—so John Adams characterized them. Congress could not seem to make up its mind. It prepared for war while it begged for peace; it proclaimed its determination to protect American liberties while it petitioned for reconciliation; it expressed respect for the king while it promised death to his armies.7 Yet there was nothing whimsical in the tendency of action in these hot weeks. Men died at Bunker Hill, and each time an American died so did some part of moderation. Death and suffering had more than a local effect in New England. The news of the fighting spread, and soldiers from the middle and southern colonies began to march toward Boston. As they left home so also did the spirit of compromise. Blundering British officials also helped destroy whatever support moderation possessed. Few in the ministry seem to have kept their balance once the war began. North’s impulses remained peaceful, though hardly strong enough to soothe an angry king. Dartmouth might have helped North contain the ugly desires for war, but Dartmouth was not widely trusted and left office in the autumn. His successor, Lord George Germain, was genuinely tough and fed the vulgar desire to put the Americans in their place.8 News of the battles at Lexington and Concord had made compromise all the more unlikely, and Bunker Hill had hardened resolves. Late in August the king expressed much of the public, and private, outrage at American behavior by proclaiming that the colonies were in “an open and avowed rebellion.” Two months later in an accounting to Parliament he explained that a “desperate conspiracy” existed in America to make a rebellious war which is “manifestly carried on for the purpose of establishing an independent empire.”9 Many in Parliament had doubtless come to the same conclusion when fighting began in America. They now followed the lead of the ministry and just before the year ended passed, on December 22, 1775, the American Prohibitory Act, which ordered all trade with the colonies stopped. This statute made American ships and their cargoes fair game for the Royal Navy; all ships trading with the colonies were to be “forfeited to his Majesty, as if the same were the ships and the effects of open enemies, and shall be so adjudged, deemed, and taken in all courts of admiralty, and in all other courts whatsoever.”10 Had the king, his ministry, and the Parliament attempted to persuade the Americans to separate themselves from the empire they could not have chosen much more effective means than those of April onward. The British army had marched and killed on two dreadful occasions; the petition of the Congress had been considered unworthy of answer; the Americans had been described as traitors and rebels who must be subdued by force. At first sight, shutting off American commerce may not seem such a portentous act. Yet Americans considered it to be, and rightly so, for it…
The Glorious Cause
Robert Middlekauff
Our brains essentially have two modes, focused and unfocused. Focused mode is a mind at attention. It’s on when we’re processing outside information, completing a task, checking our cellphone, watching TV, listening to a podcast, having a conversation, or anything else that requires us to attend to the outside world. Unfocused mode occurs when we’re not paying attention. It’s inward mind-wandering, a rest state that restores and rebuilds the resources needed to work better and more efficiently in the focused state. Time in unfocused mode is critical to get shit done, tap into creativity, process complicated information, and more. The 11 hours and 6 minutes of attention we’re handing over to digital media isn’t free. It’s all spent in focused mode. Think of this focused state like lifting a weight, and the unfocused state like resting. When we kill boredom by burying our minds in a phone, TV, or computer, our brain is putting forth a shocking amount of effort. Like trying to do rep after rep after rep of an exercise, our attention eventually tires when we overwork it. Modern life overworks the hell out of our brains.
The Comfort Crisis
Michael Easter
Tim handed over another image. It showed Factory 395 had half a dozen factories clustered around it. Ku identified each one by its number. Tim asked how many they employed. Ku did not hesitate: over ten thousand. Tim knew this was no wild guess; the figure was a current CIA estimate. He probed further: What was the ratio between those working on nuclear, chemical, and biological projects? Ku’s reply further satisfied the CIA officer that he was not dealing with another of those asylum seekers who invented what they thought their interrogators wanted to hear. Ku said that while creating nuclear bombs was still the country’s largest military priority, the work was also divided between research and production of chemical and biological weapons; each section employed about four hundred thousand people. Again, the figure corresponded with the CIA’s. Tim indicated a snapshot of a woman. Ku confirmed she was Dr. Yi, who had been at the meeting, listening and taking notes while he explained the technicalities of inserting a guidance system into one of the SS-18 missiles that had been acquired from the Soviet Union shortly before its collapse. When he had completed his presentation, Dr. Yi had asked: When would the system be ready to deliver a biological weapon? Within a year? Longer? A stocky, middle-aged general had interjected to say this was not a matter for Ku to judge.
Secret Wars
Gordon Thomas
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