Crime-Free Addendum English: Fill & Download for Free

As the estimable Mike Jones pointed out, the terms reference a legal term of art at the time, and there was significant debate at the Constitutional Convention in 1787 as to whether or not to just use that phrase and assume that the lawyers would figure it out, or to actually define it.Here’s a more detailed look, because to answer this question, we really need to look at the evolution of the concept of impeachment to provide a context.Origins and Subsequent HistoryThe term itself first occurs in legal writing about 500 years before the drafting of the Constitution, actually. It was used in the impeachment of Michael de le Pole, the First Earl of Suffolk, in 1386.[1] The Earl also held the post of Chancellor, and he was accused of embezzlement and negligence in his duties. He was found guilty and removed from office, giving him the dubious distinction of being the very first person under English law to have that happen. Oddly, even after removal, he still found himself in the good graces of the King at the time until he pissed off some different nobles, got himself accused of treason, fled to Paris, and lived out the rest of his days in exile.Throughout English legal history, various individuals were impeached on grounds including misappropriating government funds, appointing unfit subordinates, not prosecuting cases, not spending money allocated by Parliament (ahem, surely not relevant today…), promoting themselves ahead of more deserving candidates, threatening a grand jury, disobeying an order from Parliament, arresting a man to keep him from running for Parliament, losing a ship by neglecting to moor it, helping “suppress petitions to the King to call a Parliament,” granting warrants without cause, and bribery.[2]Essentially, the overarching commonalities here are 1) the person holds an office and 2) they generally encompass maladministration, negligence, or other abuse of office.The purpose of the English concept of impeachment was twofold, as noted in Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Law, first published in 1765.[3] Blackstone’s Commentaries were the preeminent legal treatises of the day. Everyone engaged in the law had a copy. His words were practically gospel for the legal community at the time of the drafting of the Constitution, both in England and in the United States.First, Blackstone noted that there was a concern that the English aristocracy could buy enough influence to get themselves a favorable verdict in a regular trial court. Because of that, Parliament, particularly the House of Lords, was considered to be the only place where they could receive a fully impartial trial. Particularly because nobility were largely the office holders (though commoners could certainly hold them as well,) there was no other good forum to investigate, charge, and try abuse of office claims if someone was to get a trial by their peers. As Blackstone lays out in Book IV, Chapter 19:“For, though in general the union of the legislative and judicial powers ought to be most carefully avoided, yet it may happen that a subject, intrusted with the administration of public affairs, may infringe the rights of the people, and be guilty of such crimes, as the ordinary magistrate either dares not or cannot punish.” [4]There wasn’t an independent judiciary or separated Supreme Court at the time.[5] The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom is only ten years old. True story.Until very very recently, it was Parliament that acted as the Supreme Court.So, Parliament was really the only appropriate forum at the time to charge and try these abuses of office simply by nature of how the judiciary worked at the time. These could include criminal wrongs, as well as wrongs not clearly defined as crimes by a court at the time, but still accepted as public wrongs.Blackstone writes:I. THE high court of parliament; which is the supreme court in the kingdom, not only for the making, but also for the execution, of laws; by the trial of great and enormous offenders, whether lords or commoners, in the method of parliamentary impeachment. As for acts of parliament to attaint particular persons of treason or felony, or to inflict pains and penalties, beyond or contrary to the common law, to serve a special purpose, I speak not of them; being to all intents and purposes new laws, made pro re nata [for the occasion], and by no means an execution of such as are already in being. But an impeachment before the lords by the commons of Great Britain, in parliament, is a prosecution of the already known and established law, and has been frequently put in practice; being a presentment to the most high and supreme court of criminal jurisdiction by the most solemn grand inquest of the whole kingdom. A commoner cannot however be impeached before the lords for any capital offense, but only for high misdemeanors: a peer may be impeached for any crime. And they usually (in case of an impeachment of a peer for treason) address the crown to appoint a lord high steward, for the greater dignity and regularity of their proceedings; which high steward was formerly elected by the peers themselves, though he was generally commissioned by the king; but it has of late years been strenuously maintained, that the appointment of a high steward in such cases is not indispensably necessary, but that the house may proceed without one. The articles of impeachment are a kind of bills of indictment, found by the house of commons, and afterwards tried by the lords; who are in cases of misdemeanors considered not only as their own peers, but as the peers of the whole nation. This is a custom derived to us from the constitution of the ancient Germans; who in their great councils sometimes tried capital accusations relating to the public: ”licet apud concilium accusare quoque, et discrimen capitis intendere.” [“One may bring accusations before the council, and commence capital prosecutions."] And it has a peculiar propriety in the English constitution; which has much improved upon the ancient model imported hither from the continent. . . .But before what court shall this impeachment be tried? Not before the ordinary tribunals, which would naturally be swayed by the authority of so powerful an accuser. Reason therefore will suggest, that this branch of the legislature, which represents the people, must bring its charge before the other branch, which consists of the nobility, who have neither the same interests, nor the same passions as popular assemblies.[6]In this first chapter of Book IV of his commentaries, Blackstone sets out the initial concept of “public wrongs, which encompasses both criminal issues and political wrongs. But he goes further to discuss impeachment specifically in Chapters 9, 10, and 19, where he discusses what he terms “Misprisions and Contempts, Affecting the King and Government.”[7]Blackstone writes:“THE first and principal [illustration] is the mal-administration of such high officers, as are in public trust and employment. This is usually punished by the method of parliamentary impeachment: wherein such penalties, short of death, are inflicted, as to the wisdom of the house of peers shall seem proper; consisting usually of banishment, imprisonment, fines, or perpetual disability. Hitherto also may be referred the offense of embezzling the public money, called among the Romans peculatus, which the Julian law punished with death in a magistrate, and with deportation, or banishment, in a private person. With us it is not a capital crime, but subjects the committer of it to a discretionary fine and imprisonment. Other misprisions are, in general, such contempts of the executive magistrate, as demonstrate themselves by some arrogant and undutiful behavior towards the king and government.”Chapter 10 lays out “Offenses Against Public Justice,” which also includes a list of various impeachable offenses, including “the negligence of public officers, entrusted with the administration of justice, as sheriffs, coroners, constables, and the like,” or what we’d refer to now as executive officers. Blackstone particularly condemns these as particularly loathsome because in his view, this abuse of office is easy to commit and hard to find legal redress against because those people are the arm of the law. You can’t get the cops to investigate and prosecute themselves.And that’s where the second reason for impeachment comes in: to go after the misuse of public office for crimes that could really only come from an abuse of office.Now, again, Parliament had jurisdiction over both criminal and civil matters. Impeachment proceedings under English law could result not only in removal from office, but also criminal sanctions on the individuals involved, up to and including execution and stripping of titles and lands.As such, it was generally considered to require the commission of some sort of known crime or punishable offense, and prohibit ex post facto punishments (where the wrong is defined retroactively and not known to be wrong in advance).This is not to say that Parliament routinely stuck to that; on at least one occasion in 1641, when the Earl of Strafford gave Charles I some legal advice on how to collect taxes without Parliament’s consent, the House of Commons was livid and attempted to impeach him for having “traitorously endeavoured to subvert the fundamental Laws and government.” After it looked like the House of Lords might acquit the Earl, the House of Commons changed tack, dropped the impeachment, and successfully went after the Earl for treason instead (which didn’t require the House of Lords’ approval.) The Earl was found guilty and executed in what was widely condemned at the time as an abuse of Parliament’s power and an excessively broad interpretation of what “treason” meant, as well as a “bill of attainder” that directly criminally punished one particular person’s conduct.[8]In fact, this very case likely influenced the statesmen of the fledgling United States 150 years later in adding the prohibitions on ex post facto laws and bills of attainder, as well as a more narrow definition of treason.Another case that would have been incredibly impactful on the Constitutional Convention was the impeachment of the Governor-General of India, William Hastings. The proceedings against Hastings started merely weeks before the Constitutional Convention was to start, and would have been very much in the legal news at the time. Hastings was impeached for “high crimes and misdemeanors” in the form of maladministration, corruption, and cruel administration toward the people of India, and indeed was even specifically referenced in the debate record at the Constitutional Convention.As a side note: Alan Dershowitz recently released a book called The Case Against Impeaching Trump where he references Blackstone’s Commentaries to claim that the framers and English law require that there must have been a criminal act by Trump to warrant impeachment. He is absolutely, entirely, 100% incorrect about his assertions, quotes the Commentaries out of context, and goes explicitly against the rest of what Blackstone writes if you read the rest of it.Anyone commenting who references this book in saying, “But Dershowitz says you’re wrong, Kruger!” will be summarily escorted to the exits without additional warning.Drafting and Inclusion at the Constitutional Convention; The Federalist PapersWhen the subject of whether to include an impeachment provision came up at the Constitutional Convention, James Madison wanted to clarify some of the issues and inconsistencies of English law, particularly the role of Parliament and just how much power the legislature should have.The delegates initially proposed a relatively generalized impeachment power, for officers to “be removable on impeachment & conviction of mal-practice or neglect of duty.” This was changed in committee to treason, bribery, and corruption, and the Committee of Eleven even took out corruption. George Mason thought this was too limited and wanted impeachment to be an available remedy for a more expansive view of abuse of office, and suggested “treason, bribery, or maladministration.” James Madison thought this was too vague and could leave an executive officer too exposed to political whims. Mason suggested falling back on the well known “high crimes and misdemeanors” instead, and that was passed without further debate.[9]In defending the proposed Constitution, Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist No. 65 that impeachment was intended to cover “those offences which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or in other words from the abuse or violation of some public trust. They are of a nature which may with peculiar propriety be denominated political, as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself.” [10]The delegates debated a parliamentary structure, but this was explicitly rejected in favor of separated powers, particularly the legislative and the judicial powers. The delegates were all pretty uniformly in agreement that they needed to split up powers so that no one faction could gain too much authority and impose a tyrannical system, and imposed very specific checks and balances on these separated powers.One of these was to take away from the legislative body the ability to directly try and impose criminal penalties on individuals, which the English Parliament had. The power to try and impose criminal penalties was explicitly given to the independent judiciary, and the legislature’s imposition of penalty was limited only to removal from office.This is explicitly spelled out in the Constitution. As with English law, the equivalent of the House of Commons, the House of Representatives - being the representative body of the people - had the power to set out a bill of impeachment. The equivalent of the House of Lords, the Senate - being the body representing the individual States and supposedly more insulated from political pressures and with cooler heads and more deliberation - was to have the power to actually try the case.But, in respect to the independence of the judiciary and isolating criminal penalties to only being able to be issued by that branch, the only thing that the legislature could do is boot someone from office. That could be followed up with criminal charges, where a person would be afforded the rights of the criminally accused. However: this makes it clear, the legislature would not be afforded the kind criminal jurisdiction like the English Parliament had.Now, you’re probably wondering when I’m going to get to the point and say what all this has to do with the difference between high crimes and misdemeanors.There’s a reason I needed to set all of this context. Impeachment directly grew out of English law, but had some serious distinctions. Where Parliament did have criminal jurisdiction over a case, and could impose criminal penalties, it was important to define the differences in criminal matters.Crimes, or felonies, were those offenses which could be punishable by causing all of one’s property to escheat to the state.In early English property law, only landowners had really any representation. All property, especially real property, was really owned by the King, who gave title and legal interest in that to individuals. The King could take it back any time he wanted or give it to someone else.One way you could find yourself getting stripped of your property was by committing a crime, or what later became known as a felony (from the French félonie). As Blackstone noted in his Commentaries, felonies did not necessarily require capital punishment, and there were other capital offenses that were not felonies, but he did concede that “the idea of felony is indeed so generally connected with that of capital punishment, that we find it hard to separate them; and to this usage the interpretations of the law do now conform.”[11]Other crimes, which did not require forfeiture of the right to own property, were misdemeanors.This has changed in U.S. law, and today felonies are offenses punishable by more than one year in prison (which is why you sometimes hear the penalty for low-level felonies as being a year and a day,) and misdemeanors are offenses punishable by up to one year in jail.There was also the term of holding “high office.” High office was an official position with the government; what we’d now refer to as executive officers, or officers of the executive branch. In English law, there was no separation of the legislative and executive branches; Parliament did both duties. It was through this governmental body that officers such as sheriffs, constables, justices of the peace, etc. would be commissioned.High offices were ones with considerable authority; the Chancellor, Lord High Steward, Lord High Chamberlain, etc.[12]These offices were more or less eliminated with the formation of the United States, and especially in the drafting of the Constitution. However, the Constitution lays out the process of appointment for principal and inferior officers, in Article II, Section 2.[13] This has been clarified by several Supreme Court decisions as to who constitutes a principal or inferior officer, as principal officers require confirmation by the Senate. More or less, anyone with significant authority under the laws of the United States is a principal officer subject to the Appointments Clause; cabinet level officials, administrators of agencies, etc., are generally considered principal officers.[14]Now, that’s relevant because that’s kind of the equivalent to “high office.” People with some sort of substantial authority under the law also can really screw things up by abusing their office, which they hold as a public trust. When we go back up to Blackstone’s Commentaries, this was the concern and policy behind impeachment.So, if we go back to English law, and we look at crimes (felonies) and misdemeanors as levels of offenses, either worth stripping a person of titles, lands, and property, or offenses worth other punishment, and we understand that with impeachment, these are offenses that come from holding “high office,” or offices with enough authority that an abuse of office is an offense against the public trust, such as maladministration, corruption, bribery, treason, or negligent exercise of duty, now we have a better context for answering this question.Putting all this together, the phrase can best be understood as offenses against the public trust, by an officer of the government with some significant legal authority under the law, where those offenses can only be committed in the scope of that office.The difference between the crimes and misdemeanors was regarding whether forfeiture of property was relevant. In today’s impeachment context, because forfeiture of property is no longer an issue - only whether removal from office is necessary - it’s essentially a distinction without a difference.Thanks for the A2A, Bob Doerschuk.This was long without pictures and if I don’t post an animal, someone will pester me about it.Mostly Standard Addendum and Disclaimer: read this before you comment.I welcome rational, reasoned debate on the merits with reliable, credible sources.But coming on here and calling me names, pissing and moaning about how biased I am, et cetera and BNBR violation and so forth, will result in a swift one-way frogmarch out the airlock. Doing the same to others will result in the same treatment.Essentially, act like an adult and don’t be a dick about it.As a reminder, first Dershowitz reference gets a free summary trip to the exits.Getting cute with me about my commenting rules and how my answer doesn’t follow my rules and blah, blah, whine, blah is getting old. Stay on topic or you’ll get to watch the debate from the outside.Same with whining about these rules and something something free speech and censorship.If you want to argue and you’re not sure how to not be a dick about it, just post a picture of a cute baby animal instead, all right? Your displeasure and disagreement will be duly noted. Pinkie swear.If you have to consider whether or not you’re over the line, the answer is most likely yes. I’ll just delete your comment and probably block you, and frankly, I won’t lose a minute of sleep over it.Debate responsiblyFootnotes[1] Impeachable Offenses[2] High Crimes and Misdemeanors[3] The Scope of the Power to Impeach[4] Commentaries on the Laws of England, by William Blackstone[5] High Crimes Without Law[6] Commentaries on the Laws of England, by William Blackstone[7] Commentaries on the Laws of England, by William Blackstone[8] High Crimes Without Law[9] Impeachable Offenses[10] Federalist No 65[11] Commentaries on the Laws of England, by William Blackstone[12] Commentaries on the Laws of England[13] The 2nd Article of the U.S. Constitution[14] The Inferior (Subordinate) Officer Test and the Officer/Non-Officer Line, by Tuan Samahon

(worth reading again, I’ve added a few things and made some corrections, based on comments)As someone who has bought a flat in Scotland, having sold a flat in England, I can tell you some of my experiences. You haven’t told us why you’re asking, or where you’re wanting to compare Scotland with, oh surprise surprise it’s a random scripted insincere QPPM question, but I’ve answered it anyway in the hope someone will benefit from the time it’s taken me to answer thisI’ll just tell you what I’ve found. I’m English born but now living in the Highlands. A Sasannach. I do have Scottish (and Australian) roots but I don’t do the American thing of calling myself English Scottish. I’m just English.An English friend of mine said he was coming up to Scotland, and asked how far I was from the ferry port to Ireland, that being the next part of his trip. I sent him a map, 5 hours it was, he said wow you’re really in the far north. Yep, I’m on the Black Isle, north of Inverness. He was quite shocked how far north I was, compared to my English hometown of Reading, Berkshire. Did I miss Reading, he asked? Yeah like a hole in the head. I miss the police helicopter over most nights, the lorries thundering past on the main road nearby, the emergency sirens - our side road was a rat run from the fire station. The constant crime, everywhere, the traffic, eugh. And, when the local psychiatric hospital 200 yards away had a breakout or a drill, we went into lockdown with the place swarming with police and their dogs, and the chopper again.And that’s not even Broadmoor hospital which wasn’t far either. If you haven’t heard of Broadmoor, it’s where the worst of the worst psychiatric patients were kept. Brady was in there, as were plenty of other high profile cases. I think Sutcliffe (the Yorkshire Ripper) was/is in there as well.As I write this, I’ve been living in Scotland two years now.Houses are about 1/4 the price of houses in the south of England and flats are freehold, not leasehold. Some places like Edinburgh or Aberdeen the houses can be as expensive as in London. House prices are generally rising in Scotland, but in England they’re generally falling. I got a quick online quote the other day for my flat here in the same postcode area and the same number of bedrooms, and the value has doubled in only 9 months. 75k to 155k in a year, not bad eh?Scottish law is different from England and Wales. We have our own sheriffs and prosecutor fiscal, which is run by Holyrood in Edinburgh and devolved (ish) from Westminster. Apart from the licensing, drink driving, and property laws though, there’s no real gotchas. What’s illegal in England is generally illegal in Scotland, other than we’re allowed to wild camp almost anywhere other than private property. As far as I know (I could be wrong) there are no trespass laws here, but respect the countryside. Leave nothing but footprints, close gates behind you, don’t let your dog loose when there are sheep or cattle roaming - a farmer would be within his rights to shoot your dog if it was worrying his livestock. And if you do wild camp, leave no trace, backfill and cover-up anywhere you’ve made a fire, and take all of your litter away with you and dispose of it legally and sensibly. Which leads me onto…Bothies are very welcome freely provided extremely basic (literally 4 bare walls , a probably draughty front door, a roof, and a bare piece of wood or stone to put your camping bed on, if you’re lucky) community camping stopovers, handy if you get stuck wild camping or hiking in a sudden snowstorm or other bad weather. They are free to use, you can’t book them, so it’s pot luck as to if there might be someone else there the same night as you - great chance to make new friends! Leave it as you found it, if not better, sweep the floors if you can, and it’s always polite to leave the next visitor some firewood and/or tins or packets of food. There won’t be a toilet, there may be a fireplace but get your own wood or fuel. There may not be a stove but there may be a fireplace, take your own cooking equipment. Nothing is supplied, they are literally a shell of an old building left there for the community to use, they’re usually old abandoned/disused crofters’ houses. There might be a donation box. There won’t be any electricity or running water.If you’re interested, just use El Goog for “bothy”. There are bothies in England and Wales too. It’s literally the same as wild camping but with sturdy walls and a roof. They’re quite popular! They’re not on the beaten track, they’re pretty remote. Handy for a wild camping expedition. Make sure you have maps, and/or a working charged GPS, and know how to use them. There’s a website to find bothies, it’s on El Goog.If the owner of a property you are buying dies (as happened in my case), there doesn’t appear to be such a long drawn out probate system as there is in England & Wales. All that’s needed as far as conveyancing is concerned is a death certificate from the court. This took about 2 weeks in my case, as the son of the deceased was already dealing with, having accepted formally, my offer for the purchase. When my Father in England died, the probate process for me to gain his part ownership took over 6 months.The drink driving laws in Scotland are stricter, about half the maximum breath alcohol limit as England & Wales - 18mg vs 35mg if I remember correctly. Half a pint or a wee dram could well put you over the limit. The cops generally have less to do, as crime rates are low, at least in the Highlands anyway, so there’s a good chance you’ll get pulled over by a bored cop. They use a lot of unmarked cars on the main trunk route, the A9, to catch speeders. In England, the cops were up in their helicopter almost every night, and sirens were a daily disruption. Here, I’ve yet to see a police helicopter, and the only sirens are the occasional ambulance or fire engine - maybe once a month.If you’re in Raigmore hospital in Inverness, you might hear or see, the air ambulance helicopter once a day or so.There’s more water in Loch Ness than in all of the lakes in the whole of England and Wales put together (Edit: not the whole of the UK, thank you for the correction Jordan Salkeld). If you do visit Loch Ness, drive up the east side from St. Augustus, there’s no tourists there or hardly even any traffic at all. And it’s just as beautiful, if not more so - including the abandoned boat that everyone takes a photo of. Don’t venture off into the side roads for the mountains to see the eagles unless you have a 4x4, as you can very quickly get stuck on a snowdrift and there’s no mobile signal there to call for help. Some mountains are snow-capped all year round. The weather can turn in an instant, getting stuck is not an option. I speak from experience. Luckily I was eventually able to extract the car from its compromise, I kept the engine running to melt the snow beneath it. If you do venture there, or even sticking to the main roads, you’ll be graced by golden eagles, possibly a white-tailed sea eagle (though they’re seen more on the roads towards Skye), red kites, and other very large raptors I forget the names of, maybe ospreys.Your windows in Scotland will likely be triple glazed, not just double. Just thought I’d throw a random fact in. Houses in the Highlands are often built using a very pleasant looking almost pinkish granite. Crofters’ houses are brilliant white.Conveyancing in Scotland is vastly faster than in England & Wales. You can buy a property in as little as two weeks and move in, unlike in England where it can take at least several months. Even with a deceased owner - see point 4 above.Despite having much cheaper property prices, things like council tax and factors (site management for blocks of flats) cost about the same as southern England. This makes it tough for those on low incomes, like me.Electricity prices are about the same as England, if not more expensive despite there being a lot of hydroelectric and wind farm plants in Scotland. In the Highlands, there might not be a gas supply to your property. Edit I spoke with an energy supplier today, and he told me we’re, the customers, paying for all those new wind farms, hydropower, and infrastructure additions. /edit.Water is unmetered (we have enough of it!) and included in your council tax. It’s very soft water, so we have our own special Scottish blend of teabags. Even Yorkshire Tea have a Scottish blend! There is a God!The Highlands are very remote in places, and amazingly beautiful. There is a very good train and bus service even in the most remote places. The train or bus might only be once an hour or less, but it will be there more or less on time. You’ll get a mobile signal in the cities, though it might be patchy. My town at least has free public service WiFi, but not in the more rural areas. Inverness has no free public WiFi that I’ve found, but some shops do - including Nero’s coffee.Mountain rescue is the 4th emergency service, alongside the coastguard and the RNLI - Royal national lifeboat institution charity, both free to use. If you’re mountaineering, it’s best to carry a satellite communication GPS device such as a Garmin Explorer Garmin 010-01735-11 in Reach Explorer+ Satellite Tracker (subscription required), for if you have no mobile service and get into trouble. But always carry a paper map (in a waterproof ziplock bag) and a compass and a torch with fresh batteries and spares, and know how to use it all and be able to read the map. If you’re out at sea, carry emergency flares. Wear or carry sufficient clothing to protect you even if it was warm and sunny when you set out. Bagging a Munro is a popular Scottish pastime. Finding and rescuing injured or lost or hypothermic climbers is another popular pastime. Addendum: Thank you Loz Squire: The mountains on Skye and Mull are magnetic. This can throw your compass out. If the mist comes down and visibility is bad. Then they are some [of the] worst places in the world to try to navigate. View topic - Cuillin magnetic deviation. There’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad choice of clothing, preparation, and/or equipment. /addendum.If you’re out at sea, or even just kayaking or sailing off-shore, carry flares and a PLB - personal locator beacon. Press it and the RNLI will know exactly where you are, and come and rescue you. For free. In any weather, day or night. If you see a donation box for the RNLI they’ll appreciate whatever you give, no matter how small or large. They’re a charity run by unpaid volunteers.Roads can be narrow single track, but with frequent passing places. And we drive on the left, a lot of foreign visitors need reminding of that! There are not enough public toilets, so be prepared to have to stop discretely at the side of the road or pull into a pub and politely ask to use their amenities. The councils are trying to change this, but it’s a slow process.Highland cattle are not Anguses. An Angus cow is a different breed. “Heeland coos” are sooo cute and furry and very photogenic.Minimum alcohol pricing means that you pay as much for a cheap drink as a premium quality brand of a similar ABV%. Someone didn’t think that law out very well. A 500ml bottle of 7.5% McEwans Champion (very nice) costs about the same as a 440ml can of Fosters. I know which I’d rather have!Licensing laws in shops are strictly 10am-10pm, except for in pubs which are often open later in Scotland, especially at weekends when they might be open until 3am. Even in large supermarkets. In England, you can buy drinks any time in a 24hr Tesco or elsewhere. Not in Scotland. We have 24hr Tescos here but the licensing laws are still limited to 10AM-10PM.Deep-fried Mars bars are delicious, not sickly sweet as you might imagine. Try them if you get the chance. Despite Scotland having a reputation for deep frying everything except salad, there are far fewer obese people in my area than in England.The further north you go in Scotland, the easier it is to understand the accent, unlike England. I had a client on the Shetland Isles and thought he was a Londoner. The Aberdeen accent can be almost impossible to understandFish and chips frequently comprise haddock in Scotland, in England, it’s usually cod with maybe an option to have haddock, cod is a bottom-feeding fish which is why the Scots prefer haddock. The best chippy in Scotland is on the Isle of Skye. The road bridge to Skye is no longer a toll bridge, it used to cost £10 to cross it but doesn’t now. They’ve recuperated their building costs from the previous tolls.Haggis is lovely, especially if it’s from Co’burns - who are a 15 minute walk from me.Black pudding is also really good, and the stuff from Stornoway or Speyside is the absolute best. I’d tried black pudding in England, and thought what the hell is this shit, what’s all the fuss about? So I tried it again when I moved here. Lightbulb moment! Many thanks to a Scottish friend who persuaded me to try it again.The post, especially in the Highlands, takes a lot longer even if it’s coming first class.Gaelic is spoken in some parts of the Highlands, particularly so on the western isles, not so generally in the Lowlands, but everyone speaks English. Even in Glasgow, but you might be pushed to believe that. Scots ‘Gaelic’ is pronounced ‘Gah-leeg’, and the Irish language is pronounced ‘Gay-lig-uh’. Welsh is completely different.Aberdeen is not the Highlands, you’ve got a wee way to go yet. Inverness marks the start of the Highlands, and is also the capital of the Highlands. Edit: it starts lower than Inverness, but the A9 when you hit Inverness has a sign “Welcome to the Highlands:”. They’re widening the A9 in places so expect some traffic delays and roadworks. It's a much-needed upgrade The A9 is the main trunk road from Perth to John O’Goats - ish. It’s single lane some of the way and used by a lot of lorries, so can be slow. Don't speed, the cops have a lot of unmarked cars.Whisky is not spelt with an E in it, it’s the law, and you need to know if you prefer it peaty or non-peaty. You DO NOT put a mixer with whisky, or ice. Take note Americans! Punishment of having to drink neat Bells, or even worse, Jonny Walker, for the rest of the night. Half a teaspoon of water is quite sufficient. You can thank me later. If you’re not sure about the difference between a peaty whisky or a non-peaty one, take advice or a taster from your bartender. Peaty IMHO tastes more like cleaning fluid, but that’s just my opinion. A lot of people like the peaty ones. Lagavulin is an example of a peaty one, Glenfiddich is not. Talisker has two types, one peaty, the other not. The Skye branded one (it’s all made in Skye) is peaty, and the regular one is not. They actually make about 6 different ones in Talisker, so this is just a generalisation. If you want a distillery tour, book it well in advance.The popular travel tour company Rabbies do several guided tours of the numerous castles, lochs, islands, distilleries, and more. They’re well priced, and reviews I’ve seen are good. They can help you book accommodation for their multi-day tours, though this is at your own risk and expense.Scotland is also home to 70% of all of the UK’s gin production. In fact, alongside small-batch craft gins, three of the world's best-selling gins: Hendrick's, Gordon's and Tanqueray, are all made here, though I haven’t tried any of it yet.The Scots generally like and welcome American tourists. But keep your volume down please, we’re not deaf but we might be soon from very loud people, and remember to say please and thank you. “I’ll take” or “gimme” is NOT an acceptable way to ask for something. Neither is using a two-finger insult (palms facing inwards) to say two of something. You ask for things properly, “can I have … please” and say thank you when you receive it. Glasgow is pronounced as it’s written, glars-go, NOT glass-cow. Edinburgh is pronounced edin-borough (burra), NOT berg.Shops are generally local and smaller than in England, but far more friendly, especially compared with the south of England. Please support rural economies by buying local instead of from supermarkets. Even the smallest shops will have most things you’ll ever need, including sandwiches, cakes, and other delicious snacks, and most supplies you’ll need if you’re camping. See point 2 above, respect the countryside.Petrol stations can be few and far between in the remote areas, and rarely open late (after 5pm). Always make sure you’ve got enough fuel for your journey and any delays or detours. If you have an LPG campervan, it can be hard to find a refuel outside of the main cities. Apparently, we have a reasonably good network of charging points if you have an EV. There’s an app you can get which will navigate you to the nearest one. Some EV cars even have it built into their satnags (sic). But as with petrol or diesel, or LPG, never assume. Always make sure you’ve got enough and lots left over. It could be miles until you get a chance to top up.Americans, please call it PETROL not gas. If you say you need gas you’ll be directed to camping gas canisters or LPG.People smile at you in the street in Scotland, and it’s not weird. If you know someone you nod upwards in recognition, if you don’t know them, you nod downwards. With a smile.How you doing, is a question to briefly answer, among shop keepers or friends, not just a vague greeting. If you don’t know the person, just repeat it back, how ye doin.It actually rains less in most parts of Scotland than it does in England, and much much less than it does in Wales. Where I live, Ben Nevis shields us from the worst of the weather - especially the beast from the east. So, don’t expect snow, or at least don’t come here looking for it. You’ll get it on the mountain tops, but you might not see any on the lower lands.It can be sunnier and warmer in Scotland than it can be in England at the same time of year. Hey, it happened once! Lol.If you want to see whales, dolphins, and seals, the best place is Cromarty point - which you might know from the BBC shipping forecasts. Or, the Whale and Dolphin Centre just over the Kessock Bridge from Inverness. The seals are found along the coast from Dingwall towards the A9 for John O’Groats.Midges are a total nuisance. You can buy a spray called Smidge as a deterrent. Avoid dusk and wooded areas near water if you want to avoid the worst of the flying teeth, and cover up as much skin as you can. Only female midges bite, but I challenge you to be able to tell the difference in a swarm of thousands of the wee blighters.Scotland has a wide range of locally produced quality food, it’s not just all about haggis. We have some of the best seafood in the world, especially our salmon, scallops, and lobsters. And don’t forget the venison, when it’s in season!It can be almost as cheap to stay in a haunted castle as a Travelodge, and the castle will include breakfast in the price. You might even get a four-poster bed as well, especially if you ask nicely.Ghosts and spirits are described as green, not grey. I have no idea why. Edit: answer in the comments, thank you. Generally speaking, they can’t harm you, so don’t worry if you get things going bump in the night, it’s just their idea of fun. Trust me, I’m a seasoned senior paranormal investigator.A full Scottish breakfast is a thing to behold, and you won’t need to eat for the rest of the day, except perhaps dinner. Porridge, toast, cereal, juice, coffee/tea, and then into the full Monty - flat (Lorne) sausage, regular sausage(s), bacon, mushrooms, fried or grilled tomato, egg, beans, more toast, black pudding, haggis, tatie scone (flat potato cake), and more tea/coffee. If (like me) you have a smaller appetite your host will give you the option to choose which bits you want, though beware some hotels if you pay for breakfast will charge you as if you chose everything, even if you only had a couple of bits of bacon and some mushrooms - you’re deemed as having had the full breakfast of everything. A business hotel in Aberdeen did this to me, and my employer was not very happy at having to foot my expenses!Scotland has been voted one of the most beautiful places in the world by Lonely Planet, and for good reason. One day I will get to experience the NC500 - North Coast 500 mile driving route, which is a circular route from Inverness right up to John O’Groats. There’s a new one now, the midcoast 200 I think it’s called, starting in Glasgow. Check the guidelines as some roads are not suitable for caravans or campervans - RVs as the Americans call them. If you are towing a caravan, for God's sake use your mirrors and let people pass by pulling into the frequent passing places.Glasgow (see pronunciation above, NOT Glass Cow) is not the crime-ridden city it used to have a reputation for. In fact, it has a world-class leading hospital, as does Aberdeen and a lot of other cities including Edinburgh which has a class-leading cancer centre, in fact, if my memory serves me Glasgow was European city of culture fairly recently. Raigmore hospital in Inverness is the leading centre of Lyme disease detection, research, and excellence.No, we’re not going to tell you what we do or don’t wear under our kilts. Men, and women - yes you read that right. That’s for you to find out if you get lucky. ;)The mountain variety of haggis are easier to catch because their legs are shorter on one side and they can’t run as fast on the flat.My photos, from the oldest pub in Inverness. Which sadly isn’t haunted.I’ve added a few extra bits if you’ve read this before.Fàilte gu Alba

So, this last weekend, I was up visiting my in-laws, and we got nailed with something they call a “bomb cyclone.”[1] It was a big two-day snowstorm that dropped about two feet of snow where I was and blew it all over hell. We’re talking 6–8 foot drifts.I have a Subaru Outback, which I was able to buy with a Good Son Discount from my parents and I’m very appreciative of that. It’s a very nice car, and it can go through just about anything with the excellent ground clearance and all-wheel drive. It’s very safe, and since I now have a kid, that’s why my folks were willing to sell it to me.My in-laws live well off the beaten path, off of a minimum maintenance road that doesn’t get plowed by the county. They hire a guy, but he often doesn’t come for days or sometimes even weeks. So, my father-in-law has a plow on his truck and has to plow out the road himself much of the time.We waited until Duluth was downgraded from “ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE” to at least “snow covered roads; travel not advised,” and my father-in-law had plowed out the road to at least the main county road (about 8 miles away,) which had been plowed by the county, before we left.And we made it home. It was a little hairy at times, but we made it home, and because of that, I didn’t have to take an extra vacation day from work over it.My Subaru can and did make it through some pretty nasty stuff, but really, we made it home because of the snowplows clearing away enough that we could do the rest on our own.Without those plows, we would have gotten stuck. I have the utmost faith in the Subie (and my wife will tell you that I have probably too much faith in the Subie), but I wouldn’t have even attempted it without the plows.At least in the United States, yes, life is much easier if you’re a white person, because essentially, white people are driving behind a large social snowplow that non-white people often do not get to drive behind.I’m sure I’m about to get a giant pile of US white people who will comment about handouts and affirmative action and “well, I’m poor and I know a lot of white people who are and it sure as hell doesn’t feel easier to me!”And that’s true. All of that is true. That road might still be pretty shitty, and you might have done a lot of work to get where you are.Listen. I probably look like the model of the self-made man. I worked hard, got an education, and now I’m doing my best to make something of myself. I’ve worked plenty of hard, manual, “dirty” jobs, and I’ve worked my way up to where the health problems I have mostly stem from a profoundly flattened ass.I’m also a lily-white heterosexual Christian Midwestern dude from a moderately middle-class family who came over on the boat when land was ultra-cheap.My success in life is partly due to hard work, and partly due to the fact that I won the birthright jackpot.There are at least two things that are solely due to the melanin content of my skin and family history that have massively greased the skids for me compared to similarly situated people who are not white: generational accumulated opportunity, and structural privilege.These two things are like a snowplow. They cleared a path for me, and people like me, particularly people who look like me, to more easily succeed.Generational Accumulated OpportunityBuy land. They ain’t makin’ any more of the stuff. - Will RogersOver Thanksgiving, I got in a stupid political argument with a family member, as you do when you live where the air hurts your face and you’re sitting in a blizzard warning watching multiple feet of snow whipping around outside.While we were arguing about deregulation and unrestrained, unbridled capitalism, I pointed out that we had that at one point, and conditions were bad enough that it led to a number of constitutional amendments and the Progressive Era to correct for the Gilded Age and the robber barons. There were a lot of people who didn’t think it was as great a time to be alive as John D. Rockefeller did.He brought up something that I’m guessing Ben Shapiro must be saying lately because I’ve been seeing it pop up a lot in recent weeks: “Well, if the Gilded Age was so bad, why did so many people immigrate here at that point in history?”That answer is, in good part, cheap or even free land.When my folks came over from Germany during the Gilded Age, they got land in Wisconsin for less than a dollar an acre. Even adjusted for inflation, my family was able to buy upwards of a half a square mile of land for less than $5,000 in today’s money. (That same land is well over $5,000 an acre today.) At other points in history, you could get 40, 80, even 160 acres of land from the Federal government for the price of “pack a wagon, go there, and work it up.”[2] A lot of land was granted to timber companies and railroads, who in turn sold it cheaply to new immigrants for a profit to them.[3]Understand that land in Europe was virtually impossible to get your hands on. People didn’t own real property, for the most part. To own 40, 80, 160 acres would have been wealth beyond the dreams of most people.Understand the history of just English property law.[4] Basically, the king owned everything, and doled out tracts of that to the aristocracy, who in turn might dole out some of that to other aristocracy or gentry. Most people lived on someone else’s land and either paid rent or worked for the aristocracy or gentry. Other European nation-states were similar.Whatever the local law was, one thing was certain: Owning land meant income.Let me repeat that: owning land meant income.When you read those old English novels by Austen and Bronte, and it seems like nobody really had a job, that’s why: they were living on the income generated by the land they owned and the people living on it.Even when real property law in European/Western nation-states evolved and individuals really owned the land more than just the local monarch, there was the problem of a lack of frontier. There was a limited supply, and it was already owned by people. Nobody was making more of the stuff.Until some people trying to go find a better trade route bumped into a whole new chunk of it that they’d previously been unaware of.And since the folks who already owned and occupied that land weren’t white or European or Christian, the people who were white and European and Christian kind of looked the other way whilst other white, European Christians cleared the folks from that land and then those other white, European Christians all looked at each other and went, “Whaaaaaaat?! A whole continent that doesn’t have anyone on it?! SWEET!”It’s ours, boys! Ours for the taking! Manifest destiny! WOOOOO!Jon Stewart pointed this out very well, this problem that the United States has always had an entitlement mentality, in The Rumble in the Air Conditioned Auditorium back in 2012, a debate with Bill O’Reilly:We are an entitlement nation. We were born that way. We’re a country [of people] who came to another country with people already on it and went, “Yeah, I think we’ll have that. That’ll be nice.”But it wasn’t just that we wanted to come here, take resources, and leave. People wanted the land.It was well worth it to sell everything you owned, hop on a boat, and come here for that. The entry cost was essentially nothing. The requirements were (a) be alive when you get here, (b) don’t have any readily apparent communicable diseases, and at various times (c) don’t be Chinese or Asian-enough to be thought of as Chinese, a Japanese businessman or professional, black (whether free or slave - didn’t matter, you couldn’t vote, own property, etc.), Hispanic or Hispanic looking when we were at war with Spain or various Spanish-descended colonies or nations, or over the quotas for nations established in the 1920’s. This didn’t really change much until the 1950’s. For a solid 150 years of the nation’s history, this was pretty much how it was.The restrictions that did exist around immigration very much favored white people. And once you got here and got in, even if you weren’t white, it was easier for you to get that land if you were white. (I’ll get to that in a bit).What’s that? You there? What does that have to do with why it’s easier to be a white person today, you ask? Be patient. I’m getting there.Here’s the thing about land. Once you’ve got land, you’ve also got a lot of things that go with land.In the law, we talk about owning real property as having a “bundle of sticks.” [5] Those sticks are various rights associated with land ownership. There’s rights to alienate (sell), exploit (mineral rights, water rights, timber rights, crop rights, etc.), to improve, to occupy, and more. You can transfer those rights, in whole or in part, for a set length of time or forever.That makes it a huge asset to leverage. Land is great collateral. It’s (generally) never going down in price, it’s usually stable and not likely to go anywhere like personal property, and the chain of custody and title is usually pretty easily traceable. Who has what rights in real property is usually a matter of public record or well-recorded.It used to be that land was also essential for voting rights. If you didn’t own land, you didn’t have the right to vote. Even after that changed, land ownership still had a significant amount of voting power to it, and still does today. I laugh a little when I hear folks say that land doesn’t vote, people do, because that’s about half true. Because we have geographical representation, folks who own a lot of land also have a lot of influence in local politics, and as any congressional veteran will tell you: all politics are local.On top of that, land can be inherited. It can be passed down generationally. Even if it’s not income-generating land, it’s a huge expenditure that’s saved from occupying someone else’s land as a tenant. That means that income and wealth could be used to leverage other opportunities: education, the purchase of more land, and so forth.If your parents are more highly educated and wealthy, that vastly increases the chances that you will be highly educated and wealthy, because that status provides more networking with other people who can provide opportunity.Think about Sam Walton’s children, for example. Walton paved the way for them, not just with direct wealth transfer to them, but because they grew up knowing a lot of the right people. They could go to private schools, with the kids of other connected people. They made friendships. Later in life, they could leverage those friendships and connections for things like getting on the boards of profitable companies, which pay them a lot of money.Even if Walton put every penny he ever got from Wal-Mart into a charitable trust and his kids never saw a dime directly, it was the opportunities generated simply because that wealth existed that gave them their wealth.So, even if your parents were rich and never passed that wealth directly to you, there’s still a substantial amount of indirect benefit of just being associated with that wealth. A name might open doors that would otherwise be closed.You got a lot of opportunity.All of that snowballs through generations. And a lack of that opportunity also snowballs through generations.[6] (Credit to Feifei Wang for sharing this awesome explanation of privilege and how small differences in opportunity over time really stack up, and can then lead to thinking you never had or needed the snowplow in the first place.)So, if 150–250 years ago, your ancestors had land, it’s very likely that you are still indirectly benefiting from that today, even if there’s not a dollar in your bank account that can be directly traced to that land. You benefit in networking, opportunity, and the absence of sunk costs.So, if we back that all up to the original distribution of real property, policies that made it harder for non-whites to own land, or businesses, or have opportunities, or that actively dispossessed some non-whites of land, businesses, and opportunities that they already had, together massively disadvantaged non-whites.You were very much more likely to have ancestors that had that land, and the opportunities that came from the generational accumulation of opportunity, if you were white.You got to drive behind the snowplow.Fine, you say. What does that have to do with, say, a white person who immigrates today? We’ve ended most of those polices - there aren’t federal land grants, etc. anymore, right?And there’s some truth to that. If you’re a relatively recent newcomer to the U.S., this is probably less of a factor for you.But here’s the thing: you look like the people for whom that was a factor. You might have a name similar to theirs. You might speak English in a dialect that more closely matches theirs.All of that accumulated generational opportunity created something else, a snowplow of a different sort:Structural privilege“If I’d accidentally jostled the Baronet Pettur in the street while I was still barefoot and muddy, he could have horsewhipped me bloody, then called the constable to arrest me for being a public nuisance. The constable would have done it, too, with a smile and a nod.Let me try to say this more succinctly. In the Commonwealth, the gentry are people with power and money. In Vintas, the gentry have power and money and privilege. Many rules simply do not apply to them.” – Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man’s FearUnderstand first what privilege is. It’s not merely advantage. Privilege is the extent to which you are exempted from certain social rules.In the earlier days of the nation, there was a very overt structural privilege built on race. Literally. Under the Naturalization Act of 1790, non-whites were legally not allowed to own property, vote, or testify in court.[7] The notorious Dred Scott Supreme Court decision held that those of African descent could never become citizens, no matter what.[8]Those who argue against white privilege sometimes point to the fact that slavery was not a new institution. However, this generally fails to acknowledge that American slavery was particularly unique, and unique in its cruelty, in that it was built specifically on race and white supremacy.[9] Even the lowliest piece of white trash would always be systemically superior to blacks in this system.This was done purposefully because the people running that power structure were vastly outnumbered by the people they controlled. By creating a system where the people at the bottom of that power structure essentially policed themselves, the people at the top could avoid any unification and uprising against them. Whole fields of pseudo-science were created to try to prove the basis for this. Religion was corrupted to justify it.Even after the Civil War, institutional momentum tried to preserve this status quo, through black codes and Jim Crow,[10] through criminalization targeted at racial minorities,[11] and even through simple class warfare that disproportionately (and intentionally) impacted blacks more than whites.[12]All of this was designed for one simple purpose: to create a hidden system of social rules for non-whites that did not apply to whites, which preserved a social order of white supremacy.Today, we’ve made some strides in trying to at least legally abolish the overt structural racism. There’s various Civil Rights Acts, the Fair Housing Act, anti-poverty and affirmative action programs that are meant to balance out that generational accumulation of opportunity.Now, I didn’t actively participate in any of the creation and perpetuation of the systemic problems, for the most part. The vast majority of all this machinery was put into place long before I was ever born, and even the attempts to correct for it were started considerably before I came about.But it still exists. And I benefit from it.My life is easier because of both that generational accumulated opportunity and the systemic privilege.In terms of generational accumulated opportunity, I got to go to college. And law school. And I had a place to stay if needed, and parents who could backstop me if I had a sudden massive expense. I got a lot of these opportunities because I had parents who could afford to spend time with me as a kid, make sure that I did well in school, provided external opportunities to learn and grow, had a hobby farm where I could learn skills such as home construction, mechanical repair, woodworking, and much more.They got a lot of that opportunity to provide those opportunities for me because of the work of previous generations snowplowing the way for them.My family mostly covered my wedding, and we had numerous baby showers when my son was on his way. Just these two alone probably freed up nearly $20,000 for me. That all came from a bunch of people who all got to follow a snowplow of their own, and who could afford to put it together for us.Because of who my grandfathers and grandmothers and parents were, my name carries with it a certain reputation that opened doors. In my lifetime, there are over half a dozen employment opportunities that I got that I can directly trace to people who gave me a chance because of my family.Go back to the point where my family really started generationally accumulating that opportunity, just in the United States, and at least some of it is due to policies that advantaged them for being white.In terms of structural privilege, there are a whole host of social rules that do not apply to me because I am white.[13]I am far less likely to be stopped by the police.[14]I am far less likely for those rare, but routine police encounters to turn violent.[15]I am far less likely to face incarceration.[16]I am far less likely to be suspected of petty crimes such as shoplifting or drugs.[17]Nobody ever asks me where I am really from. Nobody ever suggests to me that I should head back to Germany. Nobody ever looks at me and wonders if I’m a citizen or illegal immigrant purely based on the color of my skin.If I, a lily-white Midwesterner said, “It all goes down tonight. It’s going to be a huge blast. People will be talking about this for years,” what do you picture? Could be a party, right?Go back and say it with a Middle-Eastern accent.[18]I’m more likely to be rented an apartment, and pay less in rent when I do.[19] I’m more likely to achieve upper management positions in corporations.[20] I’m more likely to be paid higher than equally qualified candidates of non-white ethnicities.[21] I’m more likely to get called back for a second interview. I’m more likely to get an interview.[22]Nobody asks me to buy something or leave at Starbucks, and nobody would ever call the cops on me if I didn’t.[23]Nobody would call the police because I was sleeping in the student lounge of the dorm I lived in.[24]These rules exist for people who are not white, and the application of these rules and my exemptions from them are predicated on my race. The rules my life operates on are fundamentally different than if I were not white.Now, does this mean I haven’t earned a damned thing in my life? No.Does it mean I should feel guilty over my life having been easier? Absolutely not.It just means I should recognize the ways I am following the snowplow.I didn’t make the snowplow. I didn’t hire the snowplow driver. I didn’t send the snowplow out to clear that road for me. That snowplow didn’t clear that path with me in mind in particular and would have cleared that path whether I existed or not.But now I drive on that road.It would be wrong of me to think that I earned that plowed road, or that I deserve that plowed road, or that I would have totally gotten everything I have now without that snowplow clearing the way for me, or that the snowplow never existed.It doesn’t negate what I have done, what I have earned, or the validity of the road I have traveled to acknowledge that it was a hell of a lot easier than it is for others driving down a road that hasn’t been snowplowed, or worse, plowed in.So, what does it mean?In more civilized times, we called it noblesse oblige.[25]I was also lucky over this weekend, because one of my family members had a snowblower that hadn’t been used in years. He was going to throw it out. He’d barely ever used it because his neighbor has an ATV with a plow on it and just does his driveway for him. I asked if I could buy it from him, and he told me to just take it. If I could get it running, it was mine.I’ve been shoveling this whole time, and it’s wearing on me. I busted up my shoulder and my back playing rugby in college, and I’m getting old and fat and out of shape. And me being outside shoveling means my wife is in the house taking care of our kid, and she’s so exhausted, I try to take whatever shifts I can.I don’t have much spare income for a snowblower right now. I’d been dreaming about one, but it just wasn’t really in the cards at the moment. And our driveway is small enough that I couldn’t justify the hundreds of dollars, even for a used one.So, this was a godsend if it worked.All I ended up having to do was clean some leaves out of the tank and put some fresh gas in, which my father in law did for me while we were visiting. It started right up and runs perfectly.When I got home from that long trip, I still had to plow out our driveway. We didn’t get nearly as much as my in-laws, but still got about 5–6 inches. And, the town had gone through with the plow and dumped a big ridge in my driveway, enough that I didn’t want to pack it down before getting my wife and son in the house. I shoveled a quick path for them, and then set to work snowblowing the driveway with my new snowblower. It took me probably a third of the time it took to shovel and was so much easier. May God smile upon the inventor of the snowblower, for he is an unsung hero of the world.Now, I could have just stopped when I done with our driveway and put it away until the next time it snows.But our neighbor is going through a divorce, and she is essentially a single mom with four kids, one of whom has some serious health issues. She’s doing everything she can to stay afloat. She doesn’t have a garage with her house, so I let her have access to our garage to use our tools like the mower and shovel.She just needs a little landing pad for her minivan and a path to her door. She’d already borrowed our shovel and cleared some of it out, but she wasn’t able to do a lot. Not a knock against her; it was that wet, heavy heart-attack snow and she doesn’t have that much time for these things.I took the snowblower over and cleared that out some more for her. I cleaned up the piles next to the end of the driveway that she might have backed into on her way out. I dug it down to the concrete pathway so it wasn’t so slick. I ground down the packed ridge from the town plow. I widened out the spot where she was parked so her kids could get in and out a little easier without having to step through the snow to get in the car.Really, it took me maybe ten minutes and twenty cents’ worth of mixed gas.For her, it would have been another half-hour of labor, or hundreds of dollars for a snowblower of her own, which she would have had no place to store.It cost me virtually nothing, because of a snowplow that I got to drive behind. It would have cost her a lot more, because she doesn’t have that particular snowplow.That’s what acknowledging that life is easier is. Nothing more, nothing less.It’s realizing that not everyone got to drive behind the snowplow.It’s advocating for others who don’t get to drive behind the snowplow to have it at least a little easier.It’s not just trying to be nice to everyone, but being good to them.It’s actively working to grant others the same kind of life you enjoy for free.It’s using your place of privilege to make the world a little better.It’s being aware that you can make the world a little better.It’s using that privilege responsibly to help pay it forward. To help plow someone else out who needs it. To make their life at least a little bit closer to as easy as you’ve got it.To make the world just a little bit more fair.I didn’t deserve that snowblower.But I have it.I might as well do some good with it.I have other pictures here, but someone will comment that it was long and there wasn’t an animal at the end. Fine. Here. Enjoy this dog who apparently snowblows the driveway.Mostly Standard Addendum and Disclaimer: read this before you comment.Every time I write about this kind of stuff, it brings out a certain segment of the population.I welcome rational, reasoned debate on the merits with reliable, credible sources.But coming on here and calling me names, pissing and moaning about how biased I am, etcetera and so forth, will result in a swift one-way frogmarch out the airlock. Doing the same to others will result in the same treatment.Essentially, act like an adult and don’t be a dick about it.This kind of nonsense:will earn a special place in the annals of mockery while they howl at the void.I’m done with warnings. If you have to consider whether or not you’re over the line, the answer is most likely yes. I’ll just delete your comment and probably block you, and frankly, I won’t lose an ounce of sleep over it.Being a special kind of dick like the one above might earn you a place in the Hall of Shame, so I suppose if you plan to be a dick, you might as well go full out and make it worthwhile.Debate responsibly.Footnotes[1] Bomb cyclone: Even bigger storm slams Minnesota this weekend[2] History and Overview of the Land Grant College System[3] US Government Land Grants[4] The Social Distribution of Landed Property in England Since the Sixteenth Century[5] https://lawreview.vermontlaw.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/johnson2.pdf[6] The Pencilsword: On a plate[7] The Volatile History of U.S. Immigration[8] {{meta.pageTitle}}[9] The Invention of Race | Specials | WNYC[10] Black Codes and Pig Laws | Slavery By Another Name Bento | PBS[11] The New Jim Crow[12] Exclusive: Lee Atwater’s Infamous 1981 Interview on the Southern Strategy[13] Peter Kruger's answer to Do you believe in "white privilege"? Have you ever witnessed/experienced it?[14] The Stanford Open Policing Project[15] After Ferguson, black men still face the highest risk of being killed by police[16] A Mass Incarceration Mystery[17] https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6419&context=jclc[18] The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour (Video 2008) - IMDb[19] Analysis: African-Americans pay more for rent, especially in white neighborhoods[20] The Relationship of Race and Gender to Managers' Ratings of Promotion Potential[21] African Americans are paid less than whites at every education level[22] Employers' Replies to Racial Names[23] Wrongfully arrested at Philadelphia Starbucks, two black men seek to turn an injustice into good[24] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2018/05/10/a-black-yale-student-fell-asleep-in-her-dorms-common-room-a-white-student-called-police/[25] Definition of NOBLESSE OBLIGE