T: Thoughts through out time.

I was telling Tom tonight I didn't know what I was writing about, then I went to a site. I read the comments that someone wrote about something I wrote to explain something. Viola! My subject came to me. It is amazing that when people are cornered or have to explain their actions they always put the blame on somebody else. They never take the responsibility of their own actions. Better to misplace the blame. The most tragic example of this is the Salem Witch trials. Several young girls playing with witchcraft got caught instead of facing their crimes under pressure they falsely accused over hundred and fifty people of witchcraft. Nineteen were hung, one pressed to death for holding strong to who he was and five died in prison. Slander and what is also known as libel is what caused this damage. It continued out of greed. Several of the girls had fathers who wanted and coveted their neighbors properties and funds so they allowed this debauchery without a thought to others lives or their good names. It even continued afterwards when others tried to defend them. Rev. William Milbourne, a Baptist minister in Boston, publicly petitioned the General Assembly in early June, 1692, challenging the use of spectral evidence by the Court. Milbourne had to post 200£ bond or be arrested for "contriving, writing and publishing the said scandalous Papers." In 1695, Thomas Maule, a noted Quaker, publicly criticized the handling of the trials by the Puritan leaders in Chapter 29 of his book "Truth Held Forth and Maintained." For publishing this book, Maule was imprisoned twelve months before he was tried and found not guilty. Various petitions were filed between 1700 and 1703, demanding that the convictions be formally reversed. Those tried and found guilty were considered dead in the eyes of the law, and with convictions still on the books, those not executed were vulnerable to further accusations. In 1704, another petition was filed, requesting an equitable settlement for those wrongly accused, but it wasn't until May 1709 a reversal of attainder and compensation for financial losses was won.

We haven't learned from the examples that have come before us. McCarthyism followed. Bush is radically headed in that direction with his newest laws. Defamatory remarks are carelessly strewn over the net without the proof to back it up. When one does have proof those in denial attack hoping to keep the heat away. I have stated several times in this column, I am not afraid to speak my mind and stand up for myself and the rights of others. In this day and age it is a F.A.C.T that you need the F.A.C.T.S.