July 25

325 - The Council of Nicaea ended. Its 300 attending bishops drafted the 'Nicene Creed' and fixed the formula for Easter Sunday.

**This was the first 'ecumenical council’ (universal)...The council was also a strong denunciation of the Arians, and helped pull the various churches together.**
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326 - Roman Emperor Constantine refused to carry out the traditional pagan sacrifices.

**This was a truly revolutionary event, and one which could have only been gotten away with by an emperor of such strength and standing.**
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1394 - Charles VI of France issued a decree for the general expulsion of Jews from France.

**Just another country which threw the Jews out. It’s been happening since the days of the Babylonians, and continues to this day...Which is why the Israelis must be willing to go nukes if need be to keep Israel.**
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1554 - Mary Tudor, Queen of England, married King Philip of Spain.

**It was bad enough for the queen to be a Catholic, but marrying the Spanish monarch was too much...This was a choice she felt she had to make to protect herself from the Protestant lords, but ended up being the beginning of the end of her 3+ year reign.**
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1570 - Ivan 'the Terrible,' Czar of Russia, attended the public execution of almost all his advisers and ministers.

**Imagine how he treated his enemies...I guess Ivan earned his nickname.

It's amazing two of the most revered Russian leaders are also two of it's most brutal: Ivan the Terrible and Joseph Stalin.**
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1805 - Aaron Burr visited New Orleans with plans to establish a new country, with New Orleans as the capital city.

**One year earlier Burr was Vice President of the U.S, and also the man who killed U.S. Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton in a duel...A truly bizarre character and one I recommend you read about: Aaron Burr.**
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1866 - David Faragut became the first admiral in the U.S. Navy; Ulysses S. Grant became the first General of the Army.

**There would be other admirals, but only John Pershing (Army) attained such a lofty rank as Grant until WWII.**
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1943 - Benito Mussolini was dismissed as Premier of Italy by King Victor Emmanuel III, and placed under arrest.

**Amazingly, the useless Italians allowed Mussolini to be ‘rescued’ by the Nazi’s, but his day was coming...Within two years Il Duce's bald ass was swinging from a lamp-post.**
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1947 - The National Security Act: Established a linkage between the military and national security, establishing the National Security Council, the CIA, Department of Defense, and several other new agencies, including the National Military Establishment with three separate departments (Army, Navy and the new U.S. Air Force), and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

**You’d think there would have already been such a 'linkage.'**
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1968 - Pope Paul VI published the encyclical 'Humanae Vitae,' restating the Catholic position on the family, and condemning all artificial methods of birth control.

**I’m not Catholic, but I respect many of the positions and views of the Church...This is one I wish they’d revisit.**
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1969 - Senator Ted Kennedy plead guilty to leaving the scene of an accident a week after the Chappaquiddick car accident which killed Mary Jo Kopechne.

**How can driving drunk, then driving into a lake, then leaving the passenger to die and not reporting the crash for hours after the fact be anything less than manslaughter?

Only in Kennedyville could this fat POS get away on a charge of 'leaving the scene.'**
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1978 - The world's first test-tube baby, Louise Joy Brown, was born in Lancashire, England.

**This is an awesome display of the power of science...And a worrisome one.

In an age of uncountable abortions and fears of overpopulation you would think there’d be no need for such creations...But there are few restrictions on modern-day Mengelians, who care only about playing God in their attempt to disprove Him.**
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1986 - Former Navy radioman Jerry Whitworth was convicted of selling U.S. military secrets to the Soviets through the John Walker spy ring.

**Sounds like treason to me, and treason should always be met with death...But this POS received a 365-year sentence, and we’ll all be paying for him to live out the rest of his life.**
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1990 - Roseanne Barr sparked controversy with an off-key rendition of the 'Star-Spangled Banner' during a double-header at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego.

**'Off-key' is selling this fat pig’s effort short...Rosie was completely out of line, and if the Color Guard had loaded a couple rounds in the chamber and shot her dumb ass the world would have been much better off.**
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1990 - U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie, met with Saddam Hussein, assuring him, "...we have no opinion on Arab-Arab conflicts like your border disagreement with Kuwait."

**No wonder he felt free to invade Kuwait...The logic of this meeting escapes me.**
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1991 - Mikhail S. Gorbachev told Communist Party leaders it is was no longer a realistic goal of building Communism, and the party must reject "outdated ideological dogmas."

**Unfortunately the Chinese, Koreans, Cubans, American Democrats, etc., didn’t get the memo...Or simply rejected Gorbi’s rejection of the failure known as Communism.**