As I mentioned a few days ago, I’ve spent a right smart chunk of time the last few nights doing a little sprucing-up around this dump, most notably some pretty extensive jiggery-pokey in Ye Olde Blogrolle section. As a result there’s a whole slew of new links therein, to some excellent sites, in pretty much every Blogrolle category. I hope y’all will check these folks out as and when, and that you enjoy ’em. What with the disappointingly flaccid quiescence—in the face of truly monumental developments and escalations—on the part of more than a few of my Old Reliables, I’ve been on something of a quest to find some fresh blood to inject into my personal daily-checks list, so the New Breed types I didn’t have in my Brave bookmarks already have been added there too.

It’s remarkable how very far some of us longtime bloggers out there have shown themselves willing to bend so as to avoid serious analysis, even any mention in some cases, of certain pressing issues. As I said, that’s disappointing. I’ll neither name names nor speculate on motives now, but everyone here will no doubt have their own suspicions regarding that. As times continue to become ever more difficult and dangerous, what we might call the Crucible Effect—the separation of sheep from goats, wheat from chaff, friend from foe, as it were—will no doubt intensify. As we continue this forced-march through the Valley of the Shadow, we’re all going to be learning a lot, I think. And not just about our enemies, either.