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This is the perfume of March: rain, loam, feathers, mint. Lisa Kleypas.

You can cut all the flowers but you cannot keep Spring from coming. Pablo Neruda.

The first blooms of spring always make my heart sing. S. Brown.

Spring work is going on with joyful enthusiasm. John Muir.

A perfect spring day! Enjoy it while it lasts because you dont know whats coming. Marty Rubin.

Spring shows what God can do with a drab and dirty world." Virgil A. Kraft.

Monarda is a genus of flowering plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae. Common names include bergamot, bee balm, horsemint and oswego tea. It has a long history of being used as a medicinal herb, and as the common name bee balm implies, it has also been used to soothe bee stings.

Monardo consists of multiple species, most of which are hardy perennials and all of which are native to certain regions of North America. Summertime flowering on all these species is quite attractive to humans and pollinators.

The Oswego Indian tribe used this plant to make an herbal tea and they taught the early American settlers how to do so as well.

This just happened to come in very handy following the Boston Tea Party. As the settlers revolted against the British tax on tea, they drank tea made from Monarda instead, thus thumbing their noses at the British and their taxes.

Monarda punctata (horsemint or dotted mint) is somewhat of an unruly native prairie plant characterized by tall unbranched stems topped with rounded clusters of pink or lavender tubular flowers. The stacked combination of speckled flowers and colorful bracts make this distinctive and unusual.

Monarda fistulosa (wild bergamot) is one of the species commonly used for medicinal purposes. Being highly aromatic with showy lavender-pink flowers, it is also used as a honey plant.

Monarda didyma (scarlet bee balm) has long been cherished for not only its use for tea but also its ornamental value. Its bright scarlet/red flowers are still a part of many ongoing breeding programs with Monarda.

It has been a long road from these native species of Monarda to the prized ornamental cultivars available today. Some of the first hybrids of M. didyma x M. fistulosa produced vibrant flower colors with a more well-behaved plant, but they continued to be plagued by their native attributes of being highly susceptible to mildew, somewhat tall and leggy and had a tendency to spread by rhizomes.

Modern breeding has introduced many new cultivars that are much more suitable in the ornamental landscape. Along with many stand-alone varieties with notable attributes of their own, "Marshalls Delight" received Award of Merit from Royal Horticultural Society, "Gardenview Scarlet" was selected by the Chicago Botanic Garden as an outstanding perennial for the Midwest, and Petite Delight was the first of its kind dwarf introduction of monarda at just 12-15 inches tall.

There are several newer Monarda with formidable attributes including Monarda didyma Grand is from the Morden Breeding Program in Manitoba and an exceptionally hardy Monarda. Characterized by a profusion of bright flowers atop mid-sized plants, these also offer very good mildew resistance.

The Sugar Buzz Monardas form a solid dome of color. The 2- to 2 1/2-inches flowers top off the strong stems and deep green foliage of this series. Medium in height at around 20 inches, the eight colors in this series display above-average mildew resistance and stay well contained in the garden.

Balmy Monardas have relatively large flowers on a fully compact plant. Balmy comes in at just 10-12 inches with exceptional mildew resistance and deep green foliage. They are dwarf and mounded, so bring new uses to the landscape.

While some Monarda species come from seed, most newer selections are vegetatively propagated and are quite easy to care for in rich and organic, or just average soils. Monarda will die back to the ground in colder climates. They can then be cut back to one- to two-inch stems. Its also a good idea to remove dead leaves and stems from the area, especially if mildew has been observed on the foliage. As Monarda emerges from the roots/rhizomes in the spring, they may be pinched to create a bushier habit if desired.

In the full sun, they will produce a plethora of brilliant flowers beginning in mid-summer. Pair these with Achillea, Agastache or Phlox for a smooth transition of garden color into fall. As flowers fade, deadheading is beneficial to encourage additional flowering.The plant is deer and rabbit resistant.

Monarda brings a lot of charm and interest to the garden. Mass plantings in naturalized areas are a showstopper and create a high-traffic area for butterflies, hummingbirds and bees. Enjoy these as specimen plants paired with your favorite summer-into-fall bloomers in the middle of the garden.

When they are in full flower (with a few to spare), you can pick a few flowers and leaves to make a batch of iced bee balm tea and watch the garden grow. Or dry some and save it for hot Oswego tea on a cold winters night! This fact sheet is provided as an educational service of the National Garden Bureau and their link is https://ngb.org/year-of-the-monarda.

And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, Who lives in you. Romans 8:11.

Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe. Proverbs 29:25.

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Isaiah 41:10.

Seagle is a Sustainability Verifier, Golf Environment Organization (Scotland), Agronomist and Horticulturalist, CSI: Seagle (Consulting Services International) LLC, Professor Emeritus and Honorary Alumnus (Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College), Distinguished Professor for Teaching and Learning (University System of Georgia) and Short Term Missionary (Heritage Church, Moultrie). Direct inquiries to csi_seagle @yahoo.com.

Excerpt from:
SEAGLE: In the Year of the Monarda | Opinion | tiftongazette.com - Tifton Gazette

Police Deliver Stern Warning to 82-Year-Old Grandmother Over Afternoon Tea Party With Neighbour.

Police in the UK delivered a stern warning to an 82-year-old grandmother after she had a socially distanced cup of tea with her neighbours in their communal garden. Officers arrived at the 82-year-olds sheltered housing complex home at 9.45 pm to question her about the incident just after she had settled into bed to watch television.

They told the pensioner she had been reported for drinking tea outside with her neighbours, in breach of coronaviruslockdown restrictions.

Her daughter, Lesley Magovern, 56, expressed her disgust over the action police took and could not believe police travelled from Gloucester to Charlton Kings so late for something so ridiculous.

She added, My son works for the London Met and even he could not believe what I was telling him. We all have been left thinking, what a waste of police resources.

Mrs Magovern who has declined to name her mother to protect her from repercussions said she had had a socially distanced cup of tea with three other residents from her complex in Charlton Kings, Gloucestershire, at 1.30 pm on March 9. She added:

My mother heard a knock at the door and it was very late and she wondered really who it could be. My mother is quite deaf and she asked who it was and she thought the voice said Its me. Then mother assumed it was in fact me and she then opened the door.

There were two officers stood there, a man and a woman with masks on and they asked if they could come in and speak to her. They did not show her any identification so she just trusted the uniform and she was quite frightened. My mother has never been in trouble with the police in her life.

When they were there, they told my mother if it were to happen again she would be fined. Then they asked her to provide identification so she was rooting around trying to find some. Finally, she ended up showing them an out-of-date driving licence as that is all she had.

In a statement, a Gloucestershire Police spokesman said: An officer has spoken to the complainant and an explanation was provided in response to concerns raised. She was content with this and the matter has been resolved.

Police received a report of a potential Covid breach on Tuesday 9 March at 1.30 pm suspecting that there was a gathering involving people from multiple households in a residential garden in Charlton Kings, Cheltenham. Covid response officers attended later that day at around 9.45 pm where some residents were spoken to and given words of advice around current restrictions.

Officers are deployed to incidents based on an assessment of the threat, risk and harm of the incident and in this case officers who are part of the Covid response team and are deployed across the county attended later that evening.

It is still mandatory to wear masks during the pandemic, Amazon has a great range in stock, click on the link to see them all. https://amzn.to/3826Rmr

Thank you for taking the time to read this news article Police Deliver Stern Warning to 82-Year-Old Grandmother Over Afternoon Tea Party With Neighbour. For more UK daily news, Spanish daily news and Global news stories, visit the Euro Weekly News home page.

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Police Deliver Stern Warning to 82-Year-Old Grandmother Over Afternoon Tea Party With NeighbourNeighbour - Euro Weekly News

Passed only by a single vote in the Senate, President Joe Bidens $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act may lay the basis for overcoming two deep-seated problems that have bedeviled the Democratic Party for decades.

The first is a half-century curse on Democrats ability to maintain unified control of the federal government. As I wrote in a Washington Post op-ed a year ago:

Since 1968, Democrats have controlled both Congress and the White House three times, and each one of those periods ended with a hard turn right. Altogether, the years of unified Democratic government add up to just eight out of the past 52: four when Jimmy Carter was president, and the first two years of Bill Clintons and Barack Obamas first terms. Carters presidency ended with Ronald Reagans election in 1980, Clintons first years with Newt Gingrichs Republican Revolution in 1994, and Obamas first years with the tea party insurgency in 2010.

Even before the pandemic, it was clear that if Democrats won control of both Congress and the presidency, they needed to prioritize early deliverables to the votersvisible material benefitsto avoid repeating the disastrous reversals in midterm elections the party suffered under Clinton in 1994 and Obama in 2010. The pandemic has made those early deliverables only more urgent, and the big relief bill is providing them. With their narrow majorities in both houses of Congress, Democrats will need all the help they can get to retain control.

But short-term measures ought to support a long-term vision, and the relief legislation does that too. Indeed, it advances a second goal that has eluded Democrats for a long time: rebuilding a bottom-up political majority, encompassing both low-income working people and the middle class.

One of the reasons that Clinton and Obama devoted their first two years in office to universal health coverage was its potential for promoting that kind of cross-class support. Universal coverage would help both the uninsured poor and many in the middle class denied protection for pre-existing conditions and facing unaffordable health costs. But although Obama succeeded where Clinton failed, the Affordable Care Act was slow in delivering benefits, and its limitations still prevent it from enjoying the broad cross-class support that Medicare enjoys.

More from Paul Starr

The Biden relief legislation has two key elements, improvements to ACA subsidies and child care tax credits, that extend benefits from the poor into the middle class. Both thereby try to avoid the political weaknesses of programs solely identified with the poor. But both have been enacted on only a temporary basis, and with no votes to spare in the Senate it will be an enormous challenge to make them permanent in a follow-up reconciliation bill before the 2022 election.

Under the ACA, people who enroll for coverage through the insurance marketplaces are eligible for premium subsidies on a sliding-scale basis. Until now, however, the law has cut off subsidies entirely at 400 percent of the federal poverty level ($51,040 for a single person). That cutoff point, or subsidy cliff, may seem reasonable enough, but many people with incomes just above that level face extremely high costs. For example, as Katie Keith points out at Health Affairs, a 60-year-old earning just over the 400 percent cutoff faces an average annual premium of $12,886, or about 25.8 percent of income, not counting out-of-pocket health costs, which may also be substantial. Consequently, many middle-class people dont see the ACA as offering them much financial protection.

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The Biden rescue plan, as Jon Walker has argued, finally attempts to make good on the promise of affordable insurance. For 2021 and 2022, it extends subsidies to people above the cutoff, limiting their premiums to 8.5 percent of income. It also increases subsidies at lower incomes; in fact, people with incomes between 100 and 150 percent of the poverty leveland anyone who received unemployment benefits during 2021will be eligible for a silver plan on the marketplace at no premium.

The expanded child tax credits are potentially even more significant as a cross-class measure than the improved health insurance subsidies. Most of the news coverage about the child tax credits has focused on the stunning point that they will cut child poverty nearly in half. But this may obscure the politically crucial fact that the child tax credits are not an anti-poverty program in the sense of being targeted exclusively, or even primarily, to the poor.

Like the expanded ACA subsidies, the relief plans child tax credits have cross-class benefits. The full credit$3,600 per child under age 6, and $3,000 per child from ages 7 to 17will begin to phase out only at incomes well into the middle class ($112,500 for single heads of household; $150,000 for married couples). Even with incomes up to $400,000, couples with children will get partial credits. Many low-income families who do not receive the existing $2,000-per-child credit because their earnings are too low will also benefit from the legislation because it makes the enlarged credit fully refundable, which means that even those without tax liability will be able to receive the credit.

Not only do the child tax credits have potential cross-class support; they also have potential cross-party support because many conservatives see them as a pro-family policy.

The child tax credits are effectively what other countries call family allowances. Some analyses have suggested that in supporting the tax credits, Democrats are reversing the position they took during the 1990s in seeking to end welfare as we know it. Thats true in one sense: The new benefits are not work-related. But, in another sense, the child tax credits are the fulfillment of the promise to end welfare as we know it. Like family allowances elsewhere, the Biden tax credits dont phase out when low-income parents take paying jobs, so they dont have the kind of work disincentive effect that means-tested welfare assistance has had.

Not only do the child tax credits have potential cross-class support; they also have potential cross-party support because many conservatives see them as a pro-family policyindeed, as a policy that supports more traditional families where the mother stays home with young children. The tax credits thereby avoid some of the ideological divisions that have erupted over public subsidies for child care ever since Richard Nixon vetoed child care legislation in 1971.

Nonetheless, the opposition to making the expanded ACA subsidies and child tax credits permanent will be intense. The opponents will claim that making middle-class people eligible for benefits is costly and unnecessary. They will cite data showing that the programs will be more progressive in the strict sense of directing benefits more to the poor if eligibility ends at low incomes. But by limiting benefits to the poor, the opponents will be inviting a return to all the old political and incentive problems of welfare.

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Can Democrats succeed in turning these temporary policies into a new foundation for social provision in the United States? For the immediate future, the answer will depend on the Democrats precarious majority in the Senate. In a New York Times op-ed the other day, law professor Paul Campos urged Justice Stephen Breyer to retire immediately because the death or incapacitation of a single Democratic senator over the next 22 months could return Mitch McConnell to the position of majority leader, once again able to obstruct a Democratic Supreme Court nominee. Campos pointed out that six Democratic senators over age 70 represent states with Republican governors who could replace them with a Republican; five Democrats represent states where vacancies would go unfilled for months until an election. A single loss in one of these states would also likely end hopes for progressive reform in this Congress, including the extension of the ACA subsidies and child tax credits.

With their tenuous Senate majority, Democrats ought to be in a hurry to do whatever they can on infrastructure, taxes, and other issues. They have already made the most out of the leastthe most substantial relief measure conceivable with the thinnest possible Senate majority. If they can turn that relief measure into a permanent transformation of social policy, it will be one of the most brilliant acts of liberal political magic we have seen in a very long time.

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The Precarious Greatness of the Biden Strategy - The American Prospect

Its Nimrat Kaurs birthday, today. The Lunchbox whos in Agra is happy to be with her family and friends and she shares her plans: Im actually at home with my parents and grandmother. We were shooting in Agra so I came here just the day before yesterday. I thought Id spend two or three days here and then go back to Mumbai. Actually, last year also I was here at the same time. We went to Nizamuddin Dargah as I like to do that the night before my birthday and yesterday evening, too we went there. And today, Im looking forward to have a nice evening celebration with my family, she says.'We'll have a tea party with my nani ji' Whats on the menu, we ask her? Oh, we will have a couple of cakes not just one as we are are making up for the last year, she laughs. The plan to have just going to have a nice evening tea party thing with my nani ji. Shes actually just moved opposite us and she got here only a few days back. Mums going to have a few friends over, so it will be a small family-and-friends do. We'll have just a few easy things on the menu like sandwiches and pizzas and which don't any cooking prep as my mother was helping my nani ji settle in so I wanted her to take it easy today, she adds.

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Nimrat Kaur: Cakes, pizza and sandwiches for my birthday tea party, today - Times of India

Virginias Republicans could find opportunities in this years elections to end a dozen years in the wilderness if not for their own dysfunction.

In Richmond, a Democratic administration is trying to extricate itself from the quicksand of a Parole Board scandal in which inmates serving life terms for murder were freed without proper notice or explanation followed by efforts to keep results of investigations into the boards actions from public view.

A newly Democratic General Assembly swiftly enacted a remarkably progressive agenda by Virginia standards that includes elimination of the death penalty. Too much too soon? The election will tell.

In Washington, Democrats newly (and narrowly) in charge of Congress and a new Democratic president will inevitably wear out their welcome as happens with all regime changes. Only once since 1973 have Virginians elected a governor of the same party as the sitting president.

Those are potentially fortuitous omens for the GOP in Virginia.

But beyond that, things get worrisome for the Republican Party of Virginia.

First, lets rewind.

Late last year, Virginia Republicans decided to pick their nominees for the 2021 election for governor and two other top statewide offices in a closed convention rather than a primary election open to every registered Virginia voter. Historically, the party has favored conventions, which attract only the most motivated (and usually conservative) activists willing to spend the time and money to travel across the state and sit through a day of speeches.

The convention decision didnt set well with state Sen. Amanda Chase. A firebrand Trump disciple from Chesterfield, she preferred a primary where the former presidents supporters might give her a plurality. Thats all she would need to secure the nomination in a primary compared to a party-run convention, where she would have to muster more than 50 percent of the vote.

Some in the party fear that Chase, who called the pro-Trump mob that sacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 patriots, would fare even worse with the states dominant urban/suburban electorate in Novembers general election than her ideological kinsman, Corey Stewart, did in 2018 when Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine won 57 percent of the vote.

Chase, a COVID-19 skeptic and the only senator who refuses to wear a mask during sessions, sued to overturn RPVs convention decision, arguing in court that jamming 10,000 people under one roof would be a coronavirus super-spreader. The judge dismissed her suit.

Shortly after that, RPV scrambled to find a suitable convention venue and approached Liberty University in Lynchburg about using its expansive campus parking lots for a May 8 drive-in state convention. It envisioned thousands of delegates participating remotely from cars idling on Libertys acres of blacktop for hours under a May sun. RPV announced the tailgate convention, and media reported it as a fait accompli. School officials, exerting a measure of independence from the GOP at a post-Falwell Liberty, said in a news release that no such agreement had been reached. RPV chairman Rich Anderson declared the plan dead in a March 5 memo to Virginia Republicans and described the party as fatigued by the process.

This has begun as a rough start for me because of forces that I essentially cant control, and that is confronting this age-old question within the party: convention vs. primary? said Anderson, a retired Air Force colonel and eight-year House of Delegates member who was elected to the post last August.

On Friday night, when the State Central Committee finally approved a May 8 unassembled convention at 37 separate locations across the commonwealth, less than two months remained to winnow a field of nine gubernatorial candidates down to one.

If Rube Goldberg had come up with a convention plan, hed probably fit in on State Central (Committee) right now, said Shaun Kenney, a conservative writer and former RPV executive director. Its the definition of an unearned goal: Youre turning around and kicking the ball into your own net.

Kenney is like many Republicans who dont embrace Trumpism and find themselves estranged from the party they long served. He voices weary dismay watching his party flounder.

Its not going to be a very transparent process and I dont think that at the end of it people are going to be very pleased with the outcome or the method, Kenney said.

Conventions with murky outcomes create divisions. Questions still linger over the final delegate vote count in the 2008 convention in which former Gov. Jim Gilmore barely edged then-Del. Bob Marshall for a U.S. Senate nomination, Kenney said. Hard feelings lingered, and a few months later Democrat Mark Warner won nearly two-thirds of the vote and the seat he still holds.

Last year, Republican social conservatives in the 5th Congressional District denied freshman Rep. Denver Riggleman nomination for a second term in a drive-through convention at a church on the home turf of self-described biblical conservative Bob Good in Campbell County. Good, a former Liberty fundraiser and Campbell County supervisor, won the seat in November.

They did it that way because they knew I couldnt be beaten on an open battlefield, said Riggleman, aretired military intelligence officer with a libertarian streak who in 2019 officiated the same-sex wedding of two campaign staffers.

In 2011, the party decreed that its 2013 gubernatorial slate would be elected in a primary, but that was before the Tea Party consolidated its grip on the SCC in 2012 and scrapped the primary for a convention. That effectively squeezed then-two-term Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling out of any chance at succeeding Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell. Ken Cuccinelli, a social conservative and attorney general, was the nominee, but lost that fall to Democrat Terry McAuliffe, the only time in 44 years the presidents party won Virginias governorship.

What Ive learned is that these decisions always depend on what I call situational politics. Theres never been a great deal of principled consistency in the Republican Party when it comes to making these kinds of decisions, said Bolling, who was on the last GOP ticket to win a statewide election in Virginia in 2009.

This time its all about preventing Amanda Chase from becoming the nominee, which I understand because shed be a disaster, said Bolling, who now teaches politics and government at the University of Richmond and George Mason University. Again, its about situational politics. Its not new, its just with the players in different positions.

Perhaps the bitterest GOP nomination fight was in 2019 between former Del. Chris Peace of Hanover and current Del. Scott Wyatt. In that battle, the SCC was forced to choose between a convention that Wyatt won and a firehouse primary that Peace won. The SCC chose Wyatt over the incumbent Peace, who had supported Medicaid expansion. Wyatt won the seat in a deeply conservative district.

Its guerilla warfare. I dont like to use military metaphors, but I dont know how else youd describe it. It is hand-to-hand, its people hiding behind trees, said Peace, now a lawyer in private practice.

Despite its nomination tumult and conflicts, the GOP could still have a shot in November given a nominee who can compete beyond rural Virginia in the affluent, populous suburbs. A case might be made for wealthy businessmen Glenn Youngkin or Pete Snyder. Former House Speaker Kirk Cox has an appealing bio as a 30-year public school teacher and youth baseball coach, but as Peace learned supporting Medicaid expansion in Virginia is a tough sell within his party.

The GOPs saving grace, Kenney notes, may be timing.

Nobodys watching all this dysfunction right now, he said. Its March. Nobodys paying attention to the Republican Partys internal fights.

Originally posted here:
After 12 years in the wilderness, Virginia GOP's miscues could torpedo a 2021 comeback - Virginia Mercury