Posted on 11/05/2007 2:42:44 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson waded into the sensitive issue of American race relations at a campaign stop in New Hampshire, acknowledging that he was raised in a region of the South where many people once saw the issue through the wrong prism.
But what separated him, he said, was his mothers morality.
I had my own experience growing up in a small town in Tennessee, the former Hollywood actor and Tennessee senator said when asked if he had personal experiences with racism and how a U.S. president should handle the issue.
Looking back upon that now, I know that there were an awful lot of people who viewed an awful lot of things through the wrong prism, he said over breakfast at Politics & Eggs, a ticket-punching stop for White House contenders in the southern town of Bedford. A lot has changed.
Thompson, on his fourth visit to the state with the first-in-the-nation parimary since formally entering the race in September, said he would use the bully pulpit as president to speak the truth about race and encourage Americans to do the right thing.
I firmly believe that there is more that brings us together as Americans than separates us, he said to applause from the crowd of about 150 people gathered in the dining hall of the Bedford Village Inn.
Wayne Jennings, who posed the question as chairman of New Hampshires Cultural Diversity Awareness Council, told Reuters he was satisfied by the answer. It was a very good reply, he said.
The breakfast marked the start of three appearances by Thompson on Monday in the state, where he is trailing other top-tier Republican candidates in recent polls.
I have never though of any of Fred's characters as being racist.
The Yankees ran the slave trade prior to the American Revolution, and don’t much like being reminded of the facts. And Southerners who don’t keep in their place, are called racists, whether they are or aren’t.
Which would have been a pretty lousy business without BUYERS, doncha think?
Wow, and I always think of myself as an American.
Go Fred Go!!!
Reagan was a Midwesterner born and raised in Illinois.
I know she’s elitist...she only likes people with money or other high status that she can use for her personal contacts...and as far as racist I guess Dick Morris, aka FJB, can vouch for that.
What exactly have you heard?
There were slaves north of the Mason-Dixon line until the early 1800s. Can’t buy slaves unless someone offers to sell them can you?
She was when she was in Arkansas and don’t kid yourself she has changed.
Nope, definitely need a buyer and seller—supply and demand. There was definitely a demand, especially in the South.
Stephanopolis discusses that in his book. Hillary launched an attack on an aide that blasted him about being Jewish.
Okay you are right. So who cares what a Yankee American thinks. JOKE, some of my best friends are Yankee Americans.
Dunno, but Hillary is not a Southerner anyway. Bill is, but she's from Illinois.
Nixon was from California; no Northerner he. And, you’re right; Ford, whom I did not forget, was appointed, not elected.
That's why "Dixie's Land" was a farm in what is now the Bronx, NYC.
Fredipedia: The Definitive Fred Thompson Reference
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Slavery went out of vogue in the North when they realized that they could bring in immigrants and pay them less than it cost to keep the slaves. This new labor pool also was easier to train. Most of them could read and write at least a bit. Most slaves had been left intentionally uneducated.
In the South, slavery was dying out when the Civil War erupted and was eventually turned to slavery being the prime reason. This is like WMDs in Iraq... they weren’t the biggest reason on the list until they were not found.
I think all Americans were on the way to doing the right thing, though it would have taken years to change without the catalyst of war. I do wonder if the former slaves might have been better off without the resentment in the South and the Carpetbaggers from the North once the war was over.
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