Free Republic

8 things to think about as we mark the conflict's 150th anniversary. Some ring strong: of course the end of slavery, perhaps the worst disgrace in the nation's history. And the 620,000 ancestors lost. Other vestiges have weakened with the passage of time but are no less legacies of the four horrific, heroic years that shaped us as one nation. Here are eight ways the Civil War indelibly changed us and how we live: 1. We have ambulances and hospitals. The Civil War began during medieval medicine's last gasp and ended at the dawn of modern medicine. Each side entered...

It can only be replaced by something else that's different entirely. That's what's happening now.I've acknowledged that this is a losing fight so long as the Christian church continues to allow the culture to be ceded a totally godless element...note that it's not the wrong side of the fight.Found at Super Conservative.

Lincoln Laments at Gettysburg: Biblical Creation and Civil War Insights by James J. S. Johnson, J.D., Th.D. * Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.1 These words spoken by Abraham Lincoln 150 years ago allude to America’s Declaration of Independence. In that foundational document, the colonial declarants proclaimed a creation-based view of human liberty: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable...

Tony Kushner, the screenwriter behind the Oscar nominated movie 'Lincoln,' compared Barack Obama to the 16th president and called the defeat of Mitt Romney a "rejection" of the "Reagan era ideology" that leads to a "frightening" path of "psychotic individualism." Appearing on Thursday's edition of PBS's Charlie Rose show the openly gay playwright called Obama's evolution on same-sex marriage "Lincolnian" and roasted Ronald Reagan, Romney and the Tea Party: (VIDEO AT LINK) TONY KUSHNER: So you have people like these Tea Party people protesting government and then asked if they really want to give up their Social Security payments. And...

...Did he exert features of moral grandeur and heroism necessary to steer the country through its deepest political crisis? Or was he an aspiring tyrant, especially in his use of executive power? A recent example of how not to think about Lincoln’s leadership comes from the historian and television commentator Doris Goodwin. Goodwin wrote a book called “Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln,” showing how Lincoln drew his cabinet from his personal and political competitors. In a subsequent discussion of Lincoln’s leadership titled “The 10 Qualities That Made Lincoln Great... If all of these sound a little...

The U.S. Navy will delay the refueling of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) for an unknown period because of the uncertain fiscal environment due to the ongoing legislative struggle, the service told Congress in a Friday message obtained by USNI News.

In January 1863, Abraham Lincoln made a remarkable confession. He was, he told a senator, more worried about “the fire in the rear” than he was about the Confederates to his front... Disgusted Republicans termed them “Copperheads,” after the poisonous snake... By January 1863, their assaults on Lincoln, combined with the poor performance of the armies, were taking a toll on civilian morale. Midwesterners spoke openly about seceding and establishing another new country or aligning with the Confederate States of America. Lincoln’s critics were harsh, uncompromising and relentless. They said Lincoln was a tyrant, bent on amassing power and ruining...

One of my personal favorite pieces was this Obama/Lincoln/LifeLock parody from 2010. It seemed too perfect to me, Obama the identity thief. It's still a point the left continues to harp on, and it deserves to be ridiculed.

I’m sure most of us have read the so-called comparison of Lincoln and Kennedy, but did you ever consider the relationship between Obama and Lincoln? You might be surprised. Parallels of Abraham Lincoln and Barack Hussein Obama: 1. Lincoln placed his hand on the Bible for his inauguration. Obama used the same Bible. 2. Lincoln came from Illinois. Obama comes from Illinois. 3. Lincoln served in the Illinois Legislature. Obama served in the Illinois Legislature. 4. Lincoln had very little experience before becoming President. Obama had very little experience before becoming President. 5. Lincoln rode the train from Philadelphia to...

Since the 16th of November, the National Weather Service has been reporting that a mysterious “beam of interruption” in Lincoln, Illinois has been screwing with it’s radar. A quick glance at one of their Doppler images and it’s easy to see that something is shooting through the state, but as of now the meteorologists can only guess at the cause. Is it visual evidence of some kind of HAARP mind control? A targeting beam from an intergalactic destroyer? Maybe, but there could also be a much more mundane explanation. “We’re not sure what it is yet,” meteorologist Llyle Barker, told...

Abraham Lincoln's spiritual beliefs are notoriously difficult to pin down. It's a source of endless debate for historians trying to reconcile Lincoln's words and actions into a coherent faith. Tony Kushner, for his part, does not portray the sixteenth president as a religious man at all in his screenplay for the recent blockbuster Lincoln. Kushner alters the historical record, though, in his one direct reference to Lincoln's faith. Near the end of the film, Kushner has Lincoln tell his wife that with the war over, he wishes to visit Jerusalem, the place "where David and Solomon walked." Yet in the...

Before he left the Dallas Cowboys to come home again, Jon Kitna had one request of the two principals who run Lincoln High School: Give me your worst students. The other teachers told him to stop. This was last February and it was going to be hard enough to teach three algebra classes in the middle of a semester. He was two months gone from an NFL career that went for 16 years, after all. Yes, this was his old high school, the one where he was a star quarterback in the early 1990s, but didn’t the new football coach...

“Anyone who embarks on a study of Abraham Lincoln … must first come to terms with the Lincoln myth. The effort to penetrate the crust of legend that surrounds Lincoln … is both a formidable and intimidating task. Lincoln, it seems, requires special considerations that are denied to other figures.” — Robert W. Johannsen Lincoln, the South, and Slavery Indeed, it would not seem a safe time to critique the wisdom, motivations, and character of Abraham Lincoln. Steven Spielberg’s reverential motion picture epic Lincoln fills screens across America. The public increasingly accepts him as America’s greatest leader. Academics from the...

Rep. Allen West was finally forced to concede a couple weeks back, and his currently wrapping up his term --- but he's said that he'll continue to look for ways to serve the country, I don't think we've seen the last of him. Real Clear has the audio: MARTIN: So what’s next for you?WEST: Look, you know, God closes a door so that he can open up greater doors. I will continue to, you know, stand up and fight for this country. That’s my goal. I have two daughters, 19 and 16, and I want to make sure that they...

Burly-and-bearded country singer Trace Adkins ruffled all the usual feathers and bruised all the usual feelings when he dared to wear a Confederate battle flag earpiece in full view of gasping national TV viewers while singing “The Christmas Song” in the Yankee stronghold of Rockefeller Center on November 28. Adkins, who belches out such venerable neo-country chestnuts as “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” and “Brown Chicken, Brown Cow,” was subjected to the predictably rage-stroking vilification that comes whenever anyone suggests that the American South has ever been anything beyond a rancid cultural cesspool of lynching, incest, bestiality, racism, toothlessness, retardation, and yes,...

Steven Spielberg’s film LINCOLN clearly takes the politically correct, Northern view of Lincoln and wraps it up in the shroud of the moral fight against slavery. Thus, it decides mostly to focus on Lincoln’s fight in January 1865 to pass the Thirteenth Amendment, which outlawed slavery in the United States and its territories. Though the portrayal of this fight has its nuances, it doesn’t include the extensive evidence suggesting that Lincoln could be an ambitious, secretive tyrant. It also excludes such facts that, just before the Civil War began, President Lincoln had actually expressed support for a Thirteenth Amendment to...

I'm conservative/libertarian. My family are all Obama 'Rats/moochers/OWS types. We had just watched the movie "Lincoln". I opined that it was good (and unusual) to see a Hollywood movie cast middle-aged, white, male Republicans in a favorable light. Yes, of course, the conversation immediately became about race. A few of my family said that at some point in history Republicans became and Democrats and vise-versa. I thought my head was going to explode. I am a huge fan of history and absorb it - especially the civil war. But I had never heard this before. Should I buy more duct...

Everett Stadig recuperating in the hospital after being shoved and breaking his hip. Photo courtesy of Everett Stadig. Denver, Colo., Nov 21, 2012 / 04:49 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The arrest of a prominent Denver relator who allegedly assaulted a senior citizen collecting signatures for a pro-life petition has lead to new developments in three unsolved rape cases. “Were it not for Mr. Costello’s arrest at the grocery store in July, there would have been no new leads, and there would have been no charges filed in connection with these three unsolved sexual assaults,” Lynn Kimbrough of the Denver District...

With only a limited theatrical release last week, Steven Spielberg’s latest work of imaginative fiction is scheduled for wide release today. I know Hollywood plays fast and loose with history, but when they go out of their way to get the wallpaper in Lincoln’s office exactly right, and use a recording of his actual watch as the sound effect for his movie watch, but pay little deference to his actual statements or opinions… something must be said. People are seriously calling the Lincoln movie a “much needed civics lesson.” In reality it’s essentially a 2.5 hour courtroom drama about slavery...

Have any fellow FReepers seen this movie yet? If so, what did you think and would you recommend it?