Sorry, I don’t watch Obama when he comes on TV. My blood pressure, which I have a problem with, gets out of hand.
The average Lybian rebel wants to be free from political oppression, just as the South did in 1860-61. In the South’s case the political oppression they wanted to be free of included sectional aggrandizement, protective tariffs benefiting the North at the expense of the South, protection by Northern governors of members of John Brown’s invasion party after the failed raid, nullification of the Constitution with impunity by some Northern states, and failure of the Federal government to fully reimburse Texas for its efforts fighting invasion by Mexicans and Indians inadequately handled by Federal troops.
The Lybian rebels want to be free of physical oppression. In some sense white Southerners did too, given things like the John Brown invasion that tried to create a slave insurrection and the burning of Texas towns by abolitionists in 1860. Many Southern slaves, of course, wanted to be free from physical intimidation themselves and just to be free in general. Who could blame them?
I worry that some of the Lybian rebel leadership may have Al Qaeda ties, meaning that the non-Muslim world may eventually be threatened or damaged by a terrorist harboring, future Lybian state worse than Qadaffi’s. Not that I like Qadaffi at all — I don’t. I once turned down a company transfer to Tripoli because of Qadaffi.
Part of the reaction of South Carolinians to Anderson’s Sumter move was that they thought the Federal government had ordered Anderson to move or given him leeway to violate Buchanan’s agreement with the South Carolinians. The South Carolinians had not sent their own troops to Fort Sumter because of the agreement with Buchanan not to change the military situation in the forts.
Another aspect of their reaction was that they believed they had the right to secede under the Constitution as had the ratifiers from New York, Rhode Island and Virginia when they ratified the Constitution. South Carolina believed they had legally seceded and did not want the troops of a foreign country occupying forts inside their boundaries. They did not want to be an occupied country. This was similar the the fledgling US wanting the British out of forts in the Western interior of the new country after the revolution.
Anderson’s words about how he held the city of Charleston in his power and could close the harbor and destroy lighthouses did not ease tensions. Who would want their city subject to such threats?
I really don't think much happened at Fort Sumter. It was provoked and an excuse for the North to invade the South. The anti-Qadaffi folks are killing people and breaking things.
ML/NJ