On this date in 1864 President Lincoln receives a Christmas gift.

[Bull Snipe]

"I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the City of Savannah, with one hundred and fifty heavy guns and plenty of ammunition and about twenty-five thousand bales of cotton." General William T. Sherman's "March to the Sea" was over. During the campaign General Sherman had made good on his promise d “to make Georgia howl”. Atlanta was a smoldering ruin, Savannah was in Union hands, closing one of the last large ports to Confederate blockade runners. Sherman’s Army wrecked 300 miles of railroad and numerous bridges and miles of telegraph lines. It seized 5,000 horses, 4,000 mules, and 13,000 head of cattle. It confiscated 9.5 million pounds of corn and 10.5 million pounds of fodder, and destroyed uncounted cotton gins and mills. In all, about 100 million dollars of damage was done to Georgia and the Confederate war effort.

[rockrr]

Come to think about it - I don’t believe I’ve seen either one say anything positive about our country. Telling, isn’t it?

[BroJoeK]

In his post #693, Kalamata again detours into a lengthy off-topic explanation of his theological beliefs regarding natural science and "Biblical Science".

The heart of it seems to be a quote by Colin Patterson,

"Can You Tell Me Anything About Evolution? A Lecture by Colin Patterson."
American Museum of Natural History, Nov 5, 1981, p.3"

Iirc, I first heard that kind of talk in a Sophomore-year bull session, and I think the technical term for is actually "sophomoric solipsism" = "we can't know anything for sure, so everything is just an illusion".
Such talk is often used to undermine young people's traditional beliefs, making it entertaining here to notice Kalamata using solipsism against his own idea of "false religion" -- natural science.

The fact here is that science itself makes no claims regarding "ultimate truth" because it recognizes itself as just a model (think of a model ship) which, no matter how precisely accurate, is never the true ship itself.
Anyone who's studied science should understand such ontological basics.

Now, back to the Civil War.

[BroJoeK]

Sadly, Kalamata's post #694 consists of nothing more than childish tit-for-tat.

[DiogenesLamp]

I can’t comprehend how anyone can hold the views that Kalamata and DiogenesLamp have on the civil war and still love this country, or call themselves Americans.

I love the country just fine, but i'm not interested in lying about it's past. It had ugly parts when it started, and there is no sense in whitewashing over them.

The Civil War represents a huge departure from what the Founders thought they were creating. The massive overbearing central government which we now deal with was not at all what they had in mind when they created the nation. Lincoln is mostly responsible for putting us down the path of Federal totalitarianism.

[DiogenesLamp]

The better analogy is Pearl Harbor, since both Pearl Harbor and Fort Sumter aroused Americans in the conviction that war was the only answer. And both events were the deliberate choice of the military power which attacked the United States.

This is one of your oft repeated loony toon ideas.

I've recently devised a different method for illustrating this sort of absurdity.

This:

Versus this:

[BroJoeK]

Kalamata: >>DoodleDawg wrote: "It would have economically destroyed the powerful men that were backing Lincoln.
Northern shipping, manufacturing, banking, insurance, warehousing, and countless other industries would have been badly damaged by direct trade between the South and Europe.
It wasn't about the 65 million or so in Federal revenue.
It was about hundreds of millions of dollars lost to Lincoln's wealthy backers in the North East."

DoodleDawg: "Check again, that was DiogenesLamp. Your fellow whackdoodle in crime."

Kalamata quoting Vicksburg Daily Whig, January 1860: "By mere supineness, the people of the South have permitted the Yankees to monopolize the carrying trade, with its immense profits.
We have yielded to them the manufacturing business, in all its departments, without an effort, until recently, to become manufacturers ourselves...
...By means of her railways and navigable streams, she sends out her long arms to the extreme South; and, with an avidity rarely equaled, grasps our gains and transfers them to herself—taxing us at every step — and depleting us as extensively as possible without actually destroying us."

We've ploughed this ground before, but it may still need some disk-harrowing.
First, 1860 US GDP was about $4.4 billion (from total assets of $25 billion of which slaves were $4 billion) of which the entire South produced around $800 million of which $200+ million was Southern exports.
Another $200 million was "imported" by the South from the North, and yet another ~$200 million was owed by Southerners to Northern banks.
These numbers make the South important, but not necessarily as important as sometimes claimed.

Second, the true reason antebellum Southerners invested everything they could in land & cotton is because experience showed that was where reliable profits lay.
For example, in the Panic of 1857 many Northerners were ruined, while Southerners barely noticed.

The reason more Northerners invested in risky manufacturing & shipping was because they had no choice, and also cities like New York had manifest commercial advantages.

And the truth about Southern heartfelt complaints over "depleting us as extensively as possible without actually destroying us" -- the truth is that anyone who's ever borrowed money or managed a business knows that feeling, especially when times are tough.
It's a natural human feeling, but in fact by 1860 average Southern landowners were, as a group, more prosperous than any other such group not just in the USA, but in the world.

[OIFVeteran]

Hogwash. The passage of the 16th Amendment in 1909 (which was strongly supported by the democrats in the south) and the Wickard vs Filburn decision by the Supreme Court in 1942 did more to expand the federal government powers than anything Lincoln did.

[DiogenesLamp]

Abortion and "Gay" marriage would not exist under the Federal framework prior to 1861. The States had the right to make and pass such laws as they deemed fit. It was the "incorporation doctrine" of the 14th amendment that gave the courts so much power to make things up.

And prayer in public schools? It is my recollection that the last official state religion was not rescinded until 1835 or so, meaning it was acknowledged by all and sundry that states had a right to official state religions if the people wanted them.

[Kalamata]

>>BroJoeK wrote: "In his post #655, central_va weighs in on the value of import tariffs... This is a (perhaps rare) case where I not only agree with central_va, but agree because he took the time some years ago to explain it on a thread like this one. More important, if I understand correctly, both of us agree with President Trump, while Kalamata and DiogenesLamp, as usual, are here arguing the globalist Democrat position."

Joey is always deceptive. The fake-republican crony capitalists of the antebellum period, whose strategy of transferring wealth, via protective tariffs, from one area of the nation (the South) to another area (the North,) is no different whatsoever than the crony-capitalist globalists of today, whose one-sided protective tariffs have been transferring wealth from our nation to all of our so-called "trading partners." President Trump is doing a wonderful job of reigning in those unpatriotic globalists by countering their protective tariffs.

Did you ever get the feeling that Joey is a shill for the crony-capitalists?

****************

>>BroJoeK wrote: "And this is a good time to remember that in decades before 1860 the South was not solidly Democrat, that there were many anti-Democrats eager to vote for a viable opposition candidate. These Southern anti-Democrats elected Whig Presidents Harrison and Taylor, and as late as 1860 they gave John Bell's Constitutional Union more electoral votes than Steven Douglas Democrats."

The South was solidly republican until Lincoln's war. The big-government, crony-capitalist RINO's (republican-in-name-only, aka, modern-day democrats) controlled the North, and then took over the South during the horrors of "reconstruction," to continue their plunder and to create lasting racial tension.

****************

>>BroJoeK wrote: "In Kalamata's mind Whigs were as bad as Republicans, at least in their support for protective tariffs, a national bank and "internal improvements"."

Again, the Whigs were the precursors of the modern day Democrats. The term "internal improvements," promoted by Lincoln (from his very first campaign in Illinois,) is a euphemism for corporate welfare, aka, crony capitalism. The Whigs (who were also the precursors to the Lincoln RINO's) would push through legislation for a public works project, and then assign their politically-connected supporters and friends to the projects.

That was also true at the state level. The corruption was so bad -- one boondoggle after another -- that by the end of "reconstruction," almost every state government made it unconstitutional to fund any type of private business venture. Under Lincoln's shenanigans, the state of Illionois got saddled with massive debt for failed boondoggle; so they were one of the first (1848) to make them unconstitutional.

****************

>>BroJoeK wrote: "On the subject of tariffs, as a young man I was taught tariffs are bad (i.e., Smoot Hawley), that "free trade" will bring more prosperity, and the great test of that idea was to be NAFTA."

That wasn't free trade, Joey. That was another form of crony-capitalism. The rule of thumb is, if the Chamber of Commerce is involved, hide your wallet, unless you are a member of the club – then get a bigger wallet.

****************

>>BroJoeK wrote: "At the time of NAFTA, Ross Perot was squawking something about a "giant sucking sound" and I thought at the time: no, that's not how it's supposed to work, instead we should actually gain more than we lose. Well, Perot proved more correct, and Trump was able to make the case in 2016, win the election and quickly turn it around. Trump sold the idea that "free trade" must also be fair trade and "fair" can indeed mean substantial tariffs."

Remember, everything Joey writes is deceptive. He cannot help himself. It is in his genetics.

We were Perot supporters, and we have been Trump supporters since before he announced his candidacy. Some of the biggest crony-capitalists were the two Bush's – G.W. and his dad (that is, before Obama showed up.)

A very destructive RINO "conservative" was the corrupt Texas Senator Phil Gramm, who helped set the 2008 housing crisis in motion. He pushed through the repeal of the Glass-Stegall Act (which had made it illegal for Wall Street and the banking industry to merge,) which destabilized the financial markets. He is also responsible for the regulatory exemption for over-the-counter derivatives.

BTW, Gramm's partners-in-crime included Bill Clinton and Robert Rubin.

****************

>>BroJoeK wrote: "This puts Donald Trump squarely in the line of succession from Federalists George Washington & James Madison, to Whig Henry Clay, to Republicans Lincoln & Coolidge."

Everything about that statement is deceptive. The so-called "federalists," or rather, the FINO's (Federalist In Name Only,) and their corrupt Whig and RINO descendants, were just like the globalists of today, but on a smaller scale. Everything they did was arranged to line their pockets, while making the rest of the United States poorer.

James Madison abandoned the "Federalist" party by 1791, when he and Jefferson teamed up against the "federalists" by forming an opposition newspaper called the National Gazette.

President Trump is politically similar to Jackson, not Lincoln or Clay.

Mr. Kalamata

[rockrr]

That's a difference between scale and momentary magnitude. Sure there's a disparity of relative tonnage but the principle remains the same.

But this is illustrative - we know that when the chips are down you're the first to leave the table...

Reminds me of a song...

SINGERS: Brave Sir Robin ran away.

ROBIN: I didn’t.

SINGERS: Bravely ran away, away.

ROBIN: No, no, no.

SINGERS: When danger reared its ugly head,

He bravely turned his tail and fled

Yes, Brave Sir Robin turned about

And gallantly he chickened out

Bravely taking to his feet

He beat a very brave retreat

Bravest of the brave Sir Robin

Petrified of being dead

Soiled his pants then brave Sir Robin

Turned away and fled.

[DiogenesLamp]

If you think Pearl Harbor even slightly equals fort Sumter, you are irrational.

Fort Sumter was useless. Remained Useless even after the war when they garrisoned it for awhile just because. Was never vital to American interests. Was never such a percentage of national expenditures as was Pearl Harbor. Was never so essential to the larger security of the nation.

At Pearl Harbor, over 2,000 men killed, and many many billions of dollars in destroyed defense property. Gravely wounded our ability to defend ourselves from attack.

Fort Sumter had no casualties, served no real purpose, and was mostly paid for by the people of the South anyways.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

So basically you’re admitting that there’s no consistent underlying principle, just a subjective opinion of importance.

[Kalamata]

>>BroJoeK wrote: "Only if such knowledge were totally blank could someone even entertain the notion that sedimentary layers were deposited "rapidly", or more importantly all at the same time, in one global flood event?"
>>DiogenesLamp wrote: "Wait. Whut? You don't believe in a global flood event? And you think you are scientific? What rock have you been living under not to be aware of all the evidence demonstrating a global flood? Are you aware that during the last ice sage, the ice sheet above Kansas was a mile thick? What do you suppose happened to all that water?

BroJoeK has a lot invested in his anti-Moses ideology. He is like the Biblical Pharisee, who can see, but doesn't want to see.

Most creation scientists believe the (only) Ice Age was the result of the overheating of the ocean water due to the world-wide tectonic movements during the flood -- the movements that gave us our current continental landscape. The atmosphere was also loaded with vapor from the fountains of the great deep being opened for about six months.

Remember, the Himalayas were, at one time, a plain covered with sea water. We know that because of the marine fossils found in sedimentary rock layers on top of Mt. Everest. No reasonable geologist disputes that, even the anti-Moses secularists.

The Himalaya mountain range rose while the sediment was still pliable, leaving folded rather than broken sedimentary layering. The same for mountain ranges world-wide. Most mountain ranges look something like this, up close:

Those mountains are covered with folded, sedimentary rock layers. That would be a pretty neat trick under uniformitarian (gradualism) principles; but it makes perfect sense under flood conditions, followed by rapid plate tectonic movements.

This is the sequence of flood events that God gave us, in a nutshell.

"He established the earth upon its foundations, So that it will not totter forever and ever. You covered [the earth] with the deep [water] as with a garment; The waters were standing above the mountains. At Your rebuke they fled, At the sound of Your thunder they hurried away. The mountains rose; the valleys sank down To the place which You established for them. You set a boundary that they [the waters] may not pass over, So that they [the waters] will not return to cover the earth." -- Ps 104:5-9 NASB

The last verse is God's covenant with Noah:

"And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh." -- Gen 9:15 KJV

Neat, huh?

Mr. Kalamata

[DiogenesLamp]

So basically you’re admitting that there’s no consistent underlying principle, just a subjective opinion of importance.

What principle was at stake requiring the sending of five Warships and a troop carrier to subjugate the people of Charleston?

On a whim Lincoln could have simply ordered the garrison out. Indeed, the National Republican newspaper (Lincoln's own propaganda organ) said he was going to do exactly this.

What President could have simply ordered Pearl Harbor shut down?

[Bull Snipe]

“What President could have simply ordered Pearl Harbor shut down.”

FDR. Before May 1940 the Pacific Fleet’s Battleships, Aircraft Carriers, Crusiers and destroyers, plus support ships were based at San Pedro and San Diego CA. He ordered them to Pearl, he could order them back to CA. Had he done so, the Japanese would have bombed & torpedoed oil barges, garbage scows and a tug boat or two.

[DiogenesLamp]

You don't think the air strip or dockyards had anything of value there apart from ships?

In addition to the property values of that base, Pearl Harbor is strategically important. It's our way station in the middle of the Pacific.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

What President could have simply ordered Pearl Harbor shut down?

Any of them, in the same way they've ordered the shut down bases many, many times in the past.

[DiogenesLamp]

Any of them, in the same way they've ordered the shut down bases many, many times in the past.

This comment is sorta like moving the goal posts. Shutting down a base is not the same as ordering a withdraw and giving up the real estate.

Lincoln could have withdrawn and given up the land at his own whim. It would have had no significant impact on the Union's ability to defend itself.

Evacuating Pearl Harbor and giving up the land would have been not only horrifically costly, it would have been seriously detrimental to US defense.

You have to remember that the normal condition of Fort Sumter was empty. Nobody was stationed there by actual orders until after the Civil War, and they only did that to make a symbolic point. Eventually those troops were withdrawn, and it has stood empty of a garrison ever since.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

Eventually those troops were withdrawn, and it has stood empty of a garrison ever since.

Fort Sumter was repaired and rearmed after the war, and was extensively reworked in 1897, remaining in service until 1947, when it was retired along with most coastal fortifications that outlived their usefulness in an era of missiles and jets. In all, over 70 coastal defense installations were decommissioned between 1946 and 1950, Sumter among them.

[x]

This is all a little beside the point, though. We have bases that aren’t essential to our security, but if they were attacked the result would be war, or something very much like war. If we took no action in response we would lose credibility and be seen as a powerless paper tiger. The argument that such a base was unessential wouldn’t matter.