Posted on 02/11/2026 10:47:43 AM PST by T Ruth
Director Steven Spielberg, whom I introduced last week [in 2012] at Gettysburg at ceremonies marking the 149th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s greatest speech, said he was deeply humbled to be delivering an address on that history-making spot.
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… Daniel Day-Lewis gives the definitive portrayal of our time, perhaps ever, of Honest Abe.
For people like me, who have spent their lives studying Abraham Lincoln, the film is chilling — as if he’s really come to life.
Day-Lewis does it by avoiding the traps most Lincoln actors fall into, the stoic, “Hall of Presidents”-esque stereotype that probably most Americans imagine.
There are no moving pictures of Lincoln, no recordings of his voice. But after his death, everyone was Lincoln’s best friend, and there are descriptions of everything from his accent to his gait.
The most important thing is the voice. Far from having a stentorian, Gregory Peck-like bass, Lincoln’s was a high, piercing tenor. Those who attended his speeches even described it as shrill and unpleasant for the first 10 minutes, until he got warmed up (or his endless stories managed to cow them into submission).
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Few great people are appreciated in their time. And it’s good to remember that, no matter how right the decisions seem now, they were hard-fought then.
“I wanted — impossibly — to bring Lincoln back from his sleep of one-and-a-half centuries,” Steven Spielberg said at Gettysburg, “even if only for two-and-one-half hours, and even if only in a cinematic dream.”
***
Harold Holzer is one of the country’s leading authorities on Abraham Lincoln. ...
[At the end of the article Holzer gives thumbnail reviews of all prior Lincoln films, ranking them from worst to best, which Holzer considers to be Spielberg’s.]
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
“You still spouting that crap? You know damn well it isn’t even close to being true.”
It is mostly crap. The South was becoming an economic backwater compared to the North. They were falling behind in population and representation in Congress. The only way to keep up was creating more slave states to maintain some parity in the Senate. That was what States Rights were about. Expanding slavery into the territories. It was now or never for them.
I did not make the statement to which you are replying. I was quoting what someone else said.
And you are wrong. A cotton picking machine was made in the 1840s I think, but it was not successful. The point is, people were trying to do it, and with enough incentive, they might have made a successful one before the 1940s.
It is absolutely correct. You just don't like it, and want it to not be true.
Exactly! See how much money the North was stealing from the South?
The North only produced 28% of the trade with Europe, the South produced the other 72%, yet all the money ends up in Boston and New York!
I post that map every time I want to show people how much money the North was getting from the South.
The Civil war was fought to keep that money flowing from the South into the wealthy pockets in the North.
The war had nothing to do with slavery, and absolutely everything to do with that money.
Allow me to educate you. You have clearly learned a lot of incorrect information.
The South was an economic powerhouse. It produced 72% of the Nation's federal revenue, even though it had 1/4th the population of the North. The South would have been far wealthier if it hadn't been required to send money to the North.
It's lack of representation in congress is why it was taxed so heavily compared to the North, and it is why it finally realized it would never get a fair shake economically because the Northern coalition controlled congress, and they liked the fact the South was paying most of the bills.
As far as "expansion" of slavery, that was impossible. There was no place that slavery could expand into. All lands suitable for plantation farming were already cultivated, and all western lands were at that time, unsuitable for farming.
We can only grow cotton in West Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California due to modern irrigation systems that didn't exist back then, and wouldn't exist for another 50 years.
So the claim that slavery would "expand" was just a lie.
But 5 to 1 manpower always wins in the end, if someone was fanatical enough to shed so much blood, which Lincoln was.
Thank God that King George III was not so willing to kill so many people. He decided to just let us go rather than continue the killing.
“So the claim that slavery would “expand” was just a lie.”
What in hell do you think the fight over slavery in Kansas was about? Expanding slavery was what it was about.
“We can only grow cotton in West Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California”
Slavery was not just about cotton. That’s a tired stereotype.
The root of thesecession movement was not about taxes and tariffs. It was slavery. No other issue in US history was as inflammatory as slavery, even polygamy didn’t come close. Sure, I’m gonna go to my pro-tariff neighbors house and butcher him and his sons with home made swords. Good grief.
Just like the cause of the revolution wasn’t tea, the cause of the war of Southern independence was not slavery.
Lincoln was a slick lying railroad lawyer.
“the cause of the war of Southern independence was not slavery.”
No, firing on Fort Sumter caused the war, but slavery caused the secession. But what was it then? What poltical issue would make me so angry I would want to go kill my neighbor?
I Cant speak for Yankees but projecting backwards, for a Southerner an opportunity to kill Yankees with a free rifle and free ammo was a little hard to resist.
Sure, once the war was on, and lots of Yanks wanted to kill secesh traitors too. I’m talking about the cause of the war. I guess the Missourians wanted to burn Lawrence because you didn’t want high tariffs
Not my world, the actual real world. All/Vast-Majority Federal revenue came from tariffs.
There was no income tax. The Federal government ran on tariffs, of which the South produced 72%.
I see now why you have kept arguing with me for so long. You didn't understand the facts.
Well I know what *YOU* think it was about, because that's what you've been told.
What it was actually about was 2 Senators and some Congressmen upsetting the balance in Washington DC, and thereby cutting off the millions of dollars the Northern Industrialists were getting by controlling the Congress and passing laws which siphoned money out of the South to go into their own pockets.
The fight in Kansas was about control of Washington DC. It was never about actual slavery, just whether Kansas would support the Southern states, or the Northern states.
Expanding slavery was what it was about.
Yeah, because Kansas is a well known cotton growing state.
Get real. People spout this stuff because they've never bothered to question the things they've been told.
It was literally impossible to create any significant slave presence in Kansas in the 1850s. There was nothing slaves could do in that state which would make it worth sending them there.
Slaves could produce real money in Mississippi or Louisiana, because they could grow cotton, but in Kansas? There was literally nothing they could do thaty would be worth the cost of having slaves in that state.
LOL. So you think
1. That all the money in the country was tariff money.
2. That the South generated 72% of that money with their cotton exports?
Do I have that correct?
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