One word: Mindbleach.
Posted on 11/16/2012 7:29:27 AM PST by Kaslin
Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln” is a different film than one would expect from the brilliant filmmaker responsible for unforgettable films like “Schindler’s List” and “Saving Private Ryan.” Unlike those two features, “Lincoln” takes place on a much smaller scale.
When its trailer arrived in theaters several months ago, many viewers undoubtedly believed that the film would attempt to tell Abraham Lincoln’s complete story, focusing on a young Illinois lawyer who became president and saved the Union from self-destruction. But this movie isn’t about that, nor is it simply a noble and simplistic tribute to the 16th President. The film is, instead, a well-told story about a good man who cajoled, manipulated and bravely fought to end slavery through the passage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution. p>
Despite the fact that the North was winning the Civil War when the amendment was passionately debated in Congress a few months after Lincoln's reelection, its passage was far from assured. To pass it, the president and his team of former rivals would have to overcome naysayers, pacifists and Democrats alike who were willing to do whatever was necessary to prevent it from becoming law.
The film begins with a brief battle sequence that shows the noble president watching as soldiers prepare for engagement. In the midst of the fighting, young men- who may lose their lives in a matter of moments—look lovingly at the quiet figure who sits above them. Like fans approaching their idol, they quote back to Lincoln portions of the Gettysburg Address and stand in quiet wonder at a man who they recognize is forever changing the course of their country.
As the film continues, it focuses less on the battlefield of war and more on the political landscape where the fight to pass the amendment is taking place. Instead of the grim details of war, Spielberg puts the camera in the dark halls of Congress where threats, manipulations and lies are all used to get legislators to say yes.
As the inevitable victory of the North over the South approaches, some legislators and members of Lincoln’s administration- including Secretary of State and one-time political rival William Steward (David Strathairn)—argue fervently that ending the war quickly should be their highest priority. Ending slavery, they state, is a secondary concern. Others, including the powerful Congressman Thaddeus Stevens (Tommy Lee Jones) are more focused on punishing the South after the war than anything else.
Lincoln rejects both ideas. He rejects the idea that ending the war at the cost of enduring more years of slavery is necessary and he disputes the notion that punishing the South after the war has ended is a noble goal. He is a man who yearns for peace but who is unwilling to compromise his values to achieve it.
Throughout the movie, Lincoln is depicted as something we don’t often view him as: a politician. Like a great politician, he is able to tell a grand story to a group of people with each believing that the story was intended for them. But unlike many politicians, Lincoln was—at considerable risk to both his political fortunes and his legacy— willing to fight for an unpopular position simply because above everything else, he knew it was right.
Many will likely dislike how Spielberg has settled his story around something as seemingly simple as the passage of an amendment. But in deciding to tell the story on a small scale, the director has brought attention to Lincoln the man-- rather than Lincoln the legend-- and made this great leader into a relatable figure who achieved greatness by never backing down from the principle that all men should be free.
Consider Lincoln’s high pitched voice. Then consider the rather ugly, scraggly bearded, bad skinned, really tall, skinny politician.
NOW, consider A. Lincoln (R) in front of TV cameras during a presidential debate. Could a man who sounded like that and also looked like that win ANYTHING today with today’s American electorate and media? No way, no how.
Chris (you know) would be hospitalized in an attempt to put a stop to his uncontrollable laughing at the (R).
I walked by the television (I don’t watch, my wife does) last night, and saw some clips from the movie, and they had this woman talking and offering commentary. I had seen her somewhere before, and then it occurred to me:
It was Doris Kearns-Goodwin.
I know I shouldn’t be, but I was shocked, and blurted out to my unappreciative wife in a loud voice: “I think that is Doris Kearns-Goodwin! What is that old plagarizing hag doing on national television offering commentary on anything?”
But, with even more anger, I remembered that if you are a liberal, that revolving door for soldierly liberals is always open, because they know the vast majority of idiots who watch their programming will forget a murder by a liberal a minute after it happens.
Just a plagarizing historian on national television offering her commentary. No harm, no foul.
Didn't she also bang the married LBJ back in the day?
Lewinski plagiarized Doris.
There are reports elsewhere that the book the movie is based on is not telling the truth. There are no historical records showing Lincoln spent those months shown in the film pushing through what became the 13th Amendment (Passed by Congress on January 31, 1865). He and Grant were busy fighting the war. The Republican abolitionists got the amendment moving after Lincoln’s death as one the three Reconstruction Amendments adopted after the American Civil War.
The movie is a feel good story, but just that a story.
One word: Mindbleach.
A better question would be to ask people who Lincoln was. I’ll bet you a sizable percentage of Americans, mostly Dems, wouldn’t know who he was. My brother knew an adult employee who didn’t know who Lincoln was. The man was born and raised in the U.S.
Thanks for the first good laugh I've had all day. Ever consider a career in comedy?
Yeah, too bad we still don't have slavery. Because that was such a noble concept.
Well, I guess a whole new generation knows who Lincoln is now that this movie is out.
I’m sure anyone in the South that had their city burned to the ground, or their house ransacked/crops stolen would find your sentiments ‘comical’.
“They needlessly terrorized and plundered the civilian population of the south.”
I prefer to agree with General Sherman: War is cruelty, and you cannot redefine it.
Further I would rather err on the side of caution. In the case of this cruelty advocated primarily by Sherman, and accepted by Grant, then Lincoln himself, the purpose was logical. And that was to make the south, for several generations at least, to never try again for secession. And I argue that Sherman was right.
Let’s just contrast Sherman’s idea of warfare with limited wars we have had since WW2. None of them really worked out well. Yet the last foes we vanquished in WW2, are all thriving democratic governments who have abandoned their aggressive ways. 3 for 3, right there in WW2. At the very least you should acknowledge that the strategy was done for reasons other than revenge.
And I’m guessing the millions of black Americans who after the war no longer had a some peson telling them that they were owned wouldn’t find it comical.
I was not speaking of slavery and you know it.
Don't set up a straw horse and then bravely knock it down.
If you want to debate at that level you belong at D.U.
....And what did Lincoln do for THEM after the war? Little to nothing......
Sorry.
The historical record makes it clear that there was extreme hate and disdain for southerners motivating many of the nothern commanders and forces, especially in the waning days of the war.
Sherman's final destructive march cannot be explained away as a military necessity. There was almost a religious fervor to drive the south to its knees - to grind what was left into ashes and dust. The burning amd sacking of broken, destitute cities full of starving, war weary civilians is a black mark on America's soul.
Since you bring up WWII, I point out that postwar, the USA government was kinder, by far, to the defeated Japanese and Germans than to their fellow Americans in the southern states of their own country at the end of the Civil War.
I wonder if it shows The Noble President working to deport all of America’s blacks to Central America, the Caribbean and Africa once he had freed them?
or is that non-modern part of Saint Abe too inconvenient to be allowed to intrude upon the modern myth?
“His focus was to save the Union, not free the slaves”
Anyone who doubts this needs to read Frederick Douglass’ speech at the 10 year memorial of Lincoln’s death. While he was grateful that Lincoln ended slavery he had no illusions about why Lincoln had done it.
Preserving the Union was the overriding issue to Lincoln and this gets lost in the modern preoccupation with race and slavery. You need only to read Lincoln’s own letter to Horace Greeley:
Executive Mansion,
Washington, August 22, 1862.
Hon. Horace Greeley:
Dear Sir.
I have just read yours of the 19th. addressed to myself through the New-York Tribune. If there be in it any statements, or assumptions of fact, which I may know to be erroneous, I do not, now and here, controvert them. If there be in it any inferences which I may believe to be falsely drawn, I do not now and here, argue against them. If there be perceptable in it an impatient and dictatorial tone, I waive it in deference to an old friend, whose heart I have always supposed to be right.
As to the policy I “seem to be pursuing” as you say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt.
I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be “the Union as it was.” If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.
I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men every where could be free.
Yours,
A. Lincoln.
Yes but it seems to be human nature to deify leaders who preside over immensely destructive wars as long as they win.
All you need to do is look at the Marble Temples to various Caesars, similar to the temple located opposite The Custis-Lee House at the far end of the Memorial Bridge...
Of course Sherman thought war against fellow Americans should be cruel. Sherman was widely considered to be a madman even by his own allies.
One of his directives was to have civilians taken hostage and shot in regions where snipers were active. After WWII this same behavior got German officers executed for committing war crimes.
Should the North have lost the war and Sherman have been captured, he would have been absolved of war crimes by reason of insanity.
+1. I think Lincoln sucked.
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