Posted on 05/16/2018 1:36:01 PM PDT by Kaslin
This is a story of priorities and hypocrisy, brought to us by a president who saved the Union and was murdered for it, and a president whose policies and malevolence damaged both the nation and the world, and who is being rewarded for it.
The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation is in trouble. It is auctioning off non-Lincoln related artifacts in an effort to pay back a loan that is coming due. You see, the Lincoln Library doesn’t make a lot of money or attract enough major donors to operate. This is odd, considering President Lincoln is a “favorite” president for so many of today’s modern politicians.
Lincoln wasn’t just a regular touchstone, as an example, for the now super wealthy Barack Obama, he was used to help get Mr. Obama elected as president. Mr. Obama’s affinity for, and similarity to, Mr. Lincoln was made clear to us by his sycophantic legacy media.
“In the last couple of years, several best-selling books have focused on the life and political skills of the nation’s 16th president. And one man in particular has taken a particular interest in not just reading about the Illinois politician, but also modeling himself politically after him. That man: Barack Obama, who will be sworn in as the nation’s 44th — and first African-American — president Tuesday …,” gushed CNN on Jan. 19, 2009.
The New York Times told us, “Not since Lincoln has there been a president as fundamentally shaped — in his life, convictions and outlook on the world — by reading and writing as Barack Obama.” Obama the bookworm. And even better than Lincoln.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
That's not Lincoln.
That's some stupid tagline somebody came up with a few years back.
Peaceful secession by mutual consent was a possibility, but that's not the path the Confederates took.
The idea that states were obligated to remain permanently attached to people whom they wished to be rid of, was debated at the time. Many believed a Union voluntarily joined could be voluntarily left. Others believed that independence, once surrendered, was permanently forfeit.
That is a false dichotomy. What you're ignoring is the secessionists refusal to work for their goals within the existing system. Many places in the world today work for independence by mutual consent. Why was that so hard for the secessionists to do?
You keep putting this on the Confederates who did not attack for three months until someone sent a fleet of warships with orders to use force to keep the unwanted guests in their home. (and to make sure they continued paying the duties ordered by Washington DC.)
Had that fleet of warships not been sent, they would have had no need to attack at all.
And while we are on the subject, I find it immensely curious that I have only learned of this war fleet in the last few years. I consider it to be quite relevant to the events there, yet I had heard no word of it until relatively recently. I think discussion of it has been actively discouraged by most of the history book writers because it confuses the issue of who started the war.
All most people have ever heard is that the confederates fired on Ft. Sumter. Nobody ever tells them that Lincoln sent a belligerent fleet of warships against them, and this is what triggered it. It's as if they want this little detail covered up, because it's harder to sell the "we were attacked for no apparent reason" claim when you find out about the warships.
Even my friend who first put me on to this line of thinking, never mentioned there was a bunch of warships sent. I doubt he even knows about it.
But getting back to the point, getting "permission" to leave an organization is a form of slavery in and of itself. It means you don't control your own destiny. Others control it for you.
That is a false dichotomy. What you're ignoring is the secessionists refusal to work for their goals within the existing system.
In a democracy consisting of 4 wolves and a sheep, the goal is to have the sheep for dinner. There is no methodology whereby the sheep was going to get relief within the existing system.
Many places in the world today work for independence by mutual consent. Why was that so hard for the secessionists to do?
I'll bite. Tell me your plan for allowing the Southerners to get out of the laws and taxes imposed on them? What concessions would they have had to make to get the independence they wanted?
I will tell you that I believe there never could have been any such plan, because the entire reason Lincoln wanted them to remain under his control is precisely to insure the revenue they produced would continue flowing through New York and into Washington DC.
No plan that didn't keep the money flowing would be accepted. Money was the entire point of suppressing their independence. Read Lincoln's speech about "and to collect the duties and imposts..."
I think you might want to retreat from this thought, because if you go down this road and try to find some plan that would allow the south to leave by mutual consent, you will see the reality of it. Once seen, it cannot be unseen. You will start to notice that everything converges on this point of money.
Then make the money work for you. Modern day protesters in the US and South Africa recognized that pictures of police attacking peaceful protesters would eventually be bad for business.
Obviously, secessionists didn't have the information and experience that 20th century organizers did, but surely they could have forseen that working out a solution that would be acceptable to both sides was the only way to keep the peace. But they didn't want peace. They wanted to lash out with force. So they chose to act unilaterally and ultimately militarily.
If Davis had said that he wouldn't fire the first shot , or better still, if he and his cronies had stayed in Congress to work out a solution acceptable to both sides, there wouldn't have been a war -- or at least not a war started by the secessionists -- but they didn't because they wanted war (or at least were willing to risk war) to get what they wanted.
There you go with the ad hominem stuff again.
You reduce history and the people in it into simplistic cliches: it's all about the money, and if it isn't it's about power and ego. If that's the case, what makes you any different? What makes you any more trustworthy and upright than anyone else? If you spread cynicism beyond its natural limits, don't be surprised if cynicism comes back to get at you.
My primary concern at that time was the possibility of being incinerated by Soviet Nuclear ICBMs (for Obvious reasons growing up next to a US Military base)
Missile bases are in places where not many people live, right? The military and the government don't want large civilian populations to be destroyed by enemies attacking our nuclear weapons. So wherever you lived wasn't likely to be a major commercial or financial or industrial or educational or cultural or media or political center.
But that's okay. Different parts of the country play different roles and develop attitudes based on the roles they play. If by some chance your hometown became an economic and cultural center, you'd either have all the "New York City" faults that you attack, or you'd still be complaining about the horrible sophisticates in Minot or Cheyenne or Great Falls and how they look down on the rest of the country.
My point is: if you have a rich and successful country, you will have some places richer than others and they'll have attitudes that are different from those that prevail in other parts of the country. Just like you'll have some people who are much richer than other people. But that's okay. It's something the country can life with and something we can't avoid if we have an economy that is rich enough and complicated enough.
One side wanted to continue dining on their production, and that same side didn't want them setting up competition.
Where is the wiggle room here?
They wanted to lash out with force. So they chose to act unilaterally and ultimately militarily.
That's propaganda. They tried negotiating for over three months to get Anderson to leave Sumter, so trigger happy they weren't. Even then, had Lincoln not sent the warships, Sumter would have been resolved peacefully.
Of course Lincoln would have then insisted on starting it in Pensacola. His orders to Porter were going to start a war there if one didn't happen in Charleston.
If Davis had said that he wouldn't fire the first shot , or better still, if he and his cronies had stayed in Congress to work out a solution acceptable to both sides, there wouldn't have been a war
What solution could have been acceptable to both sides? You have the paying side, and the receiving side, and the payee doesn't want to continue paying, and the receiving side doesn't want to lose any money, and D@mn sure didn't want competing businesses set up in the South, so how are you gonna compromise?
It would have always come down to them wanting to leave, and the North wanting to stop them.
but they didn't because they wanted war (or at least were willing to risk war) to get what they wanted.
Independence? To not be controlled by the Wolf Fest at Washington DC? I want that now, and I think a whole lot of other people would like to stop sending tribute to our ruling class.
You reduce history and the people in it into simplistic cliches: it's all about the money, and if it isn't it's about power and ego. If that's the case, what makes you any different? What makes you any more trustworthy and upright than anyone else?
I don't gain anything. My bread is not buttered from either side being in the right, the blood of my ancestors does not cry out in distress because I take a specific position, so I have no ulterior motive to favor anybody. I can call it as I see it.
I also see myself as a philosopher. There are larger truths out there if we would but see them.
My point is: if you have a rich and successful country, you will have some places richer than others and they'll have attitudes that are different from those that prevail in other parts of the country.
Well see, i've been studying a lot of things for quite awhile, and I have noticed an odd correlation between money and liberalism. I've also learned that scads of other people have noticed this same correlation, and so it gives me encouragement that this is a real effect. I think the effect is even more pronounced when the beneficiaries of wealth have done very little to earn it, or even nothing at all. They develop "guilt" after a fashion, and so feel the need to speak out for the poor and oppressed, usually in some manner calling for government to do more for the poor and oppressed rather than themselves.
They don't lose all sense of proportion you see. :)
But I'm not against people being rich. I'm against rich people using their power and influence to tamper with the Government to keep themselves enriched or to provide benefits to their friends.
I'm against the collusion between the rich and the "deep state", "establishment", "Uniparty" that we have running Washington DC now.
And which I think was a permanent consequence of Lincoln's empowerment and war.
If it was, why complain about it every day? And if you are just going to keep repeating the same thing over and over and over again, what is to be gained from conversing with you?
But if war was inevitable that had more to do with people's mindset, not material factors. A generation that was more politically and diplomatically skilled would have been able to effect a peaceful solution.
The flaw in your theory is that the North was richer than you think and economically developed enough to do without the cotton states. There was no need to crack down on them if that would mean further secessions and fissures in the republic. The Confederates, by contrast, wanted those secessions and fissures. They wanted a weaker United States, and they were willing to risk war to get what they wanted.
But discussing anything with you is pointless because you just keep repeating the same hackneyed theory over and over again, as though you had some Marxist crystal ball that tells you exactly what was going to happen even if people acted differently.
It is clearly the case that secession was going to take a big heap of money away from the North and it would then be distributed through the South. Yes, the facts clearly support that this would have happened.
If it was, why complain about it every day? And if you are just going to keep repeating the same thing over and over and over again, what is to be gained from conversing with you?
Well I don't know. I presume you and others must see some merit in it, for you persist. :)
But if war was inevitable that had more to do with people's mindset, not material factors. A generation that was more politically and diplomatically skilled would have been able to effect a peaceful solution.
I don't see any reasonable suggestions as to how that could have worked. The Northern coalition had gotten the government to tax the Southerners for their benefit, and passed other laws to keep them from getting a competitive leg up. The Northerners (especially the wealthy captains of industry) liked the situation they had the South in, and they probably felt the South deserved it because slavery was evil, and so they were doing their part to make the world a better place by getting a big cut of the Wealth that would otherwise go to those slave owners.
What bone could have or would have been thrown to the South? Apart from the financial issues involved, i've read quite a few accounts where people were utterly fed up with being portrayed as the incarnation of evil on the earth, and so they just wanted to tell their moral superiors to go f*** themselves.
(Kinda the way we feel about Liberals today preaching their "transgender" this and "girl-power" that.)
The flaw in your theory is that the North was richer than you think and economically developed enough to do without the cotton states.
That is*Not* a flaw in my theory. It is what happens when you use gunships to forceably prevent trade among people who would be kicking your @$$ in trade if they were allowed to trade freely with Europe. You cannot point to Europe's continued patronage of Northern trade as if it would have happened anyways without those gunboats.
This is like shooting someone in the leg and saying you would have won the race anyways because the other guy can't run very well. Well no he can't, with a gunshot in his leg. The South couldn't win a trade war in which they were forceably kept from trading, but without interference, they would have stomped the North in European trade, and would have eventually competed with them in Industry.
There was no need to crack down on them if that would mean further secessions and fissures in the republic. The Confederates, by contrast, wanted those secessions and fissures. They wanted a weaker United States, and they were willing to risk war to get what they wanted.
The fissures already existed, and I think a large part of it was both a consequence of the climate and of the demographic that settled the different areas. The South tended more Scottish, and the North tended more English and German. I've seen several writers contend that the Civil War was just a continuation of the English Civil War, and there are reasons to think this is probably correct.
And No, I don't think the South wanted a weaker United States, they just wanted a United States that would protect their interests, and not make them foot the bill for people in the North who hated them and constantly maligned them.
But discussing anything with you is pointless because you just keep repeating the same hackneyed theory over and over again, as though you had some Marxist crystal ball that tells you exactly what was going to happen even if people acted differently.
Yeah, it's called "Math" and "Economics."
What would take a crystal ball to see is how the South, producing 73-84% of all European trade would lose economic growth by getting back the 40% of their profit being absorbed by New York.
More money is going to make things worse for them economically? How does that work?
On the flip side, how is less money for New York going to make things better for New York? How is the trade that was ordinarily pushed into that city going to benefit New York if it went instead to the South?
We are all capitalists here. Capitalization fuels growth and economic activity. I can think of no circumstances in which more money and profit will not create more economic activity and jobs, and I doubt you can either, but you insist on believing it in the case of the South taking away the European trade from New York.
The time for negotiating was BEFORE they seceded and started stealing things. "Negotiating" at that late date was little different than hostage negotiations. No matter what, you know it isn't going to be pretty.
His orders to Porter were going to start a war there if one didn't happen in Charleston.
Bullshit
I also see myself as a philosopher.
Don't give up your day job (snicker).
And yet in real life the north economically recovered rather quickly.
The "stealing" was being done by the unwanted guests in their home.
I guess you missed the part about the positive cash flow caused by using warships to force all the traffic into your ports instead of where they would have gone without the coercion.
How well would they have done had that trade gone to the South where it would have gone without the cannons forcing it North?
That's nonsense. Southern Democrats had largely controlled Congress before the Civil War. Many plantation owners were rich. That was "the situation the South was in" during the 1840s and 1850s -- at least for the slave owners. The rest is speculation.
The country had been through a depression (the Panic of 1857) and there was a feeling that a modest increase in the tariff could get industry back and running again. And while debate about slavery was heated in the 1850s, I doubt budding industrialists saw the tariff and trade questions as North vs. South, freedom vs. slavery terms.
If anybody's paying attention, they'll note how you deny moral values and portray everything in materialistic terms, but in the tariff debate, which largely was based on economics, you want to make it moralistic -- and how you make the anti-slavery moralism that you claim to find there a bad thing.
What bone could have or would have been thrown to the South? Apart from the financial issues involved, i've read quite a few accounts where people were utterly fed up with being portrayed as the incarnation of evil on the earth, and so they just wanted to tell their moral superiors to go f*** themselves.
What bone? Plantation owners were doing just fine economically. They weren't being oppressed. They weren't losing out to Yankees.
And that business about "moral superiors" is wildly exaggerated. You tell us over and over again that Northerners didn't care about slavery. But now you tell us that they despised the plantation owners as morally inferior for owning slaves.
Aside from the moral complications involved in your view, it should be obvious to anybody who's paying attention that you are no authority on what America was like 150 years ago. You just project your own ideas and resentments about the present back on to the past.
(Kinda the way we feel about Liberals today preaching their "transgender" this and "girl-power" that.)
You ought to realize that equating opposition to transgender or feminists agendas with support for slavery weakens whatever case you think you're making about modern-day politics.
I'm talking about 1861. Secessionists already wanted their own country. They wanted out of the US and they wanted the US to be as weak as possible. Whatever they might have wanted years before, is there really any room for argument about that?
I can think of no circumstances in which more money and profit will not create more economic activity and jobs, and I doubt you can either, but you insist on believing it in the case of the South taking away the European trade from New York.
There was a relatively efficient economic system going at the time -- whatever one's moral judgment of it. Tear it apart and you don't necessarily get anything better. Thinking you can cut out the "middleman" and automatically grow rich is a mistake. Look at how many countries threw off the rule of foreign imperialists and actually ended up worse economically, and you'll see that your argument here is wrong.
That's because he's making it up as he goes along.
Both of those things are true at the same time. They didn't care about slaves themselves, they only cared about virtue signaling how moral they were by pretending to care about slaves. Despising the plantation owners was a means by which they could do this.
Seriously, look at the Liberal world view right now. Do they promote policies that actually help the underclass, or do they promote policies that make themselves feel good while doing nothing for the underclass?
Abortion is a liberal sacrament. Do you know how the abortion movement began, and who it was directed at? Were they really trying to help people, or were they just exploiting them? I think the abortion movement clarifies greatly how liberals perceived a certain group of people.
Actions speak louder than words.
And why would they want that? This sounds like the old saying about Russians who didn't want a cow for themselves, they just wanted their neighbor's cow to die.
There was a relatively efficient economic system going at the time -- whatever one's moral judgment of it. Tear it apart and you don't necessarily get anything better.
I think "better" would depend on whether you were on the receiving end of economic gain or not. Jobs would have moved south, and so would have some of the shipping industry. This would have stimulated further economic growth along all sorts of diverse industries.
Thinking you can cut out the "middleman" and automatically grow rich is a mistake.
If it were less profitable to do it some other way, what need for protectionist laws and tariffs? Do not their very existence serve as proof that costs would have been cut without them?
Look at how many countries threw off the rule of foreign imperialists and actually ended up worse economically, and you'll see that your argument here is wrong.
I only know this being true of backward third world countries. I don't know of any western style countries that did worse on their own.
Also, here is more proof of the "Deep State", that i've been talking about. Others are starting to see it too. It's going mainstream.
I guess so. He just slaps it together without much regard for sense or reason.
Wow. You mean that had ‘’virtue signaling ‘’ in 1861 huh?
“Talking to you is like talking to a brick wall’’. Like I’ve said , You can always tell Diogenes but you can’t tell him much.
Are you kidding me? It's a lot older than that.
Um, you know Lampster I don’t know what religion you are but I’m a Catholic, ok? And my Lord And Savior Jesus Christ, who takes away the sins of the world never needed to ‘’virtue signal’’. Got it? He is virtue itself. Jeez, ‘’x’’ is right about you. You’re a brick f**king wall alright.
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