Pelham: "Your fantasy world leads to astray once again. I don’t have any soft spot for Woodrow Wilson."
Of course not, but still you want to blame Teddy Roosevelt for things Wilson did -- why is that?
Pelham: "Woodrow Wilson, the progessive president of Princeton University; Wilson the spokesman for progressivism in higher education; Wilson the Governor of the northern State of New Jersey.
Of course that part of Wilson’s biography doesn’t help your usual obsession so it’s understandable why you’d choose to pretend that it doesn’t exist."
Of course, I understand all that -- Wilson was the DEI hire of his time, beneficiary of the late 19th century Great Reconciliation whitewash and Lost Cause revisions of real Civil War history.
All brought to us courtesy of the ancient alliance of Northern and Southern Democrats, which had ruled the US for 60 years before 1861 and by 1912 was struggling to reestablish its dominance over American politics.
Woodrow Wilson, of course, was a child of not just the South, but of the Confederacy itself -- he had grown up as a child in the Confederacy during the Civil War, and that outlook shaped his views of not just US politics but also international relations.
Pelham: "Nor do I have a soft head, which is why I don’t blame Wilson for policies that were initiated by Teddy Roosevelt and Republicans in Congress."
But why then would you try to absolve Wilson of blame for policies that his own Democrat party advocated in its 1912 platform?
For starters, we can mention the 16th and 17th Amendments -- Income Tax and Direct Election of Senators.
Wilson's December 1913 Federal Reserve Act was not specifically mentioned in Democrats' 1912 platform, however it passed with almost unanimous Democrat support and majority Republican opposition.
Pelham: "Only fools ignore Teddy’s speeches in favor of creating the income tax.
Of the income tax Amendment circulating during the Taft presidency.
Or of ignoring the Republican Congress writing the bills that created the Fed."
Nobody denies that Teddy Roosevelt's 1912 Bull Moose party was the Progressive Party, and advocated a long list of "progressive" causes.
But only a soft-headed fool ignores the glaring fact that Teddy's Bull Moosers were defeated in 1912 by the even more progressive Southern Democrats under Woodrow Wilson.
In 1913, The Federal Reserve Act was supported almost unanimously by Democrats, while opposed by the majority of Republicans.
I'm only saying here: don't blame Teddy for actions taken by a child of the Confederacy, Woodrow Wilson.
Wilson was a DEI hire of the Great Reconciliation and a scholarly intellectual of Progressivism, on a level that outdoorsman Teddy Roosevelt could never be.