Posted under Conservatism & Lincoln & Political Philosophy & The South
Check out “How Did ‘Conservatives’ Become Lincoln-Worshipers” by our friend Michael at the Southern Nationalist Network. I’m not crazy about the designation “nationalist,” but Michael is doing some good work over there.
Posted under Lincoln & Sovereignty and Secession
One of the more notable deaths of 2012 which went unnoticed was that Thomas Naylor. The Mississippi-born Naylor who was an economics professor at Duke, started an organization entitled “The Second Vermont Republic” an organization dedicated to restore Vermont as an independent county as it was after Revolutionary War until 1795. Naylor started SVR in 2003 in the wake of the Iraq War and with the Help of Kirkpatrick Sale accomplished making secession being more than something “Southern”. Secessionist history and movement and independent republics have existed throughout American history in all corners of the country.
Naylor’s recent death may very well deflate the SVR movement, as per usual when original and charismatic persons pass away. While there are persons ready to take Naylor’s place who believe in the SVR cause, politically it remains impotent and doesn’t have very many activists. It’s growth took place during the Bush II Administration when there was some thought of a “permanent” Republican majority might have made some leftist Vermonters to wonder if breaking away from the U.S. was a feasible idea. Since Obama took over, forget about it. As one wag put it “What’s the worst nightmare of a SVR member? An Obama presidency.”
Of course as SVR member will point out not a lot has changed between the previous two administrations but to the kind of Vermonter the group had to convince to join that doesn’t matter. Our gang is in power, everything else is just gravy. And the same goes to the opposite end of the political spectrum. Talk to me all you want about all these secession petitions given over the White House web site but in terms of raw numbers it doesn’t mean much in comparison to the number of registered voters in each state. Even in Texas, which had the highest amount of petitions, the totals are but a drop in the bucket compared to the state’s population. Obama’s Administration really hasn’t sparked secessionists movements. Southern Republicans dream about taking back the whole country, not how they’re going to break away from it lest they might have to pay the full costs for all the goodies they get back from the Feds. Even in Europe where there are strong nationalist and secessionist parties and serious movements, the results are still disappointing. Scotland will hold a referendum soon but few think it will pass and Catlans couldn’t figure out which independence party they wanted to back, during recent local elections and their cause has been put into some doubt, and this amid the worst economic crisis since the depression.
However, it should be pointed out secession has ceased being the taboo subject it was perhaps 20 to 30 years ago. It has happened around the world, peacefully in some cases (Czech Republic and Slovakia) and violently in others (Sudan, East Timor). A West which basically tore the old Yugoslavia asunder can’t claim secession is illegitimate cause. Even in the U.S., the fact that Rick Perry revived his political career in 2009 just by mouthing such sentiments shows the same to be true. As I said the work of people like Naylor has helped in this regard and will be his legacy.
Posted under History & Lincoln & Movies & The South
We Southerners know that history is on our side. Defenders of the Empire who try to cherry-pick historical facts usually end up looking rather silly. Yes, we say to apologists of empire, let’s debate history. Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln is the latest attempt to justify the president who mounted a counter-revolution to the Revolution of 1776, thus re-establishing the supremacy of the government over the people.
But the reaction of fans and critics hasn’t exactly been what Spielberg expected. For starters, Daniel Day-Lewis’s portrayal of Lincoln fails to create a believable, sympathetic character. One fan echoed the reaction of many others: “Is it me or does Abe Lincoln sound a lot like Mr Burns?”
Rex Reed’s review, entitled, Arid Abe: Lincoln Is as Wooden as Washington’s Teeth, not only rips Spielberg’s clumsy propaganda, but goes on to present facts about Lincoln and the real purpose of his crusade formerly seen only in pro-Southern circles.
The movie, says Reed, is a “colossal bore.” He finds it “so pedantic, slow-moving, sanitized and sentimental that I kept pinching myself to stay awake—which, like the film itself, didn’t always work.” Ouch.
And in response to the film’s heavy-handed Lincoln worship, which is really empire-worship, Reed observes:
In reality, Lincoln believed in equality under the law, but not racial equality; he had no use for blacks and maintained a strong personal belief that whites were a superior race. In his efforts to get his amendment passed, Honest Abe was not so honest either. He and his cabinet of rivals were not above bribery, lies, suspending habeas corpus or bending the Constitution to break the South’s economic infrastructure.
What’s that? Lincoln’s war was NOT about freeing the slaves, but just another war for power and treasure? Do tell.
Posted under Lincoln & NeoCons
Dishonest Abe is the “favorite president” of one of the web’s most bloodthirsty war cheerleaders. Surprise, surprise.
See this link for background on why sofa samurai, chickenhawks, laptop bombardiers, and ordinary emperor worshipers just LOVE Abe Lincoln.
Posted under Culture & Lincoln & Movies & The South
#3 this weekend at $16.5 million. It’s budget was $70 million.
I knew it was going to flop, but was still rooting hard that it would. I have been in a couple of movies where there was a trailer for ALVH and the general audience response was not “That looks cool” or “I’ve gotta see that” but “Huh?” and “What?” The movie is based off a popular book, but if you aren’t familiar with the book then the premise just seems stupid.
It couldn’t happen to a better fictionalized President. We already have to put up with the equally farcical Abraham Lincoln as great President and Abraham Lincoln as savior of the nation, do we really need Abraham Lincoln as vampire slayer?
Posted under Lincoln & Sovereignty and Secession & States Rights & Terrorism & The South
Justin Raimondo at AntiWar.com argues Americans cannot stand up to DC’s assault on civil liberties until they first repudiate Lincoln’s legacy.
This can’t possibly be true! Obama is a liberal Democrat! But most of all, he HAS to be on the people’s side because he isn’t white. The most learned political theorists have proven whites are reactionary, while blacks are progressive.
I’m all befuddled. No one could have seen this coming…
… unless … they paid attention to the fact that Wall Street has showered Obama with contributions.
Sayyyy … that sounds familiar. An ambitious politician expands the central government and the office of president for the benefit of big business, while claiming he’s a man of “the people.” Hasn’t this act been done before?
Posted under Lincoln & Polls & Sovereignty and Secession & States Rights & The South
Posted under Conservatism & Election 2012 & Lincoln & Political Philosophy
Newt Gingrich is running for President.
Reading or listening to Gingrich makes me physically ill. (I exaggerated only ever so slightly.) He is a verbose windbag who enjoys listening to himself talk and thinks his babbling is a substitute for actual thought.
Newt is not now, never has been and never will be a conservative. He is a free-market techno futurist who throws in occasional references to the Founders and God and American “Ideals” (based on the proposition nation myth) when it suits him. He used to avoid much mention of God even but has thrown in more references to God lately since he is trying to get back in the good graces of values voters whose favor he fell out of for violating the Seventh Commandment.
He is also a Lincoln idolater who has no understanding of the actual federated republic the Founders left us. His America is a centralized Idea Nation. Newt’s Founder is more Toffler than Madison. His “conservatism” more Jaffa than Kirk.
The problem is that too many “conservatives,” who aren’t grounded in actual conservatism, are easily wowed by his ramblings. The thought of watching a debate that includes Newt makes me cringe. He will babble some technocratic wonk speak with a few buzz words thrown in and many rank-and-file conservatives will mistake it for erudition.
I really don’t know if I will be able to take it. Would I be forgiven for sitting this primary season out lest I plunge a screwdriver into my ear while watching a future debate just to make the pain stop. I love Ron Paul and all, but I’m not sure it’s worth it.
Posted under Lincoln
This is a couple of days old, but here is an Ilana Mercer article on Lincoln from World Net Daily on the occasion of his birthday.
It is nice to see the truth about Lincoln getting out at conservative outlets like WND.
Would this article have seen the light of day at a WND like site 10 to 15 years ago?
Posted under Lincoln & Sovereignty and Secession & States Rights
Garland Favorito of Voter GA, on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of South Carolina’s secession from the Union, offers us this take on the War Between the States.
The 150th anniversary of South Carolina’s attempted secession and America’s most devastating war gives us a new chance to understand the key to how our federal government can no longer be easily be controlled. But we must reevaluate what we have learned because the history of all war is written from the perspective of the victor.
Cross posted at IPR. Check out the comment thread there. An interesting debate.
Posted under Lincoln & Political Correctness & Sovereignty and Secession & The South
Here is a Dr. Thomas DiLorenzo’s article debunking the latest nonsense from the Lincoln Cult.
The article is factually correct, of course, but I don’t like the way DiLorenzo often calls people in the North (including Lincoln) “racists,” “bigots” and “white supremacists.” This is a way of basically saying, “See it wasn’t just the South that was racist, the North was racist too.” But what DiLorenzo is condemning are racial beliefs that were ubiquitous to almost all white men in America at the time. It amounts to hindsight finger wagging. If he wants to hindsight condemn the past attitudes of people that’s fine, but he should acknowledge that is what he is doing, and not do it by expropriating the modern language of past hating Cultural Marxists. Does empowering the past haters by adopting their language and hindsight moralizing help advance the cause of returning to the Constitution as originally intended?
Posted under Lincoln & States Rights & The South
Every so often American Spectator serves up one of these pro-Lincoln gems. If you just ate you may want to hold off on reading it so you don’t lose your lunch. My thoughts are in the comment section, and in general my fellow commenters are making me proud. Pro-Lincoln hagiography no longer goes unchallenged on conservative websites, as it should be.
Does anyone know anything about the author Roger Kaplan? I’ve Googled him and have found out some stuff, but I’m curious what his educational background is. This article is pure Jaffaite Lincoln revisionism.
Does speaking out against a war constitute terrorism? These government goons think so:
FBI agents searched eight homes in Chicago and Minnesota on Friday as part of an investigation the law enforcement agency said related to “the material support of terrorism.” No arrests were made related to the raids, FBI spokesmen in Minneapolis and Chicago said….
The FBI did not release the names of the targets and said the search warrants were under seal.
Minneapolis peace activist Mick Kelly’s apartment was searched, and agents confiscated computer hard drives, his cell phone, writings, and his passport, Kelly and his lawyer said.
“It’s harassment at the highest level of those of us who have spoken out and tried to build an anti-war movement,” said Kelly, who helped lead marches during the 2008 Republican party convention in Minneapolis.
“It’s an attempt to trample on our right to speak out against U.S. intervention abroad. It’s outrageous on every level,” he said.
There’s a precedent for accusing critics of providing material support to the enemy — and of course, Abraham Lincoln set it:
After Congressman Clement Vallandigham of Ohio charged Lincoln with waging war “for the purpose of crushing out liberty and erecting a despotism” and “restrain[ing] the people of their liberties,” General Ambrose Burnside arrested him for “disloyal practice[s] affording aid and comfort to Rebels.” The arrest triggered a substantial outcry from Lincoln’s opponents and supporters alike….
Lincoln defended the arrest because he believed that Vallandigham “was laboring, with some effect, to prevent raising of troops [and] to encourage desertions from the army.” “Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts,” Lincoln asked, “while I must not touch a hair of a wily agitator who induced him to desert?”
In fact, Vallandigham had confined himself to general criticism of the war and of Lincoln and had not urged his audience to disobey the law.
To Lincoln, speaking out against his war was treason. We saw that same attitude in the early days of the Iraq War when Neocon David Horowitz demanded that anti-war protesters be prosecuted as saboteurs.
If we are to resist modern-day tyranny, we must repudiate Lincoln’s legacy, which claims the primary allegiance of all Americans is to the central government.
Posted under Interventionism & Lincoln & Politics
Yesterday, I wrote that Beck’s rally at the Lincoln shrine was a snare and delusion; instead of a call to restore liberty by downsizing the central government, it cheered on the aggressive, unrestrained use of force at home and abroad under the fig leaf of promoting civil rights.
Sarah Palin’s speech at that rally confirms my view. Here’s a partial transcript:
There in the distance stands the monument to the Father of Our Country. And behind me, the towering presence of the Great Emancipator — he secured our union at the moment of its most perilous time and freed those whose captivity was our greatest shame.
And over these grounds where we are so honored to stand today, we feel the spirit of the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He, who on this very day two score and seven years ago, gave voice to a dream that would challenge us to honor the sacred charters of our liberty that all men are created equal.
Now in honoring these giants, these giants who are linked by a solid rock foundation of faith in the one true God of justice – in honoring them, we must not forget the ordinary men and women on whose shoulders they stood. The ordinary called for extraordinary bravery. I’m speaking, of course, of America’s finest, our men and women in uniform, a force for good in this country and that is nothing to apologize for.
Abraham Lincoln once spoke of the mystic chords of memory stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land. And for over two hundred years, those mystic chords have bound us in gratitude to those who are willing to sacrifice, to restrain evil, to protect God-given liberty, to sacrifice all in defense of our country.
They fought for its freedom at Bunker Hill, they fought for its survival at Gettysburg and for the ideals on which it stands – liberty and justice for all – on a thousand battlefields far from home.
“Fought for its survival at Gettysburg”? H. L. Mencken debunked that lie decades ago.
In other words, if we are to believe the Beck-Palin view of history, Leviathan is the source of all good, and those who oppose it deserve to be crushed. If you’re a patriotic American in the Beck-Palin mold, you understand that citizen surveillance, reconstruction at home, and militarism abroad are noble endeavors we must support with our blood and treasure.
I’m calling game, set, and match.
Quod erat demonstrandum.
Posted under FOX News & Lincoln & Media & NeoCons & The South
I try not to watch the MSM very often, but today I tuned into Glenn Beck for his “Founders Friday” program. Sadly, it turned out to be nothing more than a pitch to the multiculturalists where he praised the efforts of black Americans throughout history, particularly in the War for Independence. Beck and his guest David Barton were groveling at the feet of those who demand that history should be studied from month to month, each month honoring some ethnic minority wronged by evil white males, past and present. Nothing new.
I certainly wasn’t surprised by any of this, but what really got under my skin was the fact that Beck and Barton both made time in this program to bash the South replete with very glaring historical inaccuracies. Beck prides himself on “rediscovering” historical narratives which differ greatly from the Establishment’s verion, yet today he revealed himself to be thoroughly hypocritical and inconsistent. I was never a huge fan of Beck before all of this, but he now has zero integrity as far as I’m concerned. Continue Reading »
Posted under Lincoln & NeoCons & Political Correctness & Race & Sovereignty and Secession & Survival of the West & The South
Nothing is quite so striking as the spectacle of self-righteous and self-professed anti-racist crusaders flamboyantly demonstrating their sincerity by unleashing torrents of vicious bigotry. Virginia’s Governor Bob McDonnell’s decision to honor the Old Dominion’s Confederate ancestors has enraged the neoconservative and progressive left, who have used the occasion to indulge their ethnic hatred of the Southern people, while simultaneously endeavoring to discredit the Jeffersonian ideals upon which America itself was built.
I am often taken aback at, not just the hypocrisy of the anti-Southerners, but the sheer blindness and ignorance of that hypocrisy on the part of the hypocrites. Many anti-Southern bigots are not at all cognizant of the fact of their own ethnic hatred, or that it is ethnic hatred, and those that are aware of it wear that hatred as a badge of honor. Just peruse the comments section at any of these sites – so many on the left measure their own anti-racism by how passionate they are in their hatred of the Southern people. The idea that Southern people should think to honor their heritage without ritually shaming themselves is almost literally blasphemous to that corner of the left. They are outraged at such a prospect, and the sheer brazenness of their bigotry is breathtaking.
Neoconservatives are not exactly known for their robust sense of propriety, but even by their philistinish standards David Frum’s boorishness is exceptional. This Canadian presumes to dictate which Americans may and may not celebrate their heritage, and how those that may should go about it. He scoffs at the idea that Confederate soldiers “fought for their homes and communities and Commonwealth”. The idea that men might take up arms to defend their homes from invaders is strange and exotic to David Frum – a notion hardly to be believed. To neoconservatives in general it seems to be an alien concept. Perhaps this ignorance on the part of neoconservatives of such a basic and natural (and healthy) compulsion explains in part why they seem so genuinely stunned when those people they send our soldiers to conquer take up arms and resist.
Jesse Jackson, in response to Gov. McDonnell’s proclamation, displayed an impressive gift for multitasking by race-baiting and lying at the same time. And he didn’t even drop any race-bait! During his customary post-racial-controversy performance he makes the ludicrous claim that the GOP is “in hock to their Southern, neo-Confederate base.” Perhaps someone should inform the League of the South of this fact. He goes on to wage rhetorical war against our Constitution and therefore the idea of America itself, concentrating his fire on the Tenth Amendment, urging “Let us not forget the sordid history of states’ rights, bound up in defending slavery, segregation, secession, and sedition”. In Jesse Jackson’s never-ending three card monte act he has here sleeved the Confederate card and switch it for a Constitutional one, in the process maligning the founding American ideal that “whenever any form of government becomes destructive to (Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness), it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government” as seditious. It is nothing short of an attack on the idea of self-government itself, which is the great enemy of the left in America. Were the people of the sovereign states to regain the proper measure of self government the left would find its policies expunged from the great swaths of America that never wanted them and never voted for them, and the left would find themselves governing only their own lives instead of everyone else’s.
The ignorance on display in a great many of these condemnations is so extreme as to be literally incredible. Ta-Nehisi Coates makes the farcical claim that the Confederate battle flag was “raised explicitly to destroy this country (the U.S.).” I can scarcely credit that a senior editor for The Atlantic actually believes that. Presumably he has attended some college at least, and if not then high school. As such I would be stunned to find that Coates is sincerely ignorant of the fact that the Confederacy never attempted or planned to “destroy” the United States, but merely to leave them. He is either profoundly ignorant as to the nature of the War Between the States or a liar, and I’m leaning toward liar.
This controversy has brought out all that is ugly about the left – its intolerance, its bigotry, its viciousness and its philistinism: qualities the left flamboyantly feigns to abhor except when they are used to humiliate Southerners. The sons of the great state of Virginia can look to their history for inspiration in repelling this attack on their home and heritage.
UPDATE:
Pat Buchanan weighs in on the controversy, and Huffington Post blogger Dr. Jonathan David Farley rejects my argument that the Confederates never intended or attempted to “destroy” the United States.
Those who feign outrage that a celebration of Confederate history does not contain a mea culpa for slavery are missing the point: a “celebration” focuses on positive achievements, by definition. To argue that Confederate History Month should dwell on slavery is akin to arguing that Martin Luther King Day should be utilized to examine MLK’s plagiarism and adultery and communist associations, or that Black History Month would be the appropriate time to emphasize and explore violent black-on-white crime or the incompetence and corruption that characterizes the governments of so many black African nations.
UPDATE II:
Jeff Schweitzer, the author of “The Confederacy: Kill the Myth Once and For All” over at HuffPo, has responded to my argument thusly:
“You are sadly mistaken. Your proposition that the United States would have continued is more naïve than I think you are. Once a state could secede whenever it did not like federal law, the Union would soon collapse. As proof, toward the end of the war, Confederate states were threatening to secede from the Confederacy! There is no way the South’s action could lead to anything but balkanization. Your argument is a bit pathetic really.”
Marvel at how anemic that argument is. This Schweitzer “served at the White House during the Clinton Administration as Assistant Director for International Affairs in the Office of Science and Technology Policy”, “was responsible for providing scientific and technological policy advice and analysis for Al Gore, President Clinton and President Clinton’s Science Advisor, and to coordinate the U.S. government’s international science and technology cooperation,” he “worked with the president’s cabinet and 22 U.S. Government technical agencies, and with countries throughout the world, in a broad range of fields including biology, physics, chemistry, geophysics, agriculture, oceanography and marine sciences,” and “was instrumental in establishing the permanent Global Forum on Science and Technology at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development to promote greater international scientific collaboration” – and that puerile, simplistic argument is the best he could come up with. He’s being earnest, too. Does that read to anyone here like the argument of a well educated adult? That this mediocre mind has risen to any position of prominence or influence is more proof that America has long since ceased being a meritocracy.
Posted under Lincoln & Sovereignty and Secession & The South
I think it is. This piece of Lincoln haigiography was posted at The American Spectator today. Notice the comments below the article. Ten years ago there would have been almost nothing but hearty “attaboys.” Five years ago even. But today you can’t get away with uncritical praise of Lincoln on conservative websites without being met with resistance. The debate is moving our way. There is hope. It’s faint. But there is hope.
Posted under Lincoln & Sovereignty and Secession & The South
Lincoln apologist Michael Zak reminds us that Thanksgiving Day was officially established by the great tyrant himself during his conquest of the South.
Hope I didn’t spoil your dinner.
Posted under Culture & Lincoln
Andrew Sullivan, who once rallied his fellow homosexuals to back the illegal invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq in the name of “gay liberation,” invokes the sacred image of Abraham Lincoln to argue for the Federal government to legalize same-sex “marriage” in the name of equality. After all, the people of the States have failed miserably, so why shouldn’t the central government take up the cause of “marriage equality”?
Can we fight a foreign war in the name of equality and deny equal rights at home? Looks like those Neocon chickens are coming home to roost — again.