February
24th 2007
Posted under Iraq & NeoCons & Political Correctness & Political Philosophy
The neocon rag the American Thinker (sic) gets the War for Southern Independence wrong.
It is typical Jaffaesq, neocon historical revision. You know the drill. Lincoln was fighting to preserve the Republic the Founders gave us, when of course he was actually fighting to destroy the Old Republic. The writer vilifies the northern Copperheads and compares them to today’s anti-War movement.
The Copperheads were patriotic Northern Americans who were opposing a tyrannical and oppressive regime that was aggressively invading a newly sovereign nation. Actually the anti-War conservative/Copperhead analogy is quite sound. I will let the anti-War left speak for itself.
Dan Phillips on 25 Feb 2007 at 12:00 am #
My biggest question is whether these Jaffaites actually believe that drivel, or do they know it is a lie and repeat it anyway to advance their agenda?
The assertion that Lincoln was fighting to free the slaves is so demonstrably false, that it amazes me that people continue to make such an astoundingly ahistorical claim. They are either foolishly deluded, blinded by ideological indoctrination, or intentionally engaging in deceit.
Which is it Wickham?
Lawrence Talbot on 25 Feb 2007 at 12:07 am #
Mr. Wickham writes, “Our Civil War threatened to destroy the free regime created by our Founders, and it threatened to create a regime in the South based explicitly on the tyranny of slavery.”
Whatever buddy.
So one region leaving a regime “destroys” what is left? That is how these state worshipers think.
Filmer on 25 Feb 2007 at 12:38 am #
Neo-Copperheads are not the neos we need to be worried about.
D. Kaiser on 25 Feb 2007 at 2:18 am #
This Lincoln cult stuff has got to stop. It is amazing to see otherwise intelligent, educated, civilized people fall for the demagogeury of someone like Lincoln. Anyone who seriously studies Lincoln’s justifications for his war on the South can see that he misunderstood the very foundations of American government by denying that the states which made up the union were ever sovereign entities. He actually put himself and his administration above the law! How are the rights and liberties of the citizens protected if government itself is not bound by law? I think those who adore Lincoln do so because they advocate unlimited government, or do not have the courage to admit something as horrendous as the ” Civil War” could be deliberately perpetrated on the American people by an American president. It’s hard to live up to the ” City on a hill” image if you have a Stalin in charge.
Frank B Lee on 25 Feb 2007 at 11:58 am #
Americans are ignorant and lazy.
They’ll believe anything about the War of Northern Aggression without checking up on the facts.
Anti-Federalist on 25 Feb 2007 at 1:50 pm #
The American Thinker? What a joke. It should be called American Group Thinker.
J.D. on 25 Feb 2007 at 3:47 pm #
Lincoln represents yet one more example in the trend of the disastrous centralization of power which has accompanied modernity.
Since Jaffa-ites are, by and large, think-tank denizens & defense analysts & Beltway politicos who feed from the public trough, it is hardly surprising to find that they fail to criticize the power-centralization in any serious way — nor is it surprising to find them treating Father Abraham the Divine Lawgiver as a surrogate for Jesus Christ.
After all, neocons are not going to bite the hand that feeds them tasty dinners at chic expensive restaurants on the ironically-named Constitution Avenue….
Thus the only proper response to “The American Thinker” is:
Squee! Squee!
Heeeeere, piggy piggy piggy piggy……
Dan Phillips on 25 Feb 2007 at 9:12 pm #
According to Lawrence Auster, the American Group Thinker (ha ha) has banned the word neocon because it is a code word.
A lot of deep thinking going on over there.
Frank B Lee on 25 Feb 2007 at 11:10 pm #
How does he respond to the fact that some neocons are not Jews, that Irving Kristol declared it an ideology, and that most Jews are not neocons?
I’m assuming he means neocon is code word for Jew.
Dan Phillips on 25 Feb 2007 at 11:30 pm #
Just to clarify, Lawrence Auster does not edit American Group Thinker. He sent them a submission which they rejected because he used the word “neocon.” He discussed it at his website. I will try to find the link.
Just for the sake of the argument, what if neocon sometimes is a codeword. If that is so, then the appropriate response should be to vehemently decry the PC atmosphere that makes codewords necessary.
Instead, AGT and those with a similar mindset are on an anti-codeword PC jihad.
Funny thing is that Lawrence Auster is very pro-Israel. He is just skeptical of the War.
Such is the sorry state of debate on the “right†these days.
John Wilkes Booth on 26 Feb 2007 at 12:54 pm #
Apt analogy indeed. both then and now an illegal, immoral, insane imperial war of aggression with shifting ‘cases belli’ and the real reasons often alluded to but not stated as such, i.e. abolition and oil/israel, but constantly invoked to whip up the faithful. And, like the Old South, today’s Far Right knew all along that APE Lincoln was ‘Black Republican’ abolitionist and El Presidente Jorge Bush is a toll of big Oil & the Zionists…
Copperhead and Neo-Copperhead are honourable titles, though I prefer Rattlesnake myself, with its imagery of ‘Don’t tread on Me’ and the one coiled around the cotton plant on the Republic of Alabama’s reverse side in 1861. See:
http://www.netstate.com/states/symb/flags/al_flag.htm
Robert Gullum on 26 Feb 2007 at 9:13 pm #
Wow…….we are fighting the “cival war” all over again!!! What’s the matter? Run out of things to blame on GWB? I suppose we need to tear down the country again, in order to come together….huh? Neo-con this, religious right that etc….What the hell is wrong with you people? Ya’ll got fast food itis….you want it your way all the time, when the way you want it changes with the wind.
There are problems…….identify them, solve them !!! Stop the pretence you know what happened in 1860, stop the name calling, and quit using 20/20 hindsight as a point well made!!! Ya’ll sound like HRC, “if I knew then, what I know now, I never would have voted to go to war”… Bush lied, Bush misled , blah, blah……The check’s in the mail folks, figure out how to cover it…….
Filmer on 27 Feb 2007 at 1:24 am #
Robert, what exactly is your beef? The name of this site is Conservative Times. We are conservatives. It is not Republican Times. It is not Get Elected At All Costs Times. If Bush is not acting like a conservative, which he manifestly is not, then we will criticize him. If he acts like a conservative (fat chance), then we will not. No one on here is likely to criticize Bush for his tax cuts.
Also, the WBTS is an absolutely essential issue. Had Lincoln not invaded the South, then we would not have a 3 trillion dollar budget today. He was the great centralizer, as Thomas DiLorenzo calls him.
Sorry for expanding the frame of debate. But Republican does not equal conservative. I certainly wish it did.
Thor H. Asgardson on 28 Feb 2007 at 5:42 pm #
One good thing Lincoln did do is leave us with the following quote:
“..corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavour to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”
Abraham Lincoln 1865
Thank you, Mr. Lincoln. You weren’t as bad as we thought.