I don’t need to watch my dog poop to know that I need to clean up his crap.
I didn’t watch the crass campaign speeches at Mount Rushmore last night, but, sure enough, Governor Kristi Noem remains full of crap:
“Across America these last several weeks, we have been witnessing a very troubling situation unfold. In real time, we are watching an organized, coordinated campaign to remove and eliminate all references to our nation’s founding and many other points in our history,” Noem said at a Fourth of July celebration at Mount Rushmore with President Trump.
“The approach focuses exclusively on our forefathers’ flaws, but it fails to capitalize on the opportunity to learn from their virtues,” she added. “Make no mistake, this is being done deliberately to discredit America’s founding principles by discrediting the individuals who formed them, so that America can be remade into a different political image” [Tal Axelrod, “South Dakota Governor Calls Removal of Confederate Statues Effort to ‘Discredit’ Founding Fathers,” The Hill, 2020.07.03].
Gee, Kristi, is Senator Mike Rounds part of that purported effort to “discredit America’s founding principles” for saying we shouldn’t name military bases after Confederate traitors? Is the Gettysburg Police Department part of that purported effort for finally removing decals showing a traitor flag that isn’t even an authentic part of the town’s founding and history?
Governor Noem’s weak attempt to bogeyman protest as an assault on God-fearing white folks’ heritage (you don’t have to be a dog to hear Noem’s whistles) is refuted by the brave protestors who blocked the road to Mount Rushmore yesterday. They weren’t trying to erase history; they were trying to bring it to the fore, demonstrating that Mount Rushmore is not some private pomp-ground for rich and powerful white invaders but part of stolen land that by treaty belongs to the Lakota people. The Rushmore protestors, like protestors across America in this hot and dangerous summer, weren’t trying to undermine America’s principles; they were trying to get Noem and other elected officials to live up to our professed principles of an ever more perfect Union with Liberty and Justice for All.
Don’t you get it, Kristi? The only people trying to erase history are you and the mad King George whose authoritarian monarchy you are trying to defend. You and Donald are the traitors to America’s history and ideals; we, the protestors, are the patriots trying to restore America’s promise.
I don’t like cleaning up after my dog, but we can’t leave crap like that lying around stinking up the neighborhood, especially on the birthday of a nation founded in protest and toppling of wealthy, entitlement-minded autocrats.
Boy people, we are in trouble. The GA primary is an indicator of how the Nov 2020 democratic vote will be neutered. SCOTUS chief Roberts led the group of Republican lawyers and stole the Bush v. Gore election. The justice system, the courts and Dept of Justice, have been politicized to a deep degree. And Trump is a threat to the nation, the world, is psychotic, sadistic and cares only about himself. Read Carl Bernstein. Read Chauncy deVegas. We can not assume Joe Biden will be permitted to win no matter how voters turn out.
https://boingboing.net/2020/06/29/carl-bernstein-trump-delusi.html
https://www.salon.com/writer/chauncey_de_vega
My God, What a slap in the face to the Lakota people.
Our Governor truly is The Dope Queen of Delusion.
If that didn’t turn your stomach, there’s no hope for you.
I don’t have a dog to clean up after, but I am going to puke.
There’s not much else to do after that
Sh*t show.
Just saw an interview with the great, great grandnephew of Robert E. Lee, a southern minister. He was saying when folks see his name, Robert Lee, they tend to comment, “The South shall rise again,” thinking his heritage would cause him to agree. He does NOT agree, but do we really think that Kristi is correct when she says, “We learn from our history?” Tell us, Kristi, what you think you have learned. !@#%^&*
We honor our ideals by learning from our mistakes, not cloaking sin in self-righteousness.
We honor our history by defying dictators, not applauding them.
We honor our Founders by celebrating the 244th anniversary of the greatest, most eloquent, most history-changing protest by inviting all humanity to participate in the bounty of America, not by making a hateful speech denigrating Americans who seek to extend our Revolution as traitors.
NOem likely thinks, as is the eastern South Dakota myth, that her family farm “came from” the railroad.
It was, as was most of eastern South Dakota, stolen from the east Lakota (Sioux) tribes. This was due to eastern South Dakota being in the Minnesota Territory, the invaders cancellation of treaties (Traverse des Sioux and Mendota), and the Dakota War of 1862 in which more died than died at the Battle of Greasy Grass (Custer’s Last Stand).
Let’s have a dialogue about our REAL history and put it in our high school and college texts.
An abridged version: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dakota_War_of_1862
The conservative (white privilege) side of this discussion, the bringing down of the elevation of some American figures, leaves out one VERY important element: the on-going exclusion of non-white (and non-male) history from our national discourse and teaching. While the conservatives focus on the movement to diminish some white, traitorous, racists “accomplishments” to US history and culture, they at the same time, far more quietly, ensure that “our” history does not speak the stories of the non-white-european-men who made this nation great.
For every statue being pulled down, there is a worthy figure to raise up in that space.
Who will vet the righteousness of all the new statues? If anybody finds an ugly sore in one of the new fellows will they have the right to pull it down? Will Mr H be the decider? Will it be grudznick? I am just asking.
And then Noem had the gall to Tweet her thanks to Trump for unifying us.
Incredible.
John makes a good point point about the Dakota War of 1862. I just finished an excellent history of that period titled “Dakota in Exile: The Untold Stories of Captives in the Aftermath of the U.S.-Dakota War” by Linda Clemmons (recommended by Donald Pay – thanks Donald!), and a powerful historical novel, “Beneath the Same Stars, A Novel of the 1862 US-Dakota War,” by Phyllis Cole-Dai (recommended by DFP – thanks Cory!). I add my recommendation to that of Don and Cory to read these books and learn more about a sad time in America’s history (imagine e.g., Minnesota offered a $25 dollar bounty for human scalps to encourage the cold-blooded murder of people who happen to be born Sioux).
grudznick, who vetted the righteousness of the old statues?
Trump’s and noem’s campaign funds should have paid for this blatant campaign event. No way should SD taxpayers be stuck with the bill for this $hit show.
Protesters before the event were telling Native Americans to go home. drumpfsters need history lessons and constitutional rights lessons.
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/07/trump-supporters-shouted-go-home-at-native-americans-protesting-mount-rushmore-rally-on-their-land-report/
I spent last night watching the 40th Reunion of the Ding Ho Comedians. It was funny when one of the comedians mentioned Trump being in North Dakota at Mt. Rushmore for a fireworks show with no social distancing. The event I watched was on Zoom because of Covid-19; social distancing and a fund raiser for a person battling cancer. I was glad he mentioned North Dakota as it is too much embarrassment to realize how sheep-like our ‘leaders’ have become. It is like when the neighborhood bully shows up to pick on someone; no one will stand up to that bully as then they will be the next in line to be bullied. Okay, a lot of irrelevant information to get to my point. Those people who are showing up to express their opposition to everything and anything Trump are to me and should forever more be referenced as; ‘freedom fighters’. They are attempting to live the life our laws claim to promise all of us.
I don’t know, Mr. o. But must we destroy an old park to create new ones? Must we burn books we don’t care for in order to write new ones? Must we stifle the thoughts of some to make room to hear the thoughts of others?
PS: grudznick hates the works of Dickens and JK Rowling. Let us purge them all from the libraries for new books, which I am in favor of letting you choose.
I too had no intention of watching but received calls from my kids across the country, who were (because they have such strong identities of family times spent at Mt Rushmore, born and raised and educated here in western South Dakota).
As I watched I became ill at the largesse, the hundreds of National Guards at the road block and in the mediocre band on stage, and the expert USAF band forced to sit below Trump the entire program, the dozen plus USAF, USMC and USN state-of the-art-aircraft flyovers (and the Rapid City dozens of low-level flyovers and support aircraft, public and private), the local Sheriff Thom: “my people will not be wearing masks”, Highway Patrol fleet, the Parks Service staff, the DOI current (finally) director, the secret service, the 100’x50’ wedding tent and scaffolding behind the stage likely with dressing rooms, showers and food service for this elite group of “ranch” kids turned Republican politicians spending tax payer dollars for this Trump Family July 3rd campaign event, much like the Sioux Falls event bill which Trump would not pay. Late into the night the flyovers continued departing Rapid City and EAFB. Hidden fire protection workers obviously covered the forest floor amid towering granite well into the night.
I would be surprised however that there were 7,500 spectators. Kristi mentioned the daunting preparation the last few months required. And not a pandemic mask in sight, save Rep. Dusty Johnson’s (he’ll no doubt pay a heavy political price from the authoritarian GOP) and some children running about in the audience.
Ordinary people risking their lives for a psychopathic President and a barely educated Governor who hates George Soros. Rush Limbaugh despises universities. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/trump-signs-order-prioritizing-job-skills-over-college-degree-in-government-hiring/ar-BB160Ci9
They are likely duping the brain-washed ordinary people who live in South Dakota. And we the ordinary public are paying for it all.
Ms. leslie, some of those aircraft were SD Army National Guard and SD Air National Guard.
It was very warm, and it was very spectacular, Mr. Trump aside. You know grudznick’s disdain for Mr. Trump, Ms. leslie, but young Ms. Noem did a very good job.
90% are statues and memorials of the Confederacy and its leaders and generals. (The other 10% are Christopher Columbus.) So that’s the hill that the President and Governor are going to fight and die on?
Taking down memorials to the Confederacy is not an attack on our heritage, nor does it “defame our heroes, erase our values, and indoctrinate our children.” Instead, it shows that rebellion against the government to perpetuate slavery is wrong. To put it bluntly, if you think Jefferson Davis was a hero, you are in the KKK. And, as for Robert E. Lee, during the Civil War, the Quartermaster General of the United States Army Montgomery C. Meigs United States Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton believed him to be enough of a traitor to confiscate Lee’s estate in Virginia and turn it into a military cemetery for Union dead.
And let’s not forget, all those statutes and monuments to the Confederacy were put up in the early 1900s, when the KKK was rising, to terrify and subdue the blacks living in the Jim Crow South.
As for Christopher Columbus – he never set foot on North American soil. If you want to celebrate the discovery of America by a European, celebrate Leif Erikson. He was the first.
Mr. grudznick, how many of those 7,500 do you reckon were from South Dakota like yourself?
The reason I ask is that if this whole hootenanny was for economic development, who stayed in the hotels to make it that way? I’m thinking you probably didn’t stay in Keystone, so did my tax dollars pay for out of state visitors to warrant the tax investment or did I get fibbed to? Where did those 7,500 come from?
Grudznick, you deftly sidestep my question: who vetted the current statues? Even without the need to move out the old to make room for the new, let us just focus on the existence of the old. Who decided Jefferson Davis was worthy of an immortal monument?
When we shift to figures such as Thomas Jefferson, although flawed, clearly there is a body of work action, and philosophy that can be put on the “warrants a statue” column. Can the same be said for Stonewall Jackson? What exactly did Columbus do again? We are not rewriting history, we are fact checking the deified mythology – keeping to the FACTS is history.
I fear you want to perpetuate mythology. If that is the case, put up your statues in your place of worship, your church of mythological America, and choose to believe whatever you want; but do not confuse that with celebrating the history of this nation.
Mr. o, forgive me if I sound like Mr. Evans, but in my first sentence grudznick answered you directly:
Even now, hours later, that statement rings true. I still do not know.
I do know who picked Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt and Lincoln to be carved onto Rushmore Mountain. I know who picked Crazy Horse to be carved onto Thunderhead Mountain. I know who picked every president for the statues in our Rapid City, and who picked every governor for the statues in the Capital City. But I do not know who picked the subject for even a single Civil War statue, or a single Confederate statue.
Please tell me, who was it? And don’t tell me it was all some fat old white guys, wearing bow ties, sitting in rocking chairs on porches drinking tea and eating peaches, because you don’t know that for sure. There could be statues picked by young Chinese girls in Alabama that you hate. You just don’t know either, do you?
Dear Grudznick,
Below are a couple of articles about the Confederate statues / memorials around the South and how they got there.
First off from the Smithsonian:
“First, far from simply being markers of historic events and people, as proponents argue, these memorials were created and funded by Jim Crow governments to pay homage to a slave-owning society and to serve as blunt assertions of dominance over African-Americans.
Second, contrary to the claim that today’s objections to the monuments are merely the product of contemporary political correctness, they were actively opposed at the time, often by African-Americans, as instruments of white power.
Finally, Confederate monuments aren’t just heirlooms, the artifacts of a bygone era. Instead, American taxpayers are still heavily investing in these tributes today. We have found that, over the past ten years, taxpayers have directed at least $40 million to Confederate monuments—statues, homes, parks, museums, libraries and cemeteries—and to Confederate heritage organizations.”
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/costs-confederacy-special-report-180970731/
https://www.history.com/news/how-the-u-s-got-so-many-confederate-monuments
https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/06/historian-puts-the-push-to-remove-confederate-statues-in-context/
From the Harvard.edu site:
GAZETTE: What do you say to those who argue that the removal of such statues in prominent public settings dishonors the memory of those who died fighting for the Confederacy?
GORDON-REED: I would say there are other places for that — on battlefields and cemeteries. The Confederates lost the war, the rebellion. The victors, the thousands of soldiers — black and white — in the armed forces of the United States, died to protect this country. I think it dishonors them to celebrate the men who killed them and tried to kill off the American nation. The United States was far from perfect, but the values of the Confederacy, open and unrepentant white supremacy and total disregard for the humanity of black people, to the extent they still exist, have produced tragedy and discord. There is no path to a peaceful and prosperous country without challenging and rejecting that as a basis for our society.
Let’s see them erase this……
https://crooksandliars.com/2020/07/kill-em-gop-power-broker-houston-leaves
Shoot to kill George Floyd protesters.
He seemed nice….before he was born.
My dear Mr. Grudznick, I accept you do not know who vetted the righteousness of those statues. My question was not a ruse for me to spring the “answer” (although Eve Fisher seems to have done quite a good job in that answer). As you question the vetting of those who pull down these statues for the lack of virtuous righteousness, you imply there was vetting for virtuous righteousness back when they were put up.
I put forward simply: the error is not in the dismantling of these monuments, it was in their erection. As we would well agree, the fact that something happened does not mean that its happening was right. We miss the mark when discussions rely on an assumption of sound reason for these monuments’ existence.
While the defense of slavery is unacceptable and deserves no honor, statutes, or flags, it seems less justified to criticize rebellion, per se, in light of what is celebrated by the 4th of July and the US Declaration of Independence. From a British perspective rebellious colonists were certainly just as much “traitors” as were rebellious confederates from a Northern Union perspective. Both sets of rebels attacked an existing governmental structure with the goal of freedom from the perceived excesses of that government.
Rebellion can be negative or positive, depending on the perspectives of those involved, and, to a great extent, depending on whether the rebellion is successful. Whether particular Southern confederates rebelled to extend slavery or may have had other reasons seems a pertinent consideration before demonizing all confederates, especially on Independence Day.
https://www.thoughtco.com/top-causes-of-the-civil-war-104532
While some argue that claims of alternative causes other than slavery are a mere subterfuge by slavery supporting apologists, there is credible historical evidence that slavery was only one factor leading to the civil war. States rights, in fact, appears to have been a significant factor, which, in turn, seems quite close to the colonists’ desire for self-government rather than be ruled by an existing monarchy government. It is hard to see how a rebel seeking to assert state’s rights is qualitatively different that a colonist seeking to assert colonist’s rights.
I think bcb should look closer to the battlefield. The colonists killed British soldiers, while the Confederates killed United States soldiers.As a former US combat soldier, I don’t see the equivalency of wrong being equal to right.
There is no and should be no glory to the Confederates as their leaders themselves said the same in the aftermath. I agree with cibvet.
Former Russia amb not at all entralled with drumpf’s speech at Mount Rushmore.
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/07/perhaps-the-most-un-american-speech-ever-delivered-by-an-american-president-ambassador-mcfaul/
bearcreekbat, nice try, but the whole point was that the Confederacy wanted states rights in order to preserve the right to keep slaves.
Here is the South Carolina Declaration justifying secession: Note that it is ALL about slavery.
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_scarsec.asp
From the Texas Declaration justifying secession: “”In all the non-slave-holding States, in violation of that good faith and comity which should exist between entirely distinct nations, the people have formed themselves into a great sectional party, now strong enough in numbers to control the affairs of each of those States, based upon an unnatural feeling of hostility to these Southern States and their beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the debasing doctrine of equality of all men, irrespective of race or color– a doctrine at war with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest revelations of Divine Law. They demand the abolition of negro slavery throughout the confederacy, the recognition of political equality between the white and negro races, and avow their determination to press on their crusade against us, so long as a negro slave remains in these.”
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_texsec.asp
And in the Confederate Constitution: Article IV Section 2(1)
“The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired.
and
Article IV Section 3(3)
The Confederate States may acquire new territory; and Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate States, lying without the limits of the several states; and may permit them, at such times, and in such manner as it may by law provide, to form states to be admitted into the Confederacy. In all such territory, the institution of negro slavery as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress, and by the territorial government: and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories, shall have the right to take to such territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the states or territories of the Confederate states.”
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_csa.asp
And two Confederate politicians of the day:
Robert Hardy Smith of Alabama, in 1861, upon Alabama’s secession:
“We have dissolved the late Union chiefly because of the negro quarrel. Now, is there any man who wished to reproduce that strife among ourselves? And yet does not he, who wished the slave trade left for the action of Congress, see that he proposed to open a Pandora’s box among us and to cause our political arena again to resound with this discussion. Had we left the question unsettled, we should, in my opinion, have sown broadcast the seeds of discord and death in our Constitution. I congratulate the country that the strife has been put to rest forever, and that American slavery is to stand before the world as it is, and on its own merits. We have now placed our domestic institution, and secured its rights unmistakably, in the Constitution. We have sought by no euphony to hide its name. We have called our negroes ‘slaves’, and we have recognized and protected them as persons and our rights to them as property.”
and
Confederate VP Alexander Stephens, on how much better the Confederate Constitution was than the US Constitution, because it “put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution. African slavery as it exists amongst us; the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. THIS WAS THE IMMEDIATE CAUSE OF THE LATE RUPTURE AND PRESENT REVOLUTION. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the ‘rock upon which the old Union would split.’ He was right.” (My emphasis)
So can we now stop “debating” whether or not slavery was the cause of the Civil War? It was. Period.
cibvet makes a good point from one perspective.
Looking closer at the battlefield from another perspective, the unfortunate fact is that British subjects (i.e. rebel soldiers) killed British subjects (i.e. loyalist/soldiers), while U.S. citizens (rebel soldiers) killed U.S. citizens (loyalist soldiers). No matter how the killing is described, it somehow seems inconsistent to honor one group of rebel killers as “patriots” while demonizing a second group of rebel killers as “traitors.”
And as I noted earlier, I have found no reasonable or moral justification for a rebellion with the purpose of defending slavery. Another problem with labeling confederate rebels as traitors due to slavery, however, is that the rebellion of colonist rebels was, in fact, an effort to protect the right to own and control property, which included slaves.
https://www.ushistory.org/us/13d.asp
Criticism of slavery advocates, as well as post civil war Jim Crow advocates, is certainly merited, and in my view ought to be encouraged. Labeling rebels as “traitors,” however, strikes me as semantically incorrect unless it includes all rebels, not just those we disagree with.
Not of these things last forever. Efforts where made to chisel Tutankhamun and his father Akhenaten off of Egyptian stone records.
Where was Trump when Saddam’s statue was toppled in Baghdad? How about Lenin’s many statues?
Better that some of these representations be protected by museum cureators and re-enactors than Klansmen and Nazis.
Ozymandias
Percy Bysshe Shelley – 1792-1822
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
Very good Mr. Barth, We have now another statue proposed on the border with Mexico, the wall. As of yesterday, July 3, 2020, Sonora Mexico has closed its border with Arizona. ” On July 3, the governor of the Mexican state of Sonora delivered the coup de grace: She announced the temporary closure of the border with Arizona and banned Americans from Sonoran beaches.” America has now become a failed state or as trump can call us now a “s#:thole country”. Mexico has now said that they will build that wall to keep our sick arse’s out.
140,000 dead Americans, 2.5 million infected Americans (that we know of), about 40 million unemployed, and trump/GNOem have no clue on what to do. Wonder if Rhododendron has a clue on how to lead the state when GNOem has to quarantine. Let’s see how the two dummy’s handle this.
So you’re saying Mexico is now going to pay for a wall? And here I thought Mr. Trump was just full of bloviated gasses.
Enrich yourself grdz
Test tomorrow
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/costs-confederacy-special-report-180970731/
The winners write history – winners are patriots and losers are traitors. That is what is happening with the Confederate monument story as well. The Confederates are still the losers. The monuments were their attempt to deny the loss. Their denial is being pointed out for what it is.
Isn’t this 2020? Why are we having this debate now/again?
Dems move the country forward and stoopid effing wingnuts drag us backwards by undoing progress. Time and way past time to outlaw the outlaws.
Get out and vote like America’s Democracy depends on it, true Am ericans. Send Putie’s lads back to Siberia.
All history is crime.
The confederates were traitors — especially their officers, most once, as officers in the US Army, swore an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. Their likenesses belong in the history books, the museums, and in the several national battlefields and cemeteries — NEVER in the public square. If one disagrees, then why is one not comfortable with likenesses of other tyrants (Bin Laden, Tojo, Stalin, and “this many WWII-era Germans”) in our public squares? In times of great moral peril, there are time and places for the quick and the dead.
—
Slavery. Pulitzer Prize awardee historian Gorden S. Wood responded to a question that ‘wasn’t the US founded on an ideal and a lie’, as alleged by the NYTimes 1619 project. (Me here, 1619 was a well-intended but ill-thought tome suggesting that slavery was somehow limited to the colonies, the US, and Africans.)
“The United States was founded on an ideal. As for the lie, I wouldn’t use that term. Hannah-Jones is referring, of course, to slavery. But there was slavery all over the world in 1776. Slavery had existed for thousands and thousands of years without substantial criticism. People in the eighteenth century, all over the world, took slavery and indentured labor for granted. The American Revolution, and its assertion that all men are created equal, created the first anti-slavery movement in the history of the world. The first meeting of anti-slavery advocates was held in Philadelphia in 1775. That’s not coincidental. The Revolution sparked an American anti-slavery movement.”
Certainly, as Dr. Wood relates, that was not good enough — yet it was the spark, the shot, that changed the world (and US), however imperfectly.
Cory writes:
I’ve offered abundant criticisms of Governor Noem and President Trump, and neither of them seems to be sufficiently pro-liberty for my tastes, but if you’d watched their speeches last night, you might have realized they were more than crass campaign speeches.
It seems obvious to me that she wouldn’t say he is, Cory, but one of America’s founding principles is that we’re endowed with rights by our Creator. Would you say your writings discredit that principle?
It seems obvious to me that many of those who’ve protested across the U.S. this summer were indeed trying to undermine those principles. How do you claim to know otherwise?
Again, how do you claim to know that Governor Noem and President Trump are the only people trying to erase history?
It seems obvious to me that many of those who protest aren’t trying to restore America’s promise, and it seems obvious to me that your reckless abuse of the “traitor” label doesn’t work toward that end.
My sentiments are similar. Thanks as usual for allowing me to express them in this forum.
Mike, that Texan is a horrible excuse for a human being, indeed.
I think BCB makes a good, but uncomfortable point about slavery in the founding of the USA.
I do not have the stomach to listen to miserable people like Loudmouth Liar and Kissup Kristi spew hatred, lies and division. I have not heard one positive word about yesterday’s debacle at Rushmore, though I have not checked Faux Noize, nor will I.
As he falls farther behind and becomes more frightened, Crazy Creepy sprays forth ever more unhinged ramblings and rantings. It’s almost entertaining, in an anxiety provoking way. Just how bizarre will he get? How incoherently dangerous?
Good lord, he is the president. Unn. Bee. Leev. Abull.
If I remember my history correctly (not the version taught in school – but from 1776), South Carolina demanded slavery be continued to before voting to join the revolution. It seems their delegation would rather live under British rule than give up the owning of other men and women.
And to bearcreekbat’s objection or assent of “revolution,” Franklin said the difference is in the pronoun: “our” revolution is good; “their” revolution is bad (again from 1776).
Ms. Geelsdottir, with her usual out-of-state name-calling, says
while wearing her black pot hat.
Also ironic, I have yet to hear a single one of the forest fire whiners pipe up today, after last night’s spectacle. No fires here.
Noem was just the warmup act for Trump. She presented the summary outline (fed to her?) of the hate speech that was to come from the big guy. By the look on her face one might think she had just been told that Don Jr’s girlfriend, whom she had greeted with an unmasked hug, had tested positive for COVID and was being driven home to quarantine.
Kurt Evans, Just FYI – if you had done an in-depth study of the use and contemporary meaning of words written in the Declaration and the Constitution by the founders – you would know that by their “Creator”, they were referring to NATURE and not some Asian/African religion’s (No, neither Judaism nor Christianity are European) assertion that we are “spiritual beings” somehow trapped in animated clay.
Mr. grudznick, No fires because the powers to be already burned the trees to save them.
Also, you claim that you were there to hear Chubby blather and spittle about White Power. Whilst you were there, who attended that were from South Dakota? Weren’t most from out of state? I ask this of you because you seem to be like the Dos Equis guy, you know, the most interesting in the world, so you would clearly know.
Mr. jerry, I don’t know why you are calling me a two horse man, but that sounds like a compliment. I know a man named One Horse Clinton and he is not a nice fellow so I do take your compliment with a salt.
Regardless there were fellows from Oklahoma and a family from Michigan seated near me and I saw license plates from dozens of states. Even MN, land of the libbies. I was not responsible for taking a full attendance.
Of course a compliment, and take the salt with some lime. All those fellers from Oklahoma, Michigan and wherever else can now go home and not be counted on the South Dakota Covid roll count. Slick, collect the out of state money and send them home to croak.
Eve identifies important historical evidence that is well worth reviewing and that shows many individuals, likely a majority, in the South rebelled primarily due to the slavery issue. Other historians have identified alternative or additional motivations that others from the South had for the rebellion. Given the evidence that rebel colonists also apparently supported slavery, however, I am still unclear whether there is any objective, factual, logical or intellectual reason why one group of rebels – confederates – should be labeled “traitors,” while a second group of rebels – colonists – should be labeled “patriots.”
John also makes an excellent factual point that since
their participation in a rebellion was a violation of that oath. That seems to be more consistent with the label “traitor” than individuals who had not taken that oath. I only note that some colonist rebels might not have been that much different since many British subjects also took a similar oath.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oath_of_Allegiance_(United_Kingdom)
I don’t know whether any British oath takers immigrated and became colonist revolutionaries, but if there were any they would seem to be in similar shoes as US oath takers.
Bottom line, both Eve and John have added excellent relevant information, but in the end, as a subjective matter, I tend to agree that o nails it with the quote from Franklin:
This does not provide much of a foundation for our Independence Day self-righteous praise of colonist rebels as patriots while we label other rebels as traitors.
Ms. Fisher provided some interesting information about statues in the deep and middle South. Thank you.
Has anyone else noticed that whenever Mr. H uses the word “poop” or the word “hooker” in his bloggings it tends to become one of the “most commented” ones?
Grdz a hip shooting, pretentious troll and doxxer here, unfortunately wastes time and energy typically on misogynistic and racist tropes. Best ignored. Grade: F (Failure to test).
“Military officials’ statement that resources used for July 4 flyovers contribute to pilot proficiency and training [flying low over thousands of civilians!?] follows controversy over last year’s celebration and the costs the Defense Department incurred to support it. On Thursday, the Associated Press reported that the 2019 Independence Day festivities and demonstrations ordered by President Donald Trump cost $13 million, twice as much as those of the previous year.”
The air guard is USAF reserve and state militia aircraft may only be hand me downs, yet police militarization does not appear to be surplus. Perhaps Guard brass care to set us straight.
Oh, like “an organized coordinated campaign” to run for president for four years?
Make as much money as possible grifting, staying out of prison to employ the family “gainfully,” win the election unexpectedly, lawyer up ignoring trust rules, conspire to replace a sympathetic SCOTUS Justice Kennedy with early retirement, fight and destroy opposition to an “extreme presidential power advocate,” the Catholic Appeals Ct Justice Kavanaugh no matter the cost, nestling him into a conservative SCOTUS majority including McConnell’s stolen seat left vacant for the last 8 months of Obama’s term, to the already gifted Justice Gorsuch, another groomed Federalist Society shill, thus securing the power (more publicly funded lawyered Republican Senate SCOTUS Executive raw power to withstand obviously impending impeachment against Russian “collusion”, hide tax returns and accountable national finances, and continue to evade prison by stealing four more years using tried and true Republican scorched earth election tactics and strategy, leaving the middle class a smoldering wasteland while the Fox News Kim Guilfoyle lawyers of the world bed (in the 1st lady example) the President’s immature male progeny, and billionaire Devos families of the world yacht around the world secure on the GOP teat, armed with AR15s and protected by Secret Service agents in gated communities, are robbing the national public education system.
That is what you really mean, farm-girl Kristi!
Goat. Got.
Trump will always remember South Dakota:
“White faces are great places”
I’m just glad to tickled that there were no fires. I love the Black Hills. They’re in enough trouble. It’s true it’s stolen more than once and over and over again from the Lakota. Anyway, I hear it rained right after the fireworks, so maybe that’s the Great Spirit of the Lakota or the Great Mystery or Wakan Tanka or Nature or whatever you wish to call it, looking out for us. I thank them all, especially Nature.
Scratching my head over Curt’s German :), perhaps a little more Chauncey DeVega/SALON (6.25.20) to help us be clear what we need to do between now and November:
Instead of being seduced by the happy pills of liberal schadenfreude and those who peddle such intoxicants, what should decent Americans do to ensure that Trump is defeated?
Confirm ahead that you are registered. Show up to vote. Make sure that relatives, friends and neighbors are also voting against Trump and the Republicans. Use a combination of positive social pressure and social stigma to influence fence-sitters in your social circle. Only an overwhelming defeat at the polls — not a narrow or disputable outcome in the Electoral College — can prevent Trump and his minions from declaring the election result to be fraudulent.
Participate in local organizations which are working to create positive social change. Social democracy must be nurtured from the ground up as both a bulwark and prophylactic against the poison of Trumpism and other forms of fake right-wing populism.
Resist purity tests from those voices who demand a perfect candidate. Such standards are a gross luxury in a time of crisis. Joe Biden [is] the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee. Whatever his flaws — and there are many — Biden is now the last and therefore best option to remove Donald Trump from office.
Do not succumb to the undertow and churn of the 24/7 cable news cycle. Its relentless focus on the outrage of the day is an exhausting distraction from the long-term crisis and existential threat to democracy represented by Trump, his party and their followers and allies.
Internalize the warnings of Noam Chomsky (among others), who has said: “Trump is the worst criminal in history, undeniably. …There has never been a figure in political history who was so passionately dedicated to destroying the projects for organized human life on Earth in the near future. That is not an exaggeration.”
In the end, the choice on Election Day is between America and Donald Trump. Nothing more. Nothing less. The American people must vote as if their lives depend on it — because they do.
Yes, Trump can certainly be defeated. But declaring victory too early is a pathway to inevitable defeat, and a guarantee that Donald Trump will remain president for at least another four years, bringing America into one of its most perilous times.
CHAUNCEY DEVEGA
Fake noize is about to explode over The Hill’s headline about Noem Nothing’s speech and The Hill has posted a correction.
https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/505839-south-dakota-governor-criticizes-removal-of-statues-as-effort
Here is the correction…. CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story drew too strong a link between the effort to take down Confederate statues and monuments and Noem’s remarks. The headline and wording has been changed to more accurately reflect her comments.
Mr. Mike, I realize you are from Iowa, but it was mighty South Dakotan of you to point out your mistake and pitch a new blue link. Good on you, sir.
Grudzilla, I know you are from some unclaimed wilderness no one ever heard of and I appreciate you appreciating my correction, but the correction was not mine. The correction came from The Hill and is self explanatory. Fake Noize blew a fuse and claimed The Hill said something it did not say and The Hill had the ioway intestinal fortitude to act like gentlemen before swine.
Goat. Got.
Where will you blog next, Mr. mike? Nebraska Free Press, no doubt.
bearcreekbat: Confederate soldiers were *not* US citizens. JFC.
Not all confederates were the same
“This document is a Presidential pardon issued by President Andrew Johnson. It was signed on July 5, 1866 by both President Johnson and Secretary of State William H. Seward.
The year before, President Johnson had issued a proclamation on May 29, 1865, extending amnesty to most former Confederate soldiers. Despite the term “amnesty”, the move was somewhat punitive on Johnson’s part. He wanted to allow the larger portions of the Confederate Army to receive amnesty while punishing those who played a more important and visible role in the Confederacy.
If they qualified the soldier had to swear a loyalty oath to the United States and free any slaves that he owned. Not all soldiers qualified under this amnesty, as it excluded fourteen “classes” of individuals. The reasons for the exclusion varied and a soldier could be disqualified if they served as a Confederate officer and were educated at the United States Military Academy or Naval Academy. Excluded soldiers could still seek amnesty, but would have to file a petition with the President. John C. Shelton was a minor figure who was excluded from amnesty but filed a successful petition.”https://edu.lva.virginia.gov/dbva/items/show/149
Joe, I am not sure what historical evidence you rely on for the statement “Confederate soldiers were *not* US citizens,” but current authorities on the law seem to differ with your conclusion. Prior to the adoption of the 14th Amendment citizenship was defined by the common law, which explained
Under this common law, any confederate soldier with that birth history would have been a U.S. citizen under the law. In the infamous case of Dred Scott the SCOTUS
https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-14/section-1/citizens-of-the-united-states#:~:text=“All persons born or naturalized,the State wherein they reside.”
The Court, however, excluded freed slaves, hence any slaves or freed slaves that fought as confederate soldiers were not citizens, until the ratification of the 14th Amendment after the civil war. The non-slave confederate soldiers that met the common law and Dred Scott criteria, however, would have been citizens under that criteria.
That might explain why
https://www.wearethemighty.com/history/why-confederate-soldiers-are-not-considered-us-veterans
Currently, under federal law, U.S.C. 1481(a)(7), someone can lose their citizenship through an act of treason or by trying to overthrow the US, but only if first convicted of doing so by “a court martial or by a court of competent jurisdiction.”
I don’t know if we had a similar law on the books during the civil war, but even if we did a confederate soldier would still have remained a citizen until charged, tried and convicted.
I’d written to Cory:
Richard Schriever responds:
The Declaration’s preamble says we’re entitled to independence by “the laws of nature and of nature’s God” (emphasis added). What would you say was the “contemporary meaning” of nature’s God? Nature’s NATURE?
In stark contrast with the adherents of many other belief systems, traditional Bible Protestants have always taught that the Creator God and created nature are two separate things. As far as I’m aware, there’s no surviving record of any of the Founding Fathers, Christian or otherwise, ever questioning that fundamental Bible doctrine.
By the way, the Declaration of Independence also refers to “divine Providence” and to “the Supreme Judge of the world.” What would you say was the contemporary meaning of those words?
Kurt, where we got those rights is not as vital a principle as the recognition of those rights. You say God, I say nature, and the dude down the street says Allah, but we can all go to the city council meeting and fight to realize and protect those rights.
We can also see theocrats like Kristi and posers like Donald profess faith in a Creator but fail to recognize the inherent rights of all people to participate and protest.
God is not essential to the American equation. The right to protest and to topple tyrants, in stone or in flesh, is.
I’d written to Cory:
Cory writes:
The Declaration of Independence clearly defines those rights as the unalienable rights with which we’re endowed by God, including but not limited to the three listed. The recognition of the rights with which God endows us is definitely “vital,” and it logically includes the recognition that we get those rights from God.
Allah is just the standard Arabic word for God, and it’s been used by Arab Christians since before Islam was even founded, but the Declaration indicates that the Creator God and created nature are two different things.
There’s nothing in America’s founding document about any inherent right to topple stone statues of tyrants, Cory, but there’s an explicitly stated principle that we’re endowed with rights by our Creator. Would you say your writings discredit that principle?
I disagree with the assertion that we endowed with rights by a Creator. More importantly, I contend that assertion is irrelevant to practical democracy. We don’t need that principle in order to form a more perfect Union.
I can point out that the Founders wrote their s’s funny, like long f’s, without discrediting the truly basic American principles by which we live and by which all Americans can live.
Cory writes:
Would you say your writings discredit that principle?
In 1781, Thomas Jefferson wrote:
The assertion that we’re endowed with rights by our Creator is one of America’s founding principles, and Jefferson’s writings suggest it’s the only firm basis for American liberties.
Jefferson maintained a pragmatic affiliation with Anglican Christians prior to the Revolution, but he never accepted their teachings and appears to have become increasingly hostile toward traditional Bible Protestantism as he grew older. Even as one of the Founding Fathers most hostile to traditional Protestantism, though, Jefferson’s assertions about practical democracy are much more compatible with the assertions of his predominantly Protestant peers than they are with yours.
If you believe America’s founding principles are flawed, you have every right to say so, but it seems inconsistent for you to dismiss the possibility of a “purported” effort to discredit those principles if you’re part of such an effort yourself.
Waaaaay off topic, but, ICYMI, here is AOC ripping congresspig Ted Yoho a new one for accosting her on the steps of the capitol….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3Xjv03Qrtc
Wingnuts should have thrown in the towel about 5 minutes into the first round.
I’ve watched that. She is so good. Clear, direct, truthful. Bwahahahahaha!!
That’s why they hate her. She’s way too smart, way too good for them. They don’t scare her or intimidate her. Same with most of the rest of the Democratic women.
Jeh Johnson confirmed that the trumpstapo is Eric Prince’s mercenaries. Yeah, tiki torch carrying white scumacyst boys.
Where are the 1% or the 3% “Oath Keepers”? 2nd Amendment frauds said they would be in the streets when the black helicopters came. Another joke by boys who wannabe something other than bed wetters. Get the depends.
Embrace US history, not erase it. Meanwhile create ways to circumvent the gridlocked, undemocratic Senate (not elected via one-person, one-vote).
2 Federal Reserve governors want the Fed to have authority to issue economic relief directly to people – circumventing the gridlocked, corporate-representation in the Senate.
https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2020-08-01/two-ex-fed-officials-offer-a-faster-way-to-make-stimulus-payments?__twitter_impression=true
Unbelievable, I don’t have a prejudice bone in my body but I hate lies. The Lakota took this land from someone, and there were countless attempts to work out peaceful resolutions so settlers and those here before them could live together. We need to include all history! The mountains of clothing rotting out in a field that Christian organizations gave the reservations to try and help. And if anyone wants to talks about wasting tax dollars, they need to be damn sure they are good examples of grateful stewards of the blessings they have received. Half the self-centered loud mouths on here probably don’t even pay taxes but enjoy all the benefits of free money, food and housing. I’d suggest that we include the bad that EVERYONE committed in a time when they didn’t have all the foreknowledge we do now. When you point your finger in blame, there are four fingers pointing right back at yourself. Clean up your own act before you start blaming others for your problems.