How General Kelly's Attitudes Reflect the U.S. of A
When retired Marine General John Kelly became White House Chief of Staff and thereby the leader of the ruling junta the media were effusive about the "grown-up," and "adult" man.
- General John F. Kelly: from Brighton to the White House - Boston Globe, July 12 2017
With Kelly, “you’ve got an adult in the room,” said Juliette Kayyem, a former assistant secretary for Homeland Security and author based in Cambridge.
- John Kelly is a grown-up in command at White House - Washington Times, Juli 31 2017
- John Kelly: An adult in a childish president’s White House - Seattle Times, August 4 2017
Kelly just proved again that the lauded "adult" and "grown-up" is just another militaristic right-winger, has little knowledge outside of his narrow training and is as smug as the president he nominally serves:
White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly on Monday called Robert E. Lee “an honorable man” and said that “the lack of an ability to compromise” led to the Civil War, once again thrusting himself into the public spotlight on an emotionally charged issue.
How does one compromise over slavery? The "right" to own and abuse other humans to increase the wealth of their owners was the main issue the southern states fought for:
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world.
General Lee was not a nice man. A slave owner himself. he liked to torture his "property" when it did not obey:
Wesley Norris, one of the slaves who was whipped, recalled that “not satisfied with simply lacerating our naked flesh, Gen. Lee then ordered the overseer to thoroughly wash our backs with brine, which was done.”
Was that the deed of "an honorable man"?
It is not the first time the "adult" Kelly has shown his real face:
Long seen as a force of order and discipline in the White House, the retired Marine general became part of the controversy over the president’s calls to Gold Star families this month when he defended Trump’s statements to a widow, made false claims about a Florida congresswoman who had criticized the White House and said he would only take questions from reporters who knew families that had lost service members overseas. He told Ingraham on Monday that he did not believe he had anything to apologize for.
There is nothing astonishing about this. Kelly did not become a 4-star Marine general for being an enlightened defender of humanity.
The illusions some liberal luminaries expose when the lament about Kelly is quite astonishing:
Ta-Nehisi Coates @tanehisicoates - 9:29 AM - 31 Oct 2017Shocking that someone charged with defending their country, in some profound way, does not comprehend the country they claim to defend.
The White House and the U.S. military are not about "defending their country". The U.S. is surrounded by two oceans and two weak neighbors. The coast guard and some local police forces are sufficient to defend its borders. How many of the hundred-some wars the U.S. has fought were truly defensive? Most, if not all of them, were and are fought for imperial power and for the enrichment of the people of the United States. The methods were and are brutal and the enemies were and are nearly always depicted in racist terms.
The differences between the motives and attitudes of the southern states in the civil war and the motives and attitudes of the U.S. of A towards the world are marginal. Kelly comprehends that well.
Lamenting about Kelly's biased view of history looks silly when the speaker then misconstrues the imperialism of the U.S. and the role of its military.
Kelly and the other members of the junta are, like Trump, not abnormities but reflections of the United States.
Posted by b on October 31, 2017 at 18:45 UTC | Permalink
next page »Kelly's knowledge of US Civil War history tells me he never learned anymore about it beyond high school, which is typical and certainly reflective of the lack of historical understanding of those living within the Outlaw US Empire. And as with every Ugly American, he's uncouth and long ago shit all over his vow to protect and defend the US Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic.
Posted by: karlof1 | Oct 31 2017 19:12 utc | 2
Here are some thoughts on the subjects you have touched upon:
1. Some historians think that the entire American War of Independence was started to be able to continue with the slave trade, as there were already calls for the abolition of the practice in Europe and some in the American Colonies sensed that the end was near for this practice all over Western world.
2. I doubt that General Lee's practices towards his slaves were unusual in the day, I am sad to say.
3. There were many reasons for the American Civil War. The issue of slavery was one among many.
4. A few short weeks before the war of Southern Secession began, Lee was offered the position of Commander of the US Army, so he was held in high regard
Posted by: mischi | Oct 31 2017 19:17 utc | 3
Re those neighbours: I think we'd both prefer 'relatively small and largely compliant' to 'weak' ... even if Montana by itself could defeat our combined forces.
Posted by: Andrew | Oct 31 2017 19:44 utc | 5
"Gen. Lee then ordered the overseer to thoroughly wash our backs with brine, which was done.”
Salt water was, and in MANY places still is, a standard treatment for fresh, open wounds. Bear in mind that antibiotics were not even around for WWI, and the sciences of bacteriology, anesthesiology and many others simply did not exist in Gen. Lee's time. It is only in very recent times that the possible consequences of using salt water on open wounds was even explored.
This practice was long used on livestock for flesh wounds, along with many other things we consider barbaric today. When I was young and lived near the beach, I was told to go swim when I got a deep abrasion or cut. Do I assume my Mother was trying to harm me by doing that? It is very possible that the General was trying to avoid infecting the wounds recently made.
I am not saying this was at all what we would consider humane today, but viewing this type of thing out of the contexts of their time and the common practices of the day is a bad practice, just as thinking that slavery was the sole reason for the Civil War is a bad practice. Go and read some newspapers of the time to get a real understanding of the issues. Relying on historians is not a good idea - each of them has their own agenda, and all of them have an agenda to sell and promote their works.
Posted by: Oilman2 | Oct 31 2017 19:45 utc | 6
Read "The American Slave Coast" by Ned and Constance Sublette. American slavery was much worse than what you think you know.
Posted by: Stephen | Oct 31 2017 20:00 utc | 7
(The US Civil war may have had more to do with personhood and the 14th amendment, aka slavery for all instead of just slavery for some.)
In no way does Kelly represent the vast majority of Americans. Well over 90% are in fear of gov, not cheerleaders for.
They've all watched their freedoms disintegrate and no one has the power to stop it because the organizers keep getting IRS audits, Finklestein'd, or worse.
Please don't pin Kelly's behaviour on US people. They're genuinely afraid for their families, and that drives them to keep quiet.
Posted by: TSP | Oct 31 2017 20:01 utc | 8
Check out his Wikipedia entry. It's not clear how he enlisted in 1970 and apparently avoided Viet Nam.
Posted by: Bart in VA | Oct 31 2017 20:18 utc | 9
Thanks for the posting b. I like the measured way you speak truth to power, especially the sick stuff fronting for the elite currently.
That said, I am going to take issue with one statement you made as follows:
"
Most, if not all of them, were and are fought for imperial power and for the enrichment of the people of the United States.
"
Yes, the people of what is now America have been the recipients of the riches from all over the world as part of taking the country from the natives and through the trickle down of the latest world empire by the elite. But lets be clear that Americans have been brainwashed just like the Germans to believe they are special humans. That does not make my fellow countryfolk bad, but misled.
Lets also be clear that the enrichment for centuries has gone to those in control of the blood flow of the various empire beasts......those who own private finance and everything else but the debt overhang/jackboot.
Let me also repeat my characterization of Trump as the Brer Rabbit presidential candidate......one who is aspiring to be a ruthless oligarch like those who have been behinds the scenes for centuries. Now we get to see some of that shit going on as Global Political Soap Opera with humanity the real losers in the ongoing farce.....will it give us the spine to change the rules?
Posted by: psychohistorian | Oct 31 2017 20:26 utc | 10
The man who is content to march in rank and file to the strains of music is beneath contempt. He received his magnificent brain by mistake, a mere spinal column would suffice.
(Bertrand Russel as I recall).
Posted by: uncle tungsten | Oct 31 2017 20:33 utc | 11
3. There were many reasons for the American Civil War. The issue of slavery was one among many.
Posted by: mischi | Oct 31, 2017 3:17:06 PM | 3
Basically, there were tariffs, slavery, "other reasons" stemming from slavery, plus very specious reasons postulated by southerners to create "complex issue". IMHO, tariffs would not lead to a war. Mind you, tariffs were protecting the manufacturing from mostly British competitions, so farmers and planters were getting a short stick. If this was the main issue, farmers of the grain belt would be together with the South.
b: How does one compromise over slavery?
On one hand, Southerners developed "slave owner ideology" and were extremely vehement against any compromise, but solution that are intermediate between slavery and "freedom" did exists, and in actuality, some of them were practiced as a compromise between North and South that ended the Reconstruction. For example, you can split a plantation into small parts, and rent the parts to so-called sharecroppers that would be free to leave unless they have debt liability, so you must additionally create debt traps. Serfdom would probably be unacceptable to abolitionists, but some form of debt indenture apparently were.
Posted by: Piotr Berman | Oct 31 2017 20:35 utc | 12
"Gen. Lee then ordered the overseer to thoroughly wash our backs with brine, which was done.”
Salt water was, and in MANY places still is, a standard treatment for fresh, open wounds. Oilman2 | Oct 31, 2017 3:45:06 PM | 6
In other words, the good general wanted to painfully punish the slaves while protecting them from festering wounds which would decrease the productivity and could be lethal to boot. One can think about three solutions. 1. Instruct to flog while avoiding open wounds. 2. Instruct to flog to inflict bleeding wounds and to apply a combination of alcohol and salve. 3. Open wounds and brine.
Posted by: Piotr Berman | Oct 31 2017 20:50 utc | 13
"How does one compromise over slavery? The "right" to own and abuse other humans to increase the wealth of their owners was the main issue..."
The current crop of plantation owners do it quite well. Set up an electronic tracking and live camera system that entails all activities that a human will engage in; i.e. - phone calls, watching tv, driving a car, hiking in the woods, working, talking to friends, posting to Moon of Alabama blogs, on & on.
They own you and I. And watch, and intimidate, group stalk and harass at will. They film, they catalogue and many of you still call it freedom.
Those who don't, take a knee during the anthem.
They do own you. You have no fight left in you.
By your own standards b, it is quite easy to see how today's citizens have compromised away their rights for slavery.
My only question is, will you be reporting to a robot or a human?
Posted by: MananaMerica | Oct 31 2017 20:57 utc | 14
Corrections are essential.. "Most, if not all of them, were and are fought for imperial power, for the enrichment of a few and the majority stupid working class voters of the United States. The methods were and are brutal and the enemies were and are nearly always depicted in racist terms....
Posted by: OJS | Oct 31 2017 21:05 utc | 15
I think it's wrong to ignore the issue of states' rights when discussing the motives for the US CIvil War.
This from one of the closing paragraphs; "The differences between the motives and attitudes of the southern states in the civil war and the motives and attitudes of the U.S. of A towards the world are marginal." Southern states could read northern states.
Slavery is an abomination.
Posted by: Hal Duell | Oct 31 2017 21:14 utc | 16
I am not willing to wade into the fight about whether the southern states had the right to secede or not and will not defend slavery. however, I do believe the world would be much different had the South formed their own union.
Posted by: dan of steele | Oct 31 2017 21:32 utc | 17
The causes for the US Civil War have been covered at the UNZ Review. This is a very deep rabbit hole and I would urge that we do not engage in Identity politics.
The bigger problem with Lee, Grant and many other military leaders of the Civil was that they participated in the invasion of Mexico. When castigating Robert E. Lee we must also remember that President Grant also owned slaves. Furthermore, somehow the Jewish CSA Secretary of State (a slave owner) later became a close consul to Queen Victoria even though slavery has abolished in the UK.
Slavery is still a growing problem in the world and even in the US where sex slavery and even child sex slaves are commonly abused.
While we are at it, the National Anthem is a racist screed promoting the torture and murder of escaped slaves and should be replaced by "America the Beautiful"
Posted by: Krollchem | Oct 31 2017 21:50 utc | 18
Marine General Smedley Butler: "Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service."
General Kelly is the victim of 45 years of service without a thought of his own, so he's new at it, and at a severe disadvantage when dealing with civilians who have been thinking for awhile. That's why Kelly says dumb things, e.g. "He told Ingraham on Monday that he did not believe he had anything to apologize for."
See, in the Marines one never apologizes when one is obviously wrong. Never. It's not something one thinks about. This thinking thing is all new to Kelly.
Posted by: Don Bacon | Oct 31 2017 21:52 utc | 19
The rest of the western world (Britain, France, Germany, Spain, et al) abolished slavery without killing a half million of their citizens. Many historians have written that the Civil War was a northern war of aggression against southern business interests, that the issue of slavery was simply an excuse, and that it all could have been avoided without a war and accomplished freeing the slaves without a shot being fired. If the north had just forced the sale of all slaves to the central government, thereby freeing them and allowing southern cotton and tobacco farmers to convert to a free market for labor, then there would have been no bloodshed. The cost to purchase ALL of the slaves would have been far less than Lincoln and Lee spent killing each other's children. But the Yankees didn't want competition from southern commerce - they wanted to continue their role as financial middlemen, which they still have the monopoly on today.
Q. If it was about slavery, why did Lincoln wait till 1863 to issue the Emancipation Proclamation?
A. He was losing the war and was desperate, he felt he had no choice but to roll the dice with something he said he would never do.
For all your armchair historians, here's a Lincoln quote from 1858 -
"I will say then that I am not, nor have I ever been in the favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races..."
Posted by: Don Wills | Oct 31 2017 22:20 utc | 20
IMO the confusion over the 'causes' of amerika's civil war is down to the fact that each side had different motives. Sure the southern side was fighting to defend its right to own and torture other human beings, but as most of us know it wasn't a desire to free those oppressed which motivated Lincoln and co - this is revealed by two disparate facts 1)that Lincoln didn't even push for abolition in the south until the war was about halfway through and it was decided black troops were needed so 'freeing the slaves' was dreamed up as a way to motivate african americans, and 2) for the first year or two of the war the Northern side seemed to do everything they could to avoid conflict with acts like laying siege to Southern strongholds yet failing to finish them off.
The union side held back like a gang of lily livers for the first coupla years, when it would have been quicker, more humane and killed a helluva a lot less to just go in beat the southern troops and let everyone else get back to their lives. Classic example - McClellan's pissfarting around.
There was method to this madness, Northern pols were determined to bring the south to its knees and force them to accept the massive political and economic restructuring required to consolidate stage one of empire so they adopted a policy of slow strangulation.
Lincoln and the rethugs were primarily motivated by the desire to centralise power in DC and end this bullshit of a confederation of independent states replacing it with one central point of decision-making and control where all the bribes would end up in their (DC trough guzzlers) kick.
As others have pointed out if the North's motivation was to end slavery, then the victory of the North would have brought about an end to slavery, but that isn't what happened. Instead of ending the ability for one amerikan to own and control another amerikan, the rethugs brought about an exeercise in semantics whereby the concept of slavery was redefined as being only about blackfellas in chains getting whipped and raped. "You may not get paid but you will get laid" as we used to warn girls who decided that becoming a cook on a prawn trawler would be a good career move - but I digress, post civil war all types of oppression and control of other humans weren't merely made legal they were encouraged. How could a private army such as Pinkertons whose number 1 task was to force other humans to work when they didn't want to, be permitted in any society that had truly abolished slavery? What to call the gangs of Irish and Chinese men forced into working by debt slavery, in dangerous environments such as mines, if not slaves?
Remember that it wasn't until after the civil war that the truly egregious acts of genocide against the indigenous population really took off.
It wasn't until after the civil war that the spanish amerikan war and the theft of Texas from Mexico occurred.
A truly democratic federation of independent states would have really struggled to prevail in these earliest of amerika's imperial escapades.
Since the end of that conflict I cannot think of a single instance of amerika coming under threat from either external (foreign) entities, or internal (domestic) forces yet that shithole of a joint spends a stupendous amount of its imorally and frequently illegally obtained wealth on huge systems designed to slaughter & oppress foreign citizens. That horror show is paired with equally vast and over-resourced systems for domestic oppression and control. All of this to the detriment of citizens who are indoctrinated to regard the very idea of all citizens being protected from illness, ignorance and inhumanity as charity and therefore an admission of weakness rather than proof of the robustness & viability of their society which most other cultures are encouraged to believe.
None of this will change sufficiently to allow amerika to be considered a nation of reasonable humans, capable of honesty and/or collegial fraternity until the monolith has been split into several pieces, making the governing regimes far more responsive to the desires and needs of citizens.
amerika is simply too big to live.
Posted by: Debsisdead | Oct 31 2017 22:22 utc | 21
Kudos, Bravo b. Amen and +1000 thank you.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
@ Oilman2 post 6
Salt water was, and in MANY places still is, a standard treatment for fresh, open wounds. Bear in mind that antibiotics were not even around for WWI, and the sciences of bacteriology, anesthesiology and many others simply did not exist in Gen. Lee's time. It is only in very recent times that the possible consequences of using salt water on open wounds was even explored.
What does the sciences - antibiotics, bacteriology, anesthesiology - have to do with brutality and torture of humans then "in those days"? Ever heard the phrase "Add salt to my Wounds" especially when soothing aloe vera is available - and in use over centuries - well known for burnt and damaged skin?
What is the excuse for today, say Abu Ghraib? Oh wait. FFS they did 9/11. NOT.
How humanoids can quickly rationalize away evil deeds.
Go and read some newspapers of the time to get a real understanding of the issues. Relying on historians is not a good idea - each of them has their own agenda, and all of them have an agenda to sell and promote their works.
How about seeing the real thing?
Let me take you to my father’s property of several hundred acres – a place with some history of slaves, including their burial grounds and the remains of buildings with the torture chambers. Yes, walls 4 feet wide built by the slaves and entire buildings still standing; we kept them as a reminder.
Posted by: likklemore | Oct 31 2017 22:45 utc | 22
The semper lie general lost all credibility when he callously told bold faced lies during his press conference a couple of weeks ago. I was first inclined to think the "paragon of virtue" was unfairly getting tainted by association with the orange chump. Turns out he's just another POS. Unfortunately, the lying general views are in complete adequation with his base of salt of the earth opiod degenerates.
https://theintercept.com/2017/10/21/john-kelly-trump-black-women-frederica-wilson-myeshia-johnson/
Of course, for suspected white supremacists General Lee is a mythical figure worthy of reverence, for he was a first class scumbag. His slaves considered him to be I quote:"The worst man they ever saw". Taking into account the dredges of humanity to be found in the antebellum south that's saying a lot... Under Lee’s command black union soldiers were massacred even after they tried to surrender at the Battle of the Crater in 1864.
Predictably reactionary hypocrites will always find specious and convoluted ways to make weak arguments that the confederacy and the civil war wasn't about slavery even when the clear facts tell us otherwise.
Articles of the confederate constitutions Article I, Section 9, Clause 4 prohibited the Confederate government from restricting slavery in any way:
"No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed."
Article IV, Section 2 also prohibited states from interfering with slavery:
"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 i in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired."
Perhaps the most menacing provision of the Confederate States Constitution was the explicit protection Article IV, Section 3, Clause 3 offered to slavery in all future territories conquered or acquired by the Confederacy:
"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 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."
This provision ensured the perpetuation of slavery as long and as far as the Confederate States could extend it's political reach, and more then a few Confederates had their eyes fixed on Cuba and Central and South America as objects of future conquest.
Unlike the Confederate States Constitution, the United States Constitution freely permitted states to abolish slavery. If the day ever came when slavery was eliminated voluntarily throughout the United States of America, not one word of the United States Constitution would need to be changed, whereas slavery could never lawfully be abolished under the Confederate States Constitution.
Jefferson Davis in 1858: " I say to you here as I have said to the Democracy of New York, if it should ever come to pass that the Constitution shall be perverted to the destruction of our rights so that we shall have the mere right as a feeble minority unprotected by the barrier of the Constitution to give an ineffectual negative vote in the Halls of Congress, we shall then bear to the federal government the relation our colonial fathers did to the British crown, and if we are worthy of our lineage we will in that event redeem our rights even if it be through the process of revolution."
Jefferson Davis on the economic necessity to maintain a permanent underclass. To this day this is the implicit doctrine of the american states with regards to the black hoi polloi: "You too know, that among us, white men have an equality resulting from a presence of a lower caste, which cannot exist where white men fill the position here occupied by the servile race. The mechanic who comes among us, employing the less intellectual labor of the African, takes the position which only a master-workman occupies where all the mechanics are white, and therefore it is that our mechanics hold their position of absolute equality among us."
White equality depends on black slavery...
The confederate degenerates tell us exactly what they fought for, still reactionaries will argue otherwise. I suggest General Kelly have a look at the iconography on confederate states currency to have a better idea. Can't fix stupid sociopathy... http://exhibitions.blogs.lib.lsu.edu/?page_id=707
Posted by: Augustin L | Oct 31 2017 23:03 utc | 23
Whether Robert E. Lee was a good person or night - either in the context of the period or in today's view - I don't pretend to know.
But I do know that Lincoln and the North were hardly saints.
Arlington Cemetary is actually Lee's (wife's) family ancestral home.
The US Quartermaster General - who was promoted from Captain in a 24 hour period after his Fort Sumter performance, seized it and used it to bury dead Union soldiers. Clearly a dick move.
As Mischi #3 notes, Lee was considered a premier military leader and was offered the leadership of the Union armies, but he declined because he didn't want to fight against his own family and neighbors.
As a concluding note: Lincoln's son paid 75,000 ounces of gold to the Lee family, decades after the end of the Civil War, as a recompense for the literal desecration of their home.
As is often the case, the reality of such conflicts is that both sides are led by an elite with their own agenda; not one of morality but of power.
My personal view is that the Civil War erupted because Eli Whitney's cotton mill turbocharged the Southern economy to such a great extent that they were attempting to emerge from under the New York shipping, finance and trade hegemony. Up until that period, the New York banksters always sided with the slave-owners against the New Englanders because of their financial interests; once the South started cutting them out, that delicate balance was broken.
In this context, it shouldn't be too surprising that Lincoln became the President that kicked off this conflict: Lincoln was a big corporation lawyer - he worked for the railroad companies then. Think Eric Holder or Lanny Breuer, but not black or Jewish.
Posted by: c1ue | Oct 31 2017 23:09 utc | 24
Debs I,D #21 writes: It wasn't until after the civil war that the spanish amerikan war and the theft of Texas from Mexico occurred.
For someone who normally has sensible things to say this is one huge whopper.
Posted by: ToivoS | Oct 31 2017 23:18 utc | 25
My understanding is that Robert E. Lee wasn't that much different from Ulysses S. Grant--both inherited slaves through their wives--or from Thomas Jefferson when it came to their treatment. Even people who were opposed to slavery, including many blacks as well as the notable scientists of that era, would be considered white supremacists by today's standards. It's more accurate to say that North and South differed in the degree of their racism, but not in their belief in white supremacy.
Posted by: s | Oct 31 2017 23:20 utc | 26
Lincoln's original motive for the Civil War was to preserve the Union. Although large portions of the Northern population were opposed to slavery I doubt if a majority had the strong feelings of the abolitionists. The abolitionists were a significant political force in the North. There were draft riots in New York during the war. The rich could buy their way out of the draft. It always amazes me that the mainly poor whites of the South fought and died so well so the Southern elites might keep their privileged way of life. It is also true that the mainly poor white boys of the North died so that the rich banksters and manufacturing elites could preserve the Union structured to rig the game for them. Many people do think McClellan did drag his feet for political reasons. Lincoln did free the slaves. Lincoln did create greenbacks so as to not pay the exorbitant interest the New York financiers wanted to charge the US for financing the war. LIncoln did real well in a terrible time to be President. Lincoln was assassinated - and not by any lone nut.
Posted by: gepay | Oct 31 2017 23:42 utc | 27
Don Wills #20
You have just briefly recapitulated the Southern justification for the civil war. It is incorrect. Lincoln became president in 1860 because of the backing of the abolitionists. They were not a majority of the country then. Lincoln also had to appeal to many voters who didn't feel strongly about slavery so you can find quotes from him attempting to convince them.
The main reason the south insisted on slavery was because, especially in the deep south, over half of their net wealth consisted of the market value of the slaves themselves. If the slaves were freed that meant that the plantation owners credit worthiness would drop by as much as 70 to 80 percent. That would set off a financial crises that would last decades. The slave owners were protecting their wealth. They used their political control to convince through intense propaganda the rest of the white population to support succession. b is correct to state simply that slavery was the principle issue -- the complications Wills refers to were secondary causes raised during the propaganda campaigns.
Posted by: ToivoS | Oct 31 2017 23:50 utc | 28
ot - from the usa daily press briefing today.. maybe kelly and haley are vying for top asshole/leader of the free world, lol?
"Secondly, I want to talk about Cuba for a second. As many of you are probably aware, tomorrow is the annual Cuba embargo resolution vote at the United Nations. For 26 years, Cuba has introduced a resolution for the General Assembly, calling for the end to the U.S. embargo on Cuba. We’ve historically voted against that resolution. Last year the United States abstained. And Matt, if I’m not mistaken, you and the AP broke that story last year.
QUESTION: We – I think so, yeah.
MS NAUERT: You think so. So many you can’t remember. (Laughter.) Okay. Well, a little bit of news for you on that front. Ambassador Haley will be reversing last year’s abstention and will vote against the resolution this year. It will be the first vote since President Trump announced our new Cuba policy. We plan to vote against the resolution to underscore this new approach to Cuba. The Trump administration policy gives greater emphasis in advancing human rights and democracy in Cuba, while maintaining engagement that serves U.S. national interests, maintains engagement on areas of U.S. national interest, ensures U.S. engagement benefits the Cuban people, and ensures compliance with the statutory ban on tourism to Cuba."
Posted by: james | Oct 31 2017 23:55 utc | 29
The US's imperial wars were fought on behalf of a handful of the wealthy and powerful Americans. Ordinary Americans have less support from the government and the oligarchs that dominate it than any other developed nation. Their struggle is more daunting, their lives less secure than their European counterparts. With each new military adventure, they become less well off with less access to decent housing, a healthy diet, healthcare, education....etc.
Posted by: CDWaller | Oct 31 2017 23:58 utc | 30
/~~~~~~~~~~
The Truth About The Law -- They forced legal tender laws on us by packing the court.
_HERE_
If you still think Lincoln cared a wit about "freeing the slaves" consider this. The emancipation proclamation did not free a single slave in any territory that the UNION CONTROLLED. And consider this PUBLICLY issued statement from “the great emancipator”.
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union..
Get it? The civil war had NOTHING TO DO with freeing the slaves. NOTHING.
\~~~~~~~~~~
Also see:
The Truth About The Law -- time to tell the truth; the 14th amendment was never ratified.
_HERE_
Posted by: blues | Nov 1 2017 0:47 utc | 31
I want to echo those in here that recognize that the civil war wasn't good vs. evil as b misunderstands, pushing the msm preemptive narrative of white-supremacist resurgence. Like I said before, horseshit. b is simply mentioning this off the cuff remark from this dumbass who has yet to condemn the obvious evil of the Afghan occupation.
And so...8
This is almost a trolling post, b. You should follow the context and why the fuck the civil war even matters in this state of affairs (hint: it doesn't except to snare Donald and his supporters in a trap whereby they legitimize accusations of crypto-racism by fielding stupid questions and then having the press corps running them to the drooling liberal hordes with itchy "twitter-fingers.")
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Nov 1 2017 1:01 utc | 32
32 One cannot be a "liberal" and a Democrat (warmongers; pretend supporters of working people and the poor). What Obama, Hillary and Kerry did to Libya was a war crime. What Bill did to Yugoslavia also a war crime. Carter and Afghanistan, Johnson and Viet Nam, and etc. Of course, the Republicans are equally horrible and worse, No liberal pretense whatsoever. Fck workers rights. Trickle down raises all boats.
Otherwise, your point is valid.
29 Florida with its combination of Rednecks, Retired Military Assholes living in "The Villages" (highest rate of STD's in the USA) and old guard Miami Cubans is an important state for the R Party. They must undo the open Cuba policy to make Florida a Lock in the midterms and beyond.
Posted by: fast freddy | Nov 1 2017 1:25 utc | 33
Posted by: ToivoS | Oct 31, 2017 7:18:06 PM | 25
Yep you are correct of course altho it wasn't an intentional whopper - more a really bad error created by my haste, so relying on memory instead of checking facts. I was so sure in my mind about Texas that I didn't check even though I double checked the spanish american war which was nearly 50 years (well 40) after the civil war & during that hunt I had established that the separation of California from Mexico was pre civil war but I still didn't pick up on Texas. I'm sorry and I will try to double check in future. Of course now I think about it, it is a stupid mistake - how could all the drama with Houston have happened unless Texas had already signed up.
However I still maintain that amerika's imperialism is a direct result of the civil war. That the militarism and jingoism stems from it.
Posted by: Debsisdead | Nov 1 2017 1:36 utc | 34
General Lee was an honorable man, and the Civil War in the US was not started over slavery, although slavery was a big social issue at the time. Some of you folk do not know American history as well as you think you do. General Kelly is another question. Kelly sounds like a typical war mongering neocon who is controlling Trump. Not good.
Posted by: therevolutionwas | Nov 1 2017 2:22 utc | 35
Seems to me that General Kelly is right in this case. After 60 years or so, the two sides reached a point where they could no longer compromise.
So the question: "How does one compromise over slavery?" is a strawman. There were many compromises: Timeline of Compromises over Slavery.
If the war was over slavery, then why did Lincoln wait so long to issue the Emancipation Proclamation? Lincoln hoped that the Southern States would reach some compromise (as they had before) that would end the War. And possibly also because he didn't want Northerners to think the war was really about freeing slaves.
How many northerners would risk life and limb to free the slaves? Very few. They were told instead that they were going to war to preserve the Union.
The South could see the writing on the wall. Northern mercantile interests were grabbing increasing shares of the profits of slavery by controlling the terms of trade, while the Southern plantation owners were the 'bad guy'.
Neither the North or the South wanted the public to know that it was ultimately about elite pillaging. Northern propaganda sold the war as "preserving the Union" while Southern propaganda sold the war as protecting a "peculiar institution" that placed poor whites into an exalted place (exceptionalism of the day).
<> <> <> <> <> <> <> <>
But why are we rehashing the Civil War? IMO it's a distraction from Obama's failures just as the Russian witch-hunt is a distraction from Hillary's failures.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Nov 1 2017 2:38 utc | 36
General Butler,
'I spent thirty- three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.
Posted by: denk | Nov 1 2017 3:02 utc | 37
- FOX News anchor Laura Ingraham had a fawning interview with John Kelly.
Posted by: Willy2 | Nov 1 2017 3:02 utc | 38
A far better determinant of a country's character is how it treats an important minority such as expectant mothers. Since 1990, the death rate among expectant mothers in the United States has risen from 16.9 per 100,000 live births to 17.5 in 2000 (Clinton) and 26.4 in 2015(Bush and Obama). As reference, Germany has cut its numbers by more than half from 20.2 in 1990, 11.3 in 2000 and 9.0 in 2015, while Ireland has gone from 7 in 1990 to 4.7 in 2015, Italy has gone from 10.1 in 1990 to 4.2 in 2015 and Spain has gone from 12.5 in 1990 to 5.6 in 2015. With perpetual war, you would have thought that the United States would, like Nazi Germany, improve maternal care to ensure that the necessary number of imperial stormtroopers are available as cannon fodder, but no, the American oligarchs are too stupid, ignorant, venal and greedy to even do that.
Posted by: Ghostship | Nov 1 2017 3:05 utc | 39
Gen Kelly is nothing more, nothing less, than a lying sycophant scum-bag. You don't make General in the empire's military without having those qualities.
Posted by: ben | Nov 1 2017 3:11 utc | 40
@36 « But why are we rehashing the Civil War? IMO it's a distraction from Obama's failures just as the Russian witch-hunt is a distraction from Hillary's failures.«
Indeed..
Posted by: Lozion | Nov 1 2017 3:20 utc | 41
@36 jr and @ 41 lozion.. no, we are being distracted from the fact that general kelly was referring to general lee as an honourable man.. that was the trigger.. it is about the character of general kelly still, however - american history pundits and etc, will not miss a chance to wax poetic on the in's and out's of american civil war / slavery history and this thread is no different.. the thread is about general kelly, in spite of the detours that posters will make..
Posted by: james | Nov 1 2017 4:06 utc | 42
james @ 42: Yep, exactly. Meanwhile, the deconstruction of some of the U$A's positive policies for the working classes continue unabated..
Which, is the whole point of the distractions..
Posted by: ben | Nov 1 2017 4:14 utc | 43
Debsisdead @21
An educational example of the desire to centralize and expand the powers of the newly-formed American government is the westeard expansion of the railway system.
Before the Civil War ended, Congress was throwing piles of public money and enormous public land-giveaways to private individuals to create the coast-to-coast rail system in an early Pay-to-Play scheme that created billionaire/millionaire families that still enjoy their inherited privileges to present time.
Read any good book on the subject for a true picture of the gigantic fortunes and power-ce=ters made by that pay-to-play scheme. Bribery-murder-intimidation=threats-hiredthugs rule history. Quid-pro=quo has no ethical boundaries except the mythological ones taught to babes in churches and schools.
Crime and crims rise to the top in all governing schemes proportionate to the lack of fairness.
Posted by: chu-teh | Nov 1 2017 4:26 utc | 44
@james
Follow the money
=
Obama ...
... bailed out wall street and supported a 'Dodd Frank' fix that envisions a regressive 'flat tax' (higher bank fees) for future rescues;
... allowed bank fraudclosure (which hurt minorities most);
... made Bush tax cuts permanent while imposing austerity on the working poor via an orchestrated fiasco called "The Fiscal Cliff".
... created a boondoggle for insurance companies and doctors called "ObamaCare" that was so flawed that it will likely be replaced with something even worse soon after Obama left office;
... and undermined civil liberties so people have a hard time fighting back.
=
Now Trump wants "tax reform" that will give the wealthy more money.
But hey, lets talk about Robert E. Lee. And topple some old statues. That'll teach'em to mess with us!
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Nov 1 2017 4:41 utc | 45
@45 jr.. we can talk about a lot of things, but it seems to me the article is on general kelly! those who talk of lee or obama are taking it further afield as i see it..
Posted by: james | Nov 1 2017 4:47 utc | 46
** The methods were and are brutal and the enemies were and are nearly always depicted in racist terms **
Envelopment, frontal attack, ambush, air assault, airborne assault, armor, artillery, land mines, booby traps, rifles, mortars, LAWs, barbed wire, feint, surprise, fire and maneuver, SIGINT, recon, interrogation, AAA, snipers, and cyber war -- all uniquely brutal, cruel, inhumane, and naughty American methods. You're so right about that.
And oh em gee!!! American troops actually referred to enemy combatants in disparaging terms. Oh, the horror. Say it isn't so, b. You have captured the swinish essence of Americans. Yes, you have.
Posted by: Col. B. Bunny | Nov 1 2017 4:54 utc | 47
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Nov 1, 2017 12:41:14 AM | 45
+1
Old recipe. Get people into an ethnic fight so they don't notice how you rob them. Will work until people wise up.
Posted by: somebody | Nov 1 2017 5:26 utc | 48
morals and dogma - albert pike. these people are in the same design
one more thing. slavery ended only in the 70's in reality. the civil war was fought over mainly money/power, and influences for power from overseas. slavery is a campaign tactic. like NRA/Gay/abortion/party issues or else why wasn't MLK dead back then? both parties had slave owners in their midst. it wasn't like lincoln abolished it the day the war ended.
its not the slaves so much, they just needed time to turn the idea from physical into financial slavery. which is where we are now. who is picking the strawberries and nuts? mexicans...... right or wrong slavery was better than andrew jackson's march of tears on indians. no one cried for them much.... you don't see this general or the citizens speak much of it....
all this talk of moral superiority, inclusiveness of others, really is only for another way to pit people against each other.
this general seems to be on the team. grey government team. he is too much a politician and a sorry strategist for men under his command. including trump. this is not to pit republicans against democrats because he VERY WELL MIGHT BE in the same seat in hillary's cabinet as well.
Posted by: jason | Nov 1 2017 5:26 utc | 49
@james
Focusing on Kelly as imperialist monster risks overlooking his tag team routine with Trump. Either Kelly is a moron that didn't learn from his recent experience with the press or he is deliberately giving the left a reason to be distracted from the tax reform debate in a soft-ball interview where he wouldn't be challenged.
You can bet that establishment Democrats are just fine with Trump tax cuts (did you catch the purple tie?). IMO Kelly's interview is aimed at the easily divided/distracted sheeple who are about to be fleeced (again).
Once again they trot out the same tired formula: tax cuts = more jobs. But most of the tax cuts just go into the pockets of owners and management.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Nov 1 2017 5:26 utc | 50
The title of the posting
How General Kelly's Attitudes Reflect the U.S. of A
Reading many of the comments would lead one to believe that what we have here is a difference of opinion over that signature democratic phrase, all created equal.
Are some humans really genetically better than others?
As much as our species has been brainwashed to believe so I posit that we are still too stupid to form the proper question about our apparent differences to measure, let alone assign value based on your answer to the previous question.....grin
B is bringing forward an anthropological observation that General Kelly's attitudes represent a crude/non-evolved picture of our species leadership when, in fact, it does represent the attitudes of those of our species in control of the global private finance tools and everything else but debt. we like to think of our species as having attained some advanced level of civilization but it is all smoke and mirrors and centuries of lie upon lie upon lie.
I am not a trained anthropologist but it seems clear to me and many others that our form of social organization is skewed way too patriarchal and still controlled by a core of families that own the lifeblood and pumps of all economies globally, money, usury and the exchange tools.
Until and unless we turn the lifeblood and pumps of our economic interactions into functions of a public utility we will remain a diseased species run by degenerate puppets like General Kelly, Trump and the real parasite folks behind the curtain.
Posted by: psychohistorian | Nov 1 2017 5:34 utc | 51
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2017/08/23/know-called-civil-war-not-slavery/ How We Know The So-Called “Civil War” Was Not Over Slavery
When I read Professor Thomas DiLorenzo’s article ( http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2017/08/21/lincoln-myth-ideological-cornerstone-america-empire/ ) the question that lept to mind was, “How come the South is said to have fought for slavery when the North wasn’t fighting against slavery?”
Two days before Lincoln’s inauguration as the 16th President, Congress, consisting only of the Northern states, passed overwhelmingly on March 2, 1861, the Corwin Amendment that gave constitutional protection to slavery. Lincoln endorsed the amendment in his inaugural address, saying “I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable.”
Quite clearly, the North was not prepared to go to war in order to end slavery when on the very eve of war the US Congress and incoming president were in the process of making it unconstitutional to abolish slavery.
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2015/04/13/power-lies/ The Power of Lies — Paul Craig Roberts
As Thomas DiLorenzo and a number of non-court historians have conclusively established, Lincoln did not invade the Confederacy in order to free the slaves. The Emancipation Proclamation did not occur until 1863 when opposition in the North to the war was rising despite Lincoln’s police state measures to silence opponents and newspapers. The Emancipation Proclamation was a war measure issued under Lincoln’s war powers. The proclamation provided for the emancipated slaves to be enrolled in the Union army replenishing its losses. It was also hoped that the proclamation would spread slave revolts in the South while southern white men were away at war and draw soldiers away from the fronts in order to protect their women and children. The intent was to hasten the defeat of the South before political opposition to Lincoln in the North grew stronger.
Lincoln was a man of empire. As soon as the South was conquered, ravaged, and looted, his collection of war criminal generals, such as Sherman and Sheridan, set about exterminating the Plains Indians in one of the worst acts of genocide in human history. Even today Israeli Zionists point to Washington’s extermination of the Plains Indians as the model for Israel’s theft of Palestine.
The War of Northern Aggression was about tariffs and northern economic imperialism. The North was protectionist. The South was free trade. The North wanted to finance its economic development by forcing the South to pay higher prices for manufactured goods. The North passed the Morrill Tariff which more than doubled the tariff rate to 32.6% and provided for a further hike to 47%. The tariff diverted the South’s profits on its agricultural exports to the coffers of Northern industrialists and manufacturers. The tariff was designed to redirect the South’s expenditures on manufactured goods from England to the higher cost goods produced in the North.
This is why the South left the union, a right of self-determination under the Constitution.
The purpose of Lincoln’s war was to save the empire, not to abolish slavery. In his first inaugural address Lincoln “made an ironclad defense of slavery.” His purpose was to keep the South in the Empire despite the Morrill Tariff. As for slavery, Lincoln said: “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.” This position, Lincoln reminded his audience, was part of the 1860 Republican Party platform. Lincoln also offered his support for the strong enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act, which required Northerners to hunt down and return runaway slaves, and he gave his support to the Corwin Amendment to the Constitution, already passed by Northern votes in the House and Senate, that prohibited any federal interference with slavery. For Lincoln and his allies, the empire was far more important than slaves.
DiLorenzo explains what the deal was that Lincoln offered to the South. However, just as empire was more important to the North than slavery, for the South avoiding large taxes on manufactured goods, in effect a tax on Southern agricultural profits, was more important than northern guarantees for slavery.
If you want to dislodge your brainwashing about the War of Northern Aggression, read DiLorenzo’s books, The Real Lincoln, and Lincoln Unmasked.
The so-called Civil War was not a civil war. In a civil war, both sides are fighting for control of the government. The South was not fighting for control of the federal government. The South seceded and the North refused to let the South go.
Posted by: Perimetr | Nov 1 2017 6:43 utc | 52
"How does one compromise over slavery? The "right" to own and abuse other humans to increase the wealth of their owners was the main issue"
Hogwash. 4 Union states were allowed to maintain slavery throughout the war, these slaves weren't even freed until 2 years after Lincoln declared them free in the South.
We could argue about whether the vast majority of non-slave owning Confederate soldiers fought for slavery, but I certainly don't think they did.
One thing is certain, the Yankee soldiers didn't die by the hundreds of thousands to free slaves. Read a little about the riots in NY.
Kelly is a Yankee, and the entire US military and MIC are too. The methods of terrorizing the civilian population into complete submission were perfected by the Yankees during the war and reconstruction. These war crimes and crimes against humanity have been used repeatedly since: Indian wars, Phillipines, Hawaii, Columbia, Germany, Austria, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, and on and on.
Robert E. Lee would never have done this, nor would he have remained the head of an army that did. As the US army has become a wing of the IDF along with their brethren in Zato, the evil and even satanic nature of this force is becoming clear. These forces have been a part of the US military from its inception.
Conscription is little different from Slavery, and in many ways is worse.
Posted by: Heros | Nov 1 2017 8:21 utc | 53
psychohistorian | Nov 1, 2017 1:34:09 AM | 51
I have a saying that pretty much covers it: Culture is the cloth, in which we wrap our humanity.
Posted by: V. Arnold | Nov 1 2017 8:41 utc | 54
>>>> Col. B. Bunny | Nov 1, 2017 12:54:44 AM | 47
American troops actually referred to enemy combatants in disparaging terms. Oh, the horror. Say it isn't so, b. You have captured the swinish essence of Americans.
You might mock but that is the whole point of military training in western armies particularly the American one. Condition them to think of the enemy as something other than human to make it easier to kill them and commit war crimes. Perhaps that is why the American military is so prone to PTSD - because once you see the dead if there is enough left of them, you know that you have been killing human beings.
As for the United States beng uniquely brutal, the reports coming out of Raqqa suggest the damage inflicted there was far more severe than that inflicted on East Aleppo which the American government claimed was uniquely brutal. So the Americans worse than the Russians? Yes! How else do you become the world's hyperpower and then try to retain that position, and being a democratic republic all Americans should feel responsible for the crimes of their government (the largest state-sponsor of terrorism) and military
Posted by: Ghostship | Nov 1 2017 9:08 utc | 55
I think a current equivalent to the claim that "the main issue was slavery" would be the claim in Syria that "the main issue is human rights". We have heard it all before, RTP (Responsibility to Protect), stop Assad the "tyrant" and his "massacres", "Free" the Kuwaiti's, etc.
We all know that these never ending wars of empire have absolutely nothing to do with Human Rights. They don't now and they didn't back then. So please stop playing these fake Cultural Marxist anti-white guilt cards.
Posted by: Heros | Nov 1 2017 9:12 utc | 56
Thanks for the post and comments.It has given me a deeper understanding and insight of American history concerning the civil war and I appreciate the frankness of former army members.
Posted by: Theo | Nov 1 2017 10:38 utc | 57
Slavery had nothing to do with the Civil War. Read your damn history. Lincoln included it because it had become a huge no-no and taboo in Europe who wouldn't do business with the US as a result.
Posted by: MRW | Nov 1 2017 10:54 utc | 58
@ Heros 5:12:34 AM | 56
You said:
"We all know that these never ending wars of empire have absolutely nothing to do with Human Rights. They don't now and they didn't back then. So please stop playing these fake Cultural Marxist anti-white guilt cards."
If you really are concerned about "fake Cultural Marxist anti-white guilt cards" you are the willing victim of some (highly paid) cracker barrel priesthood, since you presumably did not invent this gibberish all on your own. Can we ever stop worrying about Marx please. And stop worrying about "anti-white guilt cards", please. These are slogans pretending to be ideas. Maybe a few addled college professors talk of such things, but it's just idiocy pretending to be intellectualism (they do this to revolt against their craven slavedom to their new administrator-owners). Or some trailer trash cryto-racist (highly promoted and paid) cracker barrel priests. This is a form of dementia -- stop listening to this crap or you'll end up in the sewer.
Posted by: blues | Nov 1 2017 11:30 utc | 59
MRW | Nov 1, 2017 6:54:42 AM | 58
You're correct; but good luck with that.
As long as the Ken Burns' of the world, infantilize and create infotainment; Usian's will hold close their comfortable view of their history.
Posted by: V. Arnold | Nov 1 2017 11:31 utc | 60
@ V, Arnold who responded with
Culture is the cloth, in which we wrap our humanity.
Thanks! I believe we have the potential to evolve our culture to be more humanistic but we have yet to create the will to do so.
And if comments here are any indication, folks seem quite happy to parse the entrails of history instead of saying, this is/is not the world I want to create going forward for myself and the children........of which I don't have any......except all of you......
Posted by: psychohistorian | Nov 1 2017 11:35 utc | 61
"Most, if not all of them, were and are fought for imperial power and for the enrichment of the people of the United States. The methods were and are brutal and the enemies were and are nearly always depicted in racist terms."
I would like to know how I, average citizen,have seen "enrichment" by the wars. I have lived through all of them since Korea and have seen no augmentation of my economic condition thereby.
Posted by: Joseph Moroco | Nov 1 2017 11:51 utc | 62
@blues 59
That is quite an ad-hominem attack masquerading as a comment. You also seem to be obsessed with "crackers" and "priests" in a manner that is clearly anti-white. Perhaps you could explain where all this hatred for Europeans emanates?
Posted by: Heros | Nov 1 2017 11:53 utc | 63
“Wars in old times were made to get slaves.
The modern implement of imposing slavery is debt.”
–Ezra Pound
Who today is not enslaved by imposed government (public) debt, a requirement of “citizens” in the various debt-slave colonies we mistakenly call “countries,” which are corporations by definition and constitution?
It is not our constitution, but the “founding fathers” that created this government via their constitution believed through their own writings and associations, not your own. For it was their belief system and their “Fraternal Brotherhood” of Freemasonry that created this union, not yours. They were “the People” (capitalized in the constitution as a proper noun), not you and I as “the common people”. See generally: - clint, http://www.strawmanstory.info/
Posted by: steve kelly | Nov 1 2017 12:08 utc | 64
Article "The Mind That Rules " from DeBow's Review, published in New Orleans 1858
"The population of the free States
is over thirteen millions; of the slave States, over six millions. There
have been eighteen presidential elections; twelve Presidents were slave
holders, six were not, but Northern men with Southern sentiments. The
slaveholders have held the Presidency for forty eight years - more than
two-thirds of the entire period. No Northern man has ever been
reelected; five of the slave owners have been. As far as the Presidency
is concerned, the slave-owners have had more than their equal rights!
There are over twenty millions of free people in the Union; the
slave-owners numbered, in 1850, three hundred and forty six thousand and
forty-seven. According to numbers, they should have had the Presidency
but a single year; they have had it over forty-eight!
"Since 1809, the President pro
tempore of the Senate has been a slaveholder, except Mr. Southard, of
New Jersey, and Air. Bright, of Indiana, for five or six years in all!
And they were zealous adherents of the slave power! A single year was
all they could claim upon the principle of equal rights!
"Since 1820, for thirty-eight years
closing with the present Congress, slave-owners have been Speakers of
the House for thirty years; and free-State men for only eight years! The
Speaker, by the appointment of committees, controls the legislation of
the country more than any other officer of the Government, and the
committees never were appointed in so unfair and partisan a manner as in
the present Congress! "In the thirty-five Congresses, we have had
twenty-two Speakers who were slave-owners, and twelve who were free
State men. What class of men have had more than their equal rights?
"Since 1841, slave-owners have held
the office of Secretary of the Navy, except two years, up to the
organization of the present Cabinet; and since 1849, a slave-owner has
always been Secretary of War. The free States furnish most of the
shipping and seamen for the navy, and most of the soldiers for the army;
but slave-owners command them. Who have had more, in this, than their
equal rights?
"Since 1789, up to the present
Administration, the Secretary of State has been appointed fourteen times
from slave owners, and only eight times from free-State men. This is
the first officer of the Cabinet, who has charge of the foreign
relations of the country. What men have had more than their equal
rights?
"In the Supreme Court, five of the
nine judges, including the Chief Justice, have always been slave-owners,
and only four from the free States, and these must be sturdy adherents
of the slave power. So that one department of the Government has been
forever exclusively in the hands of slave-owners. Is this giving the
other citizens their equal rights? Nearly one hundred to one of the
people of this country are not slave owners, and more than three-fourths
of the business of this court arises in the free States!
"There is a class of the people
having more political power, than any other class of citizens - namely,
the slave-owners. There are three hundred and forty-six thousand and
forty seven of them, including men, women, and children. They admit and
boast that they have controlled the Government for sixty years, and do
now. They own three million two hundred and four thousand two hundred
and eighty-seven slaves. Three-fifths of them are counted; so that three
hundred and forty-six thousand and forty-seven persons are counted as
if they numbered in fact two million two hundred and sixty-eight
thousand six hundred and nineteen in the scale of representation. These
three hundred and forty-six thousand are counted nearly two million more
than they are, because they own slaves. Instead of three
Representatives in Congress, they have thirty, because they own slaves.
But this is not all the political power they have. They control those
States. The free whites in the slave States, not owning slaves,
numbering five million eight hundred and thirty-eight thousand three
hundred and fifty-seven, the great body of the people, do not seem
practically to have any political power. Who ever heard of any of them
being President, a Cabinet officer, a Senator, or a member of Congress,
or a judge of the Supreme Court, or filling any other important office
under this Government? The slave-owners, by their property and political
privileges, are made the ruling class in those States. They control the
press, and force submission to their will by a system of terrorism and
constrained public sentiment. must add to their power the nearly six
million non-slave-holders in the slave States. These three hundred and
forty-six thousand slave-owners, bound together by a single interest,
have therefore in their hands practically the political power of about
eight million people bond and free. Do they claim more than that for
their equal rights?
"We find that three hundred and
forty-six thousand slaveholders have had one department of the
Government in their hands absolutely-the judiciary; the executive
practically, and also the legislative-all; and yet they are going out of
the Union if they cannot have their equal rights.
"This is no over statement. More
than twenty million free people are governed by some three hundred and
forty-six thousand, and have been for sixty years; and they claim more,
or will go out of the Union after equal rights. All I can say is, if
they were fairly out of the Union we might, after their departure, have
equal rights!"
Posted by: Miller | Nov 1 2017 12:52 utc | 65
In the run up to the A.C.War the southern states made a proposal that they would end their 'peculiar institution' in the USA if the federal government would invade Cuba and/or a nation or two in South America and allow slavery to be practiced there. So to deny that slavery was not a bone of contention within the American nation then is preposterous.
Recently a barrack at West Point was named for General Lee defining how the military views their own history. I guess finding someone of honor to name a barrack after would be a difficult task considering the U.S military's history of aggressive war making. There was of course the very honorable Colonel Shay as a NAME option, but the military of the day fought to quell this people's rebellion just as they would and do today.
Today of course slavery is still an institution managed by enslaving the people with debt..."But if you wish to remain the slaves of bankers, and pay the cost of your own slavery, then let bankers continue to create money and credit. {from thin air as debt all owed to themselves] - Stamp - director of the bank of England.
I, too, would recommend Thomas DiLorenzo’s books and lectures, just to read someone who does not belong to the cult of Lincoln.
This piece covers some points discussed in the comment section:
http://www.zokpavlovic.com/conflict/the-war-between-the-states-of-mind-in-virginia-and-elsewhere/
“A significant portion of contemporary Americans hold an interesting perspective on the War Between the States (aka: the Civil War). They liken it to a Super Bowl game, an annual single championship skirmish in football in which the winner takes all. The losers cannot challenge the score and have to go home suffering the humility of defeat? In 1865, two years after fumbling cannonballs at Gettysburg, the Confederate States lost and had to go home….To this day, the question remains: why would the Southerners remember and celebrate a losing team, and how come the non-Southerners care about it so passionately? A convenient answer revolves around the issue of slavery; i.e., a commemoration of the era of slavery for the former, and, for the latter, the feeling that the landscape reminders of that era should be entirely erased.”
And
“Meanwhile, the process of deification of great leaders and liberators will continue. Consolidation of the federal government’s power in the United States, particularly its executive branch—from which the “great leaders and liberators” hail—has continued as strongly as its own avoidance of enforcing the Tenth Amendment of the United States’ Constitution–the same Constitution, of course, according to which the secession of Southern states was not an illegal act.
Passion for erasing the Confederate legacy, to modify the Southerners’ collective memory into a feeling of shame that what their ancestors have done was illegal and immoral, is not incidental. Feeling eventually turns into believing, which can easily transition into rejection of one’s own history and values. It is the last stage in ultimate fortification of the central government’s power against the states, which it has tried to accomplish for the past century and a half, yet has never fully achieved.”
Posted by: 47 | Nov 1 2017 14:15 utc | 67
General Kelly is not running the country.
Neither is Mattis or Tillerson.
Trump runs the show as much as the house and judiciary allows. Thank fuck there are some restraints.
Posted by: peter | Nov 1 2017 14:31 utc | 68
In 1861, Washington would not accept the will of the Southern States to continue living as a Confederation, while the Northern States intended to impose a Federation with customs duties and a single central Bank. As soon as he was elected to the White House, President Abraham Lincoln put down the secession. It was only during the civil war that followed that the moral question of slavery progressively identified the two sides. It is very easy today to forget the million people who died in this war and condemn the Confederates as racists, while at the beginning of the conflict the question of slavery had nothing to do with it, and the Federation also included several « slave » states.
Posted by: Jose Sion | Nov 1 2017 15:42 utc | 69
Lincoln colluded with the Russians: http://www.voltairenet.org/article169488.html
Posted by: Shakesvshav | Nov 1 2017 15:58 utc | 70
Wha???!!
What was Bleeding Kansas about? What was Harper's Ferry about? These both arguably the first campaigns of the Civil War.
Almost the entirety of the "State's Rights" justification is based on revisionist writings from the early 20th century. Folk of the time knew what it was about and they detailed all that in their secession declarations and public writings - slavery and the need to expand it into the new territories. No need to speculate from our present times, period writings are easy to find.
Posted by: Miller | Nov 1 2017 16:11 utc | 71
Spot on, b. I haven't read the comments yet but I would not be surprised if this post ruffles the feathers of some of the "right wingers" here who cling to the myth of a noble past and an honorable military.
Posted by: Temporarily Sane | Nov 1 2017 16:19 utc | 72
"period writings are easy to find" that will fit anyone's conformation bias.
Southerners, both slave holders and non slave holders, realized that Yankee bankers were out to usurp control of the US long before Harpers ferry. Tariff/trade policy was clearly set up to favor the north, and just consider Andrew Jackson's battle with the second bank of the US or even the anti-Freemason party of the 1820's. Radical abolitionist terrorists had been waging their little wars as well for decades.
The Republic had been created in dishonesty and deceit from the beginning, and the South had been seceding for years. In the end the south was merely the first of many victims of Yankee greed, depravity and satanic control.
Yankees were the only reason for the war of northern aggression. Yankees and the banks, cults and secret societies that own them.
Posted by: Heros | Nov 1 2017 16:31 utc | 73
Don Bacon@ 19
Thanks for reminding me of Smidley Butler. He reminding a few Americans that war is a racket. This is another way of saying that wars are universally fought for economic gain of one group over one or more other groups. Even seemingly radical islamic ideological wars in the Balkans, Middle East, Africa, Central Asia, etc. are economic using radicals as storm troopers for this or that empire. For example in Mali the French used AQM to suppress the Tuareg in Mali when they rebelled. This worked until the AQM attacked a refinery in Algeria and killed a number of foreign workers.
Smidley Butler also probably realized that all governments are in one way or another mafia type rackets. The problem today is the use of identity politics by one wing of the government mafia to gain economic control of "mafia" power results in the mafia wing in power strengthening the military, intelligence and police powers. Eventually, one of the the wings of the government mafia will use these assets against the American people.
Posted by: Krollchem | Nov 1 2017 16:32 utc | 74
Miller #70
You are mostly right. Politically the issue of slavery was tearing the country apart through the 1850s. However, the question of states rights was part of the debate at that time. The states right justification was raised in the early 20th century by southern historians in their effort to deny the role of slavery as the primary cause. As we can see with many of the comments in this thread those southern historians planted their ideas so deeply in the US mind that it has infiltrated into the thinking of some on the left who consider themselves anti-imperialist.
Posted by: ToivoS | Nov 1 2017 16:36 utc | 75
While my US history is v. weak, agree with Don @ 20, or at least, the economic considerations should be front stage though not solitary diva-star. So. From one angle only.
The North, with its rapid industrialisation and devp., diversification (shipping, *finance*!, etc.) using waterways, then coal (steam) etc. wasn’t suited to slave labor, and was truly ‘capitalistic.’
The South operated a plantation system, working the land with slaves (tobacco, rice, livestock, etc. and later cotton, partly dependent on ‘new’ machines), in a model that was seen and analysed as ‘not viable’ (e.g. ‘free’ labor can be cheaper) producing only ‘agri’ products, e.g. food, textiles, etc.
Two completely different economic systems interacted - very unhappily, see TARIFFS etc. The North actually needed the South for ‘cheap’ food for workers.
The US civil war is representative of much else and future events. Moral considerations, slavery, cruelty, racism, dictators, bad ‘regimes’, oppression of women, gays, trans - no “democracy”, dying (but not starving) children, etc. etc. - are invoked as rationales to destroy competing economies.
Which function either/or/in ‘small units’ (the plantation, which works, provided some blanket agreements, conventions, arbitrage for disputes, exists, medieval in flavor, but modern day factories are not too different), plus communistic / socialistic / state-run etc. are all anathema.
Milosevic, Saddam, Kadaffi, Assad, etc. must have their countries destroyed.
The US uses modern ‘slave’ labor (illegal immigrants, agri workers, sex workers, lowly paid illegals in big corps, etc.) to the hilt at will. At the same time it offers huge ‘charity’ and ‘re-distribution’ to the poor to keep them marginally alive, struggling and sick, just on the edge, to prevent serious disturbance.
Posted by: Noirette | Nov 1 2017 17:04 utc | 76
Miller @70
As your comment @65 indicates, most slaves were owned by a small number of plantation owners.
@36 I wrote:
Neither the North or the South wanted the public to know that it was ultimately about elite pillaging. Northern propaganda sold the war as "preserving the Union" while Southern propaganda sold the war as protecting a "peculiar institution" that placed poor whites into an exalted place (exceptionalism of the day).Southern documents that focus on (keeping) slavery were mostly propaganda that depicted the end of slavery as an existential crisis for the south. In fact, the North was not fighting to end slavery but for a compromise (one that gave the North the advantage and would likely lead to the end of slavery decades later but continue servitude in a different form - much as occurred from 1865 - 1965).
Naturally, the documents of the time (in the North or South) don't say much about how the financial benefits of slavery are distributed. What would be, today, hundreds of billions of dollars of labor value was ultimately distributed among wealthy plantation owners and northern mercantalists that bought the cotton.
IMO its similar to climate change propaganda from energy companies. They pay for reports that say that reducing greenhouse gases means loss of jobs, the end of our way of life, etc.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Nov 1 2017 17:29 utc | 77
Jackrabbit @76
I agree with much of this and even with assertions that in the beginning there was some talk about State's rights (many Southern states held referendum and the majority result was to stay with the Union - so much for democracy) and war wasn't about ending slavery so much as preserving the Union, at least for Lincoln.
As the casualties mounted and the cost became ever more, he had to change tack. Yankee troops did march South singing "John Brown's Body", and at the end only the eradication of the slave system could be sold as the justification for the piles of dead and maimed.
Lincoln/Douglas debates sum up what Lincoln was about, and actually how many moderate abolitionists had come to view slavery.
As a final thought on this topic - I realize I'm not changing anyone's mind here but I will challenge some folks's beliefs. Slavery was absolutely poised to transition to an industrial economy. People who claim it was on the way out and could not have managed this trick need look no further then the Treadagar Ironworks where slaves not only replaced European-born ironworkers, but during the conflict also cast gun tubes and other war material, ultimately prolonging their enslavement.
Posted by: Miller | Nov 1 2017 17:43 utc | 78
Here's the secession document from S. Carolina. There's background about the Constitutional contract that was established for "free and independent States" and then a part on what was done to break that contract; namely the refusal of non-slaveholding States to return runaway slaves.
Posted by: Bart in VA | Nov 1 2017 17:44 utc | 79
@ likklemore & Piotr Bergman
You both entirely miss my point, and yet illustrate it. Conflating something that was common 5 generations ago, before the world was interconnected with internet, with modern times is totally taking any event irretrievably out of its context.
It isn't about what happened, but rather about the circumstances of that period. And that period is drastically different from today. Context - context - context!
What was the flogging offense? Because, AT THE TIME, flogging was common practice in any military, particularly navies! Children were routinely given punishment via a wooden paddle or caning at school, even into the 1970's here in America, as my butt very well remembers.
Aloe vera? I doubt that was even being produced anywhere nearby at the time, and as I live in the south, it does not grow where a freeze can kill it back - which is most of the southern USA.
Alcohol? That would likely have hurt even more and I would venture it would have been in the form of spirits, not isopropyl. Try it on a cut yourself and see if it is less burning - it isn't.
I am not conflating Abu Ghraib or modern torture with anything, but rather trying to let others understand that what is considered torture today was not considered so generations ago. What happens today should be looked at in context as well - because our ancestors would likely not consider it torture were they to view it from their perspective in the past.
As for that torture chamber with 4 foot thick walls - send me the documents and archeology about it - then I might believe. My family ran one of these plantations, and people have tried for decades to insist that the slaughterhouse was a torture chamber, merely because it shared a roof with the negro quarters. My family paid WAGES to their alleged 'slaves' before the Civil War even began.
Further, as in most historical cases, every human did not behave the same way, either slaves or owners. What people focus on is the bad, because it both fascinates us and makes us feel better about not being quite so bad.
b writes an essay and hits some knee-jerking phrases and people go off the rails - mostly people who simply have never read anything except a singular history book. Mostly people who have never even read a newspaper from the period in question.
You guys might want to consider how Washington or Lee or Ben Franklin would view us today, from their perspective in history. Taking the context away is what people do to twist history.
Posted by: Oilman2 | Nov 1 2017 17:46 utc | 80
Several commenters understand that it wasnt about slavery, like moon implies.
But it seems the usual omission of the British divide and conquer has been missed by most of you.
One commenter above, mischi, sees some nuances regarding the conflicts of interest.
The British wanted to impose freetrade in order to deprive the north the opportunity to develop their industry. To prevent competitors to rise and to develop their societies is a recurrent theme in Britains impact on the world. And this is still ongoing now by the angloamerican elites geopolitical projects. That is what the Malthusians do.
In the south removing tariffs for their cotton export was favorable.
And the life of landowners in the south might seem somewhat akin to that of the British landed gentry. The British during that era was allover the world with their subversive operations by proxy.
Established historians never tell the truth but leave everything as if there were local causes and Britain had nothing to do with it.
Posted by: Peter Grafström | Nov 1 2017 17:52 utc | 81
@ psychohistorian
"Created equal" is fallacious in the extreme, and it is a phrase used to garner as many to a cause as can be gathered - an important aspect of the document that it was written into.
We are not born equal. We have physical and mental differences in the extreme. We are born into families of wildly different social strata and financial means.
One can make the argument that what was implied was "equal under the law", but then the facts in the above paragraph must be taken into account. When one does that, it is again clear that wealth, station and abilities will always separate people into differing strata within a society. Marxism tried to turn that on it's head, but it only succeeded in changing the people at the top of the structure.
Today, all over the world, these differences in wealth, connections and possibilities still exist. We are still born into them, no matter what is written in books. It is likely they always will exist, and as history shows, when the imbalance gets too great, it gets overturned.
It's a nice catchy phrase, and it elicits the response it was intended to, even today, centuries later.
Posted by: Oilman2 | Nov 1 2017 18:04 utc | 83
Unless I missed it I haven't seen anyone note the lack of a "right of secession" in the US Constitution. That document created a perpetual union for all member states. When the southern states withdrew from the union they broke it for the remaining states, and this they had no right to do.
This is the key point of the illegality of the secession. What they could have done is persuade the majority of member states to amend the Constitution to allow various members to leave. This was the only lawful way to proceed.
The secession embodied no "right" to secede. It was unlawful.
In the same way that the unlawful Catalonia referendum and its unilateral secession would break Spain for all the rest, when the lawful way is to lobby Spain to allow it the referendum, and further lobby it to leave.
In the same way that the Kurd's referendum was illegal. And any secession would further break the law of the state.
In the same way that Crimea's referendum was NOT illegal because the government of Ukraine was itself at that time an illegal government with no lawful power. The rule of law was broken, and the people were the only legitimate power extant.
You can only successfully break the law of your nation through rebellion if you win.
The southern states were fools to think they could win. The real reason they went to war is simply stated as hubris.
Posted by: Grieved | Nov 1 2017 19:04 utc | 84
"Was that the deed of "an honorable man"?"
Wouldn't it all depend on what the slaves did?
Also, Slavy is normal and natural. It's only ever been abolished in a few places and times - and it is ALWAYS white people who abolish slaveryl, of course. Non-whites practice slavery on each other as a matter of course. Why are white people supposed to be uniquely guilty of it? Also, does it matter that the quality of life of a black slave was likely much higher than the quality of life of "free" negros in America today?
Stay out of cultural issues, Moon. Stick to geopolitics. You're just a boilerplate establishment hack leftist when it comes to anything else. "Oh God he said something that OFFENDS me!!!! Someone help! HELP! Shut that man down!" Pathetic.
Posted by: Old Ez | Nov 1 2017 19:16 utc | 85
@84 grieved
Respectfully, I don't think the reluctant south would have signed their right to secede away when they begrudgingly took up arms against the red coats. I have seen scholars establish this point before using various interpretations of the Constitution and declaration of independence. I will look further into this, as I suggest others do as well.
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Nov 1 2017 20:03 utc | 86
@84 grieved
I know...if not the right to secede...where does it expressly forbid it? Usually stuff like..."Congress shall make no law..." etc.
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Nov 1 2017 20:06 utc | 87
@84 grieved
Further, the south did look upon the north as tyrannical and illegitimate for wanting to upend the right of states to practice slavery. This is undeniable that issues such as slavery were considered to be questions of the states, not a federal authority. The north was reneging first. Ergo, illegitimacy.
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Nov 1 2017 20:19 utc | 88
"The US uses modern ‘slave’ labor (illegal immigrants, agri workers, sex workers, lowly paid illegals in big corps, etc.) to the hilt at will. At the same time it offers huge ‘charity’ and ‘re-distribution’ to the poor to keep them marginally alive, struggling and sick, just on the edge, to prevent serious disturbance."
Posted by: Noirette | Nov 1, 2017 1:04:41 PM | 76
Yep, not to mention prison labor, which by the way, is enshrined in the U$ constitution.
Posted by: ben | Nov 1 2017 20:31 utc | 89
P.S. See Amendment X111 sec. 1, in reference to my 89..
https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendments/amendment-xiii
Posted by: ben | Nov 1 2017 20:36 utc | 90
The South lost.
It tried to secede, and didn't have the resources and allies to do so.
Everything written as analysis and history is colored due to the South losing - the victors write the history.
Lesson for the future: have the resources and allies to effectively secede, know that there will be war and wait until your enemy is at his weakest to part ways. Secession will be fought - no government wants their tax base departing (debt slaves), or to lose territory (resources). They will fight to keep any state in the current union, and that means lots of bribery and buyoffs and any other thing outside of outright war. Bribery, like prostitution, has a very long and successful history.
Watch the EU over the next decade or so for a glimpse.
Posted by: Oilman2 | Nov 1 2017 21:04 utc | 91
Sorry,,, Slavery was one of the many issues but by far not the most important. As it will do little good to try to convince those already convinced I'll leave it at that. The war is over,,, the South was destroyed as was the sovereignty of the individual States. But since it makes people feel good, makes them feel they are not racists,(especially Whitey) it does no good to try to stop the propaganda and BS. Any attempt to do so results in the individual being insulted and called a racist. So enjoy your beliefs.
Posted by: ken | Nov 1 2017 22:03 utc | 92
@86 Nemesis Calling and others...
I read it in a Supreme Court ruling after the war ended. I don't know how easily I could find the case - it wouldn't be hard but I'm rusty in legal research nowadays. It was a matter of compensation and involved Texas, and it hinged on whether Texas seceded lawfully or not. The court demonstrated completely well to my mind that the Constitution was a document to create a perpetual agreement. I read the case back when I was studying the Convention that created the document and I understood - and have always understood - that it was a perpetual Union.
A contract doesn't need to list all the ways it can be broken. If no provision is made for parties to void the contract, it remains in force unless all the parties agree to amend it so it can be voided. This is really basic law, it's nothing special, and nor is it unique to the US. Perpetual agreements remain in force forever, unless they are lawfully amended.
It's truly this simple. Same with Catalonia and Kurdistan. There are right ways to make changes, and wrong ways. If you choose the wrong way, you better win.
Posted by: Grieved | Nov 2 2017 4:05 utc | 93
@93...more
To dwell on this a little longer, the states absolutely did give up a portion of their sovereignty into that binding agreement. That's exactly what they did, and it's the core of everyone's discussion in the last couple of centuries about what the people kept, what the states kept, and what the feds received. The whole long, hot summer's negotiation of the Convention in Philadelphia was exactly all about who gives up what.
The point of all partnerships is that no partner can bind the enterprise into a condition that all the partners don't agree to, unless the agreement delegates that authority to a partner. If a southern state had a grievance against the federal government, it doesn't follow that New York did, for example. The seceding states had no right under any kind of law to break the perpetual agreement for New York, just to get themselves free of the agreement they had entered into. Then New York has a real grievance, for example, against the south.
The logic is really simple here. It's called rebellion against the lawful government. If a people want to rise up and declare their just opposition to a universal tyranny against them, look for me at the barricades to stand with them. But there is no legal right to rebel - there may be righteous justification but that is not the same thing as a lawful right, which is the only point I was making, and a point that seems to be lost in this modern age.
You can't play with these things. Rebellion against the government to which you are lawfully related is unlawful. You have to win.
Posted by: Grieved | Nov 2 2017 4:25 utc | 94
I think for an awesome website like this, the debate should be on.. Who was conducting the propaganda/public relations at that time?
With the Indians u had Comanche stories(gossip) some true some outrageous.Pocahontas plays probably....how was the propaganda on both sides much different than today other than language? and after the war how has some rewritten it. seemed to have combined. this is what is important. plus context :)
Posted by: Jason | Nov 2 2017 6:49 utc | 95
"How General Kelly's Attitudes Reflect the U.S. of A"
Grieved answers this for us: "You have to win."
To Kelly and the U.S. of A, war crimes don't matter unless you lose, so you have to win. Dead children you had gassed to blame the enemy don't matter. Committing false flags against your own people doesn't matter, so they certainly don't matter if you do them against your enemies (which your own people are also). Using Nukes against an enemy desperate to surrender doesn't matter. You have to win. Look what the US did to Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. You have to win and you have to crush and destroy your victims as a message to all others who might oppose you.
So to all you who listen to the Cultural Marxists who like to play guilt games and pretend that the North was somehow righteous for their cultural genocide of the South and its youth, I say this method of warfare was perfected by the Union Army under Sherman and Sheridan in their campaigns of rape, murder, destruction and terror through the Shenandoa, Georgia and the Carolinas. There is no way like the American way.
This is the true character of the US Army, the army of Satan. Kelly is an enemy of humanity, as are all the thousands of members of the US military.
Posted by: Heros | Nov 2 2017 7:18 utc | 96
Looking at the accurate post by Heros 96
Total war. This term was coined for Nazi Germany, but it is the US who's mindset is total war. There are no rules, only what they think they can get away with.
From what I have read, the US civil war was the first war where where killing was conducted on an industrial scale with repeating rifle and gatling gun.
Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Nov 2 2017 7:37 utc | 97
@96 Heros
Your point is the opposite of my point.
What you're saying is nothing to do with what I said.
By all means carry on with your point, but please leave me out of it. You have some good points but they're wrapped up in overly broad characterizations that don't match reality, in my view.
Happy to discuss. But no, I don't support what you're concluding.
Posted by: Grieved | Nov 2 2017 7:58 utc | 98
Donald Trump, at least his public persona, embodies this Yankee "you have to win" meme. Perhaps it is somehow related to the Las Vegas Route 91 psyop where Paddock supposedly had $5m taxable income from "winning" in Las Vegas in 2015.
But as an outsider looking in, since Trump has been elected this "win at all costs" predictive programming seems to have been driven to new highs. It correlates with the stock market too. America is chock full of winners. Like Trump. Or Zuckerberg, Gates, Bezos, etc. Or the Hollywood stars. Winners all. Look at these great new Tesla's and Iphones. Winners. The dollar is stronger, we are winning.
So clearly now its time to go win in North Korea and Iran.
Posted by: Heros | Nov 2 2017 8:12 utc | 99
@Peter AU 1 97
Most people are unaware of the brutality conducted by Sherman and his thugs. Wiki doesn't start to do it justice. He turned them loose on the south in much the same fashion Zuckov turned the Russian army loose on Germany. The pictures of the cities they "visited" are reminiscent of the Dresden ruins after the bombing. When the war was over this killing machine was unleashed on the Indian nations because they still allowed slavery /snark.
But the Americans were not the only ones perfecting war crimes. In the Boer war it was the British who discovered the concentration camp as a method to decimate the population and crush the opposition. The Bolshevics perfected this method.
It is interesting to read about how those nasty Prussians laid siege to Paris in 1871 just 6 years after the end of the War of Northern Aggression:
Prussia's chancellor Otto von Bismarck suggested shelling Paris to ensure the city's quick surrender and render all French efforts to free the city pointless, but the German high command, headed by the king of Prussia, turned down the proposal on the insistence of General von Blumenthal, on the grounds that a bombardment would affect civilians, violate the rules of engagement, and turn the opinion of third parties against the Germans, without speeding up the final victory. It was also contended that a quick French surrender would leave the new French armies undefeated and allow France to renew the war shortly after. The new French armies would have to be annihilated first, and Paris would have to be starved into surrender.
Those nasty Prussians, didn't they want to win? Compare this to New Orleans, Richmond or Atlanta in 1865.
Posted by: Heros | Nov 2 2017 8:41 utc | 100
The comments to this entry are closed.
thanks b... i am not sure how one goes about overthrowing centuries of abuse, while keeping up the facade of supporting and honouring the military... the usa has been so propagandized, all this is taken as normal - thus he is described as an adult or grown up... it is really too bad all the spontaneity, creativity and wildness has been replaced with a veneration of being adult or grown up.. being a murderous, destructive, and brutal military person is being adult... the usa and much of the west have completely lost any moral or ethical position from which to stand on.. many of these military people are further proof.. if that is what people call being grown up, or adult - give me the children in the room who haven't had their wildness pounded out of them other these little men any day or the week.. as soon as these so called adults open their mouthes, it becomes apparent how little they are..
Posted by: james | Oct 31 2017 19:03 utc | 1