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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.
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.
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 2017
Shocking 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.
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
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
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