I see the wingnut reverence for Nathan Bedford Forrest rears its head again. Think Progress has the video. From Roll Call:
On Monday, Rep. Ted Poe took to the House floor to discuss foreign policy matters. To make a point, the Texas Republican invoked the words of Civil War Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest: “Git thar fustest with the mostest.”
The Carpetbagger says:
Poe’s spokesperson told Roll Call, “The reference to Forrest was used in an historical context comparing the request to Congress for support of the Confederate troops to the request that is being made today by our Generals in Iraq.”
Now I'm no civil war historian but I don't think that Forrest, a Confederate general, ever made a request to "Congress" for trooop support because things were a bit strained at the moment, as I recall.
Nathan Bedford Forrest is a figure still revered throughout the south. His roadside statue in Brentwood, Tennessee (above), executed by shall we say a less than gifted artist, somehow captures the spirit of the man who was born poor and became exceptionally wealthy as a Memphis slave trader before the war (the statue frightens my young cousin Ben every time he drives by).
The thing Forrest was most famous for at the end of the civil war was his role as the Butcher of Fort Pillow. Before the battle, according to Union officer Captain W.A. Goodman who bore a note from Forrest to General Chalmers, Forrest agreed to treat all Union troops as prisoners of war if they agreed to surrender. Said Goodman:
When the note was handed to me, there was some discussion about it among the officers present, and it was asked whether it was intended to include the negro soldiers as well as the white; to which both General Forrest and General Chalmers replied, that is was so intended.
Chalmers did not agree to surrender and Forrest attacked. Said Sergeant Achilles V. Clark of the Confederate Twentieth Tennessee:
The poor deluded negroes would run up to our men fall upon their knees and with uplifted hands scream for mercy but they were ordered to their feet and then shot down. The white men fared but little better. Their fort turned out to be a great slaughter pen. Blood, human blood stood about in pools and brains could have been gathered up in any quantity. I with several others tried to stop the butchery and one time had partially succeeded but Gen. Forrest ordered them shot down like dogs, and the carnage continued.
Accounts vary but several have black Union soldiers being buried alive and nailed to boards and tortured before they died. The total number is also in dispute, but one Forest trooper, W.R. Dryer, said that "the fort was defended by about 450 blacks and 250 whites. We captured about 40 Blacks & 100 Whites and killed the remainder."
Forrest's report, filed three days after the battle was over, said he hoped it would "demonstrate to the Northern people that negro soldiers cannot cope with Southerners."
Forrest used the butchery of Fort Pillow to justify further killings of black soldiers throughout the war. Adopting typical racist victimization posture, he wrote to the Federal Commander in Memphis, Washburn that he had heard reports "that all the negro troops stationed in Memphis took an oath on their knees, in the presence of Major-General Hurlbut and other officers of your army, to avenge Fort Pillow, and that they would show my troops no quarter." He went on to tell Washburn that he had conducted all his wartime operations "on civilized principles," and proceeded to use the "oath" (which Washburn confirmed they had taken) as an excuse for further slaughter. He really had no choice, you see.
Never mind that Poe is a flaming idiot and Forrest never uttered the quote in question with regard to requesting funding or other (Forrest apparently said some version of this when asked about his success on several occasions, but the cracker talk seems to have been inserted by enterprising journalists after the war). A southern congressman uttering an approving quote from Nathan Bedford Forrest, who went on to become the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan and was largely responsible due to his reputation throughout the South for growing its ranks exponentially, is completely unacceptable.
(All quotes in this post taken from the book Nathan Bedford Forrest by Jack Hurst. Photo from RoadsideAmerica.com.)
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Zorba!
JANE! Does Paraguay have and extridition treaty with the US?
I seem to recall that Forrest’s post Civil War claim to fame was as a key founder of the Ku Klux Klan. Interesting fella for a Republican to quote.
sheesh, that’s none too subtle of a dog-whistle to the cracker crowd…
Of course, I do not usually gossip…
http://waynemadsenreport.com/
wait! are you telling me that statue is not photoshopped ?!?!?
Hey, Jane, this is OT — ;) — but I thought of you this a.m. When checking in on MSNBC, I saw Larry Elder (ugh) discussing, of all things, pay inequality. Gloria Allred was on the phone and did a good job describing the inequity and the realities of the discrimination. (Elder, no shock, was a buffoon, but at least he gave it national TV & radio time.)
So, hey, it’s not just HRC & you & *some* of us at the lake who value the discussion!
Peace, and thanks.
Such an ugly statute for such an ugly man.
cbl @ 6
Nope. The photo does not do it justice, either. It is probably the most spectacularly ugly work of art I have ever laid eyes upon. In its own way it is a hideous masterpiece.
lotsa honks for this one…
http://freewayblogger.blogspot…..wrong.html
I have seen better sculpting artwork in the nearest McDonald’s playground.
Why are there so few rightwingers with artistic talent?
-GSD
invoking kkk founders. repugs, they must be so proud.
Great post, Jane!
That is one funny looking statue.
I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit that my mother named a cat for Forrest, because it was born a day or so prior to its litter mates and using the “quote” as the reason. I was not fully aware of Forrest’s history at the time or would have raised at least some objection. We wound having to put the cat down after it had attacked first a cousin, them my parents over a T’giving weekend. Maybe it was Forrest reincarnated.
GSD @ 11
we’ve answered this before, i think.
artists are generators of creativity, the think-for-yourselfism essence that authoritarians recoil at.
GSD @ 11
GSD, what so ever do you mean? Don’t you recall the beautiful sculpture of a pregnant Britney Spears? Now, that was art.
(ugh, I need a shower after saying that)
I still can’t understand why so many military bases are named after Confederate generals. Fort Bragg, Fort Benning, Fort Hood — major bases, all named after failed Confederate generals who were, in essence, traitors.
This kind of goes with the piece Glen Greenwald has up today, about how neocons excuse themselves and each other when they betray the nation’s secrets, but are very dismissive of anyone else’s concerns about due process.
Somehow it’s seen as honorable to have taken up arms against your country if you did it in the service of slavery, in the service of authoritarian, anti-democratic, paternalistic domination. Honorable enough to have a base named after you by the same army you took up arms against.
But those who criticize an illegal war we were lied into are traitors. Go figure.
Somewhat fitting that the revisionist history epic Forrest Gump, opens with a big tee-hee about how the General represents nothing more than people going a little crazy now and then before proceeding to bash the dirty hippies.
kaleidescope @ 14
they were all Dix.
My heros? Steven Colbert and Jon Stewart.
Sunlight @ 3
Well, the Republics seem determined to become a small, regional, southern party. I hope they achieve that goal soon.
Oh, dear. That statue. I recall thinking when it went up that it looked like it was meant to be the centerpiece of a KKK miniature golf course. I don;t recall that any of my Confederate ancestors turned over in their graves as a result of that thought, either.
As for Poe–well, getting things straight requires critical thought. Seriously, how long has it been since the average Republican could manage that party trick?
We’ll just call it ‘Katrina Redux’ ~ White House Blames Gov. Sebelius For National Guard Shortages GOP-SOP
Chertoff just said something weird on CSPAN about privacy I think (I just caught the tail end) something like, people have to be “unaculturated” to understand that they don’t own their own information…I want to hear what he actually said, but the “unaculturated” word was telling.
Racism exists in all regions of this nation. It is true however, that more than a few racists and bigots are more coy, refined and subtle in their pronouncements and implementation of this philosophy, and in promoting this defect in their seemingly inherent profile.
Nola Sue @ 7
Yes and then there’s this.
Gee – that horse looks like something Atrios would award Pony Boy when Bush’s approval rating hits a new low. Yikes!
I don’t know how you caught this, Jane, but it is so revelatory.
I have never been south of the Mason Dixon line because of a visceral feeling of utter creepiness that falls upon me when I contemplate it. People reassure me, but there is something preternatural about the disgust I feel.
I ask myself why I should have these feelings 140 years after the end of the Civil War.
Well, it is clear that there are people whose universe is a mirror image of my own: frozen in the Confederacy. For them too, these brutal generals live.
I cannot say how repulsed I am at this account.
Lou Costello @ 23
GOP = SOB
just sayin’
Mornin’ Jane (at least here in HOT LA)…
…trooop support?
Now, as for content, while I agree that this is unacceptable, are you, um, surprised?
I suppose that those who would like to defend Ted Poe would say that he is too ignorant to be a bigot but that he is trying. I think that just as Poe romanticizes the Confederacy, we romanticize the Congress. One of the principal reasons that we are in our current mess is that the Congress is made up of some of the most venal and bone-achingly stupid people on the planet. I will stop here because I do not wish to be accused of exaggeration.
I contacted his office in DC to ask if Rep. Poe considered Nathan Bedford Forrest a personal hero in light of his history as an early leader of the KKK. I was advised that Nathan Bedford Forrest was not involved with the KKK and I should “google” him and it would verify that fact. I did, and the first link (civilwar.com) not only verified his involvement with the KKK, but his actions at Fort Pillow in massacring Union troops (mainly black)and his accumulation of wealth as a slave trader. I faxed this information to his office and am awaiting his reply. I also let them know video of his floor speech was linked to by the Huffington Post so he could not cry it was taken out of context.
Does anyone still doubt the R in Republican is for Racist?
I think this just plays to his base: Will racist role hurt potential 2008 candidate Thompson?
LS @ 24
unaculturated = brainwashed
watch the Commander Guy start firin’ the catapult
Does that make Fitz Sherman?
Lou Costello @ 31
It plays to people who are too stupid to distinguish between an actor and his role or between fantasy and reality.
Badwater @ 21
At which point, Nixon’s “southern strategy” will be fully and completely realized.
That statue looks like an action figure from a claymation movie!! What’s that movie, Toy “something”…
Lou Costello @ 23
Those people are such scum.
Why’s that guy on the horse wearin a skirt?
Jeff Koons ?
and yeah Jane, was hoping you caught Ms Allred beat back the ‘partial birth abortion crap’ as a “politicized term” this morning
Fern @ 34
Like I said…His GOP/Coulter/Limpbaugh/Bigot BASE!
And Bill Maher.
spurious @ 39
Give the surface a little prick and there lurks hatred of brown and black people, hatred of anyone who may need help, hatred of women, hatred of other. And it is a matter of little pricks.
Thanks for spotlighting this Jane…great work, as always.
I remember last summer being astounded to hear that George Allen had named his only son Forrest. Of course that was before I learned more truths about “Macaca” himself.
My friends who live in VA were always too embarassed to talk openly and honestly about their Governor/Senator. Reminds me of my growing years in NC and the ignominious representation of beloved state by Jesse Helms.
Re; above comments about the South. There are racists and jerks everywhere…plenty of them here in Gotham. I remember my grammy in rural NC saying about such people “honey, he just doesn’t know any better”. Then she’d proceed to talk about how people can and should learn and that it’s up to the rest of us to make sure that happens.
and Bill Moyers
These ‘white are supreme’ groups are active in virually every state in the union. And then there’s the John Birch Society, among other groups. These guys are everywhere.
I’ve lived in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough in Alaska for 24 years now. It is an area where a lot of oilfield workers who came to Alaska from the deep South have relocated. During those years, through teaching, coaching, participation in scouting and so on, I’ve gotten to know about ten kids named Forrest. All were named after the Confederate general and co-founder of the KKK. A few are adults now. Only one has apparently changed his name. To Bob. Imagine saddling a kid with your demented dream of white superiority, haughtiness and cruelty for the person’s entire life.
Alison @ 28
Please realize that there are many of us who were born and raised in the South, and do love it, who are appalled by the racists and red-necks. The south has many fine and good people and has brought much great literature and music to the country and the world.
Having lived all over the country, I have known racists in all parts of the country. That is a reality. There are blue/liberal enclaves sprinkled throught the south, great food and beautiful weather and scenery. Please don”t condemn the entire region because of the idiots like Poe.
My great-grandfather was in the Confederate army and spent 1 1/2 years in a yankee prison camp. At the same time, I had a 3 great-grandmother who freed her slaves in the 1830s as it was “inappropriate for one human to hold another in involuntary servitude.” Many other liberal southerners have quite similar histories. It is a long battle but we’re fighting it one step at a time. (climbing back down off my soapbox once again)
Looks like an early Dixichick, ya bitch.
Jane Hamsher @ 9
Eh. Mah. Gawd.
OT – Marcy scores again. She is a force.
http://thenexthurrah.typepad.c…..t-68892310
http://www.census.gov/acs/www/…..02T040.htm
As is clear from this site, gooperism flourishes where the level of higher education is low. Nationwide about 26% of people have college degrees. When you get to that figure- gooperism virtually disappears- get down to 20% and gooperism flourishes. It ain’t just about geography!
The birthplace of the KKK is Pulaski, Giles County, Tennessee, which is on the northern border of Alabama. I had an aunt who had a farm near Prospect, Tennessee which is in Giles County. My aunt had a black share cropper family who lived on the farm. When I was eight I visited my aunt for most of that summer and played with the boy in the share cropper family. I’ve sometimes wondered whatever happened to him. Was he able, and inclined, to rise above that station in life?
Subway Serenade @ 50
That’s not a dig at the Dixie Chicks, pray tell?
Sometimes it seems that a few of those from the North are as bent on re-fighting the Civil War as some from the South are. It’s all so aggravating.
Last time I checked Jimmy Carter and Al Gore are from the South. So is Bill Clinton.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 57
So is John Edwards!
dakine01 @ 49
Cristy Hardin Smith is from West Virginia and still lives there. There are many liberals and many Democrats in the South, we are just simply outnumbered by the rapturists and such. We try to make a difference, but it’s very hard when you are surrounded by a lot of ignorance and backward thinking. Those who are so “disgusted” should instead feel sorry for the lot of us who ARE progressive because it can be a very lonely, isolating existence filled with a sense of utter helplessness at ever enlightening your neighbors and friends.
I recently saw “The Good Shepherd” and there’s a line in it that I can’t get out of my head. Matt Damon says to a “foreign” looking character, “It’s our country, you’re just visiting.”
Apart from the inherent racism in the line, it does go to the heart of what much of White America thinks of all the Blacks, Hispanics, and immigants, legal and otherwise, that live here.
That these attitudes still exist here does not surprise me in the least. That so many of us reject the view that this country “belongs” to white males gives me a small measure of hope.
Forrest sounds like a “stand-up guy”. He sounded like he did a “heck of a job”.
What do you expect from the party that’s stirring up racism across our country in the name of “immigration reform”, just because it’s popular among their racist, idiotic base.
IrishJim @ 58
w00t!
GSD @ 11
A goop with artistic talent?
BwaaHaHaHaHa
Way off topic but a friend of mine just called me and told me he was trying to pick something up at Washington Hospital Center in DC where, he says, the Queen seems to be. He can’t get near the place. It is surrounded by fire equipement and police cars. Has anyone heard anything?
Oklahoma kiddo @ 56
Amen. When you attack the South with ad hominems, you are attacking Southern progressives as well, and we need all the support we can get, for obvious reasons!
Word, OKkiddo
Oklahoma kiddo @ 47
Again, WORD!
I think what people should clearly define is the politics of the South. The sad truth is that the poltics of the South is still dominated by the regressive, racist neo-Confederate holdovers who still look dearly to the days of the “Old South”. The Trent Lott, Strom Thurmond, Jess Helms, Lee Atwater, George W. Bush-Karl Rove wing of the Republican Party.
There is much about the South that is wonderful, beautiful, charming and 100% American.
Racism and slavery are not included.
-GSD
One of the principal reasons that we are in our current mess is that the Congress is made up of some of the most venal and bone-achingly stupid people on the planet.
The Texas Legislature makes Congress look like it’s populated by 535 reincarnations of Pericles.
punaise @ 46
and Russ Feingold
1,510 DAYZ AND THE KILLIN’ GOEZ ON AND ON AND..
Citizen Hamsher and the Firepup Patriots:
Thanx for this post, I hope that FDL and the progressive blogosphere will become transmitters of truth to get the rhetoric used by these fascists into mainstream consciousness. Americans everywhere need to hear these words and their historical context on the evening news and at every campaign stop every Republifascist candidate for office makes. We must attach these criminals to their history and hang it around their necks…anyone heard from George Allen Jr. lately?
I have been sayin’ for some time that the battle we are engaged in right now is the final battle of the Civil War. The peculiarly American fascism that has power today has its genesis in the antebellum South and the vocabulary and formal ideology was developed and masterfully articulated by the Firebreathers like John C. Calhoun and Henry Clay in the 1840’s and 50’s.
Make no mistake about it, this American fascism is not new, it is as old as America and has an historical identity wrapped quite closely into the fabric of the heroic period of the early nation. These people believe what they say and their progenitors like Nathan Bedford Forrest have committed the heinous crimes we associate with brutal tyrannies far from our shores.
The anti-fascist progressive movement can take back our politics and the White House and the Congress without the solid South…indeed, the fascist Confederate history of this region is the wedge issue to split the South politically until demographic and economic changes can finish the bastards off.
But remember Firepups, these people will kill with impunity whether by politics or gunshot and we ignore the reality of their moral corruption at our own peril.
KEEP THE FAITH AND PASS THE AMMUNITION, THE BASTARDS FIGHT BECAUSE THEY LIKE IT!!
xoites defends Constitution @ 64
God save the Queen.
Leave it the Curse of W. to be the end of her reign too.
-GSD
I strongly support two Southerners for the Democratic nomination for president. Gore and/or Edwards.
possible moronic convergence . . .
a few weeks back, The Oracle of Santa Monica (aka Digby) posted about them returning to their anti semitic roots, someone downthread was asking as to why all the talk about immigration again, and I see an ‘English Only’ story was in heavy rotation at MSNBC this am –
it’s all they have left
The legend of Forrest has also been promulgated by the US armed forces, as I have heard an Army armored cavalry officer describe him Forrest as a cavalry “genius”
Yeah, I don’t wanna get in a pissin’ match about who’s racist-er. Count me among those who’ve lived around the country and will attest to there being plenty o’ prejudice *and* progressives on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line.
Feel free to move about the country, Allison.
My dad, as southern-born as they come, has been a loud-mouthed civil rights advocate all his life, much to his parents’ and bosses’ confusion, and my gratitude & pride. His attendance at the “wrong” meetings in Alabama in the 60s cost him tenure.
IMHO, when you run into a truly progressive southerner, you’re looking at someone who has really examined the issues and taken a stand. It’s not just a sociological question, but a deeply-felt matter of utmost humanity.
Again, peace.
Mandrake @ 59 says:
You’re exactly right. I’m in Texas now but have lived in Fl and AL as well as growing up in KY. Have also lived in NH, MI, MA, IL, CO, HI, CT, and NY over the years.
One of those interesting little facts, most of the Appalacian areas were anti-secession, feeling it was the rich/low-land people pushing for war. That’s how West Virginia came into being, by seceding from Virginia after Virginia seceded from the Union.
Well, it is clear that there are people whose universe is a mirror image of my own: frozen in the Confederacy. For them too, these brutal generals live.
The Union had Sherman, but this does not excuse Forrest. Wars create monsters and unleashes monsters.
The media has treated the South as a subject of ridicule for a hundred years. Some of it is deserved and some of it not. You don’t have to go there. Nobody will force you to. I haven’t lived there in over forty-two years but it is my roots and it isn’t the horror that you seem to imagine.
what dakine01 said ….. (@49)
GSD @ 71
OMG. Prince Philip is here also. I thought they were at a NASA thing today. Nothing on MSM about this.
I heartily condemn ‘regionalism’. No matter what region against which it is practiced.
Google news says Queen is scheduled to visit kids at the hospital today. Maybe it’s just security, etc.
Forrest is a gooper delight. He was born poor and stupid and then became rich and famous- through the slave trade. He apparently was bit of a genius in calvary tactics and killed lots of yankees- first Grand Klugle or Keagle- or Beagle of the Klu Klux Klan on top of it all. Self made man.
LS @ 80
Oh, ok. Normal DC hyper security then. Thanks.
1,510 DAYZ AND THE KILLIN’ GOEZ ON AND ON AND..
Citizen oklahoma kiddo:
Gore/Edwards or Edwards/Gore…I’m tellin’ ya that these are the only tickets that can save America in ‘08. Mrs. Clinton would be worse than a wingnut in the White House.
KEEP THE FAITH AND DON’T GIVE THE BASTARDS ANY ROOM TA BREATH!!
Bill Moyers is an Oklahoman.
rwcole @ 81
A Beagle Boy of the Klan! I bet Scrooge had fun beating him to protect the money-bin, huh? (sorry, coulnd’t resist)
My ticket, unless or until Gore says otherwise, is still Edwards/Clarke.
Raw Story:
pre-macaca’d? not sure the cracker crowd can distinguish role-playing from reality.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 84
Kentucky was schizophrenic (for lack of a better term). Lincoln was born in Hodgenville and his family went north. Davis was born in Hopkinsville and his family went south.
Lincoln’s wife was from Lexington, KY. One of his brothers-in-law was a Confederate General iirc (John Breckenridge).
Joe Klein’s conscience @ 69
Stephen Colbert is a Charleston, SC native!
Lincoln’s wife was also nutty as a fruitcake.
OT: Farmed fish intended for human food fed melamine contaminated food (CNN)
RonD @ 86
Clarke or Clark?
dakine01 @ 88
Shirly Temple and Adolph Hitler share a birthday. Funny how everone in my family all thought exactly the same thing at the same time about everything. The bathroom rush was murder!
way OT: on strictly esthetic grounds, the top two ads on the front page at DKos happen to nicely color-coordinated with the site themes.
GSD @ 67
i’ll go further. the folks cited above wouldn’t even stoke the old ugly fires if it wasn’t effective as a political tool.
meaning they don’t believe this crackerism themselves — they are merely nihilists seeking power.
Norske,
I have to disagree with the aspect of your comment (#70) that makes it seem as if the entire South is fascist and racist. Max Cleland and John Edwards and Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and Al Gore, whatever your feeling about them, are not racist, and they were all elected by southerners. James Webb, etc. but I won’t belabor the point.
We need the South, as much as we can get of it in our camp and we won’t get it with your kind of rhetoric.
Jeepers fucking cripes. The idiots are too idiotic to know how big of idiots they are. You can’t excuse ignorance, but you can pity it when it is displayed in such quantity.
Thanks, Jane…I guess. I’m going to go have a beer and think happier thoughts.
Shirley Temple turned into a right wing fascist ambassador.
Uh…Mpoodle, you got me. Clark(e), Wesley, is the man.
rwcole @ 95
with dimples
OK,
Will Rogers my favorite oklahoman !
While the Southern plantation owners are the most responsible for slavery, most people in the South did not own slaves. Northern industrialists profited greatly from selling to those Southern plantations.
IMVHO, it is not possible to give Lincoln enough credit for what he achieved. At the same time though, that he was anti-slavery, he was for most of his life, a supporter of legalized white supremacy. Even among abolitionists, there were very few who were not in favor of legalized white supremacy. I don’t believe that the Union General, William Tecumseh Sherman (who found no fault with Forrest at Ft. Pillow in his official inquiry) had any problem with slavery. One of Lee’s best Generals, and a close friend of Grant’s, Longstreet was an abolitionist, but chose to fight with the South on account of states rights. Grant’s father-in-law owned slaves in Missouri. Legalized white supremacy was just as prevalent in the North as in the South both before and after the civil war. Lynchings were more common in the South, because there were more African Americans down there. A lot of Southern families, who profited less from slavery than wealthy Northerners, paid a horrible price in terms of dead and wounded. It’s that reservoir of suffering that Toe so repulsively taps into. A whole generation of Southern men were wiped out. North had more people and didn’t pay nearly that steep a price. With all that said, I met a guy from Alabama at Gettysburg a few years back who was still pissed off, because after the Civil War his family received no compensation for the six slaves they had to set free. Maybe he had relatives in Texas named Toe?
I write all this, because I think it’s important that we not demonize the south in a way that is not historically accurate. To be sure, the South has specific responsibilities that the North does not. At the same time, the North’s record before and after the Civil War is not that great on issues concerning African Americans.
FWIW, Forrest was a complex guy. He later distanced himself from the KKK and if wiki is to be believed, in 1875 he met with the forerunner of the NAACP and advocated for African Americans to have the right to vote. Whether it’s true or not (I suspect it is, because it appears that he died a man of modest means), it doesn’t excuse his conduct at Ft. Pillow. He was the commanding officer, it happened under his watch.
Nola Sue @ 75
Holy Moses! You said it. You should hear my dad sometime. He doesn’t mince words about his Democratic viewpoints and will challenge his ill-informed Publican brethren with the facts at the drop of a hat. And he is also pro-Union/pro-Labor. Gasp! That is akin to satanism down heah!
But don’t get in his way with a bunch of Bush-worshipping crap. He will pare you down to size in seconds flat.
We could sure use Virginia- and La., Arkansas, and North Carolina are all within reach. Texas will be blue eventually as the hispanic population grows.
o.k. folks, bedtime here in Dresden. catch y’all on the flip side.
rwcole @ 97
See? :)
Human pile of shit Tony Snow joins in the smearing of Gov. Sebelius of Kansas.
Says she should have asked for help.
Yet the facts show she has been for years.
Kansas gets Katrina’d.
-GSD
cbl @ 101
;0)
Mandrake @ 89
Joe Klein’s conscience @ 69
punaise @ 46
My heros? Steven Colbert and Jon Stewart.
And Bill Maher.
and Bill Moyers
and Russ Feingold
Stephen Colbert is a Charleston, SC native!
Molly Ivins, transplanted Texan.
rwcole @ 104
Only if the dems actually pay any attention to what is happening in this state.
LS @ 91
Oops. Your Copper River Sockeye whose harvest begins next week, probably just went up at least a dollar a pound with that news…
xoites defends Constitution says:
Hell, I share a b’day with the Bargoyle and Joan Rivers! As well as Boz Scaggs, Nancy Sinatra, Sonia Braga, and Lexa Doig among others. we only 365/6 chances for b’days so the odds are pretty good that most of us share ours with great people and dweebs.
Not surprising that some in the South would idolize a butcher.
Nola Sue @ 109
man, do i miss molly.
fahrender @ 105
Thanks fahrender, pleasant dreams. I hope you get a chance to get back to Bama and ask around. Probably not a lot of European Americans playing with African Americans back in those days. Somebody will probably remember.
Is West Virginia considered a southern state? Do they still serve Mello Yello there?
Hey, Mandrake @ 103–
Oh yeah? Well my dad can beat your dad! He called this bunch fascists 6 years ago!
;-)
RonD @ 98
Wesley is Clark; Richard is Clarke
I want this to be the headline of the NY Times and every other newspaper.
LS @ 80
Speaking of Elizabeth visiting children in a hospital:
Elizabeth II was opening a new children’s wing at a hospital in Scotland. After the ceremonies the hospital administrator took her on a tour of the hospital. They saw all of the different sections and then they walked into one of the open wards which was full of men.
She walked up to the first bed and said, “How do you do my good man.”
The man in the bed replied: E fond kiss, and then we sever;
Ae farewell, alas, for ever!
Deep in heart-wrung tears I’ll pledge thee,
Warring sighs and groans I’ll wage thee! …
The queen confused walked away to the next bed and said to the man: “ And how are you today?”
The man responded :
, MY Luve’s like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June.
O, my Luve’s like the melodie,
That’s sweetly play’d in tune….
Elizabeth looked at the hospital administrator and asked, “Is this the mental ward?”
“No mum this is the Burns Ward.”
Sorry about that.
John Casper @ 101
It is unpleasant to think, but it must be admitted that the great country of the United States of America was built with the sweat and blood of slavery; upon land stolen by means of near genocide.
Up here in the North, we shy away from the tragedy that was a systematic genocide visited upon the Sioux Nation. But, it did happen. Avoiding the truth, doesn’t change it. Accepting it, and not accepting that it should ever be allowed to happen again, is the only sane response.
And, of course, that is a reason we all rail against the atrocities this administration allows in terms of torture for ‘the good of the state.’
I will propose, though, that areas of our country which are more accepting of injustices visited upon our own citizens — past and present — do seem to find a greater degree of support for this administration’s inhumane policies. Fear or ignorance, it matters not what the reason is, they are both two sides of the Devil’s coin.
Thank you. My ticket is Edwards/Clark.
Yep, no one ever doubted the guy’s personal courage and he was an unbelieveably good tactician, especially considering he had no training prior to the war.
GSD @ 106
And, oh joy, hurricane season starts in 24 days.
Prepare the talking points:
“They should have evacuated when they had the chance.”
“The governor should have requested assistance.”
“President Bush declared the area a natural disaster before the storm hit.”
“We thought we dodged a bullet.”
“Who could have predicted….?”
1,510 dayz and the killin’ goez on and on and..
Citizen farender:
Please don’t bring that poor abused South shit into this conversation. The “conservatives” in the southern mainstream politics are not ideologically one bit different from the mainstream of southern citizenry pre-1860. The fact that their ideology and bloodthirsty rhetoric appeals to some in the rest of the country makes my point about the malignancy of this particular brand of fascism.
We did not complete Reconstruction and we re-enfranchised the political and social leadership far too early…my God man, wake up and come to grips with your history, there is nuthin’ “heroic” about the Antebellum South or the reality of the Confederate slavocracy. No one said that everyone from the South is a fascist…I will stand by my belief, however, that southern “conservatives” and Dixie revivalists are fascists pure and simple.
KEEP THE FAITH, THE TRUTH WON’T HURT YOU BUT THE FASCISTS WILL!!
Twisted Martini @ 114
The Mason-Dixon Line is the Maryland/Pennsylvania border. Anything south of that is…well South.
fahrender @ 96
James Webb was elected just as much by transplanted non-Southerners, who still have to put up with highways named after Lee, and more insultingly, Jefferson Davis, in places like Arlington and Alexandria.
You can’t squeeze blood from a stone; we don’t “need” the South, and no lip service to their “values” has stemmed Republicans gains there; Gore couldn’t win Tennessee in 2000. Better spend time expunging the northeast of Republicans and let demography take care of Dixie in the longer term.
Hey Jane!!!
Cheney just took to the floor of the Senate to send you, me, and everyone else here a hearty “Go fuck yourself!!!”
Seems like there is no such thing as decorum any more, is there?
Very fitting that the chambers of the Congress are being used for the occasional vulgarity directed at a respected politician with whom one disagrees, the coronation as the next messiah of a convicted felon from the Korean CIA, and the quoting of racist hate-mongers from our nation’s most painful episode.
Bush sure did turn out to be the genteel reconciliator, didn’t he? Right there is evidence of how black=white and up=down with him and his coterie of thieves.
take the last Clarke to train civil … ?
Nola Sue @ 109
and Bill Moyers
and Russ Feingold
Stephen Colbert is a Charleston, SC native!
Molly Ivins, transplanted Texan.
Jim Hightower!
Today, the mythology of American “exceptionalism” can behave just like open racism used to, it seems to me. I just listened to Senator Durbin on the Senate floor, speaking after the weekly “policy lunch” of his caucus. Sounds like the Democrats don’t have much patience with the new “September Stall” plan of the White House.
But, what struck me, again, during his comments, is how pitiless Dick Durbin is about the Iraqi people and their country. Harry Reid’s righthand man in the hierarchy of the Senate Democrats apparently doesn’t really give a damn about the fate of the Iraqi people, if it means leavening his hero worship of our military with pity for their victims in Iraq.
The damage to America from this invasion, horrific as it is in lives and treasure, still pales in comparison to the damage done to every facet of Iraqi life, to all of their infrastructure, and to all of their institutions, but most of all it pales in comparison to the loss of innocent civilian Iraqi life caused by the violence our heavily-armed military invasion unleashed inside Iraq, using the homes and streets of Iraq as a “battleground.” Yet Dick Durbin didn’t mention even one example of the latter travesties on hapless Iraqi innocents as a reason for us to leave Iraq. He speaks only of American losses and American needs. Does no one keep Senators informed about the state of affairs on the ground in Iraq, or does Durbin not bother to learn the scarce facts that are available?
I consider Durbin’s utter lack of expressed concern for those innocent Iraqi civilians, who are trying to cope at the point of an American gun, to be pandering to the lowest common denominator of American self-absorption, and an example of ingrained racism of the sort that considers Iraqi Arabs somehow inferior to the exalted American people and their indomitable military machine. I don’t know how Dick Durbin squares his professed concern for the oppressed of Darfur with his inability to mention the viciously oppressed people of Iraq – people oppressed as a result of our actions, who are therefore truly our responsibility, unlike Darfur.
I know that Chicago and environs, like many places in America, has a deep and abiding racist past, and I’m afraid Dick Durbin is not immune to the easy casting of blame on “inferior” victims of the abuse of American power. Durbin nevertheless usually ends up doing the right thing, but his language in explaining and advocating his actions helps to enable those listening who prefer to ignore the wrongs America is doing, and thereby justify and maintain their racist heritage in the name of American “exceptionalism.”
Mandrake @ 129
and Russ Feingold
Stephen Colbert is a Charleston, SC native!
Molly Ivins, transplanted Texan.
Jim Hightower!
Nice list!
punaise
Thompson will be able to have it both ways
“I’m not a racist, but I play one on TV”
FWIW, emptywheel has had several posts on the current Sioux attempt to get back the gold that was
stolen from themtaken out of the Black Hills. I know OK kiddo has Cherokee ancestors. A lot of FDLers are not 100% European American.Betsy
I lived in Texas for 15 years or so- my son and grand daughter are still there. It was, of course, fairly democratic for a fairly long time. GW Clusterfuck took over for a dem governor and served as governor with a dem legislature. The democratic party must certainly be alive and well in the state and working on a rebirth- and they will be better at making it happen than the national party I suspect.
Considering the Ft. Dix story, I keep thinking that something negative will be announced today. Wolfowitz resigning?? But so far, nothing. Now I’m thinking I’m wrong. Damn.
punaise @ 127
You’re reaching…
Howie’s got a very enlightening thread upstairs.
#120
By the way, why is the Queen here? Is it a favor to Bush to prop up his ratings, is she fulfilling some diplomatic function, or was it scheduled two years ago?
My super short take on the Southern problem and suggested solutions.
Churches need to be banned from the process in Democracy they cross the line way to far way to often.
Democratic party needs to draw a sharper line of who we are. For example Sen Mark Pryor is anti choice… that imo, is not a welcome position in my party. It makes me want to leave it in my dark moments.
Unions need to get a foothold down here.
Equal pay for women and a whole lot of help for poor folks in re collage education including folks who want to pursue higher education later in life after kids are grown up a little etc..
Public campaign finance!
Mutant Poodle @ 135
over-reaching…
As I recall, West Virginia was born out of the civil war from Virginians who chose not to join the confederacy.
brendan @ 139
I heard she’d always wanted to go to the Ky Derby. Prolly wouldn’t have been proper to make the trip without stoppin by the WH. Even if Shrub’s there.
brendan @ 139
I think she is here to see the Kentucky Derby.
Solai @ 134
These guys are going to be used to frighten us but from what i heard they are not very bright. In January 2006 they took a video tape containing young men firing AK47’s and screaming for Jihad to a video store to have it copied. How smart is that? Then they attempted to buy AK47’s (i am supposing in the last 24 hours) from an FBI agent.
I am terrified of people like this because they tend to drive as poorly as they think.
You know, people in Kansas lost everything they owned and some lost their lives. I’ll bet some of those people recently expressed sympathy for Tony Snow’s health problems. Too bad, he couldn’t have a little sympathy for them in their time of need. He cried and thanked everyone for their prayers for him, but all they get is “they should have asked”. After Katrina, nothing surprises me. What a tragic state of affairs.
Solai 134,
Chevron is going to announce something about participating in kick-backs in the oil for food scandal while Condi was on the board. That’s pretty big.
pow wow at #131
Durbin’s a politician, and he’s doing his job. Remember that a majority of Americans oppose this war, and that majority includes people who cheered the invasion like a football game. They now oppose it only for the death and damage it causes Americans. Durbin is trying to keep that coalition of the unwilling together. It’s our job to speak the unvarnished truth, not Durbin’s; he’d only be punished for it…again.
Alison,
This is EPU’d now, but please don’t think we were piling on, not at all the intent. But for myself I truly love large parts of the South while hating the perverted parts.
There was a singer/songwriter named Jesse Winchester from Memphis who went to Canada during ‘Nam that may have summed it up best in one of his songs Nothing But A Breeze where he sang the line that probably fits best:
“I’d like to live with my feet in Dixie and my head in the cool, blue North…”
OT-The ’shooter’ has been out of the news for a bit and just pooped up at the waynemadsen.com site. Of course it’s only Wayne but this has got to be the best laugh of the day. Thus far!
twolf1:
She picked a good year for it. This one’s another promising Triple Crown contender.
Romney Says It’s ‘Entirely Possible’ That Saddam Had WMD And Hid Them In Syria
John Casper @ 133
I missed those posts, I’ll check archives. That might be fruitless for the Sioux, though; that gold continues to leave the Bad Lands in the form of cheesy tourist trinkets, hand over fist.
It’s a bad deal. Any sort of reparation could be nothing but a drop in a bucket; but, it’s a start.
johnSwifty @ 120
Kinda tangential to that and Christy’s early Saturday morning posts on the unsolved rapes on the Standing Rock Reservation.
Back in 1980 something when I was in H.S. my Mom and Dad were friends with a Lakota (Sioux is actually a pejorative to them) couple, and anyway they belonged to some group which met monthly, and sometimes I would babysit their kids. They were great people and I found out later that the husband was an associate of some of those who occupied Wounded Knee back in the early 70’s
Just makes you pause and remember that we’re all just people
Reid is all over the Kansas story.
twolf1 @ 150
Romney ist mit bullshit.
LS @ 155
He’s on CSPAN2 btw…
LS @ 154
GOOD!
pow wow @ 131
Wow. You said it. I was very offended by Durbin’s remarks after the President’s SOTU (or some speech Bush gave several months ago) because he was harping on how much we had done for and given the Iraqi people. He was blaming those ungrateful Iraqis for just not being able to get their sh*t together. I mean, there’s only a civil war raging over there right now. Can’t they just step over the bodies and get to work? Geez. What do these people want, the moon?
I feel the same way about Durbin in this respect. He has shown his disdain for the Iraqis not only by omission, but by flat out criticizing them like any of this is our fault and I was MOST offended by that.
You hit the nail on the head.
xoites defends Constitution @ 156
Oh, THAT old chestnut again. These boys are really starved for original ideas, ain’t they.
Some interesting reading!! The last confessions of E. Howard Hunt.
http://www.rollingstone.com/po…..oward_hunt
Seems like he should have been removed from the floor for the day.
I welcome secession. We have nothing in common with those people, and are much better off without them.
john in sacramento @ 153
Lakota, yes, I’ll remember. And in my immediate vicinity, Chippewa is pejorative…Ojibwe being preferred. Words are important too. A rose would smell as sweet but it is easier to trod upon when it is called a weed.
Solai @ 135
Germany’s World Bank Director is lobbying for Wolfowitz’s ouster. Here is a Bloomberg Link
Mary McCurnin @ 44
707!
RonD @ 74
Tom Clancy waxes eloquent on that theme in “Bear and Dragon.” Clancy’s characters praise one of Forrest’s maxims: “Keeping up the skeer.”
Another thing to keep in mind — most, if not all of the Confederate generals were graduates of West Point, and had served honorably in the US Army.
Veritas78 @ 163
Not a good idea. If the South had won the Civil War, they’d have conquered Mexico and Cuba and spread slavery there. Who knows what a menace they’d be if on their own now.
While we’re talking about slavery and genocide blackening the consciences of various populations across the US, go further South and look what the Spaniards did to the native population in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Why is the statue of Forrest wearing a little girls’ dress and riding a naked horse?
brendan @ 168
Oh good God, people! Get off it already.
1861 -
Civil War: West Virginia contributes about 32,000 soldiers to the Union Army and about 10,000 to the Confederate.
Battle of Philippi mark first land battle of the Civil War.
Union victories forces Confederate out of the Monongahela and Kanawha valleys.
April 17 – Virginia state convention votes to secede contingent on approval by popular vote.
May 13-15 – Delegates from 25 counties meet at the First Wheeling Convention, repudiating the secession from the Union.
May 23 – Virginia’s ordinance for secession ratified, but a majority in the western counties voice opposition.
June 11-25 – Second Wheeling convention: counties of western Virginia refused to secede with Virginia and created the Restored Government of Virginia in Wheeling.
August 6 – Second Wheeling convention reconvenes.
August 20 – Second Wheeling convention adopts a dismemberment ordinance that provides for the formation of a new state to be called Kanawha.
September 10 – Battle of Carnifex Ferry
September 11-13 – Battle of Cheat Mountain
October 24 – Public referendum, voters support creation of a new state, to be called Kanawha.
November 1-3 – General John B. Floyd troops attack Rosecrans yankees at Gauley Bridge
November 6 – Battle of Droop Mountain
November 11 – Guyandotte, Cabell County, burnt by Union troops in retaliation for a raid by the Confederate cavalry.
November 26 – Second Wheeling convention reconvenes, changes name of new state to West Virginia, begins to draft a constitution, and extends the boundaries .
October 1 – 3rd West Virginia Cavalry Company A – Recruited primarily from Morgantown, mustered in at Wheeling
December 21 – 3rd West Virginia Cavalry Company A – mustered in at Brandonville
History of West Virginia
Could be seen as the real heroes of the civil war- they seceded from Virginia who was seceding from the union. West Virginia showed courage in not leaving the Union with the rest of the state.
veritas and brendan:
As if helping to elect Bush twice was not enough of a menace, you guys have to keep reaching back into the past to find things to criticize us about??!! ; >
bow wow @ 131:
You know, you really take the cake. Because someone chooses not to mention YOUR pet issue in a speech all of a sudden my entire state, and particularly my section of that state, is “Racist”? This type of sterotyping is typical of the Conservatives, and I’m highly disappointed to see it rearing its ugly head in a more progressive venue.
Chicago is, and has been for decades, traditionally a Democratic town. In fact, it is Illinois’ southern area that lays claim to the rednecks and bigots. Jesse Jackson and his cronies on the City Council are almost icons of Chicago politics.
Senator Durbin has been working to end the war. To stop the violence. To put an end to ALL the death and destruction. If the only way to accomplish that is to appeal to the “Patriotic” sentiments of the Religious Wrong and the 26%ers in the Congress, then more power to him. If ending the war meant he had to stand on his head and whistle “Dixie” for an hour and a half, I’d grab his legs to help him stay up. Ending the war is what matters – not the rhetoric required to do so. Your insistance on writing someone else’s speech is childishness. If it gets the job done, then I’m for it – 250%.
Perhaps you’d like to libel our other fine Senator as racist as well while you’re at it?
*rolls eyes*
When I was a kid, I always thought that “Indian Giving” was something that the indians did- not something white people did TO them. Funny how the mind works.
rwcole @ 172
Thank you for correcting my misperception about WV and the confederacy. To me, it is still a Southern state, but I’m guessing a lot of people are just as ignorant as I was in not realizing they were not part of the Confederacy.
Alison @ 28
An interviewer Down Under was interviewing Will Ferrell and co-star when he confessed he’d never been to the southern part of US. Will Ferrell: “Treat yerself.”
Wasn’t it Margaret Mitchell who said she grew up hearing heroic tales of the Confederate soldiers and it wasn’t until she was 10 that she learned the South lost the war…
twolf1 @ 151
What do you expect when he hires Cofer Black of Blackwater as an advisor?
twolf1 @ 144
I believe she came for the 400th Aniversary of the founding of Jamestown
OK, I will stop dissing our friends in the South now…I’m in California, so fire away!
OT
Just recieved an E-mail from John Edwards asking to sign a petition to Congress on the Iraq War.
http://johnedwards.com/standfirm
Here is a copy of the email:
Congress has reached a fork in the road on the war in Iraq and they urgently need your help to choose the right path.
One direction leads straight to more war with no end in sight. It’s a road paved with symbolic deauthorization bills, hoping for veto-overrides that never come, and so-called temporary extensions that give Bush all the money he needs without ever actually bringing a single troop home.
But in the other direction lies real action—using Congress’ funding power right now to pass another binding plan to force George Bush to actually end this war.
Only massive, direct public pressure will get Congress to choose the right path. Congress took the right first step by passing their last funding bill. But following Bush’s veto the resolve in Washington has started to fade. If we want to end this war, we’ve got to speak up now.
So this week we’re gathering 100,000 voices calling on Congress to stand firm and send back a binding plan to end the war. We’re at nearly 70,000 signatures now, and we need your help to get over the top. Please sign our emergency petition right away.
http://www.johnedwards.com/standfirm
After you’ve signed yourself, please ask at least one person you know to do the same. Getting to 100,000 will take all of us.
The latest news from Washington is that Congress is considering abandoning their binding plan to end the war and instead give Bush another extension—probably until September. This is completely irresponsible. When September rolls around, we’ll be right back in the same place and Bush will push for another extension, just like he’s been doing for years.
This has to stop now. It’s already clear that the escalation has failed. Bush has no authority to use American troops to police a civil war, but that’s what he’s doing. There is no military solution to the sectarian violence in Iraq.
Enough is enough. It’s time to end the war. And that means no more extensions, no more delays, no more non-binding anything.
If Congress is going to find the courage to end the war, they’re going to need to get it from you. This is the moment of choice. The road our nation embarks down this week will have massive consequences for our troops, their families, and our country. And as citizens who know this war needs to end, we must raise our voice today.
We’re aiming to deliver 100,000 signatures this week to show Congress that the American people are counting on them to end this war. Please help make that happen by adding your name today, and finding as many people as you can to join our call.
http://www.johnedwards.com/standfirm
Thank you,
–John Edwards
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
P.S. Last week, your tremendous outpouring of support enabled us to run an emergency ad in Washington DC calling on Congress to stand firm, and then to expand the plan to run the ad in Iowa. You can see the original and Iowa version of the ad, as well as the version with dozens of citizens voices added in online, at:
it has only been a few hundred years since OUR country was invaded and stolen via murder and theft by euro-thugs nee “pioneers” or “settlers”.
might be surprising to some, but indigenous people do survive invasion. the question is, who got the biggest financial benefit out of the biggest land grab in history? are they related in any way to the wingnuts that are killing in our name today?
for starters, settler-thugs and all their progeny including any of you reading this comment. for enders, bushco and the type that is willing to do literally anything to ensure their wealth and their power for as long as the people stay bent over.
yes, native people here were totally screwed, but we have survived, we might thrive eventually, but if we had it to do over again, we might decline to invite new worlder’s to live here if we knew then what we know now.
that reluctantly being said, the point is, SOMEONE is benefiting, some corporation somewhere is banking on continued strife everywhere to gain shareholder value. when are they going to pay for the blood shed in all our names?
it will take time to recover the trillions in claims that native people have in the Black Hills and the Cobell case, but why allow poor kids everywhere (those that end up having to be in the military) pay with their blood NOW so that the neocon madmen have their way?
The Civil War is probably just recently over. It was kept alive for generations by “veterans” and small town memorial celebrations- and heroic figures in town squares- and so on and so on.
The last veterans joined their comrades underground some years ago- in the 1960s or so. Their children and grand children may have kept the oral histories alive for a short while- but at this point the guts of the thing are long gone- only a bit of confederate flag waving by those who really don’t have a personal understanding of the thing and what it was about.
RonD @ 74
A self-made man with no formal military training, Forrest was, perhaps, the South’s most brilliant general. He probably was a cavalry genius.
But his cavalry geniusness was not as great as that of Nez Pierce chief Joseph, who held off the U.S. cavalry while retreating with women and children more than a thousand miles across Oregon, Idaho and Montana, trying to flee to Canada.
Both “geniuses” fought the U.S. cavalry, but only one is now an idol. It makes me think that it isn’t really Forrest’s genius that is the basis for his hero (in some quarters) status.
Forest is a racist and a fool you don’t ask fot more troops after you have been fighting a war for a few years unless YOU the general made a MISTAKE especially if you STARTED that war. The real lesson is the South lost because their Generals thought they could win a quick war. When their plans went South they had no plan B. Oh my God! Bush is refighting the Civil war and we are the South! Why invade America when with the high price of oil the Arabs who are funding Al Queida can get rich off her. War is not about terriority its about control. We have never controlled Iraq (if we did gas would be less than a Dollar a gallon) The Arabs control the oil which now that Iraqi oil production is mostly shutdown their oil is worth more. In a sense the Arabs WHO FUND AL QUEIDA are ALREADY PLUNDERING AMERICA! Without having to invade damm I am impressed. Bush invades but never controls, only shuts down the oil making the other Oil Countries benefit at Americas expense. Bush ironicly thanks in part to the high cost of oil can’t afford to keep his invasion force there much less get control of the oil. Now then who convinced Bush that we didn’t need 300,000 troops to invade Iraq?
pow wow @ 130
I like your sentiment there pow wow. It’s kinda like Mike’s thought the other day about how we are evolving from the caves to stars. I like to think of that in moral terms as well.
Mandrake #176
Don’t forget Kentucky, who didn’t secede, either.
I think that most of the southern generals knew from the beginning that they were not likely to win- it was an outside chance at best. Lee knew damned well how strong the Union would be eventually and how weak the south was in terms of industrial strength.,
Kentucky was a border state during the American Civil War.[36] Although frequently described as never having seceded, a group of Kentucky soldiers stationed at Russellville did pass an Ordinance of Secession under the moniker “Convention of the People of Kentucky” on November 20, 1861[37], establishing a Confederate government for the state with its capital in Bowling Green.[38] Though Kentucky was represented by the central star on the Confederate battle flag.[39], the legitimacy of the Russellville Convention may well be questioned, as only a year earlier, philosopher Karl Marx records in a letter to Friedrich Engels that the result of a vote deciding how Kentucky would be represented at a convention of the border states was “100,000 for the Union ticket, only a few thousand for secession.”[40] Kentucky officially remained “neutral” throughout the war due to Union sympathies of many of the Commonwealth’s citizens. Even today, however, Confederate Memorial Day is observed by some in Kentucky on Jefferson Davis’ birthday, June 3.[41]
brendan @ 148
I can see your point, brendan – but I wonder if Americans are really that heartless, and would be as unmoved by details of the fate of the average Iraqi, as you imply, if someone like Senator Durbin gave them (at least a little of) the unvarnished truth. Even those who thought it was/is just video game or football game “fun” might be forced to bring a little conscience to bear if exposed to the reality of our actions in Iraq on innocent Iraqis.
Sewmouse @ 174 – I happen to be speaking from personal experience about Chicago’s racism, and I therefore don’t retract that statement, though it offends you, and may seem harsh to state that openly as a reality of the Chicago area’s past (if not present). That open racism in Chicago of which I have experience happened to be deeply ingrained in true-blue “Democrats” – in private individuals not in public officials – so I don’t think political parties are the point here.
I do not, and did not, want to imply that everyone now living in the Chicago area is racist – far from it. I’m referring to an earlier era and old neighborhoods, by and large, that would be very recognizable to the earlier generations of Chicago natives than to newcomers, for example. Admitting past mistakes doesn’t diminish, and can only enhance, present worth.
There is nothing “pet” about my concern about what this country has done to the Iraqi people. I have been listening to Durbin’s comments in the Senate about Iraq for a long time, and have noticed the same insinuations Mandrake mentions at 159 [Durbin likes to claim that the Iraqis have been calling “9-1-1″ for American help long enough, and that it has to stop; Durbin rarely differentiates between the Iraqi people and “their” government when he makes that claim]. Jim Webb, by comparison, manages to speak about leaving Iraq without insulting Iraqis and blaming them for the state of their alleged government.
I’d prefer for brendan and you to be right – that Durbin is simply trying to keep a coalition together and increase its numbers, but my sense is that Durbin too easily blames the Iraqis, and I think it is a dangerous and telling trait, if true. Such blame would color all his choices for policy options going forward, for one thing. I’ve noted the same tendency lately in Senator Levin, but have not been watching his speeches as closely. I simply don’t believe that catering to the “exceptionalism” prejudices of the 25%-ers is the way to move the Republicans in the Senate away from their blind support for just such a mythology.
Why is mentioning the destruction we have visited on the Iraqi people any sort of threat to the effort to end the occupation or to gain Republican support in Congress for an end date to this disaster? [Perhaps the answer(s) to that question would tell us more about ourselves than we want to know…]
John Brown’s body really IS a-moulderin’ in the grave.
An appeal to Forrest’s “wisdom ” cough, vomit is a trial balloon the Republicans might be desperate enough now to stop ussing code words and appeal OPENLY to racism in order to try and hold the South at least. While ceding US the rest of the country in the Next Election. If their Polling on this trial balloon tests well expect the Republicans to be Anti black imigrant, gay etc they may even go against free trade to pick up the poor white worker vote. Since they would be out of power they can vote freely against big business without any possibilty of actually passing any antibusiness laws. All they would need is enough votes in the Senate to sustain a filibuster. Without that then they are no longer relevant to American politics.
Actually if you want to talk about great cavalry strategists you’ll have to include Red Cloud and Gall
Anyway, back to work
The statement attributed to Forrest about “getting there fustest with the mostest” is simply an old military axiom. It is a simple distillation of military success–getting the most troops or military power focused on a critical point faster than the enemy can do it. It was a popular maxim, not because of Nathan Beford Forrest, but because it neatly and concisely captured the essence of combat.
brendan @ 187
Neither did Maryland, Delaware, or Missouri, all slave-holding states.
rwcole @ 188
Fighting a battle you are not likely to win is one thing. Starting a fight you know you are not going to win is foolish. By attacking Fort Sumpter the Rebels forced the North to fight right now. A year or two of Northern Factories without Southern Cotton would have made things hard for the North and given England and France more of a chance to enjoy the effect of cheap cotton on their economies. Which would have been an incentive for them to support the South more openly.
dakine01 @ 195
Oh well, my home state was the very first to secede and we fired the first shot, if I am not mistaken. Not much of Fort Sumter still stands.
John Caspar @ 102,
William T. Sherman did have problems with slavery. Has anyone heard of the policy ‘40 Acres and a Mule’?
This policy was to take the slave owners lands, and divide it amongst the slaves. Since they worked and lived on the land, it was going to be theirs (a reparations made entirely by Sherman). With a special order, Sherman started to enact this in some of the Southern states.
This was reversed when Andrew Johnson took office a year later, and the land given back to the ex slave-owners.
Several thoughts:
-N.B. Forrest was a genius and a psychopath.
Several biographers state his ferocity against blacks and Unions troops was largely sourced in racist feeling. A lot of his genius seems to have been a willingness to NOT play by the e rules of warfare: he was largely a guerrilla warrior, mixing country shrewdness and ruthlessness. One biography (and I can’t find the citation) claims he may have repudiated the Klan late in life, but I’m doubtful.
-I know several southern versions of poster Allison, who have a fixed idea of what Yankeeland is like, and refuse to cross the Mason Dixon line. (let me note that Maryland is below that line, and I seem to recall it remained in the Union due to Lincoln sending troops to Annapolis.
My experience Up North have been generally good; as an artist doing the American Craft Council Shows and other events, folks generally were nice, and only occasionally attempted to hold me responsible for Southern racism. I could count on some (generally poorly dressed) guy coming up to me and wanting to talk racist smack. I taught at a craft center in Western Massachusetts and was bemused to discover that they have rednecks (yup, the whole beer-pickup-deerhunt thing) who sorta talk funny. I was one of a group chased from a bar in Uniontown PA because the group of instructors from a nearby craft center included a black guy. Racism is pervasive in this country; I will not claim the southern version is any better than the northern. It has, however, become the identifier in politics, with the Republicans attempting to be the White Christian party.
-I live in one of the Appalachian counties of Georgia (”I didn’t know you had mountains in Georgia!” “Ma’am have you seen ‘Deliverance’?”)and though it was a hotbed of Unionism and anti-Confederate sentiment during that ol’ War, it’s now Rebel territory. Why? Why isn’t the real history even taught, even now?
The myth of the Noble Cause has been flogged, in school history and popular fiction, since Reconstruction. I will say attitudes like Allison’s play into the identity politics of the South, the irrational appeal to ’southernness’ that the Republicans have played to, helping to keep a chip on the shoulder of the psyche of the poorly educated (which is to say, most) voter. The Jim Crow era of a solid Democratic south gave way to, and set the stage for, the Identity politics of the Republican’s today. And Mrs Mitchell’s romance novel is mistaken for History, and elevated to Heritage.
Real history is much more interesting, but messy.
“invoking kkk founders. repugs, they must be so proud.”
Robert Byrd could not be reached for comment…
OH, and for an even worse sculpture, with even less kitsch value that the Forrest one, go to the Courthouse lawn on nearby Jackson County AL. in Scottsboro (remember the’ Scottsboro boys?’) for an exceeding primitive stone carving of another scary southern hero and racist, Andrew Jackson.
Looks like a battered escapee from Easter Island.
Rich at 198 — Byrd has repeatedly apologized for his involvement in the KKK and, for your information, the WV chapter of the NAACP routinely gives him high marks for his work in our state and for working to make amends for his involvement with the group in his 20s. Not saying it was a good choice on his part — it was not — but give the vast number of racist yahoos that walk the planet a pass altogether, but invoking a Senator who has repeatedly publicly apologized and been open about his involvement, learned from his mistake and made both public and private amends rather than talking about all of those folks who skulk about in secret and use their positions to hurt the cause of civil rights? Well, that just seems woefully ignorant to me. But maybe that’s because I happen to live in WV and actually see the reports from the WVNAACP on this sort of thing.
DING! right on the head.
The statement attributed to Forrest about “getting there fustest with the mostest” is simply an old military axiom. It is a simple distillation of military success–getting the most troops or military power focused on a critical point faster than the enemy can do it. It was a popular maxim, not because of Nathan Beford Forrest, but because it neatly and concisely captured the essence of combat.
Actually, in Forrest’s case, it was a bit more than that. He revolutionized calvary tactics by using it essentially as mounted infantry. His soldiers would gallop to the strategic point of the battlefield, dismount and fight as infantrymen. It was a tactic that had never occurred to the “gentlemen” who attended West Point.
Of course, he was a racist bastard as well.
dakine01 @ 14
Karmageddon!
xoites defends Constitution @ 106
Huh!? Shirley Temple Black was Ambassador to Ghana, and was generally accreditted with being a friendly and successful diplomat there.
I got the impression that Black was pretty much an anti-Communist, pro-Vietnam War booster…but I never heard anything about her being racist. Got a link?
mc @ 60
Care to give us a 3 sentence review of the movie and a rating of 0 (pits) to 5 (okay) to 10 (sublime)?
Twisted Martini @ 116
It all depends upon where you live.
If you’re a Northerner, then W.Virginians are Southerners.
If you’re a Southerner, then W.Virginians are Northerners (Yankees).
If you’re a Mid-Westerner or Westerner, then W.Virginians are Eastern (or back East).
If you’re an Atlantic Coaster, then W.Virginians are … oh, I don’t know, probably Mid-Westerners.
I like to say we’re in the Middle East, but nobody really gets the humor of that. He he.
Don’t hate me just because I’m wickedly funny. You don’t even know me.
brendan @ 187
The battle line of the Civil War and the 2006 elections were pretty similar. We fought from Maryland to Virginia to Tennessee (no big battles in Kentucky in 2006) over to Missouri and down the Mississip to New Orleans with a few skirmishes in Texas too. As a school teacher friend of mine called it, ‘the Hook’.
The final battle couldn’t be at Appomatox, but it did end in eastern Virginia when Webb won the day.
Who knows what those wild men in Montana were doing. How the heck did they end up electing a progressive like Tester? He must be one great politician.
The arguments about ‘Nathan Bedford Forrest’ were recently part of the discussion to rename or not a High School in Jacksonville, so maybe this is a Republican issue generally. The Jacksonville.com paper archives would provide some of the arguments also.
I don’t understand why it is unacceptable to quote a famous general on tactics. Yes, he was a bad man and a racist, but Poe was not quoting him about race.
I’ve heard the quote, “Firstest with the mostest,” all my life and never knew that it was Nathan Bedford Forrest who supposedly said it. Regardless, it is a piece of pithy common sense and as such is imminently quotable without necessarily implying approval of the supposed originator’s more reprehensible opinions.
And as for those, Nathan Bedford Forrest came to regret his involvment with the KKK and his earlier actions at the Battle of Fort Pillow. He recanted those “opinions” that led him into those reprehensible actions and even went so far to contact and meet with the newly formed NAACP to express his contrition. Strange but true. I find it ironic, given this, that neo-confederates still consider him a kindred spirit.
As an aside…
For those of you who didn’t hate Harold Ford Jr. enough – here’s a little snippet of how far he’d fallen before deciding to head up the DLC…
Oh, I just checked my facts and I was wrong about Nathan Bedford Forrest talking to the NAACP. He spoke to an organization that was one of the precusors to and founding bodies of the NAACP.
Great picture. That stupid statue is about 7 miles from me, and is every bit as silly as it looks. When it went up, it was partially screened from I-65, which it abuts, by a bunch of scrub trees, and a local State Senator, a very conservative old Democrat, got the public works guys to go out and cut down the trees and brush.
At first it was embarrassing, but now we take people out to look at it and enjoy the stupid.
I live in Nashville. That statue is an embarassment to our community and there was tremendous outrage from across the political spectrum when it was raised, literally overnight and without notice several years ago. But it is on private property and we have to respect the 1st Amendment rights of even the idiots amongst us…
NorskeFlamethrower @ 125
well, thanks for calling my comments shit, Norske. that’s a brilliant refutation. the truth is, we’re talking past each other. you’re not listening to me and what i said. you can write off the South if you want to. i am not an appologist for the horrendous evil that has existed there. it is true that television and hollywood has created an impression about southerners that is true of some but not of others. people like you and brendan seem to have bought that image hook line and sinker. unfortunately, if this image continues to prevail the racists in the South have more power than they would otherwise, and it’s a pity because it doesn’t have to be that way. Howard Dean understands this. maybe you should listen to him.