On this date

By Mustang Bobby

One hundred and fifty years ago today, President Abraham Lincoln delivered some remarks at a cemetery dedication in Pennsylvania.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

He was wrong on one point: the world did note and will long remember what he said there.

(Cross-posted at Bark Bark Woof Woof.)

Grand celebration

By Mustang Bobby

Grand Central Terminal turns 100.

I’ve never arrived in New York by train, so I’ve never used it as a traveler. But I’ve been through Grand Central Terminal to catch a subway and just to look at this icon of American architecture from a time when places of industry were monuments.

(Cross-posted at Bark Bark Woof Woof.)

Thanksgiving turkey

By Capt. Fogg

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and sometimes it's just what it looks like. Sometimes, when the fat man sucks on it, all hell is smiling. 

The true story of Thanksgiving is how socialism failed,

said Rush to a caller, and President Obama is hiding that fact behind an honest account of history. No, that's not just a cigar, and of course we didn't get tobacco from the Indians -- what are you anyway, a communist? 

Rush Limbaugh has long since run out of relevance, run out of ways to prove that president Obama is a Kenyan, anti-colonial (would he rather have him be a pro-colonial?), Muslim-Christian extremist who hates white people and is an avowed communist, atheist, trotskyite, racist, anti-Christ, ultra-liberal fascist. He's exhausted every epithet of every stripe -- and it seems he's now reduced to the even more pathetic state of turning the most mundane acts of traditional presidential sentiments and statements into fuel for his bonfires.

Lapel pins, terrorist fist bumps, leave that to the Girl Scouts. Rush Limbaugh is the Big League. What would have been, to anyone else and by anyone else, a tepid, ritual recognition of the long-standing American myth that the Plymouth colony was helped in adapting to the harsh climate and unfamiliar environment of 17th-century Wampanoag territory by some of the native people living there, the myth taught to schoolchildren for at least a century, filled with inaccuracies, and covered with a sloppy whitewash, turns in the cigar-sucking mind of Mr. Limbaugh from a third-grade pageant into a damnation of Mr. Obama. In the White House thanksgiving proclamation, the president says: 

A beloved American tradition, Thanksgiving Day offers us the opportunity to focus our thoughts on the grace that has been extended to our people and our country. This spirit brought together the newly arrived Pilgrims and the Wampanoag tribe -- who had been living and thriving around Plymouth, Massachusetts for thousands of years -- in an autumn harvest feast centuries ago. This Thanksgiving Day, we reflect on the compassion and contributions of Native Americans, whose skill in agriculture helped the early colonists survive, and whose rich culture continues to add to our Nation's heritage. We also pause our normal pursuits on this day and join in a spirit of fellowship and gratitude for the year's bounties and blessings.

Jesus Christ. No, really -- Jesus Christ. this could be a Sunday Sermon preached somewhere in Middle America to a pastel congregation painted by Norman Rockwell. To the Palm Beach tycoon, however, it's occasion for a racist sneer about Indian casinos:

So, we were the invaders, we were incompetent idiots. We didn't know how to feed ourselves so they came along and showed us how and that's what Thanksgiving is all about.

Tell that to every school kid who had to make Pilgrim and Indian costumes complete with anachronistic flintlock blunderbusses and buckled shoes -- the America hating little bastards. 

He says nothing about the Constitution in his Thanksgiving Day proclamation because he's got a problem with it,

Limbaugh continued to rant, and in the absence of any supporting information for it, failed also to tell us how a document written nearly 170 years afterward would be have any relevance to the Thanksgiving holiday other than one only obvious to a malicious, neurotic saboteur grasping for any wrench he can toss into the works of truth, honesty, and human decency. 

But, of course, thanking a long-ago vanished tribe, acknowledging the cultural tributaries of our nation, and being grateful to whatever name one attaches to providence that our country ever came to be, is no more a qualification for venomous condemnation than saying good morning or asking what time it is. Failing to mention the Constitution of 1789 means no more than failing to mention the Emancipation Proclamation, and it says nothing about Obama or the United States of America founded so many years later and mostly by other people.

The only uniting element in this or any Limbaughean argument is the desperate attempt to make Obama an "America-hating" alien in order to make sure we continue making the same arrogant, ignorant mistakes we pridefully ignore. If the president came out against slavery and wife-beating we could be sure Rush would show us just how this was the one-way door to communism and the terrifying notion that Rush may have to earn an honest living. But Rush reveals so much with every word:

Somebody is toying with me. Somebody is seeing if they can get one past me. Somebody is trying to take advantage of me being not as focused on the day before Thanksgiving and falling for this prank.

That's right, it's not about an alliance of convenience between the Wampanoag and a ragged group of Englishmen who had suffered serious losses in the previous winter, it's about Rush. The president isn't following tradition, isn't being aware of history, isn't telling the truth, isn't being a general good guy in that love thy neighbor and let's work together and can't we all get along mold. He's trying to trick Rush, take advantage of Rush, and interfere with Rush's millions, with the profits of his betrayal of my country, the malignant, hyperbolic fabrications intended to sabotage everything good and decent and true. 

No, it's true, Rush. You're right. The long, slow, and erratic movement toward freedom and responsibility and justice you're trying to retard is only something designed to get around you and your mission. There's nothing else behind it but an attempt to "get around" you, and Obama's not the only one. We're all trying to trick you, and in fact history is trying to trick you, the truth is trying to trick you, and, come to think of it, Satan himself is trying to trick you into thinking that's just a cigar.

(Cross-posted from Human Voices.)

Lessons from a bygone campaign

By Distributorcap

In more ways than one, Barack Obama and the Democratic leadership should take a few lessons from Lyndon Johnson and the 1964 campaign.

In 1964, the Democratic ticket of Lyndon Johnson and Hubert Humphrey ticket defeated Republicans Barry Goldwater and William Miller in one of the biggest landslide Presidential elections in history (it ranks #5). Johnson, who was sworn in as President upon the death of John F. Kennedy in 1963, received 61% of the popular vote and 486 votes. Goldwater got 38.5% of the vote and 52 electoral votes. The defeat of Goldwater was so overwhelming he took down the Republican party with him.

The more things change, the more they remain the same (only different).

Johnson road the coattails of Kennedy's popularity and painted Goldwater as a reactionary who wanted to end Social Security. Johnson, as part of his campaign, was promising to expand Federal programs to include Medicare and Medicaid.

Richard Nixon, who had lost the 1960 election by one of the narrowest margins and then was defeated in the 1962 California gubernatorial race, had decided that no one was going to "kick him around anymore" and opted not to run. During the 1964 primary season, there was a clear divide between the Conservative and Moderate wings of the party. Goldwater championed the Conservatives and was eventually crowned "Father of the Conservative Movement." His opponent in the moderate wing was Nelson Rockefeller, the Governor of New York.

Rockefeller was initially the front-runner, but his quick 963 marriage to Happy Murphy (who gave up custody of her kids to get divorced and marry the governor) angered the social conservatives in the party and caused his poll numbers to plummet. Senator Prescott Bush (who unfortunately spun off a dynasty that would later lead this country to real ruin) was one of the most vocal critics of Rockefeller. Goldwater would secure the nomination after narrowly winning the California primary (Happy Rockefeller had given birth 3 days before primary day, and this revived the adultery issue).

At the 1964 convention in San Francisco, Rockefeller was booed as he gave his speech condemning the conservatives. The open warfare between the two sides led to a split in the party that could not be healed during the 1964 presidential campaign.

Goldwater was a strict Libertarian and had a deep hate of communism. He voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which Johnson was able to use to tarnish Goldwater as a racist. Goldwater's comments from his past came back to haunt him. His criticism of Eisenhower caused the former (and still popular) Republican President to withhold support. He often spoke about his dislike of liberal social and economic policies - to which Johnson used in a commercial. He remarked about selling the Tennessee Valley Authority and stated that the military "should lob a nuclear bomb into the men's room of the Kremlin." Aside from Eisenhower, moderate Republicans like Rockefeller and George Romney (Mitten's dad) refused to support him.

One person who actively supported Goldwater was Ronald Reagan. A speech in support of the GOP nominee was used in television commercials during the campaign. This is often thought of as the launch of Reagan's political career.

Johnson successfully painted Goldwater as an extremist and right winger. The Johnson staff took Goldwater's campaign slogan of "In your heart, you know he's right" and morphed it into "in your guts, you know he nuts" and "in your heart, he's too far right." All of Johnson's ads concluded with "the stakes are too high for you to stay at home."  The famous "daisy ad" which had a little girl picking daisies just before a nuclear attack, was probably the most effective ad for the Johnson campaign.  That ad only aired once.

Goldwater won 6 states - Arizona and five states in the heart of Dixie (he was the first Republican to win the Deep South since Reconstruction).

Of course in 1964 there were only three television networks, no national newspapers and no takeover the radio airwaves by mega-owners.  There was not a mouthpiece to counter the arguments tossed out by Johnson - being in charge really meant having the bully pulpit.  Today, the lack of limited access has degraded the bully pulpit as a position of dictating the narrative.

Barry Goldwater went on to be re-elected to the US Senate in 1969 and served until 1987.

The father of the modern Conservative movement, while often admired by some of the more intellectuals in the GOP, would more than likely cringe at the lunacy of the party he led to a resurgence.

Goldwater's father was Jewish and sometimes referred to himself as Jewish (he was raised Episcopalian). He rarely attended church. Goldwater won the Arizona Senate seat in 1952. He was an active supporter of the conservative coalition and was a staunch anti-communist and was known to match his convictions with his actions. He did not vote to censure Joseph McCarthy, but often rejected the wild fringes of the anti-communist right. He was a strong supporter of state's rights due to his libertarian views. Goldwater was one of the Senators who forced the resignation of Nixon in 1974 (Goldwater hated Nixon and stated "Richard Nixon was the most dishonest person I ever met in my entire life.")

In 1980, as Reagan easily defeated Jimmy Carter, Goldwater barely won his Senate seat. As the religious right became more influential in GOP politics under his protege Reagan, Goldwater became more outspoken on several key Republican hallmarks. He viewed abortion as a matter of personal choice and that the government should stay out. While the religious right supported him in 1980, he then voted to uphold abortion rights and resented the bullying of these religious organizations.

When Jerry Falwell opposed Sandra Day O'Connor's nomination to the Supreme Court in 1981, he said "every good Christian should kick Falwell in the nuts." He criticized the military's ban on gays, told the GOP to lay off Clinton. He wanted to legalize medical marijuana.  He did not want to be associated with the new right of the Republicans. In 1989, he stated the Republican party had been take over by a "bunch of kooks" (if he were only alive today!). In 1994, he said to the Washington Post:

When you say "radical right" today, I think of these moneymaking ventures by fellows like Pat Robertson and others who are trying to take the Republican party and make a religious organization out of it. If that ever happens, kiss politics goodbye.

Finally Barry Goldwater said to Bob Dole during the 1996 campaign "we are the new liberals of the Republican Party."

I surely do not agree with much of Barry Goldwater's politics and ideals - but he was basically a man of conviction and one who would adapt over time. Some of his policies were extreme, but as real libertarian - his cause was individual freedom and policies, not the lunatic arguments of the current GOP torch bearers. Having a viable opposition is actually a good thing for this country - but the current Republican party is not so much opposition as it is just obstructionism and idiocy.  Barry Goldwater died in 1998 - he must be turning in his grave with the thought of Sharron Angel, Joe Miller, Rand Paul, Christine O'Donnell and especially Sarah Palin as the new keepers of the right.