Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, the first state to secede in 1860 and thus “the home office of American Sedition,” as Charlie Pierce describes the place, who managed to remove the Confederate flag from the state Capitol, following the white supremacist attack at Mother Emmanuel Church, but who couldn’t bring herself to mention slavery when asked at a campaign event about the cause of the Civil War, must be commended for finally driving a stake through the heart of the idea that there are any “good Republicans,” any “moderates,” in the Confederate White People’s Treason and Sedition Party currently masquerading as the Republican Party..
"I think government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people." Well that explains it, then. Slaves were only 3/5th's of a person, so they didn't count. Nikki was governor of my state when the Mother Emmanuel Massacre occurred here in Charleston, SC on June 17, 2015. Nine black citizens attending a Bible study were killed by a young white man who was inspired by the White Supremacy movement. He (we never refer to him by name) attended the Bible study in order to kill these people; later, he said that he "almost didn't" because they had welcomed him. But he did, anyway. What did Nikki do? There was a demand by both black and white South Carolinians that the Confederate flag be removed from the State House grounds. Yes, really: it still flew there, proudly as ever. Nikki vacillated. She REFUSED to make a decision until the issue was forced by a young black woman who climbed the flagpole and cut down the flag. Even then, her decision not to rehang it was based purely on political motives. She is a real snake-in-the-grass. (P.S. The NYT continues to disappoint: "a simple, yet loaded, question." "Loaded"? To ask a potential President for her opinion about slavery?! I canceled my subscription a few months ago. I was sick of the way they refused to give up on "botherism". The quote above is simply another case of that.)
Wins the prize for the "Worst attempt at rebranding evil as good for those at the opposite end of the whips". According to this logic the White Supremist who killed nine black citizens attending Bible study was merely guilty of overkill. Damn the insanity of this all.
Does Nikki Haley have any idea what her place in the Confederate society would have been? As a daughter of Indian immigrants, she probably would have been somebody's house servant.
I too canceled my NYT subscription for precisely that reason. I remember in public school that the Civil War was a lot of times referred to as"The War Between the States". It was taught that the main reason for this conflict was " states rights". It wasn't until college that I saw that the "state's rights" was the states rights to own enslaved Africans. Slavery was always taught in a nebulous, confusing way and never were the horrors of it ever taught. I was a history major in college with American history as my specialty and only had one professor who taught us the whole cruel story and it seared my mind. I can never forget the total awfulness of his words. The former governor of South Carolina thinks that we are idiots out here and she is not wrong about a lot of us.
When were you in college? I was in NC when I had U.S. history in 8th grade (1965), slavery was never mentioned. It happened to be the first year of integration, which meant that the Black students had completely separate classrooms and teachers. We never saw them except at lunch, where they all sat together, as we did. Essentially that was all in the past and no longer an issue. I have read many, many books about slavery since then and am OUTRAGED about how Black people's history -- and it's consequences on EVERYTHING currently in their lives -- has been erased.
I have just finished reading a book which mentions the race riots in NYC where (mostly Irish) whites were furious that Black people couldn't be drafted because they were not citizens. 500 PEOPLE WERE SLAUGHTERED. Bodies of women and children, as well as men, hung from lampposts in the city. A Black orphanage was burned to the ground. Anybody else ever hear about this? I certainly haven't. And it was only in 2021 that I learned of the Tulsa, OK massacre where the entire middle class neighborhood and businesses in Tulsa (the most successful Black town in the U.S.) were burned to the ground -- 35 blocks, 300 people killed, and the first bombs were dropped on U.S. soil. I wouldn't have heard about it, except it was the 100th anniversary of this massacre. I only recently learned about a massacre in Florida -- in Rosewood, in 1923. 150 Black people were slaughtered by white people in the next town. But of course, this is all just past history. No relevance to today. No need to teach this in schools, since, after all, it could make white children ashamed of being white. Right.
The Draft Riots of 1864. The Irish opponents of the draft began with a good argument: a man could buy his way out of the draft by posting $500, to be paid to the man who went into the army in his place. This obviously let the rich off, since they had $500, while drafting more poor people - and the Irish were predominantly poor - who didn't have $500 (then a good year's income) to get out. It's also now known that much of the anti-black provocation was the work of a ring of Southern spies who were also planning to burn the city in the midst of the riots. Of course, their provocation wouldn't have worked if there hadn't been "tinder" the provocations could set fire to inside people.
There was an interesting TV show, "Copper", which was set in New York City during the Civil War, with the protagonist being an Irish immigrant Police Sergeant, and the Draft Riots and the plot to burn New York were major plot points. "Copper" also deals with wider political issues of the war, including the treason committed by wealthy New York city businessmen who continued to trade with the south and supported the Copperheads, the antiwar pro-south northern Democrats. (There was a whole genre of "police procedurals" set in the 19th Century; another good one was "Ripper Street," starring Matthew Macfadyen - who went on to become much better known as Tom on "Succession" - which was set in 1889 London immediately after the Ripper murders.) "Copper" is available on streaming from Fubo, Apple TV, and Amazon Prime Video.
good to know. I'd seen it in passing, then stopped seeing ads.
the old NY series I liked the best was Steve Soderbergh's "The Knick," which I especially liked because I've always had an interest in medical history and knew a bit about the extent to which the guys who invented modern surgery also, unfortunately, pioneered the use of the same addictive drugs that are still around today, but mostly on themselves.
Thank you so much for the information about Northern traitors and $$$. That wasn't mentioned in the book. The author, Jennifer Wright, author of the excellent book, "Madame Restell", did write about the fact that rich boys could have their Daddies could pay $15,000 in today's money to buy their sons out of the draft. (Sound familiar?) I didn't include that in what I wrote. Thank you also for the info re TV shows.
thanks for the recommendation, Tom. I spent tonight bingeing the first six episodes of "Copper," and it really is strange I didn't know anything about it. it's GOOD! I have some minor quibbles (occasional slip-ups with 19th-century guys using the occasional expression nobody said until the 1980s, but the only one I ever saw avoid this completely--as far as I could make out--was Milch in "Deadwood"). I doubt people spoke exactly that way in the actual Deadwood, but it never slipped into the kind of anachronism I'm talking about. but of course, nobody EVER wrote dialogue that good and it's unreasonable to expect anybody will again.
the one problem I had with the first few episodes of "Copper" is that all two characters are people you wouldn't piss on if they were on fire. but I got used to it. and there is quite a bit of real history.
the watching experience was a different matter. the first four episodes were fine, but suddenly Amazon Prime became Freevee, the low-rent Amazon channel with a commercial every three minutes. those next two episodes were quite an ordeal...I'm PAYING for this shit.
so I recommended "Rogue Heroes" and you gave me "Copper." I already gave you "Slow Horses," but it's on Apple. so does this make us even for now?
is the next recommendation a jump? a coin toss? I think we should keep it on the improvisation side. more fun.
are you still dead set against "Masters of the Air?" the trailer made the combat sequences look pretty exciting.
what IS interesting is comparing "Copper" to "The Gilded Age," which is a lot more expensive, incredibly lavish and virtually unwatchable, although the piles of perfect CGI horseshit in the lovely, neat mud are ADORABLE.
Scorsese's "Gangs of New York" is about precisely this period in NYC history. nobody's asked, but I don't think it's a very good movie; it's EXPENSIVE, but IMO the script was deficient. I didn't think any of the relationships rang true and those relationships are the core of the movie.
but its coverage of the Draft Riots puts those horrifying events front and center.
I saw that movie. Because violence of any kind terrifies me, I only remember keeping my eyes closed for most of it, and hands over ears, too. (Person I was with was fine with it all.) The only thing I remember was that there was a HORRIBLE guy with a long knife, the Irish immigrants were not welcome, and people were getting killed right and left. I don't even remember the Draft Riots, which probably speaks loudly to my terrible lack of awareness in those days.
There is SO much more to American history than we were all taught. What is taught in schools is mostly a whitewash job and is more akin to mythology than actual history. The basic fact of the history of this country is that Northern Europeans, who were white, came to the Americas and removed from the land the various groups of people who were already here. The indigenous peoples who were here prior to the arrival of Europeans were decimated by war and disease, leaving the land, rich with resources, for the taking. America became a majority white country because people of other races and ethnicities were kept out. Like most other heinous situations, the economic underpinnings drove the cruelty. As usual, follow the money.
does anyone else remember the board game called "The War Between the States?" I played once and it sucked...sort of a low-rent, much less sophisticated "Monopoly" kind of thing.
now those tabletop war games based on real battles are something else altogether. I seriously considered buying a whole bunch around 1990, but realized after playing a few of them that I was a lot less interested than I thought I was...I mean, those "games" could take a week. I remember playing an Arnhem game for a day or two and thinking that it was still less painful than sitting through "A Bridge Too Far."
Thank you, kdsherpa, for the information about the young black woman who cut down the Confederate flag. That was a brave and gutsy thing to do, much more brave than Nikki. Yep, the only good Republicans are pushing up daisies.
hey! I was once in love (engaged, actually, although both of us were drunk at the time) with a brilliant, adventurous woman named Nikki. and a friend had a fabulous dog, also named Nikki, who feared nothing.
obviously, I'm kidding, even if both of the above are true.
Even today, the "rights and freedoms" that today's Republican party believes belong only to certain groups of people in "these United States"!
Yesterday, I visited Montecello. Our guide emphasized, several times, Jefferson's insistence on the right of every individual to observe the religion of their choice.
A story of Montecello I had not known before yesterday is that, after Jefferson died (on 4 July 1823), the house sat empty and abandoned for 8 years then was purchased by Commodore Uriah Levy, a Jew, *because* of Jefferson's inclusion of "freedom of religion" in the U.S. Constitution. After his death in 1862, by which time Virginia was no longer a part of the Union so his will was ignored, Montecello once again sat vacant and abandoned until his nephew, Jefferson Monroe Levy, prevailed in court to take ownership. The nephew proceeded to spend millions in dollars of the day to restore the house and property to the extent that 90% of the original structure was retained and restored. https://www.monticello.org/thomas-jefferson/a-day-in-the-life-of-jefferson/all-my-wishes-end-at-monticello/the-levy-family-and-monticello/
Also: “We need to make sure that we do all things so that individuals have the liberties so that they can have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to do or be anything they want to be without government getting in the way.”
And how about freedom to obtain an abortion, read whatever books you want to read, love and marry who you want, vote, peacefully protest? Those seems to fall under Nicky’s definition. How do you think she’d answer that question?
Gee...I wonder about that, too. Should we have another "Democrat plant" in the next town hall audience to ask that question?
When I heard that she claimed the question was voiced by a person planted by the Dems I was disgusted--how very typical of a MAGA Republican, to point a finger and place blame elsewhere rather than own a mis-spoken answer. She really is a sick-making weathervane.
Freedom for whom? Certainly not freedom for me to end my life when it becomes unbearable. Certainly not freedom for my niece to control her own reproductive rights. Certainly not freedom for my friend’s trans daughter seeking medication and respect. Certainly not freedom to institute rational gun laws for self protection. Certainly not freedom to learn about actual history in schools. Certainly not freedom to vote in a representative district free of gerrymandering. Certainly not freedom from racism, sexism, pollution, price gouging, religious bias, anti LBGTQ legislation or blatant stupidity. What passes for freedom in the GOP looks like tyranny to me.
And here’s the thing- she’s not stupid. She lied. She knew the answer but she lied to placate her racist base. It wasn’t an evasive answer, it wasn’t a loaded question. She fucking lied.
Exactly right. Her base of bigoted morons won't hear any of the pushback because they don't watch those channels and they don't read us. They like being lied to because the lies tell them what they want to hear and hides what they don't want to hear - the truth.
There's more. During a 2010 interview with neo-Confederates, she avoided talking about slavery and stated that the Civil War was "fighting for tradition," while the Union was "fighting for change." She's been ducking the question for a long time, but give her credit, she knows her audience. As someone on Twitter put it, Haley had to answer the question the way she did in NH yesterday because the Republican base is so staggeringly racist.
SICKENING! Sell your soul to become Governor, and to become President. I just don't get it. (BTW, of course she is a devout "christian"/Fundamentalist.)
Have none of her advisors told her that, to far too many members of the party she supports, she isn’t considered white, and that people of her race have, indeed, also been slaves to white people? Or is it just “I passed for white, and so can you!” for her?
I listened to the lectures on American History from The Great Courses, which were truly excellent. The section on the Civil War was super-informative. It mentioned this speech by Alexander Stephens, of course. One take-away line from the time was that South Carolina was "too small for a republic, but too large for an insane asylum." [James Louis Petigru, a member of the U.S. Forest Service, who was himself a Southerner from Charleston, S.C., speaking about his home state's decision to secede]
you really need to check out the Yale Courses for free on YouTube. they have ALL of David Blight's famous course on the Civil War, which is very famous for a reason. he's a magnificent lecturer.
I'm also a big fan of The Teaching Company, but back when they were doing real college stuff and not the better-selling fluff available now. Allen Guelzo is good in all his courses, despite the fact that he considers himself a "Conservative historian." he's still an actual historian.
Gary Gallagher did the Civil War in the one I have, and Guelzo picked up after reconstruction (robber barons, Industrial Revolution, muckrakers, labor movements, etc., also very good. Can’t say I’m familiar with Blight. I also don’t claim to be a true Civil War “buff.”, like my Dad, big on the Bruce Catton trilogy.
Catton is unreadable nowadays if you want to deal with the real history. He was a notorious northern supporter of the "Lost Cause" and presents the South as "honorable." A good one volume history of the Civil War is James McPherson's "Battle Cry of Freedom." There has been a lot of good scholarship in the past 15 years about the Southern Unionist, the anti-secession loyalists, and about anti-Confederate movements in the South (one third of Southern men who served in the Civil War did so as members of the Union Army).
I still have my Dad's copy of the Catton trilogy but never read it. When I glanced at it, I felt like it was historical fiction, where the emphasis was on narrative and story, with facts offered as needed to provide authenticity. I'm no scholar. Thanks for the tip about the McPherson book.
Blight's last big work was his big, wonderful Frederick Douglass biography several years ago. he's done a lot of work on slave narratives and the changing of historical attitudes toward slavery and the Civil War itself. it feels like he's much less interested in the military history as such.
one of the professional schmucks at "The New Criterion," a nest of right-wing vipers, refers to Blight as "the last of the great Yale lecturers." so...he's good. what's funny is that I wrote my previous post before discovering that Blight is the first big guest on tonight's Lawrence O'Donnell show...I've got the DVR playing NOW.
as for the Teaching Company courses...Guelzo has an excellent one on American Intellectual History (a genuinely dense piece of work) and another course which examines the writing of the Constitution as a series of mini-biographies of the Framers. both very recommendable.
and I'm hardly what you'd call a Civil War buff. we DID write a song about thirty years ago that pretended to be a Union soldier writing home to his wife, and that was probably in the wake of the Ken Burns series. speaking of that series in retrospect, he gave altogether too much time to Shelby Foote. commanding presence, great talker (and a really fine novelist), but very much a southerner (which, IMO, means that he's little too sympathetic for some of the wrong people). I mean, he's a big fan of Nathan Bedford Forrest, so uhhh...
...and as long as I'm here, reflecting on the Nikki Haley thing, the stupidity is even more stunning.
she's preparing for a Town Hall in NEW HAMPSHIRE. it ain't fucking North Carolina or Arkansas. it's NEW HAMPSHIRE.
so, one would THINK that, in preparing for this event, someone would have suggested they work out a smooth line of bullshit JUST IN CASE.
let's say that those wags yelling and screaming about the questioner are correct and he was a "Democratic plant." so fucking what? of course there are going to be "plants" from the opposing party. it's called an ELECTION, which is an event during which people cast VOTES.
in these ridiculous "Town Hall" events, which pretend to be "spontaneous" but are anything but, wouldn't it make sense to assume (especially in this particular moment awash in controversy about Black History standards, etc.) that somebody might possibly ask this kind of question?
shit, I woulda. and nobody's paying me to tell them how to run things in their wannabe political campaign.
on the bright side, I really do think that Nikki's blown it with this one. I mean, she's now in a position so fucked up that even the pathetic little fascist DeSantis has scored points against her.
Good tips and observations. I HAVE read the Douglass bio, but obviously didn't pay much attention to remembering the author's name! Embarrassing. That book was tremendous, absolutely.
Gumbi Girl Barbie uses silly putty to re-package ideas and has super contortionist powers to dodge meaningful values, facts or morals. Her special sponsors are the KKKoch Family Neonazi billionaires, so, no, she has absolutely no redeeming qualities.
It has been abundantly clear for decades that HST was right. Since she first opened her mouth, she has been on the chump team. She tries to put on a more normal “face, but like all phonies, she is it’s easy to see through. When my bro asked a waitress what was wrong with the mashed potatoes, the girl answered “It’s the lack of being real.” This could answer a lot of questions where repubs are concerned.
Nikki Haley didn't need this to show her incompetence. What our political siltation has descended to only is bearable because it's down so low that the only direction available is up.
Any vote for any gop candidate is a vote for chaos, lies, confusion, obfuscation...because this party decided long ago for power over people and to hell with policies that make life better for the people and the planet. Plus they're busy spouting freedom when the point is something else entirely. Tom, this link is a great political cartoon that says it all.
Haley is ambition at its rawest. And while I'd never vote for her, at least she's not Trump with his entourage of horned nihilists and snaggle-toothed avengers.
I just did an initial search for the quote and what came up had the alternative spelling with one "T" and came from the U.S. Forest Service, but it did mention he was from Charleston and speaking against the action of his home state. Wikipedia says he was Attorney General of South Carolina, lost a bid to become a state senator and then filled a vacant seat in the South Carolina House of Representatives. In any event, he was a courageous exception in that state. Thanks for the correction - you are on it!
"I think government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people." Well that explains it, then. Slaves were only 3/5th's of a person, so they didn't count. Nikki was governor of my state when the Mother Emmanuel Massacre occurred here in Charleston, SC on June 17, 2015. Nine black citizens attending a Bible study were killed by a young white man who was inspired by the White Supremacy movement. He (we never refer to him by name) attended the Bible study in order to kill these people; later, he said that he "almost didn't" because they had welcomed him. But he did, anyway. What did Nikki do? There was a demand by both black and white South Carolinians that the Confederate flag be removed from the State House grounds. Yes, really: it still flew there, proudly as ever. Nikki vacillated. She REFUSED to make a decision until the issue was forced by a young black woman who climbed the flagpole and cut down the flag. Even then, her decision not to rehang it was based purely on political motives. She is a real snake-in-the-grass. (P.S. The NYT continues to disappoint: "a simple, yet loaded, question." "Loaded"? To ask a potential President for her opinion about slavery?! I canceled my subscription a few months ago. I was sick of the way they refused to give up on "botherism". The quote above is simply another case of that.)
Wins the prize for the "Worst attempt at rebranding evil as good for those at the opposite end of the whips". According to this logic the White Supremist who killed nine black citizens attending Bible study was merely guilty of overkill. Damn the insanity of this all.
Very well said, and very sad, Fred.
Does Nikki Haley have any idea what her place in the Confederate society would have been? As a daughter of Indian immigrants, she probably would have been somebody's house servant.
Make that an indentured servant: work for 7 years without pay to "cover her passage" over -- and then she can be a free woman (maybe).
Also, let us not forget that her real birth name is Nimarata Randhawa.
I too canceled my NYT subscription for precisely that reason. I remember in public school that the Civil War was a lot of times referred to as"The War Between the States". It was taught that the main reason for this conflict was " states rights". It wasn't until college that I saw that the "state's rights" was the states rights to own enslaved Africans. Slavery was always taught in a nebulous, confusing way and never were the horrors of it ever taught. I was a history major in college with American history as my specialty and only had one professor who taught us the whole cruel story and it seared my mind. I can never forget the total awfulness of his words. The former governor of South Carolina thinks that we are idiots out here and she is not wrong about a lot of us.
When were you in college? I was in NC when I had U.S. history in 8th grade (1965), slavery was never mentioned. It happened to be the first year of integration, which meant that the Black students had completely separate classrooms and teachers. We never saw them except at lunch, where they all sat together, as we did. Essentially that was all in the past and no longer an issue. I have read many, many books about slavery since then and am OUTRAGED about how Black people's history -- and it's consequences on EVERYTHING currently in their lives -- has been erased.
I have just finished reading a book which mentions the race riots in NYC where (mostly Irish) whites were furious that Black people couldn't be drafted because they were not citizens. 500 PEOPLE WERE SLAUGHTERED. Bodies of women and children, as well as men, hung from lampposts in the city. A Black orphanage was burned to the ground. Anybody else ever hear about this? I certainly haven't. And it was only in 2021 that I learned of the Tulsa, OK massacre where the entire middle class neighborhood and businesses in Tulsa (the most successful Black town in the U.S.) were burned to the ground -- 35 blocks, 300 people killed, and the first bombs were dropped on U.S. soil. I wouldn't have heard about it, except it was the 100th anniversary of this massacre. I only recently learned about a massacre in Florida -- in Rosewood, in 1923. 150 Black people were slaughtered by white people in the next town. But of course, this is all just past history. No relevance to today. No need to teach this in schools, since, after all, it could make white children ashamed of being white. Right.
The Draft Riots of 1864. The Irish opponents of the draft began with a good argument: a man could buy his way out of the draft by posting $500, to be paid to the man who went into the army in his place. This obviously let the rich off, since they had $500, while drafting more poor people - and the Irish were predominantly poor - who didn't have $500 (then a good year's income) to get out. It's also now known that much of the anti-black provocation was the work of a ring of Southern spies who were also planning to burn the city in the midst of the riots. Of course, their provocation wouldn't have worked if there hadn't been "tinder" the provocations could set fire to inside people.
There was an interesting TV show, "Copper", which was set in New York City during the Civil War, with the protagonist being an Irish immigrant Police Sergeant, and the Draft Riots and the plot to burn New York were major plot points. "Copper" also deals with wider political issues of the war, including the treason committed by wealthy New York city businessmen who continued to trade with the south and supported the Copperheads, the antiwar pro-south northern Democrats. (There was a whole genre of "police procedurals" set in the 19th Century; another good one was "Ripper Street," starring Matthew Macfadyen - who went on to become much better known as Tom on "Succession" - which was set in 1889 London immediately after the Ripper murders.) "Copper" is available on streaming from Fubo, Apple TV, and Amazon Prime Video.
good to know. I'd seen it in passing, then stopped seeing ads.
the old NY series I liked the best was Steve Soderbergh's "The Knick," which I especially liked because I've always had an interest in medical history and knew a bit about the extent to which the guys who invented modern surgery also, unfortunately, pioneered the use of the same addictive drugs that are still around today, but mostly on themselves.
Thank you so much for the information about Northern traitors and $$$. That wasn't mentioned in the book. The author, Jennifer Wright, author of the excellent book, "Madame Restell", did write about the fact that rich boys could have their Daddies could pay $15,000 in today's money to buy their sons out of the draft. (Sound familiar?) I didn't include that in what I wrote. Thank you also for the info re TV shows.
thanks for the recommendation, Tom. I spent tonight bingeing the first six episodes of "Copper," and it really is strange I didn't know anything about it. it's GOOD! I have some minor quibbles (occasional slip-ups with 19th-century guys using the occasional expression nobody said until the 1980s, but the only one I ever saw avoid this completely--as far as I could make out--was Milch in "Deadwood"). I doubt people spoke exactly that way in the actual Deadwood, but it never slipped into the kind of anachronism I'm talking about. but of course, nobody EVER wrote dialogue that good and it's unreasonable to expect anybody will again.
the one problem I had with the first few episodes of "Copper" is that all two characters are people you wouldn't piss on if they were on fire. but I got used to it. and there is quite a bit of real history.
the watching experience was a different matter. the first four episodes were fine, but suddenly Amazon Prime became Freevee, the low-rent Amazon channel with a commercial every three minutes. those next two episodes were quite an ordeal...I'm PAYING for this shit.
so I recommended "Rogue Heroes" and you gave me "Copper." I already gave you "Slow Horses," but it's on Apple. so does this make us even for now?
is the next recommendation a jump? a coin toss? I think we should keep it on the improvisation side. more fun.
are you still dead set against "Masters of the Air?" the trailer made the combat sequences look pretty exciting.
what IS interesting is comparing "Copper" to "The Gilded Age," which is a lot more expensive, incredibly lavish and virtually unwatchable, although the piles of perfect CGI horseshit in the lovely, neat mud are ADORABLE.
there was also a movie about Rosewood. I think it was directed by John Singleton. I remember it being pretty good, which means it was VERY upsetting.
Yes, it was excellent.
Scorsese's "Gangs of New York" is about precisely this period in NYC history. nobody's asked, but I don't think it's a very good movie; it's EXPENSIVE, but IMO the script was deficient. I didn't think any of the relationships rang true and those relationships are the core of the movie.
but its coverage of the Draft Riots puts those horrifying events front and center.
I saw that movie. Because violence of any kind terrifies me, I only remember keeping my eyes closed for most of it, and hands over ears, too. (Person I was with was fine with it all.) The only thing I remember was that there was a HORRIBLE guy with a long knife, the Irish immigrants were not welcome, and people were getting killed right and left. I don't even remember the Draft Riots, which probably speaks loudly to my terrible lack of awareness in those days.
There is SO much more to American history than we were all taught. What is taught in schools is mostly a whitewash job and is more akin to mythology than actual history. The basic fact of the history of this country is that Northern Europeans, who were white, came to the Americas and removed from the land the various groups of people who were already here. The indigenous peoples who were here prior to the arrival of Europeans were decimated by war and disease, leaving the land, rich with resources, for the taking. America became a majority white country because people of other races and ethnicities were kept out. Like most other heinous situations, the economic underpinnings drove the cruelty. As usual, follow the money.
does anyone else remember the board game called "The War Between the States?" I played once and it sucked...sort of a low-rent, much less sophisticated "Monopoly" kind of thing.
now those tabletop war games based on real battles are something else altogether. I seriously considered buying a whole bunch around 1990, but realized after playing a few of them that I was a lot less interested than I thought I was...I mean, those "games" could take a week. I remember playing an Arnhem game for a day or two and thinking that it was still less painful than sitting through "A Bridge Too Far."
your account would have been excellent for providing necessary context for the quote.
hence, of course, it didn't get mentioned.
Thank you, kdsherpa, for the information about the young black woman who cut down the Confederate flag. That was a brave and gutsy thing to do, much more brave than Nikki. Yep, the only good Republicans are pushing up daisies.
"Brave" is not a word that I would ever use in the same sentence as "Nikki".
hey! I was once in love (engaged, actually, although both of us were drunk at the time) with a brilliant, adventurous woman named Nikki. and a friend had a fabulous dog, also named Nikki, who feared nothing.
obviously, I'm kidding, even if both of the above are true.
Good point! However, her "real" (birth name) is Nimarata Randhawa. A very European, white, Christian person's name.
Even today, the "rights and freedoms" that today's Republican party believes belong only to certain groups of people in "these United States"!
Yesterday, I visited Montecello. Our guide emphasized, several times, Jefferson's insistence on the right of every individual to observe the religion of their choice.
A story of Montecello I had not known before yesterday is that, after Jefferson died (on 4 July 1823), the house sat empty and abandoned for 8 years then was purchased by Commodore Uriah Levy, a Jew, *because* of Jefferson's inclusion of "freedom of religion" in the U.S. Constitution. After his death in 1862, by which time Virginia was no longer a part of the Union so his will was ignored, Montecello once again sat vacant and abandoned until his nephew, Jefferson Monroe Levy, prevailed in court to take ownership. The nephew proceeded to spend millions in dollars of the day to restore the house and property to the extent that 90% of the original structure was retained and restored. https://www.monticello.org/thomas-jefferson/a-day-in-the-life-of-jefferson/all-my-wishes-end-at-monticello/the-levy-family-and-monticello/
Also: “We need to make sure that we do all things so that individuals have the liberties so that they can have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to do or be anything they want to be without government getting in the way.”
And how about freedom to obtain an abortion, read whatever books you want to read, love and marry who you want, vote, peacefully protest? Those seems to fall under Nicky’s definition. How do you think she’d answer that question?
Gee...I wonder about that, too. Should we have another "Democrat plant" in the next town hall audience to ask that question?
When I heard that she claimed the question was voiced by a person planted by the Dems I was disgusted--how very typical of a MAGA Republican, to point a finger and place blame elsewhere rather than own a mis-spoken answer. She really is a sick-making weathervane.
she'd be flummoxed yet again and panic as badly as she did the other day.
I also noticed that she hasn't yet figured out how to avoid sounding as stupid as she obviously is.
She obviously never learned that the first thing to do when trying to get out of a hole is to stop digging.
Freedom for whom? Certainly not freedom for me to end my life when it becomes unbearable. Certainly not freedom for my niece to control her own reproductive rights. Certainly not freedom for my friend’s trans daughter seeking medication and respect. Certainly not freedom to institute rational gun laws for self protection. Certainly not freedom to learn about actual history in schools. Certainly not freedom to vote in a representative district free of gerrymandering. Certainly not freedom from racism, sexism, pollution, price gouging, religious bias, anti LBGTQ legislation or blatant stupidity. What passes for freedom in the GOP looks like tyranny to me.
Touche!
If you don’t follow Mike Luckovick- cartoonist for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution- you should.
https://www.instagram.com/p/C1aD3jEJora/?igsh=MXduNTZlN2hyMGtibw==
And here’s the thing- she’s not stupid. She lied. She knew the answer but she lied to placate her racist base. It wasn’t an evasive answer, it wasn’t a loaded question. She fucking lied.
Exactly right. Her base of bigoted morons won't hear any of the pushback because they don't watch those channels and they don't read us. They like being lied to because the lies tell them what they want to hear and hides what they don't want to hear - the truth.
you go girl...
There's more. During a 2010 interview with neo-Confederates, she avoided talking about slavery and stated that the Civil War was "fighting for tradition," while the Union was "fighting for change." She's been ducking the question for a long time, but give her credit, she knows her audience. As someone on Twitter put it, Haley had to answer the question the way she did in NH yesterday because the Republican base is so staggeringly racist.
SICKENING! Sell your soul to become Governor, and to become President. I just don't get it. (BTW, of course she is a devout "christian"/Fundamentalist.)
I would think in NH there might be a few with differing opinions - as the person asking the question!
Excellent post, Tom. Too bad the NYTimes doesn't post this historical speech by a
white supremist back in the
day, for context on their "loaded" question.
Have none of her advisors told her that, to far too many members of the party she supports, she isn’t considered white, and that people of her race have, indeed, also been slaves to white people? Or is it just “I passed for white, and so can you!” for her?
Good question.
I know! LOL!
And Vivek?! WTF is he THINKING?!!! FOTFLMAO
I listened to the lectures on American History from The Great Courses, which were truly excellent. The section on the Civil War was super-informative. It mentioned this speech by Alexander Stephens, of course. One take-away line from the time was that South Carolina was "too small for a republic, but too large for an insane asylum." [James Louis Petigru, a member of the U.S. Forest Service, who was himself a Southerner from Charleston, S.C., speaking about his home state's decision to secede]
I think he was the Pettigru who was an anti-secessionist state senator at the time.
you really need to check out the Yale Courses for free on YouTube. they have ALL of David Blight's famous course on the Civil War, which is very famous for a reason. he's a magnificent lecturer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXXp1bHd6gI&list=PL19DBE98E4329CA17
I'm also a big fan of The Teaching Company, but back when they were doing real college stuff and not the better-selling fluff available now. Allen Guelzo is good in all his courses, despite the fact that he considers himself a "Conservative historian." he's still an actual historian.
Gary Gallagher did the Civil War in the one I have, and Guelzo picked up after reconstruction (robber barons, Industrial Revolution, muckrakers, labor movements, etc., also very good. Can’t say I’m familiar with Blight. I also don’t claim to be a true Civil War “buff.”, like my Dad, big on the Bruce Catton trilogy.
Catton is unreadable nowadays if you want to deal with the real history. He was a notorious northern supporter of the "Lost Cause" and presents the South as "honorable." A good one volume history of the Civil War is James McPherson's "Battle Cry of Freedom." There has been a lot of good scholarship in the past 15 years about the Southern Unionist, the anti-secession loyalists, and about anti-Confederate movements in the South (one third of Southern men who served in the Civil War did so as members of the Union Army).
I still have my Dad's copy of the Catton trilogy but never read it. When I glanced at it, I felt like it was historical fiction, where the emphasis was on narrative and story, with facts offered as needed to provide authenticity. I'm no scholar. Thanks for the tip about the McPherson book.
Blight's last big work was his big, wonderful Frederick Douglass biography several years ago. he's done a lot of work on slave narratives and the changing of historical attitudes toward slavery and the Civil War itself. it feels like he's much less interested in the military history as such.
one of the professional schmucks at "The New Criterion," a nest of right-wing vipers, refers to Blight as "the last of the great Yale lecturers." so...he's good. what's funny is that I wrote my previous post before discovering that Blight is the first big guest on tonight's Lawrence O'Donnell show...I've got the DVR playing NOW.
as for the Teaching Company courses...Guelzo has an excellent one on American Intellectual History (a genuinely dense piece of work) and another course which examines the writing of the Constitution as a series of mini-biographies of the Framers. both very recommendable.
and I'm hardly what you'd call a Civil War buff. we DID write a song about thirty years ago that pretended to be a Union soldier writing home to his wife, and that was probably in the wake of the Ken Burns series. speaking of that series in retrospect, he gave altogether too much time to Shelby Foote. commanding presence, great talker (and a really fine novelist), but very much a southerner (which, IMO, means that he's little too sympathetic for some of the wrong people). I mean, he's a big fan of Nathan Bedford Forrest, so uhhh...
...and as long as I'm here, reflecting on the Nikki Haley thing, the stupidity is even more stunning.
she's preparing for a Town Hall in NEW HAMPSHIRE. it ain't fucking North Carolina or Arkansas. it's NEW HAMPSHIRE.
so, one would THINK that, in preparing for this event, someone would have suggested they work out a smooth line of bullshit JUST IN CASE.
let's say that those wags yelling and screaming about the questioner are correct and he was a "Democratic plant." so fucking what? of course there are going to be "plants" from the opposing party. it's called an ELECTION, which is an event during which people cast VOTES.
in these ridiculous "Town Hall" events, which pretend to be "spontaneous" but are anything but, wouldn't it make sense to assume (especially in this particular moment awash in controversy about Black History standards, etc.) that somebody might possibly ask this kind of question?
shit, I woulda. and nobody's paying me to tell them how to run things in their wannabe political campaign.
on the bright side, I really do think that Nikki's blown it with this one. I mean, she's now in a position so fucked up that even the pathetic little fascist DeSantis has scored points against her.
ew.
Good tips and observations. I HAVE read the Douglass bio, but obviously didn't pay much attention to remembering the author's name! Embarrassing. That book was tremendous, absolutely.
Gumbi Girl Barbie uses silly putty to re-package ideas and has super contortionist powers to dodge meaningful values, facts or morals. Her special sponsors are the KKKoch Family Neonazi billionaires, so, no, she has absolutely no redeeming qualities.
Image: Nikki Haley licking her finger and putting it up in the air to determine which way the wind is blowing. Must say she is consistent.
Maryanne, check out the pic with this article about (slavery -taught-good -skills )DeSantis as he weighs in.👆😂
https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2023/12/28/desantis-camp-slams-nikki-haleys-slavery-comments-months-after-floridas-own-controversy/?share=stae2horrsoreseteedd
proving my point about how stupid do you have to be to be one of them?
Simply perfect, Kathy. Great laugh and I thank you!
She learned that trick from Mitt Romney!
Here's a song we ought to bring back to popularity in 2024. 160 years ago it was more popular than "the Battle Hymn of the Republic":
The Battle Cry of Freedom (Union version)
by George F. Root
Yes we’ll rally round the flag, boys, we’ll rally once again,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom,
We will rally from the hillside, we’ll gather from the plain,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
Chorus:
The Union forever! Hurrah, boys, hurrah!
Down with the traitor, up with the star;
While we rally round the flag, boys, rally once again,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
We are springing to the call with a million freemen more,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
And we’ll fill our vacant ranks of our brothers gone before,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
Chorus
We will welcome to our numbers the loyal, true and brave,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
And although he may be poor, not a man shall be a slave,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
Chorus
So we’re springing to the call from the East and from the West,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
And we’ll hurl the rebel crew from the land we love best,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
Chorus
Here's a good rendition of the song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qK3H4JJ-8Bg
It has been abundantly clear for decades that HST was right. Since she first opened her mouth, she has been on the chump team. She tries to put on a more normal “face, but like all phonies, she is it’s easy to see through. When my bro asked a waitress what was wrong with the mashed potatoes, the girl answered “It’s the lack of being real.” This could answer a lot of questions where repubs are concerned.
Hahaha !
Nikki Haley didn't need this to show her incompetence. What our political siltation has descended to only is bearable because it's down so low that the only direction available is up.
I used to think that too until certain situations went even lower. Things can always get worse folks.
I know.....
Any vote for any gop candidate is a vote for chaos, lies, confusion, obfuscation...because this party decided long ago for power over people and to hell with policies that make life better for the people and the planet. Plus they're busy spouting freedom when the point is something else entirely. Tom, this link is a great political cartoon that says it all.
https://www.ajc.com/opinion/mike-luckovich-blog/1229-mike-luckovich-ill-solve-the-puzzle/AIWA7SPTTVFVNM5MU2GSIBT5RU/#
Good one!
Haley is ambition at its rawest. And while I'd never vote for her, at least she's not Trump with his entourage of horned nihilists and snaggle-toothed avengers.
But she'll hire the horned nihilists and snaggle-toothed avengers if she gets in office.
Can't agree with "rawest". She's got dozens of competitors, IMHO.
I just did an initial search for the quote and what came up had the alternative spelling with one "T" and came from the U.S. Forest Service, but it did mention he was from Charleston and speaking against the action of his home state. Wikipedia says he was Attorney General of South Carolina, lost a bid to become a state senator and then filled a vacant seat in the South Carolina House of Representatives. In any event, he was a courageous exception in that state. Thanks for the correction - you are on it!
We both actually had parts of the whole.