Veterans' Day

I may have told this story before ... but I am reminded today of a lingering memory. It must have been on the forth of July, 1945 or 46 that, during a parade in my Pennsylvania hometown, I seen to  recall seeing one or two Civil War veterans riding in a car or truck.

Can this be?

Assume that these gents were in their early teens when the war ended in 1865 (drummer boys?), this means that they would bet then in their early 90s when I saw them.

Wow ... that is mind bending!

Headlines

Federal judge orders Trump administration to reunite immigrant families

Trump has announced his plan to crack down on foreign investment -- and it's less harsh than expected

Millennial Socialist rocks Dem. Party

Spain: Students kicked out of dorms to make way for boat migrants

Bolton to meet Putin in Moscow

Weekly mortgage applications fall sharply, as home buyers drop out

Supremes  deal big setback for labor unions ...

Koreas plan to construct joint railway

America's problem isn't too little democracy, it's too much

North Korea making 'rapid' improvements in nuclear reactor despite Trump-Kim agreement

Shock poll: 44% see civil war soon in USA ...

Le Pen: EU can't be trusted on borders

In Memoriam

From Powerline log

Sins of the Parents

The Alamo

If dreamers are not responsible for the immigration crimes of their parents, the Alamo or even the Mexican-American War, then why are current-day Southerners responsible for the Civil War, slavery and segregation policies of their ancestors? Can we require that any DACA recipients first to denounce their parents' crimes and their country's former aggressions before any amnesty may be granted? And then also can we obliterate all the Hispanic place names and landmarks in the Southwestern U.S.?

Seems fair ...

Headlines

All from Internet news sites. Guess which from Politico?

Steve Bannon takes his fight outside

Poll shows lots of support for Trump's stance on Charlottesvile

White House lawyer predicts quick end to Mueller probe ...

Stephen K. Bannon returns home to Breitbart News

Graham to Trump: Afghanistan pullout could cause another 9/11

Panicked New York set to remove subway tiles that vaguely resemble Confederate flag

NASA: 3-mile asteroid to graze past Earth [in] closest ever tracked

Bush: We're on the cusp of a second Civil War

Mother of Charlottesville victim: I won't speak with Trump

ACLU no longer automatically defends groups with firearms ...

Hero [Spanish] police officer shoots dead four terrorists ...

Finland terror: Two dead, several injured

Robert E. Lee

When the South solidly voted as Democrats, the northern liberals were happy to leave them alone. But now that they vote Republican, the Left is relishing in ripping the scab off of the Civil War and rubbing their noses in it. Robert E. Lee was one of our greatest generals ... who now is being turned into a pariah by the two-faced liberals. The Charlottesville mayhem centered around a statue of Lee as this new-found symbol of regenerated racism.

When Lee surrendered at the courthouse in Appomattox, Va, as they were exiting this ceremony, General Grant had his band strike up "Dixie" out of respect for all their battles well fought. This spirit of reconciliation is now being buried under the slime of racial politics. And the driver of that deadly car in Charlottesville was clearly a slope-headed moron. But he was being egged on by even bigger morons on both sides.

Good News, Bad News

Good news: President Trump is no longer crazy! Bad news: He seems now to be suffering from dementia! This is the latest "thinking" by many in the fake-news media ... see: NewsMax Story ... as a way of explaining Trumps recent candid comments about North Korea's Kim Jong Un: "I would be honored to have him come to the White House". And also his take on the Civil War, "Why was there a Civil War? Why could that not have been worked out?" Both comments, to me, seem within one sigma of normal. But not to much of the media which now has him entering his dotage.

The liberal media is quite good at such innuendo. They have a bag of semantic tricks with which to smear or embarass their enemies on the Right. And their number one enemy is Donald Trump. They, being knee-jerk liberals, disliked him instinctively. But, when he started calling them out for their fake news stories, dislike turned to loathing. They are now so twisted in their attempts at revenge, that many have abandoned any attempt at objectivity.

It is getting so bad that much of the media is looking silly to anyone who is not an anti-Trump partisan. Can we label it "white spittle time" as this foam forms at the corners of their mouths when his name comes up ... and many of their subtle semantic slights are now abandoned in favor of brickbats like this calling him senile. "Crazy" was silly, but "senile" is obviously vindictive.

Is such rhetoric protected by the First Amendment and even our current libel laws? Sure, but with freedom comes responsibility. Perhaps, as Trump has suggested, our libel laws should at least be re-examined and brought more in line with England's ... because so much fake news today does seem to be motivated by "malice and reckless disregard for the truth" -- a good definition of libel.

Afterward: For a reasoned discussion of why Trump is unreasoned see: CNBC Editorial. All good points ... and a view held by many. However, it is not the view of a great many other Americans (like myself) who like what Trump has been doing but are ignoring much of what he has been saying ... often the same people who liked what Obama was saying but hated what he was doing.

Bleeding Hearts

The term "bleeding-heart liberal" must exist because of hard evidence. For some reason, perhaps guilt by association, lefties often want the world to be as they wish it ... not as it is. So, President Barack Obummer and Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown, Governor of California, are both in a pardoning and sentence commutation frenzy ... particularly insofar as drug dealers are concerned (many also with gun violations). Over his eight years in office, Obama has pardoned or commuted the sentence of 1324 felons ... see: NY Times Article ... with some more Bill-Clinton-like bomb shells likely to occur before January 20th. And Brown has had equivalent but likely misguided compassion ... forgiving the sins of 856 mostly drug felons ... see: LA Times Article.

Yes, the federal and often state Constitutions grant these government executives these powers ... but I don't believe that the framers believed that they would be granted in such a blanket fashion. Yes, in the past, there have been overall pardons granted to soldiers after the Civil War, for polygamist Mormons and for  the draft evaders in the Vietnam War ... but these were special cases. It would appear to this observer that Obama and Brown's mass forgiveness comes out of a sense of empathy with these criminals ... both executives having been heavy drug users in their pasts.

It is almost a certainty that some of these released felons will display recidivism and return to their criminal ways ... at which time bleeding hearts will most certainly result in more bleeding bodies.

Afterward: Over the past year both presidential candidates and the media have focused on the epidemic of drug use and abuse that is sweeping our nation. Somehow, releasing thousands of drug dealers back onto our streets likely won't help this problem ... and actually may be part of the reason it exists in the first place.

Reparations

Hillary Clinton, if she loses the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary to Bernie Sanders ... which now seems likely, she will need to stop the bleeding in the South Carolina primary. This means that the black vote there is very critical ... sooo, what better way to energize this voting block than to promise them something. What might this bribe be? How about money channeled through the age-old political promise of slavery reparations ... see: Breitbart Article?

Now I don;t know how the polling goes for reparations, but, if Hillary embraces this cause like she has gun control and Obummer's record, she will be lucky to carry two states if she is the Democrat nominee.

As far as reparations are concerned, Abraham Lincoln,when confronted with the huge causalities occurring in the Civil War, believed that this bloodshed would continue until there was an equivalence to the prior suffering of the slaves in his country. If this was enough reparations for Lincoln, it is so for me too.

The Stars and Bars

The confederate flag has passed from being a symbol of pride for the many sacrifices made by the South in the Civil War into being an avatar of Republican racism ... all because that evil murderer Dylann Roof used it in some of his racist posts on his website. Never mind that Senator Fritz Hollings (D) once caused the stars and bars initially to fly above the South Carolina capital or that Governor Bill Clinton (D) did the same in Arkansas. It seems that our current president and the South-hating liberal media has finally drummed into the minds of our forever distracted public that this symbol ... as well as the anthem of the Confederacy, Dixie .    are evil and need disposing of ... as well they probably will.

Now for some important (and apparently forgotten) historical context ... after General Ulysses S. Grant accepted General Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox, Virginia ending our bloody Civil War ... wherein he allowed the Confederate soldiers to keep their uniforms, side arms and flags and instructed them just to go back to their homes ... General Grant, in a gesture of reconciliation, had the Union band strike up Dixie as General Lee was leaving the courthouse and his soldiers were disbanding. Thus we see the stark contrast between political greatness and historically-blind puerile pandering.

The Race Card

Let me see … the United States freed the slaves about 150 years ago and, in the process, sacrificed over 600,000 of our young men. It also stopped school segregation and Jim Crow laws about 60 years ago. And, as an act of atonement, it has long encouraged racial preferences to be used in employment and education. It has had two black Supreme Court justices, two black Secretaries of State, one black Attorney General and multiple black Presidential cabinet secretaries and top-level advisers, many black Senators, Representatives, state Governors and city Mayors, and numerous black corporate CEOs, university Presidents, sports personalities, movie/music stars, TV poobahs, and other millionaire glitterati … and now the U.S. has a black in the highest office in the land … its President … all elected, appointed or appreciated by a population which is, by its majority, not black.

One would think that these many enlightened accomplishments might begin to remove the stain of slavery from the American psyche (our original sin as so aptly described by Condoleezza Rice.)  But no … we are still racists. Not only are whites racists, but we are often compared to the Klu Klux Klan … itching to scare the black man into submission with a burning cross. We are an unrecoverable and vile form of humanity who cannot be reformed or forgiven for the sins of our forebearers … even beyond the seventh generation (the seeming Biblical limit of sin’s legacy.)

Recently, Michelle Obama, in a high-school graduation address, told her starry-eyed audience that they still hold secret prejudice against the likes of her … see: here. And Attorney General, Eric Holder has let go with both barrels. First saying that anyone who opposes President Obama’s policies is guilty of “quiet prejudice” … see: here. And then, paradoxically suggested that colorblindness is not the way to end discrimination … see: here.

I guess playing the race card in politics has become second nature to many on the left … particularly when your pile of accomplishment chips is so diminished. But, I for one am more than ready to call the left's bluff.

Continued winning at political poker requires a lot more than just bluster … and a race card.

A Civil Action

Joshua Chamberlain

Nathan Forrest

Today is the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, that wrenching spasm in the early maturation of our great nation (see: 150th Anniversary).  I have been rewatching Ken Burns' PBS series on this war and I can truly say, I have been (once again) greatly moved.  The only criticism I could level at this fine documentary is that it conveniently glosses over the religious tenor of this conflict.  Clearly, The Battle Hymn of the Republic, is, among many other things, an indication of the intensity of religious overtones to this war ... overtones which Ken Burns left on the cutting room floor.  Apparently, political correctness trumps historic accuracy.

Condoleezza Rice recently brilliantly said that slavery was the United States' birth defect. The Civil War, it was hoped by most abolitionists, would correct this malformity.  Unfortunately, it didn't, but it was a bloody good start.  In fact, Abraham Lincoln, bemoaning the length and the cost in human lives (600,00+} of the Civil War, came to believe that this carnage would continue until there had been established a parity with the suffering of Africans under the American slavery system.

The above pictures represent two of the luminaries of this great strife that were highlighted by Ken Burns: Joshua Chamberlain, the Northern hero of Gettysburg who dramatically repulsed the Southern's attack on Little Round Top and helped turn the tide of battle.  Please see and read: Joshua Chamberlain  to understand why he was the General who oversaw Lee's surrender at Appomattox.  The other is Nathan Bedford Forrest, a brilliant Rebel military tactician (and butcher) whose heroics are almost beyond belief. Also see and read:  Nathan Bedford Forrest to understand why he is an important Southern hero on a par with Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson.

And please take a few moments today to reflect on the huge losses that were suffered on both sides in this bitter internecine war ... bigger than all the deaths in all the American wars that have been fought since.

Afterthought: I am 72 years old, yet I still seem to remember seeing at least one Civil War veteran marching in a late 1940's July 4th parade in my hometown in Western Pennsylvania.  Funny how these events get compressed across the ages.