the Lyndon LaRouche fans had a poster showing Barack Obama's face with a Hitler moustache. "He's changed," went the slogan.
No he hasn't, I thought. You've just drawn a small moustache on his photo.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Quote of the day II
Lexington:
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23 comments:
There are still people in Germany who venerate Hitler to the point of near worship. History teaches us, if we but heed the lesson, that Hitler was fantastically popular with the people of his nation before he turned his zeal for “Living Space” into a conflagration that very nearly devoured the world. They thought he was doing the “Right Thing” at the time and he did, after all, rebuild the German economy and national pride.
It’s all too easy to look back through the prism of history and, with the sure knowledge of hindsight, condemn such comparisons today. But, as the above illustrates, today’s savior may be tomorrow’s villain.
I might even go so far as to suggest that all the freaks out there who screamed the loudest about the invasive nature of the “Patriot Act” would be hard pressed to show how any of their precious “Rights” were violated. But now, we have an administration that actually has a “snitch switch” on their official website that allows you to “tell” on your neighbors, they want “equal time” on commercial stations (and, if you fall for that ruse, you’re a bigger idiot than I imagined) and they want to tell you exactly how, when and where you can get health care, sell your car or even unload your used refrigerator. The very idiots who support Obama and think that they agree with his policies fail to see that they will probably be among the first to be “rounded up” if he has his way.
His “Night of the Long Knives” is fast approaching.
Caveat Emptor.
Ha, ha, ha! That is too funny! I suppose the highly organized and jack-booted Democratic Party will be his tool for national and world domination? Ha, ha, ha!
Well now, Hitler wasn’t all THAT fantastically popular.
In the presidential election held on March 13, 1932, the results:
Hindenburg 49.6 percent
Hitler 30.1 percent
Thaelmann 13.2 percent
Duesterberg 6.8 percent
That’s 70 percent against. On April 19, 1932, in the runoff election, results were:
Hindenburg 53.0 percent
Hitler 36.8 percent
Thaelmann 10.2 percent
Still, 63 percent against.
In the July 31, 1932 election (Reichstag seats) produced a major victory for the National Socialist Party. The party won 230 seats in the Reichstag, making it Germany’s largest political party, but it still fell short of a majority in the 608-member body.
I’m sure the number of people enthralled with Herr Hitler grew but I’d bet a whole lot of them were faking it, for obvious reasons and by the end of the war I’m just as sure they hated the little shit’s guts.
I’m almost convinced any nostalgia for the regime that may have existed after the war amongst ordinary citizens was probably more a nostalgia for the stirring Horst Wessel Leid which had been barred (and which is a hell of a better piece than the atrocious “Internationale”) and all those fabulous rallys (they did know how to put on a rally).
George, I suspect you are too little concerned about the heartless bleeding-heart liberals and their long history of oppressing the little guy here in America! ;-)
Alan,
It's not like heartless bleeding-heart liberals haven't oppressed and destroyed the little guy in an attempt to save him from himself. Mao, Stalin, Castro, etc. The Left produces tyrants just like the Right.
Now, we haven't seen one in America yet, but part of that is the America is a center-right country and therefore generally distrustful of left-wing leaders and ideas. But that doesn't mean we will never see a left-wing tyrant.
Is Obama a potential tyrant? Nah.
But, as they say, historical performance is no guarantee of future success.
The U.S. hasn't seen a right-wing tyrant either. The closest thing to a tyrant we've ever had was FDR (and I'm not saying he was a tyrant, though Japanese-Americans of the time might, just that he was the most powerful man in U.S. history).
Alan:
I've not gotten as far as 'emoticons' in my struggle against computer illiteracy. I'm assuming that's a wink and a smile - if so carry on.
I'd have no problem identifying this country's only tyrant in a lineup. It was the ole rail splitter himself - Abe Lincoln.
I do have a problem bringing it to anyone's attention though, as it seems to rile people up good and hard.
I think I'm safe here though, at least for the time being.
Andrew Johnson would probably get my vote for ending reconstruction and ensuring that those participating in the reversal of the post-Civil War political gains of freed slaves (groups like the new KKK) experienced no federal interference. Completely successful oppression. Second, for me, would be the various Presidents who participated in clearing the west of those troublesome natives. The Japanese-American complaints pale in comparison.
That said, I remain amazed by the cries that liberals are going to (suddenly turn fascist and) subdue the country. Note that in Lexington's commentary, someone who compares Obama to Hitler calls for the elimination of Britain--a goal of Hitler. Rather a confused bunch.
They are hardly alone. Michael Steele claims Republicans must protect Medicare from Democrats. Right, Michael. http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendId=384407627&blogId=507058352
Wink and a smile, George. But, I will give Abe a pass on account of the national emergency he was facing.
Alan:
"But, I will give Abe a pass on account of the national emergency he was facing."
He was the cause of the national emergency!
"someone who compares Obama to Hitler calls for the elimination of Britain--a goal of Hitler. Rather a confused bunch."
Someone who compares anyone to Hitler (well, other than the usual suspects, Uncle Joe and Chairman Mao) ought be eliminated from being taken seriously. But since when did Hitler want the elimination of Britain? Sparing the Brits at Dunkirk argues against that point.
I'm going to split the difference here. I have to side with George that the Nazis didn't really want to eliminate Britain. If you read Mein Kampf, it's clear that Hitler would have been happy for the English to live on their island. In the book, he expresses great admiration for the British Empire and expresses his hope to ally with the British as well as with Italy. With this alliance, he then hoped to conquer France, Eastern Europe, and finally Russia.
It's not 100% clear why Hitler didn't order a full-scale attack on Dunkirk. The most plausible explanation was that he hoped he had hurt them sufficiently that they would agree to peace and worried that total destruction at Dunkirk of the BEF would lead to a climate of revenge in Britain, making peace talks difficult. After the astonishing success over France, Hitler was eager to end the war in the west and turn his sights to Russia.
However, I'm definitely siding with Alan on Abe Lincoln. Lincoln was the catalyst for secession, certainly, but he was also duly and fairly elected President of the United States. He didn't come into the Presidency in a coup or anything like that. I don't approve of all the things he did as President, but I definitely wouldn't regard him as a tyrant.
Andrew:
One may act the tyrant without the title and pay raise (tribute). Lincoln may not have crossed the Potomac with his troops (Caesar) and he didn’t force himself onto the government (Hitler) but he acted and reacted as a tyrant, beginning with suspension of habeas corpus, then issuing a warrant for the arrest of Chief Justice Taney who had declared that suspension unconstitutional. It only went down hill after that.
George: You fail to understand just how much the rebels needed killing.
George, Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus was, I absolutely believe, unconstitutional. Lincoln eventually got Congress to do it in 1863 (and Congress absolutely does have this power - see Article I, Section 9). I can understand why, in the confusion of secession, Lincoln would suspend it himself during the initial emergency and I do believe he could have justified it for a time, but I agree that two years was too long a time to go on justifying it without asking for a bill from Congress.
You have to know, however, that the "Taney arrest warrant" story is controversial and hotly disputed. I regard the evidence as weak, but not implausible. In any event, I prefer to stick to well-known facts. If you can't make a tyrant case with just those, then you can't have much of a case.
I also strongly disagree that it went downhill after that (unless you're just talking about the more egregious 1862 suspension of habeas corpus). Suspension of habeas corpus and the use of military tribunals to prosecute civilians are easily the best evidence for Lincoln as tyrant. I doubt the prosecution's got very much else.
Andrew:
Stay with me (two parts):
I
After an editorial by Horace Greeley appeared in a New York Tribune critical of Lincoln and the war, Lincoln shot back a letter to Greeley, defending his position.
From Lincoln’s letter:
“I have just read yours of the 19th. addressed to myself through the New-York Tribune. If there be in it any statements, or assumptions of fact, which I may know to be erroneous, I do not, now and here, controvert them.”
“If there be in it any inferences which I may believe to be falsely drawn, I do not now and here, argue against them.”
My Comment: Not now, not here, AND not ever.
“I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution.”
My Comment: He miscalculated?
“The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was.’"
My Comment: NATIONAL AUTHORITY! I thought it was a Federation of States.
“My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery.”
“If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.”
“I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause.”
My Comment: When he says he would do more he wasn’t whistling Dixie. Six-hundred thousand dead – at least, not to mention the carnage of the wounded and broken families.
“I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men every where could be free.”
My Comment: “all men everywhere…free” except those who wanted to be free of NATIONAL AUTHORITY – and had the moral and legal right of secession.
II
There is an important point to be made of Lincoln’s reply to Greeley.
Here you have Lincoln declaring that slavery, an issue dense with moral implications, is subordinate to the issue of political union, which has not an iota of moral significance to it. He goes so far as to say he would abandon the slavery issue altogether if he could save the union. Can anyone explain what was so BLOODY important about the union. It was a political organizing of disparate states. There is nothing of the sacred in the union. It has, in and of itself, no virtue to speak of. There is only one conceivable explanation (okay, maybe two). Either Lincoln wished to grab as much of the power delegated to the states as he could and to centralize that power in Washington, in the federal government, and, judging by his utter disregard of the Constitution, in the office of the presidency – making him a tyrant. Or, he was a madman.
Lincoln believed it was his Constitutional duty to preserve the Union. There is nothing in the Constitution allowing for secession, not a single word. If secession was envisioned by the writers of the Constitution (and there is evidence that it definitely was not envisioned by James Madison, the principal author), then surely a procedure would have been mentioned? Now it is perfectly all right for you to disagree with Lincoln and argue that there is no moral significance to union and that secession is perfectly moral, but I do believe Lincoln has the better of the legal arguments and, therefore, through his moral duty as President of the United States to enforce the Constitution, may even have the better of the moral argument.
I agree with the Supreme Court's ruling in Texas v. White:
The Union of the States never was a purely artificial and [74 U.S. 700, 725] arbitrary relation. It began among the Colonies, and grew out of common origin, mutual sympathies, kindred principles, similar interests, and geographical relations. It was confirmed and strengthened by the necessities of war, and received definite form, and character, and sanction from the Articles of Confederation. By these the Union was solemnly declared to ‘be perpetual.‘ And when these Articles were found to be inadequate to the exigencies of the country, the Constitution was ordained ‘to form a more perfect Union.’ It is difficult to convey the idea of indissoluble unity more clearly than by these words. What can be indissoluble if a perpetual Union, made more perfect, is not?
But the perpetuity and indissolubility of the Union, by no means implies the loss of distinct and individual existence, or of the right of self-government by the States. Under the Articles of Confederation each State retained its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right not expressly delegated to the United States. Under the Constitution, though the powers of the States were much restricted, still, all powers not delegated to the United States, nor prohibited to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. And we have already had occasion to remark at this term, that the 'people of each State compose a State, having its own government, and endowed with all the functions essential to separate and independent existence,’ and that ‘without the States in union, there could be no such political body as the United States.’ Not only, therefore, can there be no loss of separate and independent autonomy to the States, through their union under the Constitution, but it may be not unreasonably said that the preservation of the States, and the maintenance of their governments, are as much within the design and care of the Constitution as the preservation of the Union and the maintenance of the National government. The Constitution, in all its provisions, looks to an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible States. [74 U.S. 700, 726] When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State. The act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final. The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration, or revocation, except through revolution, or through consent of the States.
Andrew:
“There is nothing in the Constitution allowing for secession, not a single word.”
How many words are there forbidding it.
“ evidence that it (secession) definitely was not envisioned by James Madison, the principal author”
James Madison: "the people… not as individuals composing one entire nation, but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they respectively belong." - Federalist Paper 39,
We are not a nation of one people but a confederation of distinct, independent states, i.e the people didn’t vote on ratification of the Constitution, the States did.
“Lincoln has the better of the legal arguments”
Then he ought to have made them in court and not on battlefields.
“… through his moral duty as President of the United States to enforce the Constitution, may even have the better of the moral argument.”
You couldn’t possibly have stretched this idea one iota more without tearing at the fabric of the Universe.
“I agree with the Supreme Court's ruling in Texas v. White:”
I do not. Neither do:
Thomas Jefferson: "If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union, or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left to combat it." - 1st Inaugural Address
Jefferson again, at the time of the New England Federalists secession” "If any state in the Union will declare that it prefers separation... to a continuance in the union.... I have no hesitation in saying, 'Let us separate.'"
Governor Morris of Pennsylvania head of the committee on style of the Constitutional Convention of 1787: (on the meaning of "We the people") The Constitution was a compact not between individuals, but between political societies, the people, not of America, but of the United States, each enjoying sovereign power and of course equal rights.
Alexis de Tocqueville: The Union was formed by the voluntary agreement of the States; and in uniting together they have not forfeited their nationality, nor have they been reduced to the condition of one and the same people. If one of the States choose to withdraw from the compact, it would be difficult to disprove its right of doing so, and the Federal Government would have no means of maintaining its claims directly either by force or right.” - Democracy in America
There are many, many more such testimonies but I’ll leave it at that. That Lincoln was a tyrant – we agree to disagree.
Your quote does not even purport to give Madison's opinion on secession. However, we do know what it was. During the Nullification Crisis, James Madison wrote a letter to Daniel Webster congratulating him on a speech opposing nullification. Madison said:
"I return my thanks for the copy of your late very powerful Speech in the Senate of the United S. It crushes 'nullification' and must hasten the abandonment of 'Secession.' But this dodges the blow by confounding the claim to secede at will, with the right of seceding from intolerable oppression. The former answers itself, being a violation, without cause, of a faith solemnly pledged. The latter is another name only for revolution, about which there is no theoretic controversy."
You see where he's going here? Nobody ever doubted that the States had the right to revolt against intolerable oppression. The United States was founded on a political revolution so this was never disputed. However, the right to secede just because a President you don't like happens to be elected? This is very much disputed. And the South never invoked the right to revolution, but that's precisely what they were doing.
Washington had similar words in his Farewell Address:
"The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation derived from local discriminations…
"But these considerations, however powerfully they address themselves to your sensibility, are greatly outweighed by those which apply more immediately to your interest. Here every portion of our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preserving the union of the whole.
"With such powerful and obvious motives to union, affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavor to weaken its bands."
And:
"To the efficacy and permanency of your Union, a government for the whole is indispensable. No alliance, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute; they must inevitably experience the infractions and interruptions which all alliances in all times have experienced. Sensible of this momentous truth, you have improved upon your first essay, by the adoption of a constitution of government better calculated than your former for an intimate union, and for the efficacious management of your common concerns. This government, the offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its principles, in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with energy, and containing within itself a provision for its own amendment, has a just claim to your confidence and your support. Respect for its authority, compliance with its laws, acquiescence in its measures, are duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government. But the Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established government."
I'm probably willing to grant you Jefferson, though Jefferson was such a complex individual, that it's possible to use his words to support virtually anything you want. Your quote from Morris doesn't actually speak to the right of secession and who cares what de Tocqueville thought?
Andrew:
“However, the right to secede just because a President you don't like happens to be elected?”
Stop that! The Republican Party published 100,000 copies of “The Impending Crisis” by Hinton Helper, which called for slave revolt, and distributed them in the South. Also, States were, are, Constitutionally bound to recognize and act upon the laws of the other States. Northern States acted illegally in passing personal-liberty laws enacted to thwart the Fugitive Slave Laws.
“Jefferson was such a complex individual, that it's possible to use his words to support virtually anything you want “ and “who cares what de Tocqueville thought?”
That’s convenient, Jefferson was complex. Am I to understand that you mean Madison was a simpleton? And de Tocqueville was an observer on the American scene and obviously discerned a right to secession from what he’d seen and heard. But so much for bandying about “he said”, “he said”. The competing opinions were just that. Now for the Law.
We’ve already established that the Constitution makes no mention of secession. No law there.
Is there a Federal statute that expressly forbids secession with penalty or consequences of secession or attempted secession? No law there. The only thing left is to scan for circumstantial evidence in the ratifying documents and accompanying statements of all thirteen ratifying agents for their understanding that secession was not allowed and that they were entering into a perpetual union. No, nothing there. The South generally, and South Carolina specifically broke no laws, broke no compacts, broke no agreements dealing with secession - because there were none.
This might have left Lincoln to engage in a moral crusade. He might have made his cause one of opposing evil, in this case, ending slavery but it’s already been established by Lincoln’s own words that he had little or no interest in that. As it is impossible to make the case that secession was evil, the only thing to conclude is, Lincoln was a big man with a big ideas, - perpetual union, and centralized power – and was willing to expend vast amounts of human and material resources to get his way, making him not only a tyrant but a bloody tyrant.
I'll leave you the last word should you choose to have it. Unless of course you come up with something like “However, the right to secede just because a President you don't like happens to be elected?”.
"who cares what de Tocqueville thought?"
Please tell me you meant "who cares what de Tocqueville thought on the issue of secession?"
Because I won't stand for general Tocqueville bad-mouthing.
Stop that! The Republican Party published 100,000 copies of “The Impending Crisis” by Hinton Helper, which called for slave revolt, and distributed them in the South. Also, States were, are, Constitutionally bound to recognize and act upon the laws of the other States. Northern States acted illegally in passing personal-liberty laws enacted to thwart the Fugitive Slave Laws.
Yes, the slave states weren't so much in favor of states' rights when they controlled the Presidency and the Senate. It was really an extraordinarily flexible doctrine of theirs, this states' rights. When they wished to force the Northern states to utilize their own resources to catch their runaway slaves for them, there was never any mention of state's rights.
That’s convenient, Jefferson was complex. Am I to understand that you mean Madison was a simpleton?
Calling Jefferson "complex" was meant to be rather obvious code for "inconsistent." Jefferson was the sort of man who was quite capable of holding two completely irreconcilable opinions in his head at the same time. Madison was not. I decline to say which of the two men was superior.
And de Tocqueville was an observer on the American scene and obviously discerned a right to secession from what he’d seen and heard.
Read your own quote again. De Tocqueville said, "If one of the States choose to withdraw from the compact, it would be difficult to disprove its right of doing so." This is a very different claim from saying that it was crystal clear that the States had such a right.
Please tell me you meant "who cares what de Tocqueville thought on the issue of secession?"
That is indeed what I meant. I could also quote Andrew Jackson on nullification in which it's clear that he didn't recognize a right to secession. But unlike Madison, Jefferson, Washington, and Morris, Jackson's opinion on the matter is no more germane than de Tocqueville's.
This might have left Lincoln to engage in a moral crusade. He might have made his cause one of opposing evil, in this case, ending slavery but it’s already been established by Lincoln’s own words that he had little or no interest in that.
This is plainly not true. Lincoln quite clearly thought that slavery was a great evil, but his oath was to preserve and protect the Constitution. Lincoln, in his response to Greeley, was sending a message to the South - "If you give up and come back, I am not unalterably opposed to letting you keep your slaves." Note that at the time Lincoln wrote the letter, he already had the Emancipation Proclamation in his back pocket, though he hadn't yet delivered it.
As it is impossible to make the case that secession was evil, the only thing to conclude is, Lincoln was a big man with a big ideas, - perpetual union, and centralized power – and was willing to expend vast amounts of human and material resources to get his way, making him not only a tyrant but a bloody tyrant.
Even if Lincoln was for centralized power (and you have hardly made that case - you've just assumed it), he never dreamed of the sort of centralized power that has been wielded by the federal government since FDR and arguably less than wielded by Theodore Roosevelt. If Lincoln is a tyrant, where do Woodrow Wilson, FDR, and Ronald Reagan fall?
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