That compromise thing
So, after all of that talk about “working together” with Congress, I’m guessin’ that by “bi-partisan” the president means “My way or the highway”. It seems that cry-baby John Boehner presented the president with a compromise plan to avoid the “fiscal cliff” we about to go forward over. Boehner’s plan raised taxes on folks making over a million bucks, but that wasn’t good enough for “I Won” according to Fox News;
White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, though, said it “doesn’t ask enough of the very wealthiest in taxes and instead shifts the burden to the middle class and seniors,” and cannot pass the Senate.
Within minutes, Boehner spokesman Brendan Buck fired back: “After spending months saying we must ask for more from millionaires and billionaires, how can they reject a plan that does exactly that?”
Buck accused President Obama of “moving the goal posts” and in the process “threatening every American family with higher taxes.”
Boehner, with no less than his leadership standing on the line, is trying to walk a tightrope in negotiations as the president demands tax hikes that many Republicans adamantly oppose.
And yet, it’s not class warfare, no, not a little bit. It’s not about pandering to a base of grubby little grabby cretins. If the administration is so worried about shifting “the burden to the middle class and seniors” why isn’t he doing everything he can to avoid the Obama Tax Hike that are pending in a few days? Who is going to be hit hardest when the Obama Tax Hike hits if not the lower income folks who are going to suddenly get hit with taxes for the first time?
December 19th, 2012 at 12:17 pm
Basically, it could increase taxes on anyone making over $1M to 100 percent, and Obama knows 1–it won’t make a dent in the deficit, 2–he ain’t gonna stop writing checks the Treasury can’t cash.
IOW, the stupid shall be punished because “rich” is now defined as anyone not totally dependent on big gub’mint for their existence.
Congratulations, America–you voted for it, you own it.
December 19th, 2012 at 12:29 pm
Obama doesn’t care. He knows that Republicans and especially Boehner are completely inept at dealing with the hostile MSM. Who will get blamed if a deal isn’t reached- Repubs no matter what. And uninformed sheepy Americans will buy that it was the evil Repubs who wouldn’t make a deal.
December 19th, 2012 at 12:46 pm
@1 – But isn’t that the plan, in the big scheme of things?
While the country goes down the toilet, people will naturally become more dependent on the government (which is the end state they are trying to achieve).
I mean, folks already get Obama-phones and food stamps to buy lobster and crab legs by the bushel, right? Free health-care is right around the corner. I only wonder what’s next?
Socialism at work, which is just the way they want it.
You’re right, though. “We” voted for it, so now we own it.
December 19th, 2012 at 12:55 pm
Of course it is–as it has been since a century ago with the Progressive movement. FDR got to implement a huge chunk of it, LBJ an even larger chunk, and finally, Obama gets to drive the final nail of dependency into the American coffin.
December 19th, 2012 at 12:56 pm
melle–which is why we need someone LIKE Reagan, if for no other reason to use the “Great Communicator” aspect of his personality, his incredible debating and public speaking abilities, to take the case to the American people.
But then again, even in the 1980′s the MSM was trying to maintain some sembalance of integrity. They’ve long since given up any attempt to hide their bias.
December 19th, 2012 at 9:16 pm
Well, the Democrats DID win. And it wasn’t close. President Obama beat Mitt Romney by 126 electoral votes and 4 percentage points, twice the margin of GWB’s one victory. Furthermore the Democrats won in the Senate, and won decisively considering we were defending more than twice as many seats. The ONLY reason why you even have a seat at the table at all is through redistricting as House Democrats got a million more votes than House Republicans.
President Obama did campaign TWICE on raising the tax rates for people making over 250k. You managed to stop him after 2010 by holding unemployment benefits hostage. But now he’s won AGAIN on that.
I know Republicans hate democracy, hence the extended use of the filibuster, voter supression and the limiting of early voting. And now you’ve added Boehner’s threatening to use the full faith and credit as hostage to thwart the will of the people. I get that.
But your dislike of Democracy does not mean it does not exist. You get a seat at the table, you will win some things that Democrats do not want to give you. But it shouldn’t be- and it won’t be- a 50/50 split. If you want to get your way, start winning elections.
December 19th, 2012 at 10:21 pm
Seriously, sippy–you think having EVERYONE’S tax rates increase is a “win”?
Mmmmm…good KoolAid.
Oh, and use of the filibuster? Fuck you. Just fuck you. Your attitude is the reason why the Founding Fathers limited voting rights to landowners, for starters. No skin in the game, no ability to vote yourself freebies. Amazing how that worked.
December 19th, 2012 at 10:27 pm
Gaaaaaad Damit.
December 19th, 2012 at 10:29 pm
@7 Funny how Democrats just loooooove the filibuster when they are minority party..
December 20th, 2012 at 12:12 am
@9- No, actually we didn’t. No one has ever misused the filibuster to the extent the Republicans have. I know you love the “both sides” meme to justify your behavior.
No, Nhsparky, FUCK YOU. There’s 4 thousand kids that were Killed in Republican wars- the majority of which are NOT landowners that have “skin in the game”. There’s 20 children that are dead largely because of Republican policies towards guns and the insane, all of which left their “skin in the game”. I know you’re having a sad because the blacks and the hispanics and the queers have as much power in the voting booth as you do. Deal with it.
It is not just the people who pay income tax that have “skin in the game” you fucking moron. Everyone is effected by government policy and EVERYONE pays for bad government policy, Either they pay with money, as with the wealthy, or they pay with bad health care, bad education, bad environment and with their very lives as with the poor. The fact is that it has been the poor that has been “paying” far more than the rich for the horrible policies of Reagan on down.
The fact that you would deny them the ONE right that puts them on the same level as Buffet or Gates or Romney or Obama just shows what a wretched piece of shit you are.
December 20th, 2012 at 12:16 am
Oh, by the way, Nhsparky, the founders had a LOT of “freebies”. They were called slaves. Slaves which weren’t landowners and were not allowed to vote. So again, fuck you.
December 20th, 2012 at 12:32 am
@10 You are so biased that you can’t see the forest for the trees. Of course Dems filibustered a ton when they were in power from 60-08- 68 times. But because they represent YOUR views that is okay with you..And here is a little tidbit you should ponder.. mmkay
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-11/democrats-filibuster-plan-may-backfire.html
In 2005, when Republicans controlled the Senate, they threatened to push through a rule change to cut off Democratic filibusters of President George W. Bush’s judicial nominees. In retaliation, Democrats said they would block all Senate business and essentially shut down the chamber. The situation was defused when a so-called Gang of 14 — seven senators from each party — agreed to end filibusters of judicial nominees except in extraordinary circumstances.
When Republicans contemplated the nuclear option in 2005, a senior Democrat said it was “ultimately an example of the arrogance of power.” Those were the words of then-Senator Joe Biden. He was right then, and he’s right now.
December 20th, 2012 at 12:40 am
>>>I know Republicans hate democracy, hence the extended use of the filibuster
. If you want to get your way, start winning elections>>>
Oh yeah, you don’t want filibusters- then get 60 senators elected.. see how that works?
December 20th, 2012 at 1:43 am
“There’s 20 children that are dead largely because of Republican policies towards guns and the insane”. Damn, Sippy, we didn’t think you were so willfully stupid as to post lame shit like that.
Who sued to get the mentally ill released from involuntary committals? Why, that would have been the ACLU, hardly a bastion of Republicans.
Now, thanks to the
RepublicansACLU, the mentally deranged have a constitutional right to accost citizens on the street and shake them down for money. Not to mention, they can wander in the traffic lanes of city streets and panhandle for cash from people forced to stop for traffic lights.Nice job. By the by, you raging moron, how can the “poor” pay “far more” for anything, when they pay 2.25% of the total income tax burden?
ESAD, you incredibly dumb office drone. Go change the toner in the fucking copy machine.
December 20th, 2012 at 4:51 am
Insipid is consitutionally incapable of telling the truth. This is not news.
December 20th, 2012 at 2:45 pm
@Insipid – You should really try to make your point by using logic, instead of lacing your arguments with insults and profanity. You loose creditability to any point you make when you post here. I believe you can articulate your points in a little more mature manner.
…and to bring up the murder of 20 innocent children to enforce your political point is tasteless. The President tried it yesterday, and he was wrong, too.
That’s all.
December 20th, 2012 at 3:02 pm
Killed in Republican wars
Seem to recall a lot of Democrats voted in favor of them as well.
December 20th, 2012 at 3:09 pm
@11, apparently you do not understand the business of slavery. It isn’t free. There is no freebie about it. The slave market in the 18th and 19th century was big business. The slave trade and ships transported thousands of African natives from their tribal homelands to America, AFTER they were SOLD by neighboring tribes who wanted their land, to slave traders.
Slaves were property. They were a commodity. They were not free for the taking, they cost money to buy, money to train and money to hunt down if they ran away. They also cost money to feed, house and clothe. So I don’t know where in the hell you got the idea that slaves were freebies, but they were NOT freebies in any sense of the word.
Big mistake, you stupid ass. BIG, HUGE MISTAKE.
December 20th, 2012 at 3:49 pm
@11 – Without injecting an emotional response, carefully read how one founding father viewed slavery:
http://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/thomas-jefferson-and-slavery
While I don’t share the sentiment of his views, as posed in that article, that slaves were less than whites, runs contrary to “ALL MEN, CREATED EQUAL” and my own beliefs, but I believe Thomas Jefferson was on the right track when he abhored slavery – so much so that he predicted how it would influence a civil war in this nation’s history.
I have more if you want to read it, and not links from WIKIPEDIA either.
December 20th, 2012 at 9:56 pm
@18- Oh, so they paid for the labor they received? Cause last i checked, that was free labor? Well considering GOP’S union busting, it’s hatred for the minimum wage and workers rights, it seems like slavery is where you want to go back to.
December 20th, 2012 at 9:59 pm
I have no problem debating without vitriole. I do it all the time. But see post #7. I’ll give as good as i get.
December 20th, 2012 at 10:00 pm
By the way, i PREFER debating without vitriole. And i truly did spend a long time turning the other cheek. But that gets old after a while.
December 20th, 2012 at 10:12 pm
@22 – OK, I’ll give you that as I overlooked it, but I still believe we could ALL benefit from letting emotion get the best of us and rise above the behaviors of people. After all, I’ve seen some very candid and logical responses that can be attributed to maturity and temperment. As adults, I suspect we’d like to keep it that way.
December 20th, 2012 at 10:30 pm
@20 – So you don’t understand the difference between buying property, like a car or a slave, and paying for labor in the form of a wage of some kind?
Of course, what you’re doing is ignoring the viewpoint of slave traders and owners who simply viewed other human beings as nothing more than cattle, something to be used and then sold when no longer useful.
The analogy is your car, the vehicle that you pay money for and have serviced, which is not free. Fuel for your car is not free, nor are tires, brakes, and windshield washer fluid, or maintenance and repairs. Those all cost money.
Maintenance for a slave or a horse comes in the form of food, medical care, housing and clothing. Horse blankets are clothing, as are saddles and harnesses. Slaves and horses both cost money to purchase and maintain, and both may or may not produce offspring, which also cost money to maintain. Neither a slave nor a horse gets a monetary wage out of it. In regard to food, a horse used by a plantation owner got high-quality grains and hay as well as bedding.
A slave, on the other hand, got the ends and leavings of animals from slaughter. If you don’t know what chitlins are, the chitterlings or chitlins of pigs are the intestines. They only become edible if they are turned inside out, scrubbed with soap and water, and boiled until they are tender enough to eat. Want some? Moo and Oink sells them down on the south side of Chicago. I can give you their address and phone number.
If a plantation owner was financially well off, the slaves may or may not have been given better quality foods than pig intestines, perhaps hog jaws brined and roasted and turnip greens.
The American South built an economy based on labor by human beings bought and sold as if they were no more important than cattle. The cost of keeping a work force of slaves in an agrarian society like the 19th century Deep South involved everything from the price of a slave to the costs involved in maintenance, usage and upkeep, just as the auto industry is built on the price of automobiles and the costs incurred in maintenance, usage and upkeep.
Slavery was no more a source of free labor than your car is a source of free transportation.
Of course, when you’re unwilling to listen to anyone else’s viewpoint, none of this matters, does it.
December 20th, 2012 at 10:42 pm
Here are some references to the buying and selling of slaves in the South:
Sylvia Cannon, a freed slave, described slave auctions this way:
I see ‘em sell plenty colored peoples away in them days, ’cause that the way white folks made heap of their money. Course, they ain’t never tell us how much they sell ‘em for. Just stand ‘em up on a block about three feet high and a speculator bid ‘em off just like they was horses. Them what was bid off didn’t never say nothing neither. Don’t know who bought my brothers, George and Earl. I see ‘em sell some slaves twice before I was sold, and I see the slaves when they be traveling like hogs to Darlington. Some of them be women folks looking like they going to get down, they so heavy.
The slave auctioneers spoke of their business as though they were, in fact, buying and selling hogs. The callousness is clear in this July 10, 1856 letter from slave trader A.J. McElveen to Charleston slave merchant Z.B. Oakes:
I offered Richardson $1350 [equal to $27,000 in 1998] for his two negros. He Refused to take it. The fellow is Rather light. He weighs 121 lbs., but Good teeth & not whipped. The little Girl he was offrd $475 [$9,500, 1998]. I thought the boy worth about $850 [$17,000, 1998] and at that price they would not Sell for cost, but I Supposed the fellow would bring $900 to $950 [$18,000 to $19,000, 1998] &c and the little Girl $500 [$8,300] at best.
Edmund L. Drago’s book, Broke by the War: Letters of a Slave Trader, includes additional letters describing the nonchalance of those dealing in “the bodies and souls of men.” (University of South Carolina Press, 1991)
This only outlines the sale prices of slaves at the auctions, which were exactly like cattle auctions today. The slaves were divided into various categories for both men and women, and for families, just as steers are today broken up into various categories in the livestock market. Slaves were nothing more than a commodity.
If you still insist that this was all free, I can come up with a lot more stuff, but since you have the attitude that you are the only person in the universe that knows anything about everything, I doubt you’d listen or care.
December 20th, 2012 at 10:54 pm
Here are two references on the economics of slavery you can dig into when you get over being bored by it all:
Barzel, Yoram. “An Economic Analysis of Slavery.” Journal of Law and Economics 20 (1977): 87-110.
Conrad, Alfred H., and John R. Meyer. The Economics of Slavery and Other Studies. Chicago: Aldine, 1964.
December 20th, 2012 at 10:55 pm
I do believe there was a difference between indentured servitude and slavery, although it applied both ways.
Observation.
December 20th, 2012 at 11:12 pm
Yes. Indentured servants, from the 17th to the 19th centuries, were also known as bond servants, were frequently people who had committed minor crimes and were bonded or bound to work off the penalty instead of going to jail.
They were also people who immigrated to North America and agreed to work for someone in exchange for accomodation and passage. Breaking the contract was considered a crime and rewards were offered for the return of runaway bondservants.
And under Roman law, a citizen who was in debt could sell himself into slavery to pay off his financial debt and was bound by the terms of sale to work until the contract was paid. Roman slaves received wages from their owners and were able to use that money to buy back their freedom through a writ of manumission.
I can go on about this kind of thing forever.
December 21st, 2012 at 11:44 am
@24 ex-ph2- I’m not “ignoring the viewpoint of slave traders and owners who simply viewed other human beings as nothing more than cattle”, i’m rejecting that viewpoint as morally abhorant and intellectually vacuous. The fact that someone on a message board 147 years after the end of slavery can defend their views is a reflection of how morally bankrupt conservatism is.
To use your car analogy, if i steal a car and pay for gas and tires and for its upkeep that does not make the car mine. Nor am i entitled to sell the car. The person I sell the car to does not become the owner either. If i or a person i illegally sell the car to decides to use that car to open up a taxi service the owner of that car is entitled not only to his car back but for the money you received by illegally using his property. If I told a judge “But i paid for the oil changes!” he would laugh at me.
These were human beings (rememeber?) that were taken from Africa or their parents and forced to do labor. You do not gain possession of that human being simply because you’re paying to keep that human being alive. Or because you paid someone else for that human being, since he/she was never “theirs” to begin with. Just as you are not paying for their labor by paying to keep them alive. When you feed a slave a meal it is in order to GET the free labor, it is NOT paying for the labor. What “paid” for the labor is physical intimidation and the threat of being traded and sent away from what family they know.
If aliens from the planet Htous kidnapped you and forced you to work manufacturing Nottoc for 12 hours each day of hard labor would you consider the meager food they gave you as payment? Add to that the fact that the Htous felt they were entitled to give your children (not that the Htous consider them your children) to any other factory and to use your wife (not that the Htous recognize your marriage) for sexual pleasure. Would YOU feel as if the meals you were “given” and the clothes you were “given” is payment for your labor? Of course you wouldn’t.
The fact that owning slaves cost money is nowhere near the same as PAYING the slaves for their labor. Paying to keep someone alive is not paying them for their work. The fact that you lack the morality to see the difference is stunning.
December 21st, 2012 at 12:18 pm
“No one has ever misused the filibuster to the extent the Republicans have.”
I see Sippy the Pinhead finally recovered from his last bender.
Geez, Sippy, that statement a new level if hypocritical idiocy even for you. Did you know that of the 5 longest Senate filibusters in history, 3 were conducted by members of the Democratic party – and the other two individuals later left the Republican party, with one becoming a Democrat and the other founding the Progressive Party? And I’m pretty sure D’Amato’s 1992 15+ hour filibuster to kill a tax bill is #6 all-time.
No, obviously you didn’t.
http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/uscongress/tp/Five-Longest-Filibusters.htm
December 21st, 2012 at 12:32 pm
I was talking about the number of filibusters and blocks, not the length of an individual filibuster. While i don’t like the filibuster at all, I don’t mind it as much if it actually takes some effort to do it.
December 21st, 2012 at 12:37 pm
>>I was talking about the number of filibusters and blocks, not the length of an individual filibuster. While i don’t like the filibuster at all, I don’t mind it as much if it actually takes some effort to do it.
Yepper biased as hell. 2006-2008 Dems filibustered 68 times. And you can call the fact that they refuse to vote on many house votes, just plain obstructionist.
December 21st, 2012 at 12:43 pm
@31: I agree (wait; what did I just say?). It used to be that when you filibustered, you had to continue to talk, which is what it was meant for, but in this day and age, they don’t put that much effort into it. Our elected officials have gotten lazy.
December 21st, 2012 at 1:33 pm
Well, let’s look at that “Republican War Casualties” thesis of yours, Sippy.
Here’s a list of major US conflicts, along with which party held the Presidency at their beginning. American Revolution and Civil War are excluded; during the American Revolution neither party yet existed, and during the Civil War both parties supported the war (albeit with Democrats supporting both sides). Responsibility for military deaths is allocated to the party holding the Presidency at the beginning of US involvement in the conflict on the basis that the one beginning US involvement assumes responsibility for the deaths therein. (D) or (R) is used to denote the political party holding the Presidency.
War of 1812 (D) – approx 20,000
Mexican-American War (D) – 13,283
Spanish-American War (R) – 2,446
Philippine Insurrection (R) – 4,196
World War I, including operations in Northern Russia and Siberia (D) – 117,268, plus 3,350 still missing
World War II (D) – 405,399, plus 30,314 still missing
China Civil War (D) – 164
Vietnam (D) – 58,209 plus 1,679 still missing
Dominican Republic (D) – 47
Beirut Bombing (R) – 256
Grenada (R) – 19
Panama (R) – 40
Gulf War (R) – 258
War on Terror (Afghanistan and Iraq) (R) – 6,518
I don’t think you really want me to total up that “scorecard”, Sippy. It doesn’t look too good for your side if I do.
A few notes:
(1) these are military casualties. US civilian deaths in each conflict are excluded.
(2) don’t even try that “I was only talking about Iraq” BS. If so, let’s compare Iraq to the Mexican War – when a Democratic POTUS, Polk, went to war for no other reason than as an excuse to beat the hell out of Mexico and take their land. (See, I could gloss over facts and oversimplify too – if I wanted to be dishonest as hell.)
(3) don’t even try that “Vietnam started under Eisenhower”. US involvement in the Vietnam conflict dates to our support for the French, which started in the Truman administration.
(4) don’t even try to exclude World Wars 1 and 2. We were attacked on 9/11 just like we were at Pearl Harbor; if the latter is justification for World War II, the former is justification for Afghanistan. And if you want to claim either Iraq War was “unjustified”, I’ll simply point out that the US was hardly truly neutral before we declared war on Germany in 1917.
My point: neither party has the “moral high ground” when it comes to war. Both parties have gotten the US involved when it was clearly morally correct to do so, and both have done so under arguably specious pretenses. And if anything, it appears that the Democratic party has more to answer for if you total up that meaningless “scorecard”.
December 21st, 2012 at 2:00 pm
‘The fact that someone on a message board 147 years after the end of slavery can defend their views is a reflection of how morally bankrupt conservatism is.’
Just how dimwitted are you, Insipid?
Where in all the seven hells do you find ANYTHING — ANYTHING AT ALL — that says or even remotely indicates that I was defending slavery or any of the crap that went with it?
WHERE, DO YOU FIND IT, YOU HARPY SLAG HEAP? NAME THE PLACE. NAME THE SENTENCE.
Just how much imbecility do you intend to sputter and how incredibly bad is your tunnel vision?
I provided more than enough backup to support my viewpoint, based on factual evidence NOT derived from Wikipedi, but from historical references, and you can’t even provide a good rebuttal.
So get this into that dormant organ you have for a brain: the military, in 1967, when I enliste as an E-1 recruit, provided food, clothing, shelter, medical and dental care. This was not free, this part of the compensation package.
The equivalent in civilian costs was as follows:
$150 per month for groceries for one person
$100 per month in dental care – there was no dental insurance then
$110 per month for housing in the form of a mortgage
$150 per month for medical care in an insurance policy, not counting deductible
None of it was free. It was part of the compensation package if you lived on base. So yes, food, clothing, shelter, medical care for a slave is considered payment. It’s not free.
What part of that math do you not get, you slackwitted lackbrain?
If it costs money to the slave owner, it’s not free labor. It never has been and never will be.
If you think for even one tiny second that I was defending slavery, you are so desperately stupid you don’t even know you’re alive.
December 21st, 2012 at 2:16 pm
Quit wasting your time, Ex-PH2. All Sippy had to do was see the word “slavery” and he jumped to the conclusion you’re a racist trying to defend the practice. All anyone has to do is use a word that someone, somewhere, sometime has used in a racist manner in the past and Sippy assumes they’re racists. He doesn’t bother to analyze context to see if that’s the intended usage.
He looks for racists behind every tree. And he finds them – whether they’re really there or not.
Sippy’s mind is limited to a small set of ideas. He believes “the man” does nothing but “screw over people of color”, that whites are all racists at heart, and that he’s so superior for realizing that. He believes “government is good, and more government is better.” He believes the free market cannot be trusted, and that government can do everything more efficiently. He claims he’s “protecting democracy” but instead advocates cradle-to-grave socialism – apparently without even realizing it. He dismisses opposing arguments without evaluating them or countering them with logical argument.
In fact, he’s nothing but a closed-minded fool.
But Sippy’s convinced he’s infallible and omniscient and can never be wrong. I guess that’s why we’ve seen so many examples of him failing to get basic facts right, do even rudimentary research, cite his sources, or even bother read other people’s comments accurately (or at all, sometimes). Doing any of that is beneath you when you’re omniscient.
It’s fun to pick Sippy’s arguments apart and prove him an ass. But don’t ever expect Sippy to admit he’s wrong, ore even for him to realize you’ve proven him a fool. That ain’t gonna happen.
December 21st, 2012 at 2:29 pm
Hondo, I know. But Sippy, in #11 above, brought it up:
‘Oh, by the way, Nhsparky, the founders had a LOT of “freebies”. They were called slaves. Slaves which weren’t landowners and were not allowed to vote. So again, fuck you.’
In reviewing the information I provided, which included a reference to Roman society, I don’t think I left out anything other than a reference to a debate between two historians over whether or not slavery in the 19th century American South made farming profitable.
However, I think I may have touched an Inspidish nerve ending, because nowhere did I EVER defend slavery.
And you’re right — it is fun to prove that balloon sniffer to be as narrow-minded as possible. It unleashes my vocabulary when I do so.
December 21st, 2012 at 2:31 pm
Ex-PH2: I think you misspoke. Didn’t you mean “tailpipe sniffer” in your last sentence in comment 37? (smile)
December 21st, 2012 at 2:36 pm
Oh, no, Hondo. I did indeed mean balloon sniffer. Helium, hydrogen.
I’m also thinking that since nitrous oxide at the dentist’s office makes people dizzy and unconscious, I could find a way to use that, too.
Part of the creative writing process, you.
December 21st, 2012 at 2:50 pm
Ex-PH2: car exhaust contains various nitrous oxides, can make people dizzy, and can cause unconsciousness, too. And that comes from automobile tailpipes. (smile)
December 21st, 2012 at 3:11 pm
Durn proofreading! That should be ‘you know.’
Hondo, you got me on that. Now I need to come up with another dizzy-maker.
I have it! The skate spinner, for those who can’t get the one-footed spin.
December 22nd, 2012 at 2:04 am
Here’s the U.S. Senate website that shows the number of cloture motions. Yes, you are accurate when you say there were 68 cloture motions in 2005 and 2006, however there were more than twice as many in 2007-2008 (139) and again close to twice as many in 2009-2010 (137) and in 2010-2012 there is a slight decrease of 115 thus far. So Republican obstructionism is proveably unprecedented:
http://www.senate.gov/pagelayout/reference/cloture_motions/clotureCounts.htm
By the way, i think the Democrats were wrong too. I dislike the filibuster as undemocratic. I think the people have a right to know what they voted for, not to know what it is the minority will let them have. But that being said, this “both sides are the same nonsense is demonstratably bullshit.
@34- Hondo- Oh my god that is about the stupidest piece of reasoning i’ve ever seen on a message board. Really? The war of 1812? Also, we don’t count the South as a “side” in the civil war because the confederacy was never a legitimate government and Jefferson Davis was never a legitimate president. Of course the main reason why you left out the Civil war is because it destroys your stupid as hell thesis. Just as you’re leaving out the fact that quite a number of soldiers died in Vietnam under Nixon. You probably would have left out the number of soldiers that died under Eisenhower in the Korean war, but you didn’t even list it. By the way, i approve of the civil war so i wouldn’t count it against Abe, just as i don’t count WWII against FDR.
Also, i’d be against WWII if FDR had responded to the attack on Pearl Harbor by attacking Spain. Also, i think it more than a stretch to acquaint giving money to the French as akin to sending in forces.
Either way, no President in history has lied to the extent that Bush has lied to get us into that war. Even the Gulf of Tonkin- as blown out of proportion as it was- was based on a real event. There’s no evidence that Sadam Hussein had anything to do with 911 and there’s no evidence that he ever had weapons of mass destruction. So to say that Iraq was not unique is bullshit.
But either way, this is still your childish method of defending upnorth and his call to take away peoples voting rights by focusing on a small portion of what i said. You don’t want to defend the indefensible.
December 22nd, 2012 at 2:36 am
Every time I see Sippy post something this is what I feel like…
http://worldofwonder.net/2011/03/11/a84bcc9d.gif
December 22nd, 2012 at 2:37 am
35- You most certainly are justifying slavery, there’s very little difference between you assinine arguments than the arguments that Slaves are happy and well fed made by the South at the time.
The fact that you can use your 1967 COMPENSATION PACKAGE as a comparison for slavery shows how intellectually bankrupt you are. My guess is that if ALL you received was food, clothing and shelter you would not have considered youself. But let’s leave that asside. When you signed you name on the line in ’67 it was with the full understanding that you would do X and receive Y for it. There was no such understanding between slave and master. The “understanding” there is you do X and if you don’t I’ll whip you. The fact that they it cost them money to extort that labor out of them does NOT mean that they paid for the labor.
I have actually met a Holocaust survivor. And though he’s not alive right now, i’m pretty sure that if you told him he was compensated for his labor with potato soap, clothes and shelter (such as it was) he’d call you what you are: a schmuck.
December 22nd, 2012 at 3:07 am
@36- Hondo- Blah blah totally kicked the liberals ass blah blah.
Again let’s review the reality:
I said the SC would uphold the mandate as a tax, you said they wouldn’t while calling me a fool the entire time. Afterwards you demonstrated your complete lack of knowledge of the law when you didn’t understand how something can be a tax under one statute but not another.
You called SS a “Ponzi scheme” that would be illegal if tried in the private market and i used YOUR definition of Ponzi scheme to demonstrate how mightily full of shit you are. Since Ponzi schemes include fraud and you could not even prove ONE element of fraud, let alone all 4.
I give proof from the federalist papers that the founders thought of the militia in the second as a military body and your argument was basically that Hamilton doesn’t count as a founder.
That and the fact that you wimped out when you refused to explain why you weren’t mad at Romney when he adopted the same foreign policy you condemned President obama for having.
Yeah, i’ve really been suffering under the weight of your profound overwhelming intellect, Hondo.*
*- Sarcasm, since you probably can’t tell.
December 22nd, 2012 at 7:52 am
So much idiocy, so little time . . . .
Sippy, Sippy, Sippy – you were gone for a while, then you came back. I think you really need some more detox time at the Betty Ford Clinic.
Your comment 42 boils down to the following: “Oh shit – I was talking out of my ass again without factual basis, and got caught. Time to change the subject, spout some non sequitur ingorance, make an ad hominem attack, and Blame Bush!” You’re also being hypocritical. How many of the troops killed in Afghanistan have died since 20 January 2009, Sippy-poo? And to whom did I allocate responsibility for those deaths?
You’re also manifestly ignorant about Presidential lies relating to war, too. Iraq the “worst” example of such “lies”? Give me a freaking break.
First, decisions based on what turns out later to have been bad intel aren’t “lies” – they’re errors. Lies involve knowing deception.
Second, how about you research the history of LBJ and how he got the US involved in Vietnam, circa 1964-65, and get back to us. You won’t do either, of course. Why? Because you don’t have either the intellect to conduct the research credibly or the guts to admit you’re wrong.
I omitted the Civil War because, well, it was a civil war and both parties supported it, so I chose not to allocate responsibility. Hell, you want me to attribute it to one party? Fine. Put a (D) behind the Civil War regarding allocation of responsibility – since it was the Southern Democrats who started the Civil War by (a) seceding and (b) began hostilities by shelling Fort Sumpter. Add the 600,000+ dead from the Civil War to the Democratic blameline. That puts the (D) responsibility well over a million US dead.
Sheesh, are you REALLY that freaking ignorant of American history? Do they let you walk around without supervision often?
You were consistent in your previous history of closed-minded idiocy in comment 44. As soon as I saw the word “slave” in comments above, my first thought was “One or more of our resident lib trolls will stop reading as soon as they see the word ‘slave’ and take that as a defense of slavery vice a discussion of economics.” As predicted, that’s exactly what happened – your brain checked out at that point, you quit reading, and you went into raging libidiot attack mode, understanding of argument or truth be damned.
Let me put this for you as simply as I can, speaking for the group here: OWNING SLAVES WRONG. NO ONE HERE WANT TO OWN SLAVES. NO ONE HERE THINK OWNING SLAVES RIGHT. NO ONE HERE WANT SEE OWNING SLAVES COME BACK. OWNING SLAVES EVIL AND WRONG. There – is that explanation freaking simple enough for you to understand it, fool?
Further: I will also remind you that it was the Democratic party that began the Civil War precisely in order to preserve the institution of slavery – doing so about 5 weeks after an “evil Republican and abolitionist” had taken office as POTUS. What’s next – are you going to start defending “State’s Rights” like your Democratic political ancestors once did? After all, they were Democrats vice being “nasty Repugs” (to use your term).
As for your entire comment 46: yeah, turns out you called that single case correctly. Freaking good for you; a stopped clock is right twice daily, too. Roberts was apparently off his meds that day and had a brain fart, checking logic and common sense at the door while writing his opinion. And before you crow any more, I have two words for you: Dred Scott. Or maybe 3 words: Buck v. Bell. Look them up; I’d guess your probably ignorant enough of US history to need to do so.
The SCOTUS can indeed blow it out it’s ass on occasion and get things 100% wrong.
Regarding Social Security: Prove me wrong? You did no such thing, jackass; quit lying about this point. What I actually said was that if implemented by a private entity as a retirement plan (e.g., as an investment scheme), Social Security would indeed be unlawful. What part of “it’s only legal because Congress passed a law making it legal for the government to do that” is impossible for you to understand?
Social Security is legal for the same the reason that the government can incarcerate criminals and/or execute them after conviction. The government can do those things because the law explicitly authorizes the government to do so. Absent such explicit authority, they’d unlawful detention or murder, respectively – as they generally are if the same thing is done by private citizens or firms.
I’ve already addressed your cherry-picking from Hamilton in the Federalist papers elsewhere. To summarize here: Hamilton was thought an extreme monarchist and big-government extremist by most of the other Founding Fathers. The Constitution doesn’t include many of Hamilton’s ideas – such as Hamilton’s proposal for the offices of POTUS and US Senator to be for life, for example.
Further: the paper you cite doesn’t exactly say what you claim it does either, dipstick. That particular paper’s thrust is merely that a militia is necessary and that Congress should have a say in the militia’s organization and training. Once again, your inadequate ability to comprehend written English shines through. Moreover, the Constitution explicitly addresses exactly those points in Article I, Section 8; it gives the Federal government the power to call the militia into Federal service and establish standards for the militia’s training and organization.
Finally, regarding Romney: moot point now. But for the record, please point out where Romney has advocated abandoning US allies, a weak and supine posture abroad, and sucking-up to Islamic terrorists or otherwise supporting known US enemies. I can’t think of any. Those are the foreign policy issues for which I have taken issue the Obama administration.
And if you’re talking about Romney and getting US forces out of Afghanistan – we’ll never know how that will have turned out in practice. Candidates say many things they come to realize aren’t a good idea after they’re elected. Wanna talk about closing Guantanamo Bay?
I really shouldn’t waste my time detailing the shortcomings of your arguments or your hypocrisy; they’re damned obvious to everyone but you. But doing so is fun, so when/as I have time I guess I’ll continue to do so.
“Sippy the Pinhead”. Yeah, that’s about right.
December 22nd, 2012 at 9:14 am
@46 – Must say I’m more than pleased to see that, as usual, instead of answering a direct question, to wit: ‘Where in all the seven hells do you find ANYTHING — ANYTHING AT ALL — that says or even remotely indicates that I was defending slavery or any of the crap that went with it?’ — Shittbrains not only does not answer the question, but also supplies nothing more than an angry retort for being proved wrong.
I could quote Stephen Hartnett’s paper on the comparison between labor in modern-day prisons and post-Civil War prison labor in th 19th century as another rebuttal, but that would require that Skippy actually go to the trouble of reading it. I could also include the dispute between Thomas DiLorenzo and Gerald Gunderson in regard to the perceived profitability of slavery, but that would actually require reading.
However, I will include one quote from DiLorenzo: ‘I basically concur with Jeffrey Hummel’s analysis in his book, Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men, that antebellum slavery was propped up by such laws as the federal government’s Fugitive Slave Act (which Abraham Lincoln strongly supported) and that the abolition of that law would have greatly reduced the profitability of slavery and quickened its demise.’
The entire purpose of the Civil War had less to do with eliminating an abominable system of labor than it did with destroying the economy of the American South.
In one of his letters, Lincoln wrote: “”I am not now, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social or political equality of the white and black races. I am not now nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor of intermarriages with white people. There is a physical difference between the white and the black races which will forever forbid the two races living together on social or political equality. There must be a position of superior and inferior, and I am in favor of assigning the superior position to the white man.”
It’s not, Hondo, that I am silly enough to expect that our local lackwit Sippy the Brainless Wonder will actually take the time to read anything. It’s the consistency of Sippy the Simple-Minded when, instead of giving a direct answer to a direct question, he/she/it blows it off in his always ineffective way with an angry retort and an accompanying curse.
But then, you know how it is when you’re bitchy little ghey boy and you really hate women the way Sippy the Slurpee does.
December 22nd, 2012 at 9:21 am
This is a requote of Sippy’s comment in #11 above, which he refuses to even acknowledge:
‘Oh, by the way, Nhsparky, the founders had a LOT of “freebies”. They were called slaves. Slaves which weren’t landowners and were not allowed to vote. So again, fuck you.’
Can’t even admit that HE brought it up first, WAY ahead of anything I said. All that anger, all that hatred from such a teensy-weensy little brain over being outed about something he said. What a waste of brain cells he is.
December 22nd, 2012 at 9:46 am
@21- “By the way, i PREFER debating without vitriole. And i truly did spend a long time turning the other cheek. But that gets old after a while.”
I call bullshit. If I’m not mistaken, you initially came here somewhere around one of the earlier “repeal of DADT” debates we had. Every one of your posts was a variation of, “suck it cons! Change is coming! You lost the election, now deal with it! Stop hating gay people!”. Even though there was a rational discourse going on, and even though many of us seemingly shared your opinion of DADT, you repeatedly and vociferously attempted to make the conversation about how much everyone on the right hated homosexuals.
You even defended the left’s not-very-transparent tactic of using the military forces as political leverage against the states without gay marriage laws. It was a shitty, dishonest tactic, and you defended it with an offensiveness I had never seen before in conversation- after initially denying that was the true intent of the DADT repeal, of course.
I, personally, have treated you like the asshole you are ever since then, because you’ve proven, time and again, that you’re a big “ends justify the means” guy. Even when I share your opinion, like on DADT, I can’t abide by a sniveling wanna-be dictator, condescendingly telling people what they should be thinking. But only after you, yourself, are told what to think by your “progressive” handlers. You prove me correct with every sneering, pontificating post you make.
Funny, how any one of Cole’s troll buddies’, with two notable exceptions, could be substituted for any one of your posts. Same tone, same language and same emotional bullshit.
Just more “free thinkers” from the same herd, I guess.
December 22nd, 2012 at 9:56 am
Either way, no President in history has lied to the extent that Bush has lied to get us into that war. Even the Gulf of Tonkin- as blown out of proportion as it was- was based on a real event.
Wilson, FDR, LBJ. Do a little research on the years 1916, 1940, and 1964, then get back to us, mkay?
Not even close. Not even the same ballpark. Not even the same fucking sport.
And if the FF wanted “freebies”, they would have written it into the Constitution, wouldn’t they? I’m looking at Article I, Section 8 now, and I don’t see shit about transferring wealth from any group to any other group for whatever reason, etc.
So take your “we won” bullshit and jam it up your ass, because that “free” shit you think you’re getting is going to be just that–SHIT. And when Unca Barruh can’t keep the printing presses over at Treasury going any more because even the Chinese have had enough and can’t buy any more of our worthless bonds, then, in the words of Doc Brown, “You’re gonna see some serious shit.”
December 22nd, 2012 at 10:24 am
Sparky, all that ‘free shit’ costs money. It comes from taxpayers who pay taxes to federal and state tax collectors.
If you want to know how much your share of taxes is, look at your tax return. There IS NO free shit, never has been, not even going back to the days of the Pharoahs. They had tax collectors, too.
December 22nd, 2012 at 12:36 pm
@46- Hondo- Iraq was not simply bad intelligence (funny, how so many of you clutched your pearls when Rice “threw the intelligence community under the bus). It was either cherry-picked intelligence or outright lies. There was plenty of good intelligence out there, it just handily never made its way to Congress.
I will actually agree with you that the South was more to blame for the war than the North (ex-ph2 would disagree with both of us, but you won’t go after him. Why is it incumbent upon me to castigate every liberal i disagree with, but you never have anything to say against your own?). However, the criteria you were using for ALL the other wars was who was President when the war started. You changed criteria for the civil war because that blows you “more deaths under Democrats” hypothesis to smithereens. It’s cherry picking.
Lincoln, actually is my favorite President and I certainly don’t blame him for the war. Just as I don’t blame FDR for WWII. A war is good or bad depending on the circumstances surrounding it, not based on whether or not the President at the time has a D after his name.
I will say that I was wrong to use the phrase “Republican wars” I should of said George Bush’s Iraq war. I forgot your genius in ignoring the main point and focusing on the minutia, my bad. My main point was that the poor do have “skin in the game”. That everyone should have the right to vote regardless of whether they own property because everyone is effected by policy. Your clearly ignoring my main point because, i think, you agree with it. So since you’d rather fight a liberal then one of your own, you ignored the main point and argued the minutia.
The SCOTUS decision on the PPACA was completely consistent with common law, the Heller decision overturned law since Miller. The “off their meds” decision was for Heller. For the PPACA decision, if anything, i’d say he was “off his meds” in the places where he agreed with the minority. Clearly the PPACA falls under the commerce clause and clearly the PPACA is allowable under the general welfare clause. In fact i disagree with Kagan as to the Medicaid expansion (though she might of given that to Roberts as a horse trade).
As far SS your statement that it was illegal was specefic: that it was a ponzi scheme. You then proceeded to give me the legal definition of Ponzi scheme. I then pointed out that it didn’t meet the definition as there is no fraud involved. I then gave you ALL the elements of fraud and asked you to prove them. You couldn’t even prove one element, let alone the requisite all 4. So you lost.
You can’t just declare that something is illegal, you have to state what crime has been committed and then you have to demonstrate how the case at hand meets the elements of that crime.
No one said that slavery is good. But someeone did say that slaves were compensated for their labor. My argument is that they weren’t. Simply feeding and clothing someone who does work for you is not the same as paying them for the work they do, unless of course there’s an agreement on the part of the employee that this is what they will work for. They were paying to keep them alive, not to compensate them. The way they got them to work was through intimidation and force, not through giving them food.
Also, you’ll see below that ex-ph2 is giving the standard Southern defense of their actions in the war. That the Civil War had nothing to do with slavery and that they only wanted to, for whatever reason, break the economic back of the south, blah, blah. He of course also gave the cherry picked Lincoln quote ignoring 1. that if he were a full-bore abolitionist he’d of never been elected and 2. the hundreds of anti-slavery lincoln quotes. While Lincoln did not believe in the equality of the races, he certainly was against slavery, and THAT’S what the war was about.
Your summarization of what Hamilton’s Federalist paper says is exactly what i think it says. Clearly Hamilton envisioned the Militia as a military body, capable of being regulated and trained by the feds during time of emergency. Which is what the drafters of the Second Amendment had in mind.
In the third debate, Romney pretty much endorsed Obama’s entire foreign policy, including a stated date of withdrawal from Afghanistan. I’ll ask the same question you asked of me in reverse please state where Obama “has advocated abandoning US allies, a weak and supine posture abroad, and sucking-up to Islamic terrorists or otherwise supporting known US enemies”.
The reason why Guantanamo isn’t closed is because of Congress, not President Obama (i get into this same argument with Obama haters on the left). President Obama has maintained a consistent position on this, he just can’t get Congress to fund it. Such progressive “champions” as Russ Feingold refused to fund the transfer. But if you can find any evidence where Obama has changed his mind on it, please cite it.
December 22nd, 2012 at 12:42 pm
@49 – Teddy- Either you’re getting me confused with another liberal (a not uncommon and even understandable occurrence considering there are so few on this board) or someone pilfered my name. I never had an extensive conversation with anyone regarding DADT on this board. In fact, most of the posts I’ve seen on this board regarding DADT is to state just what a complete asshole Lt. Dan Choi is. A position i agree with wholeheartedly.
December 22nd, 2012 at 12:43 pm
“(S)ucking-up to Islamic terrorists or otherwise supporting known US enemies”. Does the phrase “Muslim Brotherhood” mean anything to you? Probably not, you are one of the denser ones to post anywhere. Libya? Syria?
Close Gitmo? How about an executive order? He’s down with those on a myriad of other things, if he wanted Gitmo closed, all he has to do is sign the order. He just doesn’t have the balls to do it, it might reflect badly in a poll somewhere.
December 22nd, 2012 at 12:48 pm
@54- President Obama did sign an executive order closing Guantanamo his very first day in office. Congress has refused to fund the transfer:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28788175/ns/politics-white_house/t/obama-orders-cia-prisons-guantanamo-shut/
December 22nd, 2012 at 1:02 pm
And why would they, dear boy? BTW–that was a DEMOCRAT-controlled Congress which refused to fund the move for the first two years.
Wouldn’t have anything to do with bringing them, uh, HERE, would it?
December 22nd, 2012 at 1:20 pm
They would because Gitmo has been a rallying point for terrorists since it’s opened. I disagreed with Congress on that one. I have a far easier time pointing out when Democrats are wrong then most of you do.
But that’s all besides the point. The point Upnorth made was that President Obama didn’t have the “balls” to sign the order. Clearly he did.
December 22nd, 2012 at 1:55 pm
Anything can be a rallying point for anyone. Anyone who has spent any amount of time in the Middle East knows that there is the truth, then there is what people believe. You wouldn’t believe the fantastic stories cooked up over there, even back in 2008 when I was studying at the University of Jordan.
The Arab public believes what they want, irrespective of facts. The terrorist population is no better.
December 22nd, 2012 at 2:16 pm
Sparky, I’m curious about something. Maybe you can enlighten me.
What, if anything, is there in what I posted above that says I supported the South’s position in the War Between the States, or remotely implies that I’m a liberal, when neither is true of me or of what I said?
Or is this confusion on Sippy the Simpleminded’s part based on his confusion about who I am?
I felt that I was being quite clear, certainly did not take or support one side or another, and used historical references instead of Wiki. Or is this apparent ‘confusion’ not actually ‘confusion’, but rather a stubborn refusal to acknowledge anyone else’s supporting references?
Could it be as simple as Sippy is a spoiled bitchy ghey boy and a sore loser?
December 22nd, 2012 at 3:41 pm
First off, can you please point to where i used wiki as a referance anywhere? You did not take the South side directly but you echoed the Southern apologists talking points:
1. That the slaves were compensated for their labor by being given food and shelter.
2. That the Civil War had little to do with slavery.
3. That the war had more to do with crushing the Southern economy than slavery.
4. You took a single quote, out of historical context to try and paint a picture of Lincoln not caring about slavery, when he most assuredly did. You also failed to mention that while Lincoln supported the fugitive slave act, he was also against ANY expansion of slavery. That was what had the South was rebelling against.
December 22nd, 2012 at 5:40 pm
@60 – In your opinion, what was the catalyst for the Civil War?
I kinda know what you’re going to say, but I’m curious anyway.
December 22nd, 2012 at 9:34 pm
Well, the specific catalyst was the election of Abraham Lincoln. I’d say the biggest determinative event was John Brown at Harper’s Ferry. But obviously that’s a pretty broad question which whole books have been written about. However the effort to mitigate slavery as a cause is revisionist history at its most virulent.
December 23rd, 2012 at 10:51 am
Sippy: are you saying the posts from this thread using your screen name aren’t you?
http://thisainthell.us/blog/?p=27209
I think this is the discussion that teddy996 was referencing.
December 23rd, 2012 at 11:03 am
Sippy: I’ll agree with you here on one point. IMO Ex-PH2′s confusing underlying war aims and war strategies in her argument above. From the Confederate perspective, the Civil War’s aim was indeed about preserving slavery; from the Union perspective, the war aim was preserving the Union. Only relatively late in the war did the Union side’s war aims expand to include ending slavery.
But otherwise, you’re pretty much out to lunch – as always.
Preserving slavery is precisely why the Confederate states, under Democratic leaders, seceded and started the Civil War in the first place. From their perspective, an “evil abolitionist Republican” had just been elected POTUS. They could not abide that, and decided to secede.
However, slavery was not why the Union went to war. The Union’s war objective was to preserve the Union. The Northern grand strategy of preserving the Union resulted in the North adopting a grand strategy of first blockade, then later general economic destruction against the Confederacy. Destroy the Confederate economy, and the Confederate forces in the field can no longer be supported to fight – and the Confederate states in rebellion can then be occupied and later re-admitted into the Union.
However, Lincoln’s primary concern was never abolishing slavery; that for him was a secondary concern, and only manifested relatively late in the war. Lincoln’s primary aim was always preserving the Union. See this quote:
“I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be ‘the Union as it was.’ If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. 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. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. 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. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.”
Lincoln, letter to Horace Greeley, August 22, 1862
Also see the Emancipation Proclamation – which freed slaves only in states currently in rebellion against the Federal government. This was a calculated move on Lincoln’s part, intended to cause the Confederacy difficulty both at home and diplomatically in Europe. It worked. However, note that the Emancipation Proclamation did not apply to slave states that remained in the Union. Slavery remained legal in Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri until slavery was outlawed in each of these locations by either changes in state law or the 13th Amendment.
In short: the South fought the Civil War to preserve slavery, and lost. The North fought the Civil War to preserve the Union, and won. The abolition of slavery was a fortunate, but secondary, outcome. And the Union strategy of blockade and destruction of the Confederate economy was never the primary Union purpose per se. That strategy was adopted in order to destroy the ability of the South to sustain its armies in the field.
December 23rd, 2012 at 11:25 am
Many people make the erroneous leap that Lincoln’s opposition to slavery equated to a desire on his part to see enslaved blacks legally placed on equal footing with whites. Lincoln did not view equality among races as possible, for reasons that had nothing to do with politics or the predominant views of the day.
December 23rd, 2012 at 11:46 am
Hondo, the economics of the Civil War have less interest to most historians than the political aspects, however, there was an aspect to it that largely goes unnoticed, as per this article:
” In the seven states where most of the cotton was grown, almost one-half the population were slaves, and they accounted for 31 percent of white people’s income; for all 11 Confederate States, slaves represented 38 percent of the population and contributed 23 percent of whites’ income. Small wonder that Southerners — even those who did not own slaves — viewed any attempt by the federal government to limit the rights of slaveowners over their property as a potentially catastrophic threat to their entire economic system. By itself, the South’s economic investment in slavery could easily explain the willingness of Southerners to risk war when faced with what they viewed as a serious threat to their “peculiar institution” after the electoral victories of the Republican Party and President Abraham Lincoln the fall of 1860.”
“An economic case for the North is more problematic. Most writers argue that the decision for war on Lincoln’s part was not based primarily on economic grounds. However, Gerald Gunderson points out that if, as many historians argue, Northern Republicans were intent on controlling the spread of slavery, then a war to keep the South in the Union might have made sense. Gunderson compares the “costs” of the war (which we discuss below) with the cost of “compensated” emancipation and notes that the two are roughly the same order of magnitude — 2.5 to 3.7 billion dollars (1974: 940-42). Thus, going to war made as much “economic sense” as buying out the slaveholders. Gunderson makes the further point, which has been echoed by other writers, that the only way that the North could ensure that their program to contain slavery could be “enforced” would be if the South were kept in the Union. Allowing the South to leave the Union would mean that the North could no longer control the expansion of slavery anywhere in the Western Hemisphere (Ransom 1989; Ransom and Sutch 2001; Weingast 1998; Weingast 1995; Wolfson 1995). What is novel about these interpretations of the war is that they argue it was economic pressures of “modernization” in the North that made Northern policy towards secession in 1861 far more aggressive than the traditional story of a North forced into military action by the South’s attack on Fort Sumter.”
Source is Ecnomics of the Civil War.
http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/ransom.civil.war.us
There is too much material to justify taking up the amount of room it requires to post the entire reference, so I have posted the link. Gunderson’s tables are included in that reference, as well as plenty of references to other published resource materials.
In Gunderson’s view, the intent by the North may have appeared to be political, which is the common view of most historians, but his thesis is grounded in the destruction of any economy by warfare, including internecine strife, which we can now see going on in Syria in a modern-day comparison.
December 23rd, 2012 at 12:12 pm
This reference is from “Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant”, copyright 1885 edition, which belonged to my great-grandfather:
“Up to the Mexican war there were a few out and out abolitionists, men who carried their hostility to slavery into all elections, from those for a Justice of the Peace up to the Presidency of the United States. They were noisy but not numerous. But the great majority of people at the North, where slavery did not exist, were opposed to the institution and looked upon its existence as unfortunate. They did not hold the States where slavery existed responsible for it; and believed that protection should be given to the right of property in slaves until some satisfactory way could be reached to be rid of the institution. Opposition to slavery was not a creed of either political party. In some sections more anti-slavery men belonged to the Democratic party, and in others to the Whigs. But with the inauguration of the Mexican War, in fact with the annexation of Texas, “the inevitable conflict” commenced.
“As the time for the Presidential election of 1856 — the first at which I had the opportunity of voting — approached, party feeling began to run high. The Republican party was regarded in the South and the border States not only as opposed to the extension of slavery, but as favoring the compulsory abolition of the institution without compensation to the owners. The most horrible visions seemed to present themselves to people who, one would suppose, ought to have known better. Many educated and, otherwise, sensible person appeared to believe that emancipation meant social equality.” — Chapter XVI
President Grant goes on to say that the election of a Republican President meant the inevitable secession of all the Slave States, and he preferred a candidate whose election would prevent or delay secession, and voted for Buchanan in the 1856 election.
December 23rd, 2012 at 12:48 pm
Ex-PH2: we’ll have to agree to disagree here, Ex-PH2. I reject the thesis that destroying the South’s economy was the primary Union rationale for the Civil War, though in some areas essentially that resulted. Lincoln was fighting to preserve the Union – plain and simple. Fighting a war for the express purpose of destroying something you’re trying to keep doesn’t exactly make much sense.
In a protracted war – like the Civil War, World War I, or World War II – economic collapse of one of the belligerent parties often is a major factor in ending the conflict. That’s why both sides in World Wars I and II often practiced economic warfare – e.g., the German u-boat campaigns in both wars, the British (and later US) blockade in World War I, and the Allied strategic bombing campaigns in World War II. Some of these campaigns worked well; others didn’t.
Union efforts to degrade or destroy the Confederate economy during the Civil War fit into this pattern quite well. They were part of the overall Union grand strategy, not a war aim in and of themselves. The Union war aim supported by this strategy was the defeat of the Confederate armed forces, thus allowing reoccupation of the Confederate states and their eventual readmission into the Union.
December 23rd, 2012 at 1:08 pm
OK, I’ll concede your point, but tell me which tactic is more effective in the long run, and I’m bringing it into the modern world in this: the economic embargo against Iran, or making all-out war on Iran?
One will produce results more quickly and also cause ecnomic destabilization and devastation. The other, which is basically a siege, costs less in materials and lives.
They both work, but which one is more effective?
I think the North did run an embargo, using the Navy to form a blockade of trading ships off Confederate shores.
December 23rd, 2012 at 1:09 pm
That should be ‘economic’.
December 23rd, 2012 at 1:28 pm
Embargos placed on other countries rarely work. Iran still manages to get materials for their nuclear ambitions. Hamas was still able to get rockets through to fire into Israel. Embargos work in conjunction with military operations like in the Civil war. Blockades make smugglers rich for getting the goods into the country. There’s no shortage of people ready to take to risk.
December 23rd, 2012 at 1:30 pm
Ex-PH2: both have their place. Economic efforts alone don’t work very well. Fighting a military war without engaging economic targets works best against third-world nations without a significant industrial infrastructure. Against an enemy having both, engaging both is the best way to ensure the shortest possible war. And even then, a determined enemy may stretch things out for years.