no subject

[archerships]

Via ehintz:

Garrison Keillor writes in (We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore):

How did the Party of Lincoln and Liberty transmogrify into the party of Newt Gingrich’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk?
...

The concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the few is the death knell of democracy. No republic in the history of humanity has survived this. The election of 2004 will say something about what happens to ours. The omens are not good.

Lincoln was no friend of liberty:

My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, 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.

-- Abraham Lincoln

In other words, Lincoln didn't particularly care about slavery one way or the other -- he was simply using the slavery issue as a way to maintain power by preventing the Southern states from seceding.

I would argue that the Republicans are returning to the policies of Lincoln--strong centralized government-- and abandoning their more recent support for decentralized power. They've also adopted Lincoln's disrespect for constitutional safeguards:

"...[Lincoln] suspended the writ of Habeas Corpus, the only personal liberty law in the Constitution, and ordered the military to arrest tens of thousands of Northern citizens for merely voicing opposition to his administration. This number included hundreds of Northern newspaper editors and owners who criticized the Lincoln administration. None of these individuals was ever served a warrant and some spent four years in military prison without any due process. ..."

Sound familiar?

The concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the few is the death knell of democracy. No republic in the history of humanity has survived this. The election of 2004 will say something about what happens to ours. The omens are not good

If the concentration of wealth and power worries you, then you should be just as concerned with a win by John Kerry. Kerry's net worth is 20 times more than George Bush's net worth. All of the top 10 donors out of the top 100 individual contributors in this election are Democrats. As Common Dreams, a liberal advocacy group notes:

The GOP can solicit a greater number of $2,000 donations as a result of wide support in a corporate community...Democrats, in contrast, have depended on trial lawyers and wealthy liberals who do not have large constituencies to draw on.

In other words, Bush has a much broader base of financial support -- Democrat John Kerry depends much more heavily on donations from a small number of wealthy individuals.

Methinks Keillor doesn't really mind the concentration of wealth and power -- he's just upset that the power isn't being concentrated in the hands he favors.

If Keillor were really concerned about the concentration of power, he would be advocating downsizing government, and returning money and power to individuals and local level goverments. In fact, Keillor's candidtate Kerry wants to expand Federal power as much or more than Bush does, albeit in slightly different areas.

Note that I'm voting for Kerry. However, I don't think he's a better candidate than Bush. His policy proposals are as bad or worse than Bush's. However, as a Democratic president, he won't be able to easily press his agenda through a Republican controlled congress or judiciary. Unlike Bush, who has only too easily been able to expand the size and scope of the Federal government.

Comments

[visgoth.livejournal.com]

Well, I hope the Mr. Keillor feels better that he has made public his position.

Maybe now we can go about implementing some of the solutions he proposed... oh, wait... He didn't propose anything aside from the implied "vote democrat."

Not a solution I find particularly compelling.

[apotheon.livejournal.com]

Keillor's a schmuck anyway.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Yes, he didn't really propose anything concrete. Perhaps because there's very little real difference between Kerry and Bush's policies.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

The Republicans can have been both the party of Lincoln and the party of liberty without Lincoln having been particularly for liberty. Whether Lincoln himself was radically abolitionist or not, much of his party was.

That may be true. But Keillor invoked Lincoln's name because, in the popular mythology, Lincoln is considered the "liberator of the slaves". And Lincoln may well have preferred the abolition of slavery. But just as some are skeptical that the "liberation of Iraq" is Bush's primary motivation, I'm skeptical that Lincoln's primary motivation was the freedom of the Negro. Especially considering the other ugly things Lincoln appears to have done, such as the suspension of habeas corpus, the introduction of the draft, and the reversal of slave emancipation in secessionist states.


That's a terribly cynical way of reading his statement--believing, on the one hand, the part that he doesn't care about slavery, but disbelieving that his primary concern was the Union, not his own personal power.


Oh, I believe he was for the Union. But, as President of the Union, wouldn't the maintenance of the Union also mean the maintenance of his own personal power?

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

--"Oh, I believe he was for the Union. But, as President of the Union, wouldn't the maintenance of the Union also mean the maintenance of his own personal power?"

True, but you you could say that for just about anybody in that kind of position. And who's to say that he didn't want to maintain his own power in order to have the power to help others?

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm sure that Lincoln saw himself as the savior of "the people". What government official doesn't claim to be working selflessly for the good of "the public"?

I'm simply pointing out that Lincoln's program, whatever benefits it may have had, also had the effect of maintaining and expanding his own personal power, which may have had some influence on the decisions he made.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

You may be right that a Kerry administration won't spend less.

However, Bush has increased non-military government spending by more than any president since Johnson. His administration passed the Patriot Act, nationalized the airline baggage industry, imposed steel tariffs, imprisoned people without trial for years, presided over the torture of POW's, initiated a $100 billion dollar war on flimsy pretexts, inflamed international hatred for the U.S., and tries to hide its machinations behind the veil of "national security".

Kerry maybe no better, but given Bush's proven dismal track record, I'm willing to give Kerry a chance.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Like I said, I don't think Kerry's any better than Bush as a candidate. But if Kerry wins, perhaps the Republicans will be chastened enough by the loss of the Presidency not to rubber stamp his agenda. Unlike now.

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

--"However, as a Democratic president, he won't be able to easily press his agenda through a Republican controlled congress or judiciary. Unlike Bush, who has only too easily been able to expand the size and scope of the Federal government."

What do you mean by this statement?

[crasch.livejournal.com]

The Congress and judiciary are controlled by Republicans. Therefore, Bush has been able to get his agenda passed easily. Kerry, as a Democrat, would hopefully not find it so easy.

[ehintz.livejournal.com]

Sorry it's taken so long to reply. Had a few things occupying my attention...

In other words, Lincoln didn't particularly care about slavery one way or the other -- he was simply using the slavery issue as a way to maintain power by preventing the Southern states from seceding.

I don't know if it's fair to say he didn't care. Mind you, I'm not a scholar of Lincoln, but in giving the benefit of the doubt I would suspect it's more likely to be a case of feeling the preservation of the Union was of greater import than the abolition of slavery. In fact, many of the politicos of the day supported a gradual abolition of slavery, due to it's importance to the Southern economy (and in turn the National economy). There were quite a few who opposed slavery at a moral level, but felt it was a necessary evil for the time being.

Anyway, my understanding is that the civil war was about State vs Federal rights, and Lincoln only used slavery as an issue to rally the populace(much like the current war is more about unfinished business and oil rights, and terrorism/wmds/democracy are used as the rallying cry for the populace). Interestingly, while I have never supported slavery, I do have a strong sympathy for the CSA. Ideologically, I do prefer the states rights to trump federal. I'd even be open to discussion county/city rights trumping the state, though I realize you do need to draw the line somewhere.

Note that I'm voting for Kerry. However, I don't think he's a better candidate than Bush. His policy proposals are as bad or worse than Bush's. However, as a Democratic president, he won't be able to easily press his agenda through a Republican controlled congress or judiciary. Unlike Bush, who has only too easily been able to expand the size and scope of the Federal government.

I refuse to vote for either. Straight Libertarian or Natural Law votes for me. Back around '99 I vowed to never again vote for a Demopublican or Republicrat until such time as a viable 3rd party is established. While many say I am "wasting" my vote, I feel it would be more wasted supporting the status quo. My feeling is, a pragmatic vote for Kerry is a de facto vote in support of the current state of affairs, which I find reprehensible.

wasted votes

[laffingkat.livejournal.com]

I've never voted for a Republican or Democrat before, and I never felt like I was wasting my vote, but I'm not sure what to do this election. I'd rather vote for a third party, and preferably a classical liberal party, but I think the Libertarian Party is a lost cause and I'm not impressed with any of the other parties. And even if there was a party I could feel good about supporting, I'm very worried about what Bush might do in a second term, so I've been leaning toward voting for Kerry. Even though I don't think he'd be a good president, I do think he'd be less likely to cause as much damage as Bush could.

I'm curious to see whether the US Peace Government makes any progress. I like the idea of setting up a complementary government rather than fighting within the current political system.

Re: wasted votes

[ehintz.livejournal.com]

I hear you... Essentially, where I'm coming from is a point of view that it may well have to get worse before it gets better, and if that's the case, so be it. But I will not vote for Kerry simply because he's less bad than Bush.

Of course, given that I vote absentee in California, I guess it doesn't matter much anyway, as it's probably a given that the Democrats will carry CA regardless of my vote, and the Electoral votes will go to Kerry anyway...

Re: wasted votes

[laffingkat.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I always forget that it's the electoral votes that really matter. WA has been considered a swing state, but it sounds like even with some of the Seattleites voting for Nader, Kerry will probably come out ahead. If I feel sufficiently confident that he'll get our electoral votes, then I will probably vote for Badnarik.

Ugh, I just want this election behind us. I have enough to think about in my personal and professional life; worrying about things at the national or international level is seeming more and more like a waste of energy all the time.

lincoln stincoln

[joe-tofu.livejournal.com]

I have always thought Lincoln was overrated.

He never served as President in peacetime, so we don't know how good he'd be as an administrator. He never made any significant foreign policy decision. Indeed he never made any decision at all, except to hire a series of idiots to fight a war for him against his own people.

Freed the slaves? Lincoln only freed some of the slaves (the ones behind enemy lines who he couldn't reach anyway) and only as a last-resort measure to keep England from entering the war.

His only Presidential "accomplishment" was barely winning a war against a vastly inferior force of rebels, a war that should have ended on its first day, a war that he allowed to drag on for five years and hundreds of thousands of deaths. The way he botched that war makes him probably the most destructive klutz in the history of the United States of America.

(What else could you expect from the hippie who whined in the Senate against the Mexican war 20 years earlier?)

[new-iconoclast.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't say that Lincoln didn't care about slavery; his position was more like that of Bush on abortion: "Personally opposed, but Roe v. Wade Dred Scott v. Emerson is the law of the land."

Unfortunately, given how "moderate" a lot of alleged Republicans are (especially in the House), I fear your plan may backfire. I don't know that Ketchup will have any more trouble increasing the weight of the Federal yoke than W has had.