Shared! Good Column! I hope everyone will take the time to read this short article!
On Fri, May 26, 2017 at 11:33 AM, MJ <[email protected]> wrote: > > May 25, 2017 > > *After the Confederates, Who’s Next? *Patrick J. Buchanan > > On Sept. 1, 1864, Union forces under Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, > victorious at Jonesborough, burned Atlanta and began the March to the Sea > where Sherman’s troops looted and pillaged farms and towns all along the > 300-mile road to Savannah. > > Captured in the Confederate defeat at Jonesborough was William Martin > Buchanan of Okolona, Mississippi, who was transferred by rail to the Union > POW stockade at Camp Douglas, Illinois. > > By the standards of modernity, my great-grandfather, fighting to prevent > the torching of Georgia’s capital, was engaged in a criminal and immoral > cause. And “Uncle Billy” Sherman was a liberator. > > Under President Grant, Sherman took command of the Union army and ordered > Gen. Philip Sheridan, who had burned the Shenandoah Valley to starve > Virginia into submission, to corral the Plains Indians on reservations. > > It is in dispute as to whether Sheridan said, “The only good Indian is a > dead Indian.” There is no dispute as to the contempt Sheridan had for the > Indians, killing their buffalo to deprive them of food. > > Today, great statues stand in the nation’s capital, along with a Sherman > and a Sheridan circle, to honor these most ruthless of generals in that > bloodiest of wars that cost 620,000 American lives. > > Yet, across the South and even in border states like Kentucky, Maryland > and Missouri, one may find statues of Confederate soldiers in town squares > to honor the valor and sacrifices of the Southern men and boys who fought > and fell in the Lost Cause. > > When the Spanish-American War broke out, President McKinley, who as a > teenage soldier had fought against “Stonewall” Jackson in the Shenandoah > and been at Antietam, bloodiest single-day battle of the Civil War, removed > his hat and stood for the singing of “Dixie,” as Southern volunteers and > former Confederate soldiers paraded through Atlanta to fight for their > united country. My grandfather was in that army. > > For a century, Americans lived comfortably with the honoring, North and > South, of the men who fought on both sides. > > But today’s America is not the magnanimous country we grew up in. > > Since the ’60s, there has arisen an ideology that holds that the > Confederacy was the moral equivalent of Nazi Germany and those who fought > under its battle flag should be regarded as traitors or worse. > > Thus, in New Orleans, statues of Jefferson Davis, president of the > Confederate States of America, and General Robert E. Lee were just pulled > down. And a drive is underway to take down the statue of Andrew Jackson, > hero of the Battle of New Orleans and president of the United States, which > stands in Jackson Square. > > Why? Old Hickory was a slave owner and Indian fighter who used his > presidential power to transfer the Indians of Georgia out to the Oklahoma > Territory in a tragedy known as the Trail of Tears. > > But if Jackson, and James K. Polk, who added the Southwest and California > to the United States after the Mexican-American War, were slave owners, so, > too, were four of our first five presidents. > > The list includes the father of our country, George Washington, the author > of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, and the author of our > Constitution, James Madison. > > Not only are the likenesses of Washington and Jefferson carved on Mount > Rushmore, the two Virginians are honored with two of the most magnificent > monuments and memorials in Washington, D.C. > > Behind this remorseless drive to blast the greatest names from America’s > past off public buildings, and to tear down their statues and monuments, is > an egalitarian extremism rooted in envy and hate. > > Among its core convictions is that spreading Christianity was a cover > story for rapacious Europeans who, after discovering America, came in > masses to dispossess and exterminate native peoples. “The white race,” > wrote Susan Sontag, “is the cancer of human history.” > > Today, the men we were taught to revere as the great captains, explorers, > missionaries and nation-builders are seen by many as part of a racist, > imperialist, genocidal enterprise, wicked men who betrayed and eradicated > the peace-loving natives who had welcomed them. > > What they blindly refuse to see is that while its sins are scarlet, as are > those of all civilizations, it is the achievements of the West that are > unrivaled. The West ended slavery. Christianity and the West gave birth to > the idea of inalienable human rights. > > As scholar Charles Murray has written, 97 percent of the world’s most > significant figures and 97 percent of the world’s greatest achievements in > the arts, architecture, literature, astrology, biology, earth sciences, > physics, medicine, mathematics and technology came from the West. > > What is disheartening is not that there are haters of our civilization out > there, but that there seem to be fewer defenders. > > Of these icon-smashers it may be said: Like ISIS and Boko Haram, they can > tear down statues, but these people could never build a country. > > What happens, one wonders, when these Philistines discover that the seated > figure in the statue, right in front of D.C.’s Union Station, is the High > Admiral of the Ocean Sea, Christopher Columbus? > > Happy Memorial Day! > > http://buchanan.org/blog/confederates-whos-next-127112 > > -- > -- > Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. > For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum > > * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ > * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. > * Read the latest breaking news, and more. > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "PoliticalForum" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- -- Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PoliticalForum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
