“…may his pernicious soul
Rot half a grain a day! he lies to the heart”
(Othello, act 5, sc. 2)
Comments. Not Lincoln, but those who willingly falsify history. Steven Spielberg is one of the topmost masters of US propaganda and the heavily promoted movie “Lincoln” once more proves it. The film is no more accurate in its representation of a crucial period in American history (the consequences of the Civil War),
Sen. Crittenden, author of the Crittenden Resolution
than George Bush’ tale of Iraq’s “weapons-of-mass-destruction.” Tale that triggered the era of “perpetual war”, the verbal testament of the now disgraced Petreus.
To begin, contrary to popular myth, the Civil War had little if nothing to do with abolishing slavery. In this context, it may be interesting for readers of this entry to read Jefferson Davis’ account of the Civil War. Jefferson Davis was the president of the Confederate States. If the war was to abolish slavery why is it that it was the slave-holding South attacking the Union at Fort Sumter? Should it not have been the other way around?
The Civil War was fought between two sets of White people to see which one would profit most from the products obtained from Black slave labor. Two powerful engines of the American economy—cotton and slaves—were in their South. But the big banks in the North realized most of the profits from their plantations. Hence they decided to end that one-sided relationship and separate from America.
Abraham Lincoln knew that America would collapse without Southern slavery and reluctantly fought the war to maintain the UNION of North and South—and, most important, to keep the slavery wealth flowing from South to North.
In fact, even before the war started, both sides agreed to the Crittenden Resolution, (note for the doubtful – the Crittenden Resolution, agreed upon is NOT the same as the Crittenden Compromise which is totally different and did not pass). The Crittenden Resolution made it clear that the war would not target what they called “established institutions,” namely, slavery
Furthermore, after the abolition of slavery, countless numbers of slaves found themselves indentured to their previous slave-holders and in living conditions worse than before. When an indentured ex-slave could not pay his debts he was conscripted into the coal mines where the average length of survival was three months. Nor it is necessary to point out the obvious – that it took 100 years plus to overcome segregation, which is but the sister of slavery.
Contrary to popular belief, Lincoln’s famous Emancipation Proclamation did not “free” a single Black person from chattel slavery—not one. When it looked like the Union was losing the war, Lincoln “freed” slaves in the South so that they could fight against their masters. In that same document he made sure that slavery was not disturbed where it existed in the North!
…. And so on with plenty of other examples. That history books perpetuate the myths and that the myths survive intact in the collective mind is striking evidence of the unsurpassed power of American propaganda. For the purpose of “full spectrum dominance” the less is known about history the better (see the United States of Amnesia of Gore Vidal). But when the whiffs of history cannot be avoided, history must be sanitized – so that the message complies with the “full spectrum dominance” philosophy.
Still, anyone who lies so openly and shamelessly well deserves the curse contained in this entry.
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Tips for Use. A good curse against liars at large.
In the play. Emilia, on hearing from Othello that her husband Iago was the instigator of the jealousy and the events that led to Desdemona’s murder, inveighs against Iago
Hmm. The war was about states’ rights vs. the federation authority, of which slavery was the igniting issue; the south’s economy was built on that labor, and without it substantial wealth would be sacrificed, and have to be rebuilt; and they were psychologically invested in defending their difficult moral position, as people are likely to do, particularly when they are a) wrong and b) public opinion moves against them. The issue of slavery was CLEARLY front and center on the decision to secede, and out here in Kansas and Missouri a central political issue about the future of the nation and why the war became a shooting affair before everyone else. The attack on Fort Sumter was about breaking the economic blockade at sea imposed by the North after secession (and arguably before, as an attempt to keep the south from arming themselves more in advance of that anticipated decision), an embargo which first triggered the label “Northern Aggression.” It was about slavery, both because of the financial reliance on the practice in a very large population, and because it became a hot button regarding the morality of each side, do we have the right to control the decisions of others as a nation and declare acts immoral and/or illegal, or the right to make our own choices on ethics and morality in smaller groups within the body, including rights over another human being, and again, to define morality within that light. Read your history, suck it up. The Douglas/Lincoln debates, the speeches before congress regarding secession, the papers of the time. Believe me, they knew it was about slavery. Not just slavery, but it was at the heart. The right to determine local governance vs. national governance has always been the heart of American politics since we wrote the first Federal Articles, and this was the war we determined our future. Most simply put, could we own each other, or not.