It's About Making Gray Thing

Dear America,

Gray in Your Service

March 14, 1783

General Washington's Headquarters

Newburgh, New York

"For perhaps the very first time, 

George Washington felt completely alone."

(Just the beginning of the Eleventh Chapter,  go to Glenn Beck's Being George Washington, for more)

truth is, given yesterday's blog --   and when I say yesterday, it was really days ago, being last Saturday ----   if  the original Black Lives Matter protesters were comprised chiefly of the members of the GOP, being the party clearly on the right side of history and in concert with the U.S. Army and the Commander-in-Chief, President Abraham Lincoln.....then it makes the case for the characterization of the Confederacy and the Confederate Army being nothing more than a band of violent thugs, similar to the groups such as the Neo-Nazis, White Supremacists, KKK, and even including, the resurgence of the anti-fa movement, under the guise of being the "counter-protest" -- suffice it to say, throughout history, these groups are chiefly comprised of democrats and socialists and communists and anarchists.  

But lets be clear -- Any group that operates to undermine, threaten, wreak havoc, upon the security and unity of a nation and it's people -- whether it be on a college campus, at a parade, whether town or country  -- is not good.  Every act bears responsibility, being completely liable to be considered actions equal to that of any enemy of the state, both foreign and domestic.  



Anarchists and Fascists, fascists and anarchists...Extreme left and extreme right, unite, to untie the threads that bond and tear America apart.

The south shot first.

The confederacy shot first, coming on the heels of establishing its own southern republic (well, kinda -- sorta) in February of 1861 -- when, over time, a total of eleven states set out to secede from the Union. 

[They officially didn't succeed in seceding; they merely lost representation within the federal government.  The territory, itself, was always considered to be part of the Union.  After the war, the 14th Amendment was used as the means for the southern states to re-establish representation within congress -- the states had to agree with it, in full, or have no voice.  And while along those lines, much to my surprise, eventually, Congress considered all members of the Confederate Army to be veterans (warning: that's a rather long read there and some of the conversation may be considered controversial, try and get over it and through it.).  Thing is, congress allowed for pensions to be paid to their widowers, and even moved to allow for a few to be buried in places like Arlington National Cemetery,  having such considerations made possible through legislation dating back to the early 1900's and as recently as 1957.]

But as we all know -- what happened at the end of the Civil War was not really the end, was it?  For the southern states didn't take no for an answer, they didn't take their loss quietly, and spent the years following the war trying to save face, to the extent of rewriting its own history, and all the while egregiously continuing to foment divide between blacks and whites. 

Words from the link just above, in How the Cult of Robert E. Lee Was Born,  posted by Becky Little, the former president of the Confederate States, Jefferson Davis, said this:

“By the 1890s, the Lost Cause arguments had become really a racial ideology, they had become a set of arguments for white supremacy.” 

As Little goes on to add, "[T]he idea that slavery had been a gentle institution that benefited both masters and slaves, and that freedmen could not handle their emancipation, was a foundation upon which Jim Crow laws were built."

In the process of researching this morning, the twenty-fifth president of the United States came up, President William McKinley.  After victory in the Spanish American War, he gave a speech in Atlanta that basically aimed to heal all of America, in order to move forward with great hope for the future, to come together as one nation.  And it goes something like this:

Speech before the Legislature in Joint Assembly 

AT the State Capitol, Atlanta, Georgia, Decem- 

ber 14, 1898. 

3Ir. President and Gentlemen : 

It is with more than common pleasure that I meet 

these representatives of this great State. I am more 

than glad to be with you here at this time and share 

with you in the general rejoicing over the signing of the 

treaty of peace between the United States and Spain. 

Sectional lines no longer mar the map of the United 

States. [Great applause.] Sectional feeling no longer 

holds back the love we bear each other. [Applause.] 

Fraternity is the national anthem, sung by a chorus of 

forty-five States and our Territories at home and beyond 

the seas. [Applause.] The Union is once more the 

common altar of our love and loyalty, our devotion and 

sacrifice. The old flag again waves over us in peace, 

with new glories which your sons and ours have this 

year added to its sacred folds. What cause we have 

for rejoicing, saddened only by the fact that so many of 

our brave men fell on the field or sickened and died from 

hardship and exposure, and others returning bring 

wounds and disease from which they will long suffer. 

The memory of the dead will be a precious legacy, and 

the disabled will be the nation's care. [Applause.] 

A nation which cares for its disabled soldiers as we 

have always done will never lack defenders. The na- 

tional cemeteries for those who fell in battle are proof

that the dead as well as the living have our love. What 

an army of silent sentinels we have, and with what 

loving care their graves are kept ! Every soldier's 

grave made during our unfortunate Civil "War is a trib- 

ute to American valor. [Applause.] And while, when 

those graves were made, we differed widely about the 

future of this government, those differences were long 

ago settled by the arbitrament of arms; and the time 

has now come, in the evolution of sentiment and feeling 

under the providence of God, when in the spirit of fra- 

ternity we should share with you in the care of the 

graves of the Confederate soldiers. [Tremendous ap- 

plause and long-continued cheering.] 

The cordial feeling now happily existing between the 

North and South prompts this gracious act, and if it 

needed further justification, it is found in the gallant 

loyalty to the Union and the flag so conspicuously 

shown in the year just past by the sons and grand- 

sons of these heroic dead. [Tremendous applause.] 

What a glorious future awaits us if unitedly, wisely, 

and bravely we face the new problems now pressing 

upon us, determined to solve them for right and hu- 

manity ! [Prolonged applause and repeated cheers.] 

---------------------------- pink highlighting courtesy of G

Perhaps he aimed a wee bit high, considering how the next century went down...

Such lofty ideas, though, eh?  Oh McKinley could dream, he could dream.

Can't blame him for trying...
What an army of silent sentinels we have, and with what 

loving care their graves are kept ! Every soldier's 

grave made during our unfortunate Civil "War is a trib- 

ute to American valor. [Applause.] And while, when 

those graves were made, we differed widely about the 

future of this government, those differences were long 

ago settled by the arbitrament of arms;

(Or so he thought.)

It is a tribute to American valor, as McKinley said to applause, rightly so, because each side fought bravely in the mission at hand.   Lives were harmed, even lost and buried; warriors were wounded and widows were made.   Sure, it is easy to be the great arbiter of history, placing the moral and immoral characterizations just like so...we all know which side was right, right?  But the reality is, all of these men fought with courage, bravely aiming to be a part of making history, come hell or high water, whether wrong or right.

And now, this girl is gonna wander deep into the woods for just a moment -- here's another history wake up call for you, as President McKinley was assassinated not all that long after that speech, in 1901; he was just six months into his second term as president.  From the whitehouse,gov website:

  "He was standing in a receiving line 

at the Buffalo Pan-American Exposition 

when a deranged anarchist shot him twice. 

He died eight days later."  

[And yeah, that's exactly how the post on McKinley ends.  Weird.]

Anywho...  A republican president shot and killed by an anarchist.  huh, now there's a precedent President Trump probably doesn't want to think about...especially when there are state representatives making these kinds of statements, here.

The anarchist:   After going from one moderate socialist club to a more radical one, Leon Czolgosz fell victim of a swift indoctrination, leading him to take matters into his own hands and the making of a radical choice: assassinating the 25th president of the United States.  Upon the day Czolgosz was scheduled to die by electrocution (just 45 days later...) he apparently said this:  "I killed the President because he was the enemy of the good people – the good working people. I am not sorry for my crime. I am sorry I could not see my father."

The thing is...now getting close to the end of my long about day today, for which I will not apologize...America was designed to be the exception, fully committed to the vision born out of the pure brilliance of our nation's founders; a republic such as ours, built upon the Rule of Law and under the checks and balances of three branches of government, was not only skillfully crafted, every word, but it had never been done before on this earth.  We honestly were the exception, being admired for our courage to break from England -- coming after another long war in American history -- and eventually, over time,  becoming the leader of the free world.

We cannot sanitize or rewrite history to make it feel better.

We have laws against defacing/destroying public property.

We are a nation of free people under Article I of the Constitution -- "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peacefully to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

The key here is 

"PEACEFULLY to assemble, and to petition..."

We've lost our sense of peace.  Somehow or other, we have evolved -- no, depreciated and descended  -- into committing indefensible acts of violence and reckless name calling and extremist statue toppling, risking total civil unrest, as a means of dealing with each other face to face, from sea to shining sea.  Anarchy has become the way...while hating this president has become dangerously vogue.

How is this okay?  The conservative press was never this disrespectful to President Obama.  

And what gives?  When the shameless press promotes a left winged activist who nonsensically labels all 60 million Americans who voted for Trump a racist...that is, through the words of Michael Moore while on CNN ...does it even matter if  Don Lemon warned Moore he may get a little blowback...[#kind lesson #3,  #never let bullies win ...right, Ellen DeGeneres?  Just fresh word in September's Good Housekeeping.  Please don't misconstrue, I love ellen!]

or read this one, same verse, same as the first.
or read this one, same verse, same as the second.

Does the mainstream media -- especially CNN -- have any idea how reckless this is, let alone realize they have pathetically crossed the line?

Does the mainstream media really have the credibility to decide for all Americans just who has the moral authority and higher ground to protest over another, especially when, in fact, it's all bad when it ends in tear gas and fists?

Doesn't the free press have children, too?  Is this, shockingly, the new neighborhood now?

God help us if we are back in an age when our differences are being "settled by the arbitrament of arms," fully supported  through  the posturing and propaganda of a free-wheeling, left leaning, unconscionable press, who would rather watch America go up in flames then support this administration's call for unity, no matter color or creed, no  matter the politics.  It's simply disgraceful.

We've seen an age immediately following a president's call for unity before; time and time again, history reveals America's response, with or without the free press providing for the correct account.

If in all things we learn to blend a wee bit better, smudging the imaginary sectional lines that  continue to divide and bury us under skies of gray and rivers of tears, this nation may amass the courage to live another day towards achieving real peace and genuine brotherhood.

Make it a Good Day, G