Selective Memory???

[nohil-billy]

Democrats: The Missing Years
By Jeffrey Lord
Published 8/12/2008 12:08:03 AM


Missing: 52 years of history.

Ignored: The other 113 years that take the Democrats from their birth in 1800 to 1965.

As Democrats prepare to nominate Senator Barack Obama to be the first black president, the Democratic National Committee and its chairman Howard Dean have whitewashed the party's horrific and lengthy record of racism. The omission is in the section of the DNC website that describes the party's history. The missing history raises the obvious question of whether the Democrats, unable or simply unwilling to put their party on record as taking direct responsibility for one of the worst racial crimes of the ages, will be able to run a campaign free of the racial animosities it has regularly brought both to American presidential campaigns and American political and social life in general.

What else to make of the official party history as presented by the DNC on its website? It is a history so sanitized of historical reality it makes Stalin look like historian David McCullough.

The DNC website section labeled "Party History," linked [LINK POSTED BY MEMBER] Only Members Can View This No Hillary For President Forum Link. , is in fact scrubbed clean of the not-so-little dirty secret that fueled Democrats' political successes for over a century and a half and made American life a hell on earth for black Americans. Literally, the DNC official history, which begins with the creation of the party in 1800, gets to the creation of the DNC itself in 1848 and then...poof!...the next sentence says: "As the 19th Century came to a close, the American electorate changed more and more rapidly." It quickly heads into a riff on poor immigrants coming to America.

In a stroke, 52 years of Democrat history vanishes. Disappeared faster than the truth in the Clinton administration. Why would this be? Allow me to sketch in a few facts from those missing 52 years. For that matter, lets add in the facts from the party history before and after those 52 years, since they aren't mentioned by the Democrats' National Committee either.

So what's missing?

* There is no reference to the number of Democratic Party platforms supporting slavery. There were 6 from 1840-1860.

* There is no reference to the number of Democratic presidents who owned slaves. There were 7 from 1800-1861

* There is no reference to the number of Democratic Party platforms that either supported segregation outright or were silent on the subject. There were 20, from 1868-1948.

* There is no reference to "Jim Crow" as in "Jim Crow laws," nor is there reference to the role Democrats played in creating them. These were the post-Civil War laws passed enthusiastically by Democrats in that pesky 52-year part of the DNC's missing years. These laws segregated public schools, public transportation, restaurants, rest rooms and public places in general (everything from water coolers to beaches). The reason Civil Rights heroine Rosa Parks became famous is that she sat in the front of a "whites only" bus, the "whites only" designation the direct result of Democrats.

* There is no reference to the formation of the Ku Klux Klan, which, according to Columbia University historian Eric Foner became "a military force serving the interests of the Democratic Party." Nor is there reference to University of North Carolina historian Allen Trelease's description of the Klan as the "terrorist arm of the Democratic Party."

* There is no reference to the fact Democrats opposed the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution. The Thirteenth banned slavery. The Fourteenth effectively overturned the infamous 1857 Supreme Court Dred Scott decision (made by Democrat pro-slavery Supreme Court justices) by guaranteeing due process and equal protection to former slaves. The Fifteenth gave black Americans the right to vote.

* There is no reference to the fact Democrats opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1866. It was passed by the Republican Congress over the veto of Democratic President Andrew Johnson. The law was designed to provide blacks with the right to own private property, sign contracts, sue and serve as witnesses in a legal proceeding.

* There is no reference to the Democrats' opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1875. It was passed by a Republican Congress and signed into law by President Ulysses Grant. The law prohibited racial discrimination in public places and public accommodations.

* There is no reference to the Democrats' 1904 platform, which devotes a section to "Sectional and Racial Agitation," claiming the GOP's protests against segregation and the denial of voting rights to blacks sought to "revive the dead and hateful race and sectional animosities in any part of our common country," which in turn "means confusion, distraction of business, and the reopening of wounds now happily healed."

* There is no reference to four Democrat platforms, 1908-1920, that are silent on blacks, segregation, lynching, and voting rights as racial problems in the country mount. By contrast the GOP platforms of those years specifically address "Rights of the Negro" (1908), oppose lynchings (in 1912, 1920, 1924, 1928) and, as the New Deal kicks in, speak out about the dangers of making blacks "wards of the state."

* There is no reference to the DNC-sponsored Democrat Convention of 1924, known to history as the "Klanbake." The 103-ballot convention was held in Madison Square Garden. Hundreds of delegates were members of the Ku Klux Klan, the Klan so powerful that a plank condemning Klan violence was defeated outright. To celebrate the Klan staged a rally with 10,000 hooded Klansmen in a field in New Jersey directly across the Hudson from the site of the Convention. Attended by hundreds of cheering Convention delegates, the rally featured burning crosses and calls for violence against African Americans and Catholics.

* There is no reference to the fact that it was Democrats who segregated the federal government of the United States, specifically at the direction of President Woodrow Wilson upon taking office in 1913. There is a reference to the fact that President Harry Truman integrated the military after World War II.

* There is reference to the fact that Democrats created the Federal Reserve Board, passed labor and child welfare laws and created Social Security with Wilson's New Freedom and FDR's New Deal. There is no reference these programs were created as the result of an agreement to ignore segregation and the lynching of blacks. Neither is there a reference to the thousands of local officials, state legislators, state governors, U.S. Congressmen and U.S. Senators who were elected as supporters of slavery and then segregation between 1800 and 1965. Nor is there reference to the deal with the devil that left segregation and lynching as a way of life in return for election support for three post-Civil War Democrat presidents, Grover Cleveland, Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt.

* There is no reference that three-fourths of the opposition to the 1964 Civil Rights Bill in the U.S. House came from Democrats, or that 80 percent of the nay vote on the bill in the Senate came from the Democrats. Certainly there is no reference to the fact that the opposition included future Democratic Senate Leader Robert Byrd of West Virginia (a former Klan member) and Tennessee Senator Albert Gore, Sr., father of future Vice President Al Gore.

* Last, but certainly not least, there is no reference to the fact that Birmingham, Alabama Public Safety Commissioner Bull Connor, who infamously unleashed dogs and fire hoses on civil rights protestors, was in fact -- yes indeed -- both a member of the Democratic National Committee and the Ku Klux Klan.

Reading the DNC's official "Party History" of the Democrats and the race issue and civil rights is not unlike reading In Through the Looking Glass: "When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less.'"

Here's this line from the DNC: "With the election of Harry Truman, Democrats began the fight to bring down the final barriers of race..." Truman, of course, was elected in 1948, and to his great credit he did in fact, along with then-Minneapolis Mayor Hubert Humphrey, begin to push the Democrats towards a pro-civil rights stance. This culminated in the passage of the 1960s' Civil Rights laws -- legislation that re-did what was done by Republicans a hundred years earlier but had been undone by the Democrats' support for segregation. But the notion that "Democrats began to bring down the final barriers of race" begs the obvious questions. What were these barriers doing there in the first place? And who exactly was responsible for creating them?

Reading the DNC version of race history in America in which they have erased their own leading role is not unlike checking in on an official German government website and seeing a description of Germany that ends around 1900, then picks up with a sentence that reads "As the mid-20th century came to a close, the German people changed more and more rapidly" followed by another sentence that begins, "With the election of Konrad Adenauer in 1949, Germans began the fight for world peace and to bring down the final barriers of anti-Semitism..." You know, why bother with those inconsequential things like World War I, World War II, Hitler, the Nazis and the Holocaust? We Germans had nothing really to do with any of it anyway.


AS IF TO CONFIRM the "who, me?" racial psychology behind the DNC website, Nancy Pelosi's Democrats passed a House Resolution on July 29th sponsored by Tennessee Democrat Congressman Steve Cohen. The resolution, passed by voice vote, concludes this way:

Resolved, That the House of Representatives--

(1) acknowledges that slavery is incompatible with the basic founding principles recognized in the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal;

(2) acknowledges the fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality, and inhumanity of slavery and Jim Crow;

(3) apologizes to African Americans on behalf of the people of the United States, for the wrongs committed against them and their ancestors who suffered under slavery and Jim Crow; and

(4) expresses its commitment to rectify the lingering consequences of the misdeeds committed against African Americans under slavery and Jim Crow and to stop the occurrence of human rights violations in the future.

What word is missing here?

You got it. The word "Democrat." Never mentioned anywhere. As with the DNC website, all these terrible things -- somehow, apparently, it seems, so they keep hearing -- happened. Speaker Pelosi, Congressman Cohen and their fellow House Democrats just can't understand how. But, you know, whatever. They are sorry. Really.

Are they? Let's take them up on this.

After all those Democrat platforms and conventions that championed slavery and segregation, what do you think the chances are they will use the occasion of Obama's nomination to have the Democrat platform formally apologize for the active, frequently violent and decidedly official support of the Democratic Party for slavery, segregation, lynching, the Ku Klux Klan and all the rest?

Better yet, do you think they'll pass a resolution promising to use the funds raised from all those Jefferson-Jackson Day fundraisers to pay reparations for slavery? (Did I mention that while the DNC discusses party co-founders Jefferson and Jackson it neglects to mention that between them the two owned an estimated 360 slaves?)

Will the NAACP and other groups seeking reparations from non-government entities for their role in supporting slavery (companies like Aetna, Wachovia and Chase along with educational institutions like Brown University, etc.) finally zero in on the prime historical mover behind some of the worst chapters in American history? Will they sue the Democrats?

The Democrats are poised to nominate a black man for president of the United States. But will they apologize for slavery? Will they start paying reparations not from tax dollars but their own dollars for what they have done?

Do they have the guts to publicly admit what serious history records of their deeds? Are they capable of running a campaign without playing the race card as they have played it for the better part of two centuries? Can they even escape the race psychology that has indelibly branded them as America's Party of Race?

Or, when it comes to their own responsibility for race relations in America, will they order up more of what, under the circumstances, is a very appropriate word for the DNC website?

Whitewash.

[nohil-billy]

Black Leader: Democratic Party Architect of Racism


Monday, February 25, 2008 9:43 AM

By: Ronald Kessler

Frances Rice, chairman of the National Black Republican Association, describes the Democratic Party as the architect of modern day racism.
Rice, a retired Army lieutenant colonel and lawyer, says in an interview it was Republicans who pushed through much of the ground-breaking civil rights legislation in Congress. Now, she says, Republicans stand for empowering blacks to help them out of poverty. In contrast, Rice says, the Democrats push to keep blacks dependent on government handouts and encourage them to see themselves as victims.

“The Democratic Party has built its power base on the backs of poor blacks, and they want to keep blacks poor, angry, and voting for Democrats,” Rice tells Newsmax. “Every election cycle they go into the black community and preach hatred against the Republican Party and get blacks to cast a protest vote against Republicans.”

In Rice’s view, “The Democrats fight every effort of Republicans to get blacks out of poverty because they know that once blacks become prosperous, the Democratic Party will lose its power base.”

Rice co-founded the National Black Republican Association in 2005 with the mission of returning African-Americans to their Republican Party roots. Because co-founder Andre Cadogan knew Newsmax CEO and Editor in Chief Chris Ruddy, the first meeting of the organization took place at Newsmax offices in West Palm Beach, Fla. The organization has grown from five members to over a thousand members. It publishes a quarterly glossy magazine — The Black Republican — and has a Web site: [LINK POSTED BY MEMBER] Only Members Can View This No Hillary For President Forum Link. .

Rice says the Democrats oppose giving blacks the opportunity to become wealthy through Social Security personal accounts and oppose efforts to reform Social Security, even though blacks on average lose $10,000 in the current system because blacks on average have a five year shorter life expectancy.

Aligning themselves with special interests, Rice says the Democrats are “fighting school-choice opportunity scholarships that are designed to get black children out of failing schools, because the teacher’s unions wants to maintain control over buildings.”

Rice also cites widespread opposition by Democrats to the No Child Left Behind Act, which has lifted reading scores of black children but is reviled by teachers’ unions.

“Our philosophy in the Republican Party is to teach a person how to fish, so he can feed himself for a lifetime, whereas the Democratic Party’s philosophy is give a man a fish, so he can eat for a day,” Rice says.

Rice says most blacks are not aware that from its founding in 1854 as the anti-slavery party, the Republican Party has been at the “forefront of the struggle for civil rights, which is why Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a Republican.”

It was Republicans, she notes, who fought to free blacks from slavery and amended the Constitution to grant blacks freedom, citizenship, and the right to vote. Republicans also pushed through much of the ground-breaking civil rights legislation in Congress from the 1860s through the 1960s, Rice says.
“It was the Democrat public safety commissioner, Eugene ‘Bull’ Connor, in Birmingham who let loose vicious dogs and turned the fire hoses on black civil rights demonstrators,” Rice says.

Democrat Georgia Gov. Lester Maddox “brandished an ax handle to prevent blacks from patronizing his restaurant,” Rice says. “Democrat Alabama Governor George Wallace stood in front of the Alabama school house in 1963 and declared that there would be segregation forever. In 1954, it was Democrat Arkansas Governor Orville Faubus who tried to prevent the desegregation of Little Rock public schools. It was Republican President Dwight Eisenhower who sent the troops into the South to desegregate the schools and who appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to the U.S. Supreme Court, which resulted in the 1954 Brown versus Board of Education decision.”

In contrast, the Democrats “fought to keep blacks in slavery, started the Ku Klux Klan to terrorize blacks, and fought civil rights legislation,” Rice says.
“The Democratic Party is the architect of modern day racism,” Rice says. “Now they are fanning the flames of racism in order to keep blacks in economic poverty.”

[nohil-billy]

[Herb Schaffler]

What is the full context of Obama's statement? Is he talking against state and local oppression of individual rights and the necessity of the Federal Government intervening on the basis of the 14th Amendment to protect those rights? If that's the case, Martin Luther King would be in full agreement. Is Obama really saying that states and local governments have the right to constrain individual rights? If that's the case, Obama would be no different than Bork, whom so many conservatives admire, who believes that state power trumps individual rights and that the 14th Amendment only guarantees that races be treated equally, that both whites and blacks can be oppressed by state and local governments as long as they are oppressed equally.

[nohil-billy]

I remember watching him when he made this remark and it had to do with gun control and the Washington DC gun law. This opinion of his only pertains to his feelings about the second ammendment. Not Abortion.

[Herb Schaffler]

Yeah, you're right, nohil-billy. I remember him making a big deal about respecting the rights of states and localities infringing on individual gun rights. I believe the 14th Amendment can be applied to protect individual rights of gun ownership against states' and localities' infringements of those rights.

[nohil-billy]

Yeah Herb, but it's Obama's contention that any city or state can ignore the right to bear arms as specified in the second amendment, and arbitrarily ban weapons of all kinds.

Hence his statement, "Just because you have a right does not mean that the state or local government cannot constrain that right.

[Herb Schaffler]

We don't even need to get into the 14th Amendment. States and localities don't have the right to infringe on the right to bear arms on the basis of the 2nd Amendment. And Obama's supposed to be an expert on the Constitution.

[nohil-billy]

Here's another example of the MSM, if you can call MSNBC the MSM, getting away with downplaying the achievements of blacks, when FNC or the Republican Party would have been crucified by the MSM and black organizations for saying the same thing. Remember when Bill Clinton was accused of playing the race card when he downplayed Obama's primary victory in South Carolina?

Matthews Insults Rice & Powell as 'Showcase Appointments
By Geoffrey Dickens
August 28, 2008

Contrasting how Barack Obama won the nomination of the Democratic Party to how Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell achieved their successes, Chris Matthews insulted the aforementioned as "showcase appointments."

"Again he [Barack Obama] carries with him the history of tonight. And it's important to point out, as we have not so far, Barack Obama was not given this nomination, he won it. He was not offered a nice title like Secretary of State, like Condoleezza Rice got from the Republicans. He was not offered the title of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs as Colin Powell was, or Secretary of State. He won the nomination of a Democratic Party voting together. He defeated all other opponents and took the prize and took the leadership. He is the chosen leader of the Democratic Party."

"He is not some popular appointment or a showcase appointment. He is the victor here tonight. That's why he dictates the agenda. That's why he says, personally, what the Democratic Party will do if he's elected President. He is the leader of the party. He may be the leader of the country through a democratic process. It is so vital to understand the history being made here tonight. This is not something cute or wonderful. It is something compelling and powerful. This country has changed its history."

Right!!! In reality, both Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice would be ready to serve on day 1, and both have more foreign policy experience in their pinkies than Obama has between those "What, Me Worry!" Alfred E. Neuman looking ears of his.