Friday, October 31, 2014

How the War Is Remembered....

Over on Kevin Levin's Civil War Memory flog, the discussion has been about some historians at Liberty University, and how they downplay slavery, etc.

In a slight departure from the other commenters, a new person to the blog said she grew up in the Midwest where the Civil War was like the Spanish American war and others --  they just studied it and that was the end of it. When she moved to North Carolina, she was surprised by how differently people remembered the civil war and slavery and all that. It wasn't something they just studied and dismissed. (This is a very short recap of a rather long comment, and thus not comprehensive and complete.)

Levin thank her for posting and said things were "changing" in the South, slavery is slowing being acknowledged, etc.

I thought I had knowledge, info and a perspective that might be helpful to the new commenter, so I left a comment of my own. I seriously doubt it will be cleared, but you never know; Simpson let three of my comments through at XRoads recently. 

Here are my thoughts left at Kevin's flog:
Ms. K---, I would suggest that it isn't just the war that Southerners perceive/experience/remember differently, but what happened after it -- in fact, especially what happened after it -- until well into the 20th century, and that certainly influences how they remember the war.
Today, the focus is almost exclusively on blacks and their terrible experience after the war, while whites who also had terrible experiences get little ink and little thought, though it is crucial to how the war is remembered.

For example, "sharecropper" is synonymous with "African American" for many people, but there were more white sharecroppers than black ones. James Webb's Born Fighting notes that of the South's 1.8 million sharecroppers, 1.2 million were white. And though their experience is downplayed, ignored, dismissed (and sometimes "justified"), that experience plays an inescapable part in shaping civil war memory in the South.

Effects similar to those of sharecropping accompanied the exploitation of workers in industry (coal mining, timber, textiles) that occurred with the creation of the "company town" (company housing, company store, company money, i.e., scrip) which kept workers in a form of economic near-slavery.

The extreme poverty so prevalent in the South created widespread nutritional deficiency diseases such as pellagra and hookworm, in the decades of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the effects of which contributed to the false stereotypes of Southerners as dimwitted and lazy, which persist to this day.

Keeping the South and its people poor occurred by other methods -- for example, discriminatory freight rates that prevented industry from developing and kept wages low (see: http://freepages.history.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cescott/freight.html). This was a policy of private industry (the railroads) but permitted by the federal government, and it took federal authority to end it.

Then there was the debt run up by carpetbagger legislatures that taxpayers were saddled with for generations. (I may be mistaken about this -- I'm going from memory of something I read years ago -- but South Carolina's carpetbagger debt was not paid off until the 1960s.) So there was very little money for infrastructure, public education, etc. -- and then Southerners were ridiculed not only for being "lazy" but for being poor and uneducated.

Every economic tumble the USA experienced fell especially hard on the already poverty-stricken South. All of this, and more, had a direct bearing on how the war was -- and still is -- remembered in the South.
This wasn't the case for a few years, or even a few decades, after the war -- but for about four or five generations. For example, the Interstate Commerce Commission did not end the discriminatory freight rates until 1953, when I was four years old, (though of course I didn't know this at the time). The point is simply to show how long such circumstances lasted, and how much time they had to exert influence on remembering the war.

If you are going to go with current scholarship, which focuses almost exclusively on slavery before the war, and blacks afterward, understanding how the war is remembered by others in the South will will likely elude you.

More On Mr. Shelley

Mr. Shelley sez my previous post is "excruciating." I don' t know if he means the book excerpt, or the whole post.

In case he's talking about my novel excerpt, I've been looking for popular fiction by Mr. Shelley so I can,  you know, put it on the excruci-o-meter and see how it stacks up with mine.

So I went looking for books by Mr. Shelley.  Found these at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Christopher-Shelley/e/B001H9TSU6
~Transpeople: Repudiation, Trauma, Healing
~Contemporary Perspectives on Psychotherapy and Homosexualities
Not exactly popular fiction, and likely not the same Christopher Shelley.

Another Christopher Shelley author at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Christopher-H-Shelley/e/B00FRT2FSO/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

There are some titles that appear to be fiction, but these books look a bit too spiritual or metaphysical for hard-nosed historian realists (smirk).

So I next got a list of Facebook's Christopher Shelleys to check. Alas, Facebook, of course, doesn't have a very good ROI, timewise, what with closed profiles and all.
 https://www.facebook.com/search/more/?q=Chris+Shelley&init=public

I set them aside for later checking, if need be, and turned to Google.

Now, when I do this, Simpson calls it doing "background checks." When he does it, he calls it "tiptoeing through the Internet..." (just another of many examples of the double standards he holds). Here are some of the Christopher Shelley links I checked:

Chemistry prof at Bellevue (Wa) College
http://www.bellevuecollege.edu/directory/PersonDetails.aspx?PersonID=VRgVwSc0CzHK50/Yg14Etw==


Wedding Officiant &Life-Cycle Celebrant
...as seen on 'The Rachael Ray Show'
http://www.illuminatingceremonies.com/

Sessional Instructor, Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice
Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice
University of British Columbia
http://grsj.arts.ubc.ca/persons/chris-shelley/
(Turns out this is the author of the first two books I mentioned above.)

Instructor, US History, American Indian History
Portland Community College
http://www.pcc.edu/staff/index.cfm/1123,html
Now, this one looked promising.... Quotes Faulkner and James Burke ...

But it wasn't conclusive, so I kept looking and came across this blog: The True Blue Federalist.

Bingo!

Marble Lincoln in the header, usual-suspect commenters in a list down the side... Oh, yes folks, the gang's all here...well, some of 'em, anyway. Dick, Hall, Ruminski, Rodgers... the usual buncha white guys...What, do they just travel en mass to each others blogs? What an insular community, huh....

Interesting thing about Shelley ... he is the instructor, US History, American Indian History Portland Community College, and on his blog, he identifies his interest, indeed, his agenda, outright. And it's not simply the promotion of accurate history, oh no. Sez Shelley's About page:
The True Blue Federalist is meant to do a couple things. First, it’s kind of a “one-stop” shopping place for arguments to destroy the so-called “Lost Cause” and Libertarian interpretations of the Civil War.  ...  Having said that, my main concern in this blog is to search out bogus arguments about the Civil War that have found their way into Popular Culture, and tear them apart. Which sounds like fun to me. I hope you enjoy.
You're gonna destroy and tear apart, huh? Self-aggrandize much, Mr. Shelley? Although I have to admit, I'm on a mission regarding the Popular Culture, too --not just to search out bogus arguments about the Civil War, but fraudulent portrayals of Southerners that have found their way into Popular Culture -- and set them straight with truth.

See, this is what "historian" has come to mean, especially in academia. Not somebody who objectively researches history and objectively presents the findings to students and the public, but somebody with an agenda against...

Alas, there doesn't appear to be any popular fiction written by Mr. Shelley... so I will have to content myself with analyzing the fiction in his history writing, and I can already tell you folks, from just the small sampling I've read thus far, it's sending the needle on the excruci-o-meter into the red zone....

This man is no Edward Baptist, who, as we know, writes such sparkling, emotive fiction-- uh, history. Nope, Mr. Shelley's agenda-driven history is deadly dull stuff, folks. Have the No-Doz handy if you visit True Blue...

Thursday, October 30, 2014

For Christopher Shelley

Simpson's flog is in a tizzy over the Virginia Flaggers' new drone.  I left a smartaleck comment ... and he actually let it through! His reply was really lame. But Christopher Shelley's comment following it was a bit more interesting. In fact, interesting enough to blog about:
Me:  You’re tho jealuth — of the VaFlaggers’ popularity and my book-cover skills. All my covers, even the ones that didn’t get used, are better than any covers on YOUR books. Left any more fraudulent reviews on Amazon lately?
Simpson:  I am sure that I am not alone in expressing the hope that you seek the professional help you so desperately need.

Christopher Shelley: You have no idea.

Please do keep coming back and entertaining us with your…dialect? Is that lisp a regional thing?

Seriously, these people are ten times better than reality television. These days I make sure I bring popcorn to the computer before setting down to check the blog comments.
Mr. Shelley, Simpson routinely sends my comments to the Anthony Fremont-style cornfield so I basically don't comment at XRoads anymore. In fact, I sent two others in the same thread, but he tossed 'em. If you want to see the show, I guess you'll just have to come here.

I was going to explain that the word "jealuth" was inspired by my character, John Mark Jordan, an original sweet Southern boy, who uses it when he'd being funny. But rather than go to all the trouble of typing up the backstory, I decided to edit together an excerpt for you....

So pull up a chair. Here, have some popcorn. Want butter on it? It's free. Enjoy!

From Sweet Southern Boys: 
Their respective attorneys' offices called them just before noon and told them the injunctions had been lifted. At 12:03 the phone rang at the Stevenson residence and Randy's heart began to beat faster. He picked up the handset and brought it to his ear.

"Hey." It was Shelby.

"Back atcha," Randy said.

"You are one lucky son-of-a-gun," Shelby told him. "You're gonna get to see me."

For the first time in weeks, Randy laughed. "Have you called John Mark?"

"I thought you might want to do that." 

"You're right, I do. So, when and where?"

"When do you think? Right now! At his house, 'cuz it's in the middle."

"Works for me," Randy said.

"It'll take me a few minutes," Shelby said. "My truck died. I'll have to hoof it."

"Nah, you won't. I'll come get you."

"Ah-ight."

Randy hung up and with trembling fingers, he dialed the Jordans' number. The phone rang once. 
"Stacy's Pool Hall," John Mark said.

"I'm coming to your house as soon as we hang up," Randy said. "Shelby, too."

There was a short silence and he barely made out what sounded like John Mark catching his breath. Then his friend said, "Come ahead on, we'll do lunch. I got pizza. I got Robocop."

"Sounds great--" Randy bit his lip. "Hold on a minute. Have you got hot sauce?" What he heard on the other end might have been a chuckle. Or a whimper. Maybe both. Then the line went dead.
* * *
Shelby was leaning against the tailgate of his disabled truck and talking to Ainsley when Randy turned into the Kincaid's driveway. At the sight of them, his vision blurred. He dismounted and removed his helmet as Shelby pushed himself off the tailgate and walked toward him. Their reunion started as a shoulder-clutching handshake and ended with a tight, eyes-closed, backslapping embrace.

Shelby stepped back and looked his friend up and down. "You haven't changed a bit."

"Neither have you," Randy said. "You still need a haircut."

"I've been worried about you. What they did to you."

Randy shook his head. "I'm all right." He turned to Ainsley and held out his arms. "Hey, darlin'."

"Hey, other-brother," she said, walking into his embrace and returning it. "I'm so glad you can come see us again."

"So am I."

"Look," she said, reaching into her jacket pocket. She withdrew two small white boxes. She handed one tied with white ribbon to Shelby and said, "That's John Mark's," and gave the other to Randy. He opened it and Ainsley took out a silver chain necklace with a small medallion. "This one's for you."

"What's on the pendant?"

"Yours has a basketball," she said, showing it to him. "John Mark's has a skateboard. Shelby's has a football. He's already wearing his. They're to celebrate your reunion."

Randy bent down slightly so she could fasten it around his neck. "Thank you, sweet thang. I'll treasure it."

He unstrapped the extra helmet and tossed it to Shelby and then put his back on. "See if you can get that on over your hair." He mounted the motorcycle, kicked the starter and the engine came to life. Shelby climbed on behind him.

"Tell John Mark to come see me!" Ainsley told them.

"We will."
* * *
Shelby and Randy climbed the front steps to the parsonage. The door was opened by John Mark's mother before they rang the bell. She stood on tiptoe to give the visitors a kiss on the cheek as they entered. "It's wonderful to see you boys together. John Mark's in the family room."
He was standing by the coffee table waiting for them, his weight on one foot, arms crossed, head tilted. When he saw them, he sauntered toward them with his heart-stopping smile, reaching Randy first. They gave each other a series of restrained body punches and segued into a long, brotherly embrace.

"All right, y'all break it up," Shelby said. "You look like a couple of queers."

John Mark turned toward Shelby and pursed his lips in an air kiss. "You're just jealuth."
"You betcha. C’mere, pretty boy." Shelby took his friend in a similar bear hug that he broke off abruptly. "Dang, Wock!" he said softly, feeling of John Mark's shoulders and biceps.

"What?"

"How much weight have you lost?" Randy said.

John Mark shrugged. "I don't know. A few pounds."

"A few?" Shelby said. "You're skinny as a rail!"

"That's an exaggeration."

"How much?" Randy repeated.

"Nine, ten pounds."

Shelby's jaw dropped. "My gosh! Mama told me you were sick, but that's too much weight to lose, flu or no flu."

"Well, some of it happened before that," John Mark explained. "I haven't had much of an appetite since the night the cops showed up at the door and hauled me off to the hoosegow. But, hey, it's not that big a deal. I'm not the one the jack-booted thugs sent to the hospital," he said, looking at Randy with narrowed eyes.

Randy shook his head, not ready to go there yet. "Later.... Your parents said you were off your feed a little. That's all I heard, and now look at you... Shelby's right, ten pounds is too much to lose in three weeks, even counting the flu. It could be dangerous."

"Well then," John Mark said. "Y'all will be happy to know that with my recovery from the flu, my appetite has returned, with a vengeance. I've been eating everything I can lay my hands on for the past day and a half." He patted his newly hollow cheeks and added, "I will be back to my normal, cherubic self in no time."

"Odd, how it has affected us all," Randy observed. "You with no appetite and weight loss, Shelby with migraines, me with nightmares and insomnia..."

"Which I predict will all get a lot better, now that we can be together and help each other through this trouble," Shelby said.

John Mark said, "I agree. But let's not talk about that yet because right now I have a confession to make." He looked at Randy regretfully and said, "Hey, man, I'm sorry to have to tell you this but I lied to you. I don't have pizza and Robocop....

"However -- and I hope this makes up for it -- I do got N'waluns po' boys, red beans and rice, seafood gumbo, crawfish étouffée and French bread coming from Bridget's, be here any minute. I've also got my mama's sweet, sweet tea...and...the original McIlhenny Tabasco brand hot sauce di-rect from Avery Island, Luzie-anna." He paused, then added, "Oh, and Red Dawn in the VCR."

Shelby breathed, "My gosh! We must've died and gone to Heaven," and Randy said, "That's vengeance, all right. Big time."

So Simpson makes not one but two -- count 'm, two -- fraudulent profiles** at Amazon in order to leave fraudulent reviews of my books, which he admits he has not read. And he suggests that I need professional help? Is that not a scream?Later in the drone post comment thread, Simpson sez:
I see the Virginia Flaggers primarily as a source of amusement, a truly fascinating reality show rife with comedic moments. You need to embrace them on that level … your first mistake may be to take them seriously.
And...
I am far too busy laughing at the Flaggers to consider hating them. They provide an endless source of amusement.
Yeah, right. Take a look at the left sidebar <------- (scroll down some) at the list of 200+ posts and/or comments about the VaFlaggers that have appeared at XRoads. Go read some of them and see how amused Simpson sounds.

If it was for amusement, why did he harass Susan Hathaway about Rob Walker for days on end? Why did he team up with some truly hateful people in Richmond to stop the first I-95 Memorial Flag  from going up? Why did he accuse the VaFlaggers of digging up Confederate graves to plant the flag? Why did he try to sic the Richmond media onto the flaggers during the run up to the raising of that flag? Why accuse them of breaking the law by cutting trees on the right of way? Or of faking the theft of the excavator (oh, wait, may be that was Levin). Why does he keep bringing up Susan's employment? I could go on, but you get the picture.

This man clearly is not amused. He is nursing an enormous grudge against people who have never done a thing to him....





**None of your business and One Skeptical Observer.
______________________
Photos: Pixabay; Kevin Russ via I-Stockphoto.

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

More This 'n' That

 Go To It, Hank!

Some floggerette in Simpson's peanut gallery going by the handle hankc9174, comments, in response to a post about Weary Clyburn "...equal effort should be spent at the graves of the other 402,405 enslaved South Carolinians…"

Well, the person whose passing was recently commemorated and noted online was never a slave. The memorial was for Mattie Clyburn Rice, Weary's daughter. There seems to have been some confusion about that in the floggosphere (but then, when have facts and reality mattered to them?)

Be that as it may, Mr. hankc9174, why don't you start that equal effort? I mean, if it's something important to you, why don't you spearhead it? I personally think it's a good idea. I have no problem at all honoring America's slaves for their contribution to this country, and I think the slavery museum's financial difficulties are most unfortunate.  Maybe you could could step up and offer to help with that project, hankc9174.

* * *
Rich, Rich Irony
Another perfect example of allowing a political agenda to influence one’s interpretation of historical events.  -- Al Mackey, Oct 28, 2014
And that, my friends, is a perfect description of  civil war "memory" and civil war "era" and civil war "other stuff" floggers (and their satellites and sycophants) whose dedication to their leftist ideology forms the basis of, and motive for, their interpretation of historical events. (But, of course, that was not who Al was referring to. I guess they sincerely believe people can't see through their pseudo-dedication to "history" to their true agenda....)

* * *
Feel the (Leftist) Love 

Comment left following the Style Weekly report on the VaFlaggers new picture-takin' drone:


A bunch of crackers who act like fools and display the same stubborn pride that started the civil war in the first place. A hundred and fifty years after the war, and these goofs are still trying to fight. Not only should they not be flying confederate flags, the city at some point should take down those absurd monuments on Monument Avenue. A reasonably sized statute of Lee or Jackson at a Civil War museum of some kind could certainly be justified--but the massive statues that deify war generals on the losing side have long since served their purpose. They are like statues found in Russia and Serbia. I'm surprised they don't have halos over their heads. It's hard to become a modern, dynamic city when you've got ginormous statues of losing generals who fought against the United States on a main avenue. The Confederacy should be remembered but not celebrated, though I know there are those who still wear their Jeb Stuart woolies to bed and miss those good 'ole days of slavery and plantation life. I'm sorry to mention it, but it's 2014--time to move on.
Left by someone with the handle "Kazoo." You reckon this is the poster's real name, or is it a coward-handle to hide behind?

Monday, October 27, 2014

It Couldn't Have Happened!

It Was Against the Law!!!

From a comment thread at the X-Roads Flog (click to see full-size):


LOL! (Pssst... it's "if-then," perfesser, not "if-than." And btw, the other floggers don't "write about the Civil War full-time," either. They write about "memory" and "era" and "other stuff"; but they spend an inordinate amount of time writing about Confederate heritage, and the SCV and the UDC and the Virginia Flaggers and the SHPG, and hot-headed kids who post on Facebook.)

Do y'all suppose Mr. Historian Ruminski believes that there was no drinkin' during Prohibition because there was AN ACTUAL US LAW -- indeed, AN ACTUAL US CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT -- against it?

Does he imagine there were no abortions performed in the United States before January 22, 1973 because they were PROHIBITED BY LAW?

Does he believe there are no foreigners illegally in the US of A because there are LAWS AGAINST it?

Does he think that nobody in the US of A smoked marijuana before it got  legitified (for medicinal purposes, don'tcha know)  in some states?

Detail of Confederate Memorial
Arlington National Cemetery
License: Creative Commons
Does he believe nobody ever drives faster than the speed limit because those limits are AUTHORIZED BY LAW?

I'll bet he believes there's no rampant voter fraud, either, since it's PROHIBITED by LAW.  No rippin' off Medicare. Nobody drives drunk. Nobody commits kidnapping, theft, rape or murder because there are ACTUAL US AND STATE LAWS against these things....

If you're going to make the case that no blacks served the Confederacy in war, you're going to have to do it on some other basis than there was AN ACTUAL CONFEDERATE LAW prohibiting it....
________________

For those who are interested, here is my position on black Confederates, dating back to June and July 2011 (it is patently NOT what floggers say the "heritage" position is):

The Black Confederates Controversy
Black Confederates Redux

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Of Windshields and Bugs....



Confederate heritage (especially the Virginia Flaggers)  just keeps rolling on, despite everything the floggers try to throw at it -- including themselves!

Friday, October 24, 2014

This 'n' That

Leftist/atheistic hatred of Nina Pham and her faith on display in the Twitterverse: 

* * *

Hey, BParks, it's October ... and we're still HEE--ERE.


* * *
Confederate drones? Watch the skies...

 
 
* * *
 
I'm a smooth jazz fan, but now and then traditional jazz rocks! Pete Fountain ain't got nothin' on this lady!


* * *

Finally, finally at long last! Love in Smallfoot Alley is done! Stick a fork in it and send it to the beta readers. Depending on how fast they read and get comments back to me, I would love to get this puppy published by Halloween!

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Callous Flogger Contempt on Display

Sometimes, all you can do is shake your head. Kevin Levin belongs to a batch of civil war "interpreters" who are enslaved to their post-civil rights agenda of demonizing white Southerners, past and present. I don't call such "interpreters" historians because they have no respect for, or even concept of, actual history. For them, history is nothing but a tool to be used in their pursuit of advancing their ideology, leftism, and their agenda, demonization of Southern whites.

And as I have stated here before, for them, antebellum Southern white evil exists in direct inverse proportion to black/slave misery. Slaves must be portrayed as as utterly miserable in order to portray slave owners as utterly evil. The occasional disclaimer, issued for the purpose of seeding "plausible deniability" doesn't change this.

Not only is history a tool (or a weapon) for these "interpreters"; black folks, past and present, free and slaves (especially slaves) are objects to them. Cardboard cutouts from whom all humanity has been removed, who could not experience human emotions, (beyond pain and fear) or relationships, loyalty, affection, community, responsibility, humor, and, yes, joy.

The stakes of white evil and black misery rise considerably when it comes to the Confederacy. Nothing alarms and enrages "interpreter"/floggers like the subject of "black Confederates." They say black Confederates were "made up" by heritage folks to "prove" the South wasn't fighting to keep their slaves. They repeat, ad nauseum, that slaves could not be soldiers. They say slaves who accompanied their masters to war did so not out of loyalty but because they were slaves and had no choice. They say such slaves served their masters, not the Confederate army.

In other words, these slaves in the camps of the rebel army, who were cardboard cut outs in every other aspect of life (except in their ability to experience pain and fear) were suddenly keenly astute in understanding that the Confederacy was fighting to keep them in chains, and would not willingly have fought for it....

On his blog over the past several days, Levin has shown utter and brutal disrespect to the late Mattie Clyburn Rice, her father and her family. Mrs Rice, who passed away September 1 at 91, was the daughter of Weary Clyburn, who is accepted by many as a black Confederate soldier, a circumstance that enrages Levin, because it lifts Clyburn from his status of cardboard cutout slave and gives him human qualities of loyalty, bravery and so many others that slaves are not supposed to have, according to "interpreters."

Nevertheless, on the strength of his service to the Confederate army, Mrs. Rice was a member of the United Daughters of the Confederacy

Reading Levin's blog posts, if one wishes to choose some examples of the callous disrespect for the descendants of Weary Clyburn, one is frustrated by the sheer magnitude of the opportunity. I have had to choose something at random. Says Levin,
"Regardless of the nature of the relationship that the family has forged with descendants of Confederate soldiers, we should never forget that it was the defeat of the Confederacy that made Weary Clyburn free. It allowed him to build a family that no longer ran the risk of being forcibly separated."
In fact, most slave families -- a great majority of them -- did not run that risk. Digital History.com notes: "The most conservative estimates indicate that at least 10 to 20 percent of slave marriages were destroyed by sale. The sale of children from parents was even more common. As a result of the sale or death of a father or mother, over a third of all slave children grew up in households from which one or both parents were absent."
http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtID=2&psid=3042

Turn the numbers around and what you see is that 80 to 90 percent of slave marriages were NOT destroyed and basically two-thirds of slave children grew up in a household with one or both parents.

To hear critics of the Confederacy tell it, basically ALL slave families were broken up by cruel masters. These numbers -- virtually never acknowledged by "interpreters" -- say otherwise.

What's supremely ironic is that these critics of the Confederacy, with their devotion to their ideology, glowingly approve of government poverty programs and entitlements to the descendants of slaves -- which has achieved the dissolution of the black family with a success rate slave masters couldn't begin to approximate (and who likely didn't want to). Today, 75 percent of black children (and in some cities, 90 percent) are separated from their fathers by government programs before they are even born.

Does that bother the civil war interpreters whose blogs I follow? I've never seen them complain about it, but then, they have a built in excuse -- their blogs are about the civil war (or its "memory" or its "era" or its "other stuff").  So, basically, Levin can show coldblooded contempt for Weary Clyburn, Mattie Clyburn Rice and their entire family, and come across to his colleagues, supporters and admirers as a champion of the ideology he worships, and a victorious promoter of its agenda...

  UPDATE  UPDATE  UPDATE  UPDATE  

Over on Levin's flog, somebody left a comment that included this:
In essence, it really doesn’t matter what Levin’s views are when the core of this matter is addressed: whether Clyburn was a slave or a soldier during the Civil War.

As if they're mutually exclusive.  They're not. Slaves have been serving as soldiers since ancient Rome, maybe before.

Saturday, October 18, 2014

Toldja, Part Deux

Florida man ordered to remove American flag display 
Residents of a Florida city covered their neighborhood with hundreds of American flags Monday in support of a local hardware store told to remove six American flags from its property.   Story and video here
As I've noted before ... what goes around, comes around.  Or ... paybacks are H-E- double hockey sticks and karma's a be-yotch.

Hey, good, loyal, leftist American starzinstripe-lovin' statists -- how does it feel to have your own methods turned on you? And remember -- it's only gonna get worse.

Friday, October 17, 2014

Whittle Nails It ... Again

A number of things concern me ... there are even a few things I fear. But ebola fever isn't one of them -- and Whittle does a fine job of presenting the reasons why I ain't skeered of coming down with it. What's interesting about ebola to me is the reaction to it in this country and what it says about us -- and about our government and its meddling and intrusion into health care.

What it says about the government is that it is either (a) astonishingly inept or (b) astonishingly uncaring about the population it is supposed to represent. Personally, I think it's a little of both. (You can see this starkly in the government's illegal importation of multitudes of kids from Central America, with basically no health screening or precautions.)

The dumbing down of American kids, starting with the baby boomer generation (talkin' 'bout MY generation) in our elementary school years, has now been increasingly implemented for three generations. Americans have been indoctrinated by the  leftist-run school system to see themselves as incompetent and government as the answer -- the caretaker. The problem is, officials in government come from the same pool of dumbed down people, and instances of  government incompetence that have resulted are paraded before us in the news, day after day.

As low as we have fallen, we still haven't reached the point where we hack to death people (unless, of course, we are Muslim converts) who are trying to help us; but I have seen on Facebook comments by people who suspect, like the Africans Whittle mentions, that efforts to combat the problem are actually efforts to spread it, in disguise.

We are the nation that basically won a global war and put men on the moon... But that was accomplished by the final un-dumbed down generation. By now, the USA has become a parody of itself...

Friday, October 10, 2014

Quote of the Week ... or Month ... or Whatever

I think the Virginia Flaggers err when they fly the CSA navy jack/Army of Tennessee flag as a salute to the soldiers of the Army of Northern Virginia. Not only do they fly a flag with no context, but the flag they fly violates any sort of historical context.

After all, it’s not history, but heritage, with these folks, and we know that it’s a heritage of hate, judging from the bitterness spewed by their spokespeople and supporters.

Your job, dear readers, should you accept it, is to --

(1) advise who should get to decide when flying a flag "errs" and what the criteria  for their decision should be; and what qualifications they should have to make such decisions for anyone but themselves.

(2) Identify spokespeople for the Virginia Flaggers.

(3) Identify any instances of hate and bitterness "spewed" by them at the VaFlaggers blog, Facebook group, or other venues. (Provide links.)

Personally, I think the Virginia Flaggers are doing a great job of keeping the Confederate battle flag visible, and people who are upset about it are those who wish to remove Confederate flags from public view and hide them in a basement somewhere, if not actually destroy them. This certainly includes the people who mouth off about "context".

The flippin' context for the Virginia Flaggers memorial flags is that they are Confederate battle flags flying in a Confederate state where battles were fought, for the purpose of commemorating the Confederate soldiers who fought those battles. How hard is that to comprehend?

Discuss.

What Goes Around, Comes Around

We've been telling all the CBF haters and CBF removers that once you create acceptance of removing American flags, even this* one, then that one would be next. And so it is...

Burning the US flag in Ferguson
SC high school students told to remove US flag from truck bed
Apartment complex orders resident to remove US flag
Firefighters ordered to remove US flag decals from helmets (This has since been reversed)
College student forced to remove US flag

And this is just a very quick, tiny look at the beginning. It will get worse.

Google Search index of orders to remove US flag

And, yes, Confederate flags are American flags. See? Fill in the blank:

 The Confederate States of _________

I'll give you a hint. It starts with A and ends with a and it ain't Antarctica.

* "...this one" refers to:

Thursday, October 9, 2014

And Now for Something Completely Different

There's been precious little rock music I've cared anything about since the late 1980s. But here are a couple I actually like. The video absolutely sucks, and the lyrics are awful, but I like the music.
 



Right Here, Right Now was released in 1999. How You Like Me Now was released in 2009. Perhaps another rock tune will be released in 2019 that I'll like...

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Corey In Drag

So David Tatum posts some images of his new ribbons on his blog, and gets a comment from Corey:


It's hard to read at this size, so here's a close up:


If it's still too small to read, it sez, "Not new nor improved. Did you check all your spelling this time professor?"

Dave also made a post about the ribbons at Dixie Outfitters on Facebook, and got a similar comment from one LeAnne Crabtree:
Interesting thing about LeAnne Crabtree. She's a member of George/Corey's Trashing Confederate Flags Facebook group. Her profile page shows some longstanding Corey fake-profile hallmarks. New to Facebook, few friends, little activity...
Another interesting thing about "LeAnne" -- she shows up in a Google image search...  Boy, does she!
Google Image Search

Scroll down past the "Visually Similar Images" and see all the web pages where "LeAnne" shows up!

Soooo, Ms. "LeAnne" joins a whole host of fake profiles Corey has fabricated (Victor Hatcher, Max Webber, Finster Henhawk, and many more). This is the first time I'm aware of that he created a female profile, however. Which leads us to wonder, has Corey developed gender issues? Or does he just enjoy going around in cyber-drag?
This is an example of the ethically challenged person who trashes Southern heritage and who hates and harasses heritage folks like the Virginia Flaggers.  A brother (sister?) in arms with a history professor who writes fraudulent book reviews at Amazon.com (click "Wish List" at bottom right to see who "One Skeptical Observer" really is) and who also hates and harasses the Virginia Flaggers. Big cyber-friends with Kristen "Wonder Woman" Konate who accused two Virginia Flaggers of putting her address online, when she was the one who did that.

Also friends with "Hecate Crowley" or "Crowley Hecate," aka Liberty Lamp(rey), who threatened the VaFlaggers ("Well, they should be scared of us, we win at this game, always have and always will. We would like to help put a stop to this flag going up, but we need a little assistance")and whose Twitter feed revealed a disturbing death fetish (Kill Whitey!). Corey/LeAnne has some bizarre cyber-friends ... not to mention weird alternate personalities....

Monday, October 6, 2014

Harping and Carping from the Texas Coast

Andy Hall is carping, broken-record-like, about Confederate veterans and the KKK again. His point is that if any Confederate veterans embraced the KKK, any and all who honors the Confederacy today should, too -- and in fact, they probably do, but don't trumpet it, since it got politically incorrect to do so ... but now and then, it slips out...

This is Andy's latest salvo against Southern heritage folks, this time Robert Mestas of Defending the Heritage. Andy was the one, you may remember, who called Robert's son "friggin' Opie" for his appearance on a Defending the Heritage video.  http://cwmemory.com/2011/04/05/the-next-generation/

You may further recall that Andy was all affronted by heritage folks who referred to a location in 1960s television series in their praise of the South, specifically, Mayberry, of The Andy Griffith Show fame. Sed Andy, "There’s one well-known Southron heritage site that, when the author wants to refer to traditional, rural Southern virtues, also mentions Mayberry — a fictional town that only existed on a Hollywood backlot, whose law enforcement officers never dealt with really serious violent crime, and where African Americans were almost invisible."

He never did explain why that was objectionable, but it was okay for Kevin Levin to huff and puff against heritage folks on the basis of a fictional 60s TV drama, The Rebel -- Johnny Yuma.

 Levin's tripe is here: Johnny Yuma’s Appomattox  http://cwmemory.com/2011/04/09/johnny-yumas-appomattox/

You can read my thoughts on Ludicrous Levin's praise of the fictional Yuma here: THIS is the spirit of reconcliation? http://mybacksass.blogspot.com/2011/04/this-is-spirit-of-reconciliation-lol.html

So now Andy is bellyaching because Robert's short caption identifying a Confederate veteran doesn't include the information about the man's KKK involvement. Then sez Andy, "I don’t know why I should expect better from Robert. After all, he has a habit of making up fake quotes from Confederate veterans, right?"Andy has a link embedded in that comment that takes the reader to this image from Facebook:

And in the Facebook thread following this image, there is this note from Robert:

I wrote the words myself as if they had been spoken by the man pointing his hand out to the future...
I suppose none of Andy's commenters notice that one instance of something does not establish a habit. But it's classic Hallism to take comments, claims, activities of one or a few heritage folks and palm them off as far more than they are, usually representative of all Southern heritage.

It's simply jaw-dropping that someone who strives so assiduously to palm himself off as a scholarly history writer seems ignorant of the concept of poetic license. (See Ed Baptist's new "history" book on slavery for breathtaking examples of poetic license.)
License or liberty taken by a poet, prose writer, or other artist in deviating from rule, conventional form, logic, or fact, in order to produce a desired effect.  (Dictionary.com)
Anyone with a grain of sense knows, or can figure out, that Robert's quote is poetic license, created from the present situation that Confederate heritage finds itself in (though Patrick Cleburne said something similar during the war).

Andy makes himself look nastier and more mean-spirited as time goes by.

Sunday, October 5, 2014

If This Is True...

There. Are. No. Words....  Story HERE AT Jihad Watch.

Baseball and ... the Civil War?

Excerpt from Dumb Jock: The Alex Austin Story. The set up: Kate Simmons has had a crush on Pensacola Mullets catcher Alex Austin since the first of the season. When she meets him at a team charity event, and he invites her to eat with him, it's like a dream come true...  (Alex, btw, is a sweet Southern boy.)

========


They carried their heavily laden plates and tall cups of iced tea to a vacant table at the edge of the crowd. There was no room on their plates for bread, and Alex volunteered to return for rolls.

"Be right back," he told her.

Considering that being near him, seeing him up close and conversing with him kept her stomach madly quivering, it was amazing to Kate that she could eat a bite. And yet her appetite had ratcheted up throughout the evening, and now hunger was gnawing at her.

He brought back a plate heaped with dinner rolls, breadsticks, buttered slices of French bread, and saltines to accompany their salads.  

"I also took a chance on bringing dessert. Do you like white chocolate macadamia nut cookies?"

She smiled, delighted. "My favorite!"

"Mine too." He returned her smile and took a bite of seafood salad, giving a barely audible moan of pleasure. "Good stuff. So, Kate, are you from Pensacola?"

"I'm from Gadsden, Alabama. I moved here about a year ago. "

"Gadsden. Home of Emma Sansom," he murmured. "A Confederate heroine. Fifteen years old, showed General Forrest where to ford a creek and engage Union troops that were on the way to cut off the Confederate railroad at Chattanooga."

"Yes. There's a monument to her in Gadsden. And a school named after her."

He nodded. "I've seen the monument."

Kate's brows rose with mild curiosity. "Are you a civil war buff?"

"In a manner of speaking. I'm a student and admirer of the Confederacy."

"I guess I don't automatically associate the War Between the States and baseball."

"Well, there is a connection." He gave her a wink. "Ken Burns made snarky documentaries about both of them."

What Simpson Purposely Left Out ...

... I.e., Lying by Omission. What a Surprise, Huh? But Lying by Omission is Still Lying.

He comments at XRoads following the recent garbage post about Duck Dynasty: 
From a fan of the show defending her heroes: “One fellow harped on Phil advising men to marry a fifteen year old, as if it were awful.” Oh, those sweet southern boys can do whatever they want.
That's actually TWO lies-by-omission.  Here's what I said. (The red parts are what he deliberately lied about by omitting.)
One fellow harped on Phil advising men to marry a fifteen year old, as if it were awful. This was discussed at XRoads several months back and if memory serves, in the comment thread that followed, Liberty Lamp(rey), aka Crowley Heacate on Facebook, claimed that I had defended a rapist, which, of course, I have never done. (First lie by omission, which itself contains Lamprey's lie.)

But back to the kitsch group, I had to ask, "... what's worse? A teenaged girl marrying someone who loves her and will be good to her, or a teenaged girl who sleeps around, gets pregnant, has abortions, gets STDs, drops out of school and "marries" the federal government for the rest of her flippin' life?" (Second lie by omission.)
Cherry picking for deceptive effect is an old, old habit with this guy. Anybody care to delve into his motives ... i.e., WHY he left out the parts in red?

The more I see of Simpson's purposeful deceit, his lack of scruples, his woefully deficient level of ethics, the more sobering it becomes to me that American college kids are indoctrinated by the likes of this narcissistic deceiver.

One of the hallmark narcissistic traits, btw, is haughty body language. Another is excessively taking selfies and posting them on social media. Haughty body language IN a selfie would be a dead giveaway, then, wouldn't it?

Read more on selfies and narcissism here.

Saturday, October 4, 2014

Retreat? Or Stalin-like Erasure?

Kevin Levin defines "the steady retreat of Confederate symbols such as the flag and other references in public places" as one of the "narratives" of the Civil War sesquicentennial. Citing the proposal of The Danville Va Museum of Fine Arts and History to remove the Third National Flag that flies on the property, he quotes past board president Barry shields:
“We believe this plan lays the groundwork for many encouraging and fulfilling years ahead in the arts, culture, humanities, Danville’s history, education facilities, new partnerships, inclusion and community engagement."
Levin highlights the word "inclusion" and concludes: "Seems like all of these stories are about inclusion."

You've got to shake your head, wondering how presumably educated people of presumably reasonable intelligence can equate REMOVAL with INCLUSION.

The only conclusion I can reach is that they're being deliberately dishonest. It is totally disingenuous to say confederate symbols are in a "steady retreat." They are the targets of a steady, Stalin-like "cleansing" campaign. They are purposely being erased.

Levin further sez, "Throughout the South public institutions are taking steps to remove or move Confederate Battle flags for reasons that are obvious to folks who understand its long history from the Civil War to Civil Rights and beyond."

No. The battle flags are being removed by people, often from elsewhere (Anna Brodsky, Cara Burton) who have little to no understanding of the South, its history and its denizens -- people who want to foist their leftist ideology on the culture at large, and separate a people from their history and heritage. That's what leftism does.

Friday, October 3, 2014

Duck Dynasty Meets MCM

I got kicked off one of my mid century modern Facebook groups.

I'm a member of one group that emphasizes design in architecture and furniture from the 1950s and 60s, and was intended by the creators to be educational. Emphasis is on architects like Richard Neutra and Pierre Koenig and furniture designers like Vladimir Kagan and Charles and Ray Eames.

But human nature being what it is, sometimes a post strays into "Is this MCM?" followed by a lamp, a vase, a piece of furniture. Or "How do I fix this?" followed by a closeup of an ink stain on teak... And there can be an occasional side-splitting post with equally hilarious comments; for example, photo of an old 19th Century woman sitting at a spinning wheel with the comment, "MCM?" (Maybe you'd have to be there to appreciate it.)

I also belonged to MCM Kitsch and that group included discussions of everything from chalkware fish for bathroom walls to paint-by-numbers pink flamingos. Danish modern furniture, atomic textiles, sputnik lamps, all welcomed. But some of the folks on this group didn't like the other group -- said they were snobbish and snooty and "jumped" on people who asked about the wrong thing...

Well, I pointed out that not everyone at the "snooty" group did that, only a small handful of people in a group of 20,000+ members.

Some folks didn't like me defending the snooty group, I guess.

I also -- along with some other group members -- pointed out how the decorum in the kitsch group had recently deteriorated, with f-bombs in nearly every post, and even a change in the group's description to protect members' "free speech" right to express their vulgarity.

But that wasn't the only thing that wore out my welcome there. A day or so later, someone posted, "Um, do pastel Tupperware tumblers have something to do with Duck Dynasty?" and things went downhill from there.

There was a short explanation of Uncle Si's Tupperware tumbler, and then somebody posted, "Duck Dynasty -- the new Mad Men." Someone else posted, "More like the new KKK." Well, I couldn't let that go unchallenged.

The thread turned into a knockdown-drag-out.  Somebody called the Robertson men "ignorant and backward," so of course I had to mention that Phil had a masters degree in education. Somebody else called Phil a pedophile, or at least guilty of statutory rape because he and Kay surely had sex before marriage, and they married when she was fourteen.... 

I informed them that Phil openly admits that he did a lot of bad things -- including drunkenness and adultery -- before he became a Christian.

One fellow harped on Phil advising men to marry a fifteen year old, as if it were awful. This was discussed at XRoads several months back and if memory serves, in the comment thread that followed, Liberty Lamp(rey), aka Crowley Heacate on Facebook, claimed that I had defended a rapist, which, of course, I have never done.

But back to the kitsch group, I had to ask, "... what's worse? A teenaged girl marrying someone who loves her and will be good to her, or a teenaged girl who sleeps around, gets pregnant, has abortions, gets STDs, drops out of school and "marries" the federal government for the rest of her flippin' life?"

The thread continued, some sticking up for Phil, some not, and then I posted: "This country, this culture, has become so sex-saturated, it's everywhere, and it's accepted -- read the Guttmacher Institute's data on teen sex -- and people are huffing and puffing about what Phil Robertson did 50 years ago? Why? Because he's a Christian, and Christians are facing greater and greater hostility in this country. And that is the ONLY reason."

But when I tried to post it, the thread was suddenly gone... In fact, the whole group was gone -- I had been kicked out without warning though I had violated no group rules.

Ah, just as well. When there was more emphasis on f-bombs than starburst clocks, there wasn't much point, anyway.

Interestingly enough, not long after that, Simpson posted "A Note on Duck Dynasty" at XRoads.
Remember those folks who stood tall and proud for “Duck Dynasty” … even in the face of this report … at least until they found out that the central character didn’t care for the Confederate flag?

A certain quacker quacked: “We need to keep the ability to differentiate between a Phil Robertson and a Brooks Simpson.”

This has just become more difficult in light of this revelation. More like Duck Head than Duck Dynasty (and I owned my share of  Duck Head khakis in the 1980s when I lived in South Carolina … I see they’ve become more expensive).

Oh, my.
He, of course, can't be talking about moi, because I never stopped supporting Phil.

The Xroads blog entry is just a rehash with links to old posts about Duck Dynasty ... Except for a link to this (the revelation):

 How A Filthy-Rich, Clean-Cut ‘Duck Dynasty’ Tricked The World

Apparently this is for me. I guess I'm supposed to be shocked and feel betrayed by the Duckster clan.  In the March 5, 2014 article at that link, Author Jackson Marciana claims, that A&E's "reality" show is fake. All of it.  It's scripted, he sez.

Well, that's just silly. It's not a reality show. It's a flippin COMEDY.  And while it is staged, it's not scripted. Much of what pops out of these guys' mouths is from them, not a scriptwriter.

Nevertheless, the outraged Mr. Marciana sez, "But contrary to the claims of fans, this is not “all in good fun.” The Duck Dynasty cast are wealthy “1%ers” who know precisely what they are doing and why. Their actions are part of a systematic “dumbing down” of society, and a romanticizing of ignorance."

Look, funny is funny. Nobody accused the Three Stooges or Laurel and Hardy of dumbing down society and romanticizing ignorance.  And Duck Dynasty IS funny. (Willie and Jase hitting golfballs that Phil and Si skeet shoot is one of my favorite scenarios!)

Yes, the Robertsons are wealthy. Who doesn't know that? Willie refers to himself on camera as "...a wealthy redneck..."

Nevertheless Mr. Marciana tries to prove, using some photos, that the show is fake.  "The first thing you’ll notice," he sez about the photos, "is the conspicuous lack of camouflage, face paint, headbands, and beards." He claims the "before and after" photos are "before and after A&E makeovers" designed to fool fans and, presumably, to promote ignorance.

Does that shock me? Uh, no. I've known most of what's in that juvenile, ludicrous website going on two years now.

 My husband was a fan about one season ahead of me. When I discovered the show in season two, I did a lot of reading about the Robertsons at The Christian Chronicle. I also found online an ABC  video, Swamp Millionaires, that aired March 21, 2012 and includes pretty much everything this dolt Marciana thought was  such a revelation in March 2014.

The "clean cut" photos of the Robertson boys are years and years old.  They weren't made just before A&E started the series, as Marciana implies. Look at the photo of Willie, Korie and their two kids -- those little pre-schoolers are John Luke and Sadie, who were in high school when the series started.

In fact, the very same picture of Willie's family is featured in the ABC video.

(My favorite part, btw, -- skeet shooting golf balls -- comes at about 2:17.)



Nope, these guys didn't climb into camo and grow beards for A&E.  Phil started making and selling hunting videos back in the 1980s.  Later, the Robertsons had a show on The Outdoor Channel -- again, about hunting, not the slap-stick comedy of Duck Dynasty.

So the beards go back a ways; and the clean-shaven faces go back even further.

It's amazing what a presumably smart man with all kindsa book edumacation thinks will stick it to somebody he doesn't like.... In this case, he really, really guessed wrong.

THIS Is Why...

...I oppose "freedom of religion" for Islam in the USA. First, Islam is not a religion, it is an ideology. Second, one of its tenets is to destroy all other religions, and freedom, and anyone who opposes Islam.  Islam opposes everything the USA was built on, and what it stands for (or what it used to stand for, before leftists made so much headway transforming the culture).

So imagine you're at work one day, just like any other day, and an Islamic madman enters your workplace and, out of the blue, begins stabbing you... And then slices your head off.

Simpson and the floggers -- good little multicultural leftists that they are --  may want to accommodate the religion that compells people to do that.

I do not.



"The left, you see, secretly admire people like Jah’Keem Yisrael. They admire them for having the courage to do what they will not do, namely, get their hands dirty ... or bloody, as the case may be.  The left and these Islamic murderers are in a symbiotic relationship and they both know it. Both depend on the other to weaken traditional American strength -- the left at home and the jihadis overseas. Papering over a few beheadings is a small price to pay to keep that alliance together, especially since this happened in Oklahoma, I mean, it's not like Colleen Hufford was a celebrity or a real person or anything. If they'd beheaded Barbra Streisand well, then, there would have been some handwringing to do. No, they will let this domestic cancer grow because if Americans wake up to the reality that the media is, in fact, in the news suppression business, well then, they may start to wonder what other stories have been suppressed. No, they're going to let this cancer grow unreported until the Statue of Liberty and anyone who is with her go into the flames."  ~Bill Whittle

The Fort Hood jihadist terrorist used a gun and really racked up the number of victims.  The Oklahoma jihadist terrorist used a knife and beheading -- only two victims, and one survived -- but he ratcheted up the terrorist meter, bigtime.

This evil cannot be accommodated. It has to be opposed, stood up to, and defeated. Utterly.

Wednesday, October 1, 2014

What a Scream!

"...I’ve made it a point to highlight on this blog how Americans have gone about interpreting the Civil War era."  ~Kevin Levin

Bwahahahaahhaa  LOL LOL LOL!!!!

What he's made a point of doing is demonizing Confederates, trashing and attacking Confederate heritage and vilifying white Southerners, past and present.

Smooth Jazz Interlude

 From the silken trumpet of Rick Braun (no, I don't know if he sleeps with his trumpet)...

"Notorious" (with Boney James on sax) and "Chelsea" -- no, not new-mom Chelsea Clinton Whatezername, but the artsy-foody section of Manhattan ... but y'all don't hold that against this smooth mellow tune....

I'm going to be on and off the Internet for the next day or so. I'm gonna make pies. Three pies. I probably haven't made five or ten pies in my whole life. But I'm going to make these three pies, and then I'm gonna drastically cut carbs until the end of the year (except for Thanksgiving and Christmas).

Meanwhile, y'all enjoy...



Hatred of Southerners on Blatant Display

Here:  The South’s victim complex: How right-wing paranoia is driving new wave of radicals

The article is leftist sewage. Best I've been able to discover thus far, the author, Matthew Pulver, has no other leftist hate-mongering articles in Salon, but has several articles at Flagpole Magazine in Athens, Georgia, home of the University (what a surprise, huh) of Georgia. I hope I get some time to skim these articles, but you can tell just from the titles they drip with toxic leftism.

But what's even more interesting is the hate spewing forth from the Salon comment threads. Although she's a Confederacy-hater, commenter LynnRobb gets some things right. She nails it with this:
What do you think Germany or Japan would be like today if no one had lifted a finger to help feed them or rebuild their infrastructure and economies after WWII?  That is what happened to the South, and it took almost a century for it to pull itself up by its bootstraps and become economically viable again.

Coupled with the kind of hateful attitude toward Southerners expressed in most of the 642 posts (so far), perhaps the South is justified in both feeling victimized and distrusting liberals.
Ah, Mr. or Ms. Robb,  you're injecting entirely too much reality into the discussion. Don't you know that gittin' your leftist hate on is soooo much more fun?  Like this:

:Too bad my ancestors let the southern traitors off as easy as they did.  They should have killed every inbred* hillbilly they found in Georgia.
(LynnRobb asks: @TCinLA You DO realize you are advocating ethnic cleansing, right? ButTCinLA doesn't reply! Gasp! What a surprise! And I guess TC doesn't realize that quite a number of hillbillies in the north Georgia mountains were unionists.)
Spoken like a true, never can admit defeat, low-bred, low-educated southerner**Yay you.
It may need burning down again. ... Where is Sherman when you need him. And where are the lions? ... It is awful, the people dumb, their policies and poltics stupid and dangerous. I've been working on getting out since my ill fated decision to move down here. A total cesspool.

It's not just a racial thing.  In fact, I would argue that's the least important aspect of the problem.  It's the whole Southern mentality, the hyper-religiosity, and the contempt for education and science.  These are things that can't be imposed by outsiders.  It has to happen from within and the chances of that ever happening are vanishingly small.

...these fools world view is heavily predicated on preserving the social order ...

...Look at the rapid minority growth, that is causing the southern whites to freakout and pass Jim Crow voter laws. (Passing laws to prevent the voter fraud so expertly practiced for generations by the left isn't "freaking out". The left hates honest elections--cw)

There's more, and I even left a few comments, but leftists are hermetically sealed off from any viewpoints other than their own, so it's pretty pointless.

But for people who say we "need" to be hated, but really aren't hated, the comment thread at Salon proves them abysmally wrong. 
____________________
*Hate words in red.