The analogy should be to King Geo III and Don (the don) Trump, both nutsy koo koo.
In Trump's insanity, he'is a combination of Don Corteleone (fictional Mafia godfather)and Vladimr Putin.
When I was in high school, I read the Head and Heart of Thomas Jefferson, by John Dos Pasos. Becuse it was critical of Jefferson, my teacher thought that automaically made me some kind of a radical, bent on undermining the validity of the "patriotic" history of America. If reading it didn't, maybe my teacher's reaction did!
Jefferson was complicated. While he owned slaves, and was defacto lord of the manor, he wrote:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
What hypocracy. When I was in school, segregation was still the law of the land. The voting rights concept did not become law until I was in college.
At the same time, in a letter, now known to historians as “A Dialogue between the Head and Heart,” Jefferson pines for a woman [Mrs Cosway] who has made him “the most wretched of all earthly beings” and at the same time chides himself for giving in to emotional attachments. From AI: The dialogue reveals Jefferson’s struggle between his desire for Cosway and his need to maintain his integrity. (She was, after all, married.) The letter concludes with Jefferson’s reason winning over the desires of his heart. He wrote that the only “effective security against such pain of unrequited love, is to retire within ourselves and to suffice for our own happiness.” Two years later, however, his letters to her still expressed great longing.
In 1787, Jefferson wrote to Cosway while traveling in Italy, painting an idyllic picture of the two of them together one day in the future: “we will breakfast every day…[go] away to the Desert, dine under the bowers of Marly, and forget that we are ever to part again.” He wrote to her again in 1788 from Paris and expressed his “tenderness of affection” and wished for her presence though he knew he “had no right to ask.”
Eventually, Jefferson’s physical separation from Maria and the hopelessness of a relationship with her cooled his ardor. After returning to America in 1789, his letters to her grew less frequent; partly due to the fact that he was increasingly preoccupied by his position as President George Washington’s secretary of state. She, however, continued to write to him and vented her frustration at his growing aloofness. In his last letters, he spoke more of his scientific studies than of his love and desire for her, finally admitting that his love for her had been relegated to fond memories of when their relationship had been “pure.”
Cosway left England in 1789 after her husband died and moved to a village in Italy to open a convent school for girls.
More from AI: While Jefferson wrote about his desire to ameliorate slavery and treat people more humanely, he still profited from their labor and owned them as property. He reportedly avoided harsh punishments like whipping, but he did sell slaves away from their families, which he considered the ultimate punishment, and even used slaves as a means of generating wealth through their reproduction.
Adams was also no prize, as he considered himelf as prfesident like a king, thus the alien and sedition controversy Trump promotes.
Before we can reform the system, we have to get rid of Trump; and MAGA.
It is very likely that Jefferson did not write those words....Thomas Paine did. They were close friends. Paine gave his draft of the Declaration of Independence to Jefferson. If you compare the punctuation style, capital letters in the middle of sentences for emphasis in the Declaration to the style and wording in Common Sense you can see the match. Jefferson's style was much more formal and flowers. Paine gave not only words but passion for Independence from the king instead of a frustrated rebellion as it started out to be. First came Common Sense Jan 1776, then the draft of the Declaration in summer of 1776.. Paine did not think the colonialsl would accept a Declaration of Independence written by and Englishman. So his first draft was handed over to is distinguished friend. So no hypocracy.
Jefferson, Adams, and Franklin were named to a committee to prepare a declaration of independence. Robert R. Livingston, and Roger Sherman also participated .While Jefferson is credited with the primary authorship, the committee and then the Second Continental Congress made significant revisions and edits.
Some of the language came straight from John Locke, but "property" was replaced by perfuit of happineff. All their ss's looked like f's. I stole this from Stan Freberg. .https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSlsKUFT1n8
AI says Paine had nothing to do with it. Paine's pamphlet "Common Sense" played a crucial role in influencing public opinion in favor of independence. "Common Sense" argued for separation from British rule and paved the way for the Declaration.
Lucian Truscott IV, who is a descendant of Thomas Jefferson from Jefferson’s daughter with his wife, has attempted unsuccessfully to get his fellow descendants of Jefferson to acknowledge and accept the descendants of Jefferson and Sally Hemings as members.
Jefferson also imagined that America could be a nation of small farmers, with the middle class consisting mostly of merchants supplying them. International traders would be limited to shipping our produce to Europe where it would be in demand, thus avoiding any chance we would be attacked. He did set up a plan for selling public lands which was largely carried out, though ultimately it did not lead to an America of yeomen farmers happy on their lands with just little cities to supply them. The vision was of a sort of pure Rosseau-inspired democracy, ignoring of course the people whose lands were taken, the rights of women, the planter aristocracy and of course enslaved human beings. As Thom has discussed Hamilton was far more realistic in trying to develop an industrial society to make the country fairly self-sufficient in its needs and which went far beyond people living in the countryside. On the whole Thomas seemed to have the ideal, Alexander the practical, and there's that's the tension we often see in America. It's a shame that they never could find a compromise that worked.
As president Jefferson expanded the land mass, opening up the west. As to ownership, in Anglo Saxon common law, posession was 9/10ths of ownership and we still use concepts like adverse possession and easment by necessity, that give rights to squatters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adverse_possession
Jefferson wrote the 5th Amendment, used to take private property for public necssity -- with just compensation -- condemnation.
Oh I agree, I was thinking more of a vision for America. Really until the middle of the last century there was some idealization of the small farmer while the economic power was increasingly centered in the cities. A lot of post-Civil War history was related to that tension between urban and rural areas, and I think a case can be made that in some ways it morphed into the cultural and immigrant conflicts we see today. There are other related strands, such as those who see the country through a religious lens and those who are mercantile in orientation. For his own purposes Trump has definitely plugged into a mythical vision of a simpler time and country, though obviously it is not one Jefferson would ever have approved of!
Doc, Trump, if anyone, is the heir to Hamilton. Hamilton propositioned a unitary executive that would serve indefinitely, and he favored tariffs, as noted in his Report on Manufactures.
What is not understood by us moderns is the mindset, environment and culture of the 18th Century.
In the 18th Century only property owning men were considered citizens. Citizens were those who had a vested interest (property) in the success of the nation.
And it was property owning men who were to elect representatives to legislate and administer the affairs of state (i.e. a Republic), just as in ancient Rome and Greece.
In the first two elections, freed owning blacks and women could and did vote, until that right was rescinded by NJ in 1807. Also only property owing men could vote, until the various states realized that they could embed their political control by enfranchising all men.
By 1800 only three states gave voting rights to all white men, Kentucky, New Hampshire and Vermont
You should view the fairly recent SNL skit where they bring to life the painting of Washington Crossing The Delaware. Kenan Thompson, as a slave, asks if he’s included in the “all men are created equal.
None of this makes sense. Our degree of desperation doesn't approach that of the Founders. When it does, we will be as creative. I bet we will create ideals & ideas as radical and new as theirs.
Great change rises out of ashes. We have yet to burn.
Lets talk about the real reason for Trumps Tariffs: He wants to make a deal (blackmail) countries and companies so they are beholding to him. Same tactic used by Putin to gain control after fall of USSR. Trumps tariffs have nothing to do with protecting and creating jobs in US. NOTHING !!!
Trump can only blackmail those that are dependent on the United States.
America's super power is consumption, we are the insatiable mouth, and the world lines up to sell us their products and resources. World leaders humiliate themselves by making haj to the fake gold room for an audience with his ethereal and imperial highness , Donald J Trump, prostrating themselves before him, and allowing him an opportunity to demonstrate his mastery over them as though they were lap dogs.
Not just country leaders like Macro, Canada's Carney, Stermer, but even governors like Newsom and Whitmer...If they flipped him the finger he would get pissed and try to take retribution, but he would respect them. He doesn't respect his MAGAts, he doesn't respect those that adore and supplicate themselves to him, and for good reason he knows that they don't deserve respect. One person he does respect is the governor of Maine, who told him I will see you in court, she did and she won.
The reason Trump told Carney of Canada, Never say never, is because he debased himself by visiting the Offal Office and allowing himself to be humiliated by Trump, and all because of money.
On the whole, I think Carney came off looking better than Trump. Trump’s threats on Canadian sovereignty were disgraceful and disrespectful of one of our oldest allies. All they did was to sink the campaign of Canada’s wannabe Trump Pierre Poilievre, and Poilievre deserved it.
Yes, Carney came out looking better than Trump, but for what, and to what end.
Here is the problem, all of these country leaders and governors that come groveling to Trump, kissing is feet and ass, only empower Trump, and debase themselves.
Trump has the whole world groveling at his feet, no wonder he tweeted I rule the world, and with people like Carney, Stermer Whitmer, Newsom, performing haj to his holiness, it only encourages him and makes him worse.
If they all stood up and told him to go fuck himself, he would lose this bullying bravado.
He is a bully and the only way to deal with a bully is to knock him on his ass.
As always thank you for this excellently crafted essay. When we look at the writings of our founders, Jefferson, Franklin, Adams and others we see these common themes, and understand why they rebelled. The Declaration, the Virginia statute on religious liberty and so many other documents attest to this. We are in the same situation today with Mad King Donnie, his band of morbidly rich oligarchs, the police state that he is creating, and the nations he is threatening with military invasion. We must, like those you mentioned resist this tyranny.
By the way I wrote this the other night on my Substack. It is a warning and call to resistance.
If we do not do what you urge, we will deserve our fate. It doesn’t matter that the morbidly rich and the religious fundamentalists have succeeded in dumbing down huge chunks of the electorate. Enough of us are smart enough, healthy enough, and capable enough to do it. What we need is the will to do it, recognizing it might require actions not entirely consistent with our goals. But the reality is we must defeat those who would destroy this country and control our lives by any means necessary. Only then can we rebuild, restore and reform. As the farm workers marching with Cesar Chavez chanted, “Si, se puede! Venceremos!”
A Internet search advised that there are 735 billionaires in the United States. Thirteen of them are in Trump's cabinet. Ten percent control 60% of the nations wealth. The richest of them Elon Musk has gutted many departments of the federal government and left tens of thousand of government workers unemployed. Among them, inspector generals,overseers ferreting out fraud waste and abuse. Trump family and friends are making billions in crypto and manipulating the stock market. So it seems to me. Pardons for most all involved in in the Jan 6 coup attempt, deportation of immigrants without due process, accumulation of data on all of us, and the Supreme Court bending most of the time to Trump's will. There is no divine right of billionaires but money talks. The richest put Trump in power and appear likely to try to keep him there. As John Lennon wrote and sung, "They keep you doped with religion, sex, and TV, and you think your so clever and classless and free, but you're still (expletive) peasants as far as I can see". If Trump hasn't taken away the right to vote by midterms maybe we have a chance.
The real problem G2 is not the billionaires, the 1%, they are who they are, they have always been and will always be. Even in a supposedly classless society, there arose a New Class of privileged, like in Russia and Yugoslavia. Milovan Djilas, wrote of them in his book The New Class.
No the problem is our fellow citizens, the ideologues, the true believers, (and religion is an ideology), the lazy, the semi sentient, the fearful. Those who voted for and demand an authoritarian, one whom they believe will make the world not only safe for them, but elevate them as to stature and status. They be MAGAts. Trump is their lord and savior, he can do no wrong, they don't care if he is a felon, a pedophile, that he steals from them, they gladly throw money at him, just like those idiots in Prosperity Gospel churches.
They don't care, he can profane their Jesus, the Pope, and kill someone on 5th Ave, because in him they see deliverance and social elevation over those that they perceive as a personal threat to their natural superiority,
Yes there is a lot of evidence for what you are saying. The MAGA's are lost in their faith, lost to reason. The thin reed I'm holding onto is, if we have open honest nationwide midterms, perhaps concurrent with stagflation then maybe some of the 89 million that did not vote will vote in their own best interest. Maybe.
It sounds like you're scared. :) You outta be. . . It's time to be scared. Now that you are scared, you should write a post on SLOTH—Dante did! How about writing about Midas or that guy in the Bible who couldn't read the writing on the wall. Maybe you could write about Plutus or Mammon. Stay scared, write scared, maybe someone will listen!
"if we don’t fight them now, everything the Founders built could collapse." Strike
"could" and insert "will". If we don't resist — and resist now — we lose. Doors will be smashed open in the night, the troublesome sent on their way to Libya (Libya? Really?) The question of the hour, discussed furtively, will be whether or not Orwell was an optimist.
Self-rule? If we had self-rule we would have a national health care system, affordable housing, and end to perpetual war and genocide in Gaza and strong organized labor. We have been ruled by the donor class since the founding of our country, as the slaves and servants were ruled by oligarchs like Jefferson who wanted to maintain a system that kept the wealthy in power to protect their capital. You can idealize all you want, and it's not easy to start a country of course, but I'd prefer to get past the lionization of rapists and torturers who built this country on the backs of human suffering.
Holy shit, he is back. Our phoney Jew, Boris. Come on man, you don't give a shit about Gaza, it is only a tool by which to whip your foes, those of us who don't want to live under the slavery of Trump and his brother Putin.
There is something seriously wrong with your wiring.
Thom has mentioned many times the hypocrisy and moral dilemma of Thomas Jefferson, yet here you go, totally ignoring what he has written, and launching into a screed as if he was a Jeffersonian apologist.
There really is something wrong with your wiring. Maybe you are frustrated because you are not the savior of the world, or just a Putin henchman.
MSM has not been reporting that the PA is on our side.
"Mahmoud Abbas has called Hamas "sons of dogs" in a fiery speech in which he demanded the group release the hostages it is still holding, disarm, and hand over control of Gaza in order to end the war with Israel.
"The president of the Palestinian Authority told a meeting in the occupied West Bank that Hamas had given Israel "excuses" to continue its attacks on Gaza, and told it to "release the hostages and be done with it".
Here is my opinion. Dispensing with the fruitless chicken and egg argument.
The current situation was caused by HAMAS.They arrived at the wrong conclusion after that Gilead hostage swap. In which one IDFsoldier was swapped for 1,000 terrorists including Yahya Sinwar.
They took from that the message that the Jews would give up anything and everything for a Jewish life, even after they committed an act of cold blooded terrorism by murdering over 1,000 Jewish women, children, elderly and disabled.
If HAMAS is not an agent of Netanyahu,. the Likkud, its allies and the orthodox settlers, it might as well be
I am also positive that Netanyahu knew in advance what was coming, for one thing their was a shift change in the watch towers overlooking Gaza just before the attack, and women replaced the men and the women were unarmed and the men took their weapons, and the IDF and police were basically unreachable, in communicado,
HAMAS could have stopped the destruction and slaughter anytime, still can, but they are playing into the agenda of the Israeli right and Trump by hanging on.
As regards Israel's response. Let's personalize it for all of the bleeding hearts.
What would you do if a marauding gang came into your neighbor hood, slaughtered and raped people, then took hostages back with them. and there demand was that if you want the hostages back, then commit suicide and leave.. Dispense with the who started what thing, deal with the present.
As regards a two state solution. A pipe dream, never happen as it is a religious war.
Israel, prior to Oct 7th, was a liberal democracy, ostensible an ethnostate (there are 57Muslim ethostates BTW) But it was a liberal state with civil rights and voting rights for all, including Muslim Arabs and Beduins, That sentiment and rights are evaporating in the wake of Oct 7th, as the Israeli public is become more radicalized.,, thanks to HAMAS.
The goal of the Ultra Zionists, the settlers,the Israel right is Eratz Ysrael, great Israel, and the flag represents their designs, the blue strip at the top is the Euphrates and the blue stripe at the bottom is the river of Egypt.
For the Muslim Arabs, the mere existence of a Jewish state on what is deemed to be sacred Muslim soil, is an affront, a blasphemy that cannot stand, and was probably the reason behind the 1948 war, the 1956, 1967, 1973, 2006 wars and intifada.
Islam has three holy sites, Makkan, Medina, and Haram al Sharif (Dome of the Rock and al Aqsa mosque)
The sites are so sacred that the kufr, the kaffir, the infidel is not even permitted to enter.in fact Saudi soil is so"sacred" that he Mufit of Makkah had to desacrilize enclaves where Saudis built gated and fenced compounds to accomodate the needed foreign workers.
One of the reasons that raised the ire of Bin Laden was that Prince Sultan air base, housed infidels who walked around freely.
one act that the Israel right know will cause an uproar and another uprising is for Jews to enter the Haram al Sharif and the al Aqsa mosque.
It is Islamic belief, sahih 1295/1296), book 56, hadith 139 al Bukhari, that the day of jjudgment (Islamic end times) won't come about until their is a war with the Jews and they are are all wiped out, it is even quoted in para 7, of the HAMAS covenant.
The point is that this is a religous war, I am sure that Liberal and secular Israelis, want nothing to do with it, and want nothing more than to live in peace side by side with their neighbors, and I am sure that their are Muslim Arabs that feel the same way, but alas, it is not such people that run nations governments, make policy and carry through with action.
Most Americans would rather live unbothered by all of this sturm und drang that rages around us. I sure would, but the true believers, the haters aren't satisfied, they want it all, land,property wealth, supplication,obedience.
The same shit that is happening in the mid east is happening in America, it just hasn't reached he crescendo of violence,....yet.
As my friend, Curtis from Oakland said in 1959, the next time this planet stops, I'm getting off.
I don't because there are too many fanatic Muslims, that want to be shaheeds and get their 72 virgins. They will use the Palestinian state as a base of operations, as they did Gaza, to launch attacks on Israel, and that will be that.
I have an observation. Trump has already claimed that he is running the world, that he wants Canada, Greenland & who knows what's going on in the Panama Canal. We haven't heard anything!
He's posted a picture of himself as Pope! Do you think he's going to declare himself Pope? If so, maybe we could call him "Poop 💩 Don the 1st"!
Hello Thom, please stop using words like 'amazing' when describing despicable Trumpian behavior. Use adjectives such as degrading disgusting putrid despicable and the word 'criminal' for what we are witnessing. Channel just a little rush limbaugh who did outrage so well!
The Sacred Trinity of the Eternally Profane.
Nice work, Thom. This is an exceptional report.
We elevevate and personify our founding.
The analogy should be to King Geo III and Don (the don) Trump, both nutsy koo koo.
In Trump's insanity, he'is a combination of Don Corteleone (fictional Mafia godfather)and Vladimr Putin.
When I was in high school, I read the Head and Heart of Thomas Jefferson, by John Dos Pasos. Becuse it was critical of Jefferson, my teacher thought that automaically made me some kind of a radical, bent on undermining the validity of the "patriotic" history of America. If reading it didn't, maybe my teacher's reaction did!
Jefferson was complicated. While he owned slaves, and was defacto lord of the manor, he wrote:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
What hypocracy. When I was in school, segregation was still the law of the land. The voting rights concept did not become law until I was in college.
At the same time, in a letter, now known to historians as “A Dialogue between the Head and Heart,” Jefferson pines for a woman [Mrs Cosway] who has made him “the most wretched of all earthly beings” and at the same time chides himself for giving in to emotional attachments. From AI: The dialogue reveals Jefferson’s struggle between his desire for Cosway and his need to maintain his integrity. (She was, after all, married.) The letter concludes with Jefferson’s reason winning over the desires of his heart. He wrote that the only “effective security against such pain of unrequited love, is to retire within ourselves and to suffice for our own happiness.” Two years later, however, his letters to her still expressed great longing.
In 1787, Jefferson wrote to Cosway while traveling in Italy, painting an idyllic picture of the two of them together one day in the future: “we will breakfast every day…[go] away to the Desert, dine under the bowers of Marly, and forget that we are ever to part again.” He wrote to her again in 1788 from Paris and expressed his “tenderness of affection” and wished for her presence though he knew he “had no right to ask.”
Eventually, Jefferson’s physical separation from Maria and the hopelessness of a relationship with her cooled his ardor. After returning to America in 1789, his letters to her grew less frequent; partly due to the fact that he was increasingly preoccupied by his position as President George Washington’s secretary of state. She, however, continued to write to him and vented her frustration at his growing aloofness. In his last letters, he spoke more of his scientific studies than of his love and desire for her, finally admitting that his love for her had been relegated to fond memories of when their relationship had been “pure.”
Cosway left England in 1789 after her husband died and moved to a village in Italy to open a convent school for girls.
More from AI: While Jefferson wrote about his desire to ameliorate slavery and treat people more humanely, he still profited from their labor and owned them as property. He reportedly avoided harsh punishments like whipping, but he did sell slaves away from their families, which he considered the ultimate punishment, and even used slaves as a means of generating wealth through their reproduction.
Adams was also no prize, as he considered himelf as prfesident like a king, thus the alien and sedition controversy Trump promotes.
Before we can reform the system, we have to get rid of Trump; and MAGA.
It is very likely that Jefferson did not write those words....Thomas Paine did. They were close friends. Paine gave his draft of the Declaration of Independence to Jefferson. If you compare the punctuation style, capital letters in the middle of sentences for emphasis in the Declaration to the style and wording in Common Sense you can see the match. Jefferson's style was much more formal and flowers. Paine gave not only words but passion for Independence from the king instead of a frustrated rebellion as it started out to be. First came Common Sense Jan 1776, then the draft of the Declaration in summer of 1776.. Paine did not think the colonialsl would accept a Declaration of Independence written by and Englishman. So his first draft was handed over to is distinguished friend. So no hypocracy.
Jefferson, Adams, and Franklin were named to a committee to prepare a declaration of independence. Robert R. Livingston, and Roger Sherman also participated .While Jefferson is credited with the primary authorship, the committee and then the Second Continental Congress made significant revisions and edits.
Some of the language came straight from John Locke, but "property" was replaced by perfuit of happineff. All their ss's looked like f's. I stole this from Stan Freberg. .https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSlsKUFT1n8
AI says Paine had nothing to do with it. Paine's pamphlet "Common Sense" played a crucial role in influencing public opinion in favor of independence. "Common Sense" argued for separation from British rule and paved the way for the Declaration.
See https://www.history.com/articles/thomas-paine-common-sense-revolution
And I remind that when I'd ask the docent at Montecello about Sally Hemmings, all I'd get were stares.
Sally who?
Lucian Truscott IV, who is a descendant of Thomas Jefferson from Jefferson’s daughter with his wife, has attempted unsuccessfully to get his fellow descendants of Jefferson to acknowledge and accept the descendants of Jefferson and Sally Hemings as members.
Jefferson also imagined that America could be a nation of small farmers, with the middle class consisting mostly of merchants supplying them. International traders would be limited to shipping our produce to Europe where it would be in demand, thus avoiding any chance we would be attacked. He did set up a plan for selling public lands which was largely carried out, though ultimately it did not lead to an America of yeomen farmers happy on their lands with just little cities to supply them. The vision was of a sort of pure Rosseau-inspired democracy, ignoring of course the people whose lands were taken, the rights of women, the planter aristocracy and of course enslaved human beings. As Thom has discussed Hamilton was far more realistic in trying to develop an industrial society to make the country fairly self-sufficient in its needs and which went far beyond people living in the countryside. On the whole Thomas seemed to have the ideal, Alexander the practical, and there's that's the tension we often see in America. It's a shame that they never could find a compromise that worked.
That WAS the compromise that worked.
As president Jefferson expanded the land mass, opening up the west. As to ownership, in Anglo Saxon common law, posession was 9/10ths of ownership and we still use concepts like adverse possession and easment by necessity, that give rights to squatters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adverse_possession
Jefferson wrote the 5th Amendment, used to take private property for public necssity -- with just compensation -- condemnation.
Oh I agree, I was thinking more of a vision for America. Really until the middle of the last century there was some idealization of the small farmer while the economic power was increasingly centered in the cities. A lot of post-Civil War history was related to that tension between urban and rural areas, and I think a case can be made that in some ways it morphed into the cultural and immigrant conflicts we see today. There are other related strands, such as those who see the country through a religious lens and those who are mercantile in orientation. For his own purposes Trump has definitely plugged into a mythical vision of a simpler time and country, though obviously it is not one Jefferson would ever have approved of!
Doc, Trump, if anyone, is the heir to Hamilton. Hamilton propositioned a unitary executive that would serve indefinitely, and he favored tariffs, as noted in his Report on Manufactures.
What is not understood by us moderns is the mindset, environment and culture of the 18th Century.
In the 18th Century only property owning men were considered citizens. Citizens were those who had a vested interest (property) in the success of the nation.
And it was property owning men who were to elect representatives to legislate and administer the affairs of state (i.e. a Republic), just as in ancient Rome and Greece.
In the first two elections, freed owning blacks and women could and did vote, until that right was rescinded by NJ in 1807. Also only property owing men could vote, until the various states realized that they could embed their political control by enfranchising all men.
By 1800 only three states gave voting rights to all white men, Kentucky, New Hampshire and Vermont
Timeline of voting rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_voting_rights_in_the_United_States
The 19th Amendment was pass, only because the parties in power,figured (rightly) that enfranchsing women would double their vote.
At the time of the Constitution, in most states Catholics and Jews could not take the oath of office.
No doubt.
You should view the fairly recent SNL skit where they bring to life the painting of Washington Crossing The Delaware. Kenan Thompson, as a slave, asks if he’s included in the “all men are created equal.
Washington at Valley Forge.
https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=DzI_DMDgMd4
None of this makes sense. Our degree of desperation doesn't approach that of the Founders. When it does, we will be as creative. I bet we will create ideals & ideas as radical and new as theirs.
Great change rises out of ashes. We have yet to burn.
Lets talk about the real reason for Trumps Tariffs: He wants to make a deal (blackmail) countries and companies so they are beholding to him. Same tactic used by Putin to gain control after fall of USSR. Trumps tariffs have nothing to do with protecting and creating jobs in US. NOTHING !!!
Trump can only blackmail those that are dependent on the United States.
America's super power is consumption, we are the insatiable mouth, and the world lines up to sell us their products and resources. World leaders humiliate themselves by making haj to the fake gold room for an audience with his ethereal and imperial highness , Donald J Trump, prostrating themselves before him, and allowing him an opportunity to demonstrate his mastery over them as though they were lap dogs.
Not just country leaders like Macro, Canada's Carney, Stermer, but even governors like Newsom and Whitmer...If they flipped him the finger he would get pissed and try to take retribution, but he would respect them. He doesn't respect his MAGAts, he doesn't respect those that adore and supplicate themselves to him, and for good reason he knows that they don't deserve respect. One person he does respect is the governor of Maine, who told him I will see you in court, she did and she won.
The reason Trump told Carney of Canada, Never say never, is because he debased himself by visiting the Offal Office and allowing himself to be humiliated by Trump, and all because of money.
Trump is a full service extortionist.
His Extortion of US companies is what we have to fear the most.
On the whole, I think Carney came off looking better than Trump. Trump’s threats on Canadian sovereignty were disgraceful and disrespectful of one of our oldest allies. All they did was to sink the campaign of Canada’s wannabe Trump Pierre Poilievre, and Poilievre deserved it.
Yes, Carney came out looking better than Trump, but for what, and to what end.
Here is the problem, all of these country leaders and governors that come groveling to Trump, kissing is feet and ass, only empower Trump, and debase themselves.
Trump has the whole world groveling at his feet, no wonder he tweeted I rule the world, and with people like Carney, Stermer Whitmer, Newsom, performing haj to his holiness, it only encourages him and makes him worse.
If they all stood up and told him to go fuck himself, he would lose this bullying bravado.
He is a bully and the only way to deal with a bully is to knock him on his ass.
Thank you Thom for giving us the history lesson as you always do! There is some comfort to recognizing what we’re going through is nothing new.
Thom,
As always thank you for this excellently crafted essay. When we look at the writings of our founders, Jefferson, Franklin, Adams and others we see these common themes, and understand why they rebelled. The Declaration, the Virginia statute on religious liberty and so many other documents attest to this. We are in the same situation today with Mad King Donnie, his band of morbidly rich oligarchs, the police state that he is creating, and the nations he is threatening with military invasion. We must, like those you mentioned resist this tyranny.
By the way I wrote this the other night on my Substack. It is a warning and call to resistance.
https://dundas.substack.com/p/building-to-the-crescendo-of-doom
As always, thank you, be safe, keep fighting, and watch your six.
Steve Dundas
Happy Birthday, Thom! Thank you for all that you do.
If we do not do what you urge, we will deserve our fate. It doesn’t matter that the morbidly rich and the religious fundamentalists have succeeded in dumbing down huge chunks of the electorate. Enough of us are smart enough, healthy enough, and capable enough to do it. What we need is the will to do it, recognizing it might require actions not entirely consistent with our goals. But the reality is we must defeat those who would destroy this country and control our lives by any means necessary. Only then can we rebuild, restore and reform. As the farm workers marching with Cesar Chavez chanted, “Si, se puede! Venceremos!”
A Internet search advised that there are 735 billionaires in the United States. Thirteen of them are in Trump's cabinet. Ten percent control 60% of the nations wealth. The richest of them Elon Musk has gutted many departments of the federal government and left tens of thousand of government workers unemployed. Among them, inspector generals,overseers ferreting out fraud waste and abuse. Trump family and friends are making billions in crypto and manipulating the stock market. So it seems to me. Pardons for most all involved in in the Jan 6 coup attempt, deportation of immigrants without due process, accumulation of data on all of us, and the Supreme Court bending most of the time to Trump's will. There is no divine right of billionaires but money talks. The richest put Trump in power and appear likely to try to keep him there. As John Lennon wrote and sung, "They keep you doped with religion, sex, and TV, and you think your so clever and classless and free, but you're still (expletive) peasants as far as I can see". If Trump hasn't taken away the right to vote by midterms maybe we have a chance.
The real problem G2 is not the billionaires, the 1%, they are who they are, they have always been and will always be. Even in a supposedly classless society, there arose a New Class of privileged, like in Russia and Yugoslavia. Milovan Djilas, wrote of them in his book The New Class.
No the problem is our fellow citizens, the ideologues, the true believers, (and religion is an ideology), the lazy, the semi sentient, the fearful. Those who voted for and demand an authoritarian, one whom they believe will make the world not only safe for them, but elevate them as to stature and status. They be MAGAts. Trump is their lord and savior, he can do no wrong, they don't care if he is a felon, a pedophile, that he steals from them, they gladly throw money at him, just like those idiots in Prosperity Gospel churches.
They don't care, he can profane their Jesus, the Pope, and kill someone on 5th Ave, because in him they see deliverance and social elevation over those that they perceive as a personal threat to their natural superiority,
Yes there is a lot of evidence for what you are saying. The MAGA's are lost in their faith, lost to reason. The thin reed I'm holding onto is, if we have open honest nationwide midterms, perhaps concurrent with stagflation then maybe some of the 89 million that did not vote will vote in their own best interest. Maybe.
It sounds like you're scared. :) You outta be. . . It's time to be scared. Now that you are scared, you should write a post on SLOTH—Dante did! How about writing about Midas or that guy in the Bible who couldn't read the writing on the wall. Maybe you could write about Plutus or Mammon. Stay scared, write scared, maybe someone will listen!
No Kings Day is going to be epic!!!
"if we don’t fight them now, everything the Founders built could collapse." Strike
"could" and insert "will". If we don't resist — and resist now — we lose. Doors will be smashed open in the night, the troublesome sent on their way to Libya (Libya? Really?) The question of the hour, discussed furtively, will be whether or not Orwell was an optimist.
Another inspiring distillation, Thom.
Three points to remember and hold on to for protest, and progress !
Darker days are clearly in our future, without some extreme course correction.
But every group is a democracy — some just do it a hell of a lot better than others.
We will get back to a democratic republic.
My wife says we needed to see this. She doesn’t want it either, her point is clear.
Your call to make that course correction soon is ringing in my ears, and I hope many others.
Many more of us make that call every day, in our own ways —
June 14th - The 250th anniversary of founding the US Army to throw down tyranny, and throw out tyrants ! — best luck to US, b.rad
Self-rule? If we had self-rule we would have a national health care system, affordable housing, and end to perpetual war and genocide in Gaza and strong organized labor. We have been ruled by the donor class since the founding of our country, as the slaves and servants were ruled by oligarchs like Jefferson who wanted to maintain a system that kept the wealthy in power to protect their capital. You can idealize all you want, and it's not easy to start a country of course, but I'd prefer to get past the lionization of rapists and torturers who built this country on the backs of human suffering.
Holy shit, he is back. Our phoney Jew, Boris. Come on man, you don't give a shit about Gaza, it is only a tool by which to whip your foes, those of us who don't want to live under the slavery of Trump and his brother Putin.
There is something seriously wrong with your wiring.
Thom has mentioned many times the hypocrisy and moral dilemma of Thomas Jefferson, yet here you go, totally ignoring what he has written, and launching into a screed as if he was a Jeffersonian apologist.
There really is something wrong with your wiring. Maybe you are frustrated because you are not the savior of the world, or just a Putin henchman.
MSM has not been reporting that the PA is on our side.
"Mahmoud Abbas has called Hamas "sons of dogs" in a fiery speech in which he demanded the group release the hostages it is still holding, disarm, and hand over control of Gaza in order to end the war with Israel.
"The president of the Palestinian Authority told a meeting in the occupied West Bank that Hamas had given Israel "excuses" to continue its attacks on Gaza, and told it to "release the hostages and be done with it".
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4g20pj6epvo
This has been going on for months. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAfN4LBmOyE
Of course, Netanyahu doesn't want to negotiate a two state resolution and Trump is Trump -- only wants what's in it for him.
Here is my opinion. Dispensing with the fruitless chicken and egg argument.
The current situation was caused by HAMAS.They arrived at the wrong conclusion after that Gilead hostage swap. In which one IDFsoldier was swapped for 1,000 terrorists including Yahya Sinwar.
They took from that the message that the Jews would give up anything and everything for a Jewish life, even after they committed an act of cold blooded terrorism by murdering over 1,000 Jewish women, children, elderly and disabled.
If HAMAS is not an agent of Netanyahu,. the Likkud, its allies and the orthodox settlers, it might as well be
I am also positive that Netanyahu knew in advance what was coming, for one thing their was a shift change in the watch towers overlooking Gaza just before the attack, and women replaced the men and the women were unarmed and the men took their weapons, and the IDF and police were basically unreachable, in communicado,
HAMAS could have stopped the destruction and slaughter anytime, still can, but they are playing into the agenda of the Israeli right and Trump by hanging on.
As regards Israel's response. Let's personalize it for all of the bleeding hearts.
What would you do if a marauding gang came into your neighbor hood, slaughtered and raped people, then took hostages back with them. and there demand was that if you want the hostages back, then commit suicide and leave.. Dispense with the who started what thing, deal with the present.
As regards a two state solution. A pipe dream, never happen as it is a religious war.
Israel, prior to Oct 7th, was a liberal democracy, ostensible an ethnostate (there are 57Muslim ethostates BTW) But it was a liberal state with civil rights and voting rights for all, including Muslim Arabs and Beduins, That sentiment and rights are evaporating in the wake of Oct 7th, as the Israeli public is become more radicalized.,, thanks to HAMAS.
The goal of the Ultra Zionists, the settlers,the Israel right is Eratz Ysrael, great Israel, and the flag represents their designs, the blue strip at the top is the Euphrates and the blue stripe at the bottom is the river of Egypt.
For the Muslim Arabs, the mere existence of a Jewish state on what is deemed to be sacred Muslim soil, is an affront, a blasphemy that cannot stand, and was probably the reason behind the 1948 war, the 1956, 1967, 1973, 2006 wars and intifada.
Islam has three holy sites, Makkan, Medina, and Haram al Sharif (Dome of the Rock and al Aqsa mosque)
The sites are so sacred that the kufr, the kaffir, the infidel is not even permitted to enter.in fact Saudi soil is so"sacred" that he Mufit of Makkah had to desacrilize enclaves where Saudis built gated and fenced compounds to accomodate the needed foreign workers.
One of the reasons that raised the ire of Bin Laden was that Prince Sultan air base, housed infidels who walked around freely.
one act that the Israel right know will cause an uproar and another uprising is for Jews to enter the Haram al Sharif and the al Aqsa mosque.
It is Islamic belief, sahih 1295/1296), book 56, hadith 139 al Bukhari, that the day of jjudgment (Islamic end times) won't come about until their is a war with the Jews and they are are all wiped out, it is even quoted in para 7, of the HAMAS covenant.
The point is that this is a religous war, I am sure that Liberal and secular Israelis, want nothing to do with it, and want nothing more than to live in peace side by side with their neighbors, and I am sure that their are Muslim Arabs that feel the same way, but alas, it is not such people that run nations governments, make policy and carry through with action.
Most Americans would rather live unbothered by all of this sturm und drang that rages around us. I sure would, but the true believers, the haters aren't satisfied, they want it all, land,property wealth, supplication,obedience.
The same shit that is happening in the mid east is happening in America, it just hasn't reached he crescendo of violence,....yet.
As my friend, Curtis from Oakland said in 1959, the next time this planet stops, I'm getting off.
I still think the Oslo Accords would work if the PA takes control amd wants them.
I don't because there are too many fanatic Muslims, that want to be shaheeds and get their 72 virgins. They will use the Palestinian state as a base of operations, as they did Gaza, to launch attacks on Israel, and that will be that.
Yes, I'll be out in No Kings Day!!!!
I have an observation. Trump has already claimed that he is running the world, that he wants Canada, Greenland & who knows what's going on in the Panama Canal. We haven't heard anything!
He's posted a picture of himself as Pope! Do you think he's going to declare himself Pope? If so, maybe we could call him "Poop 💩 Don the 1st"!
Thanks for comprehensive info and a resounding YES to all that let’s again sing “My country ‘tis of thee”… and know it to actually be true!”
Hello Thom, please stop using words like 'amazing' when describing despicable Trumpian behavior. Use adjectives such as degrading disgusting putrid despicable and the word 'criminal' for what we are witnessing. Channel just a little rush limbaugh who did outrage so well!