On "Morning Joe" this morning, Elise Jordan, a former aide to George W. Bush, criticized Trump supporters for talking about symbols (slurred as "thimbles") instead of substance. The symbols in question were statues, which was the topic of discussion as a result of this news report yesterday (I'm quoting the DCist):
A new D.C. committee recommended renaming, removing, or contextualizing more than 50 different government-owned spaces in the city, after studying the history of racism and oppression behind the namesakes. The working group, known as DCFACES (District of Columbia Facilities and Commemorative Expressions), was commissioned by Mayor Muriel Bowser and began meeting in July. It identified figures like Thomas Jefferson, Francis Scott Key, Ben Franklin, and George Washington as problematic candidates for public-works dedications.Of course, people fixate on symbols! That's why the symbols are attacked. You can't expect the pro-Trump side to refrain from engaging on what is a super-easy subject for them. Why should they?! Plus those of us who care about the traditional symbols are moved on a very deep level. I know how I've felt ever since Wisconsin protesters tore down the Forward! statue and the Hans Christian Heg statue in my town.
Speaking of superficial trivialities... I'm fascinated by Jordan's vocal slip: "thimbles" for "symbols." It underscores her point — symbols are small (compared to the big policy questions that government must decide). Now, I think some symbols are very big! This D.C. committee is recommending that the federal government "remove, relocate, or contextualize" the Washington Monument!
Jordan bemoans human nature. "We live by symbols" (to quote Felix Frankfurter).
But if symbols were thimbles... A thimble is a symbol — a symbol of smallness.
Just a thimbleful for me!
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125 comments:
Ironic - educated blacks in the United States are probably the most privileged group in the world.
DEFACES. Good name.
i wonder if all these 'republicans', that are doing everything they can to defeat a republican President ever think about what will be left of that party; once they get through gutting it?
in 2016 i was a republican that grudgingly voted for Trump
in 2020 i am a Trump supporter that has nothing but disgust for the "republican" party
Symbols are important. Symbols serve as a means of unifying us into one "tribe" of Americans, and connecting our present with our past. They help create the American myth which serves as the foundation for a national identity. This, of course, is exactly why the left wants to attack them: destroying monuments, statues, historic landmarks, etc., is about eliminating any connection with the past, about wiping out anything which might serve to counter whatever the preferred narrative is at the moment.
Saying, "they're focused on symbols instead of real issues" is the kind of technocrat, pseudo-rationalist, WASP bullcrap that has infected the establishment right for the past thirty years, rendered it incompetent and ineffective.
Maybe they could get David Copperfield to make the Washington Monument disappear for a while like he did with the Statue of Liberty.
“ Copperfield remarked that the use of the illusion was emphasizing the benefits of independence and how precious liberty is – and also how easily it could be lost. Copperfield said he could show with magic the way in which we take the freedom for granted.”
Easier than moving it.....
"remove, relocate, or contextualize" the Washington Monument!
For her pleasure.
The capital is supposed to be in the center of the country. Let's move it to back to the center of the country.
Hope and Change!! We are the Ones we've been waiting for!!!. Why do Progressives need bumper sticker slogans??? What a bunch of malarkey!!! These people are getting more and more desperate and crazier by the day. This is why we laugh at them. Seems like THEY are the ones obsessed by the "thimbles" they hate so much they have to tear down.
i wonder if all these 'republicans', that are doing everything they can to defeat a republican President ever think about what will be left of that party; once they get through gutting it?
In their fantasies I imagine that they think they'll go back to being in charge, getting cushy positions where they only fail upwards, and are once again liked and accepted among their libertarian and left-wing friends.
Screw them.
You gotta love the COVID deaths tot board.
"contextualize" is an interesting word.
Mike,
I'm glad I'm not the only one who saw "DEFACES"
John Henry
Re contextualize the Washington Monument as a super large butt plug to celebrate gay pride
John Henry
But if symbols were thimbles... A thimble is a symbol — a symbol of smallness.
Well played Professor.
Statues say things that aren't politically correct. Maybe the problem is political correctness.
Nobody wanted to be the thimble. I liked being the iron, because that's kick-ass.
Elise Jordan had that whole Clutch Cargo thing going on with her mouth.
Astounding to watch the rats actually jump on the sinking ship, particularly when it's the "opposing party's" ship.
"among their libertarian"
Excuse me? You should visit some actual libertarian sites (not Reason)to see what they say about the Lincoln Project, et al.
According to Althouse lefties/LLR-lefties, Benjamin Franklin must be removed due to his clear ties to the Confederacy.
#Leftist1619Project"History"
Thimbles ! See, no one can speak coherently ! Biden is normal !
"For her pleasure."
Yea, just put ridges on it, and maybe a large ring around the bottom so it stays ...monumental.
As part of the racist activists' process of destroying far more than symbols, the UC system is "ordered" to stop using SAT & ACT test because the tests discriminate against stupid and ignorant people.
++
“The SAT and ACT are dead and gone as far as the UC system is concerned,” said Mark Rosenbaum, a Los Angeles attorney who helped file the lawsuit as director of Public Counsel’s Opportunity Under Law project. The “historic decision puts an end to racist tests that deprived countless California students of color, students with disabilities, and students from low-income families of a fair shot at admissions to the UC system.”
Rosenbaum said he and his team targeted only the UC system to efficiently manage the case but that the court’s reasoning should apply to all colleges and universities, both public and private, across the country.
“If other universities don’t follow, we’ll come after them as well,” he said, adding that he would be conferring with civil and disability rights advocates in other states.
Suppressing symbols is exactly the sort of thing that oppressors do to try to squash the culture of those they oppress. The whole point is to try to erase the native culture and replace it with something more manageable. Symbols reflect the culture and culture is represented by the symbols. Control of symbols is powerful! If you want to erase a people, erase their history! To say this is some minor thing is either extreme bad faith or extreme stupidity. Elise does not know of what she speaks.
I wonder what her reaction would be if the decision was to remove all the Martin Luther King, Jr. symbols. I'm sure that would be "different," though once pressed Elise's response would boil down to "I don't like it" as opposed to any principled position.
"Elise Jordan, a former aide to George W. Bush,"
YOu mean THE Elise Jordan? That famous low-level associate of George W. Bush, whom nobody can remember? Was she an intern at the time?
On substance, the Democrats don't like Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln or the entire history of the USA. IF they could, they would tear them all down. Of course, there are clueless white middle class Dems who are not a fan of this. But they are weak enablers, who know when to shut their mouths and keep quiet.
Okay, contextualize. Talk about the savage and ignorant practices of 18th and 19th century Africans. If you were a non-favorite wife of some 19th century African king, your right to life depended on the whim of the king. For that matter, so did the life of a favored wife. Sally Hemmings had a better deal than the wives of African kings......The abolitionist movement did not orginate in Africa. It more often died there. The Queen of Madagascar expelled the Christian missionaries. Their offense: they preached against the evils of slavery......It is not surprising that an enslaved person should see the evils of slavery. It is more noteworthy that slave owners like Washington and one time slave owners like Franklin should be aware of the evils and actively work to abolish the institution.
The teaching moment is not that these men owned slaves,but that they worked to end slavery.....There are about a half million enslaved people in Mauretania. I presume slavery is worse than apartheid, but their plight has never attracted much attention or outrage and certainly not from Hollywood or Black activists. Pity the poor Black man who is killed, enslaved, mistreated by any other than a white man. Such suffering and death is not a cause for concern among woke citizens.
I'm moved at Col Heg's removal from it's place in front of the Wisconsin capitol. I've only visited it once. It was a chicken skin experience. He led his brave men in a gallant fight at Chickamauga, Ga. Where he gave his life. I walked the fields where he led his Wisconsin Volunteers as the faught against my great great grandfather and his companions in in Longstreet's Corp. Beautiful nNtional Battlefield. One would wish Col Heg's statue to resurrected there.
Is Dana Perino the only blonde white woman that worked for Dubya who WASN'T a leftist shill in hiding?
Ann, "I know how I've felt ever since Wisconsin protesters tore down the Forward! statue and the Hans Christian Heg statue in my town."
If people in Omaha tore down the Road to Omaha statue or the St. Ignatius Loyola statue at Creighton, I'd be more than mad.
The point here is that the people who want to rename, tear down or otherwise destroy these symbols are all Biden voters. America needs to face facts. The Dem party wants to fundamentally transform America into something really bad. We will become a shithole country.
Have no doubt, if we don't submit to their iconoclasm voluntarily, they will pull the symbols down violently in the future.
the need to mutilate an image indicates belief in its power.
And G. W. Bush's administration led directly to 8 years of the Barack Obama administration, which led to Presdient Donald Trump..
A little introspection is good for the soul. The elites of both parties should try it, sometime... not that I expect they ever will.
It's symbolic to preserve a monument, but substantive to tear it down? What horse shit.
How is it anything but symbolic to tear down a symbol?
How does tearing down a monument improve the life of a single black American who needs a good paying job? Trump's policies resulted in high employment for blacks and all Americans. He wants to stop and reverse export of good paying jobs overseas.
How does destroying a monument improve the education of a single black kid? Trump is for school choice. If anything can be called systemic racism in America, the education system is it.
How does tearing down a monument help a single black man or woman imprisoned due to Biden's 94 crime bill? Trump has worked to reform this.
Also: I wonder if anyone is going to sit back and think, "Man, I guess Trump was right that they'd eventually come for Washington and Jefferson."
STOP MAKING TRUMP RIGHT.
I’ll always feel bad for her because of how her husband died (and how conspiracy theorists wouldn’t shut up about it for awhile, compounding the pain for her).
If Trump said "thimbles" instead of "symbols" the internet blowup would be epic.
Blogger Rory said...The capital is supposed to be in the center of the country. Let's move it to back to the center of the country.
The capital, fine by me. However the deep state should be spread all over so the Washington DC area is largely a park, with no employment opportunities for deep staters.
she was michael hastings girlfriend, if you recall how that ended up,
This again shows the genius of the founding generation. They explicitly created a government city controlled by congress in order that the government would not be powerless in the face of petty municipal control. Too bad, if you live in DC you don't control the national areas. It is not your right to manage or tax federal property.
Me thinks we have found new symptoms of the coronavirus pandemic............
I just did a quick google scan on how Benjamin Franklin could possibly be "problematic" nowadays? And got nothing IMHO, other than he liked money and was too puritanical on occasion?
Does anyone have a simple answer for this latest stupidity?
And does this mean "Hawkeye" from M-A-S-H must now go the way of "Spearchucker" from the first season? And can Alan Alda finally be cancelled?
I'm done with the motherfucking Republican party, the party I have been registered with since 1968. The RHINOS are part of the Uniparty, less interested in benefiting their traditional conservative or even right of center constituents, more committed to insuring their place at the government trough. Trump has been a threat to their greed and desire to be accepted by the leftist Democratic establishment and their courtiers in the media. Therefore, I no longer identify with what this party has become, instead, I will declare myself as an Independent. The Republicans are dead to me.
Here is a link to a PDF of the full report. Of course a lot of these properties are not within the control of the DC government so it is unlikely (I hope) that anything will be done to them. It is incredible that they would include the Washington Monument and the Jefferson Memorial on the list. Even someone as benign as Alexander Graham Bell is on the list. The statue of Marion Barry, however, remains untouched. So, just about anyone who accomplished something for the benefit of the nation needs to be memory-holed while thoroughly corrupt local heroes get their due. They want all meaningful history washed down the drain. To hell with them.
Based on this as well as the ongoing issues with rioting and threatening the safety of innocent people in public I think home rule for DC should be abandoned and the District should be brought under total Federal control. This will never happen since, sometime in the next few years, the Dems will obtain total and perpetual control over our government and this kind of stuff will go on without end.
Not least of Trump's contributions to American history is his ability to get everyone, not only Democrats, but "True Conservatives" like Morning Joe and the Bushies to show their true colors. Regardless of the result of this 2020 Election, we have seen who these people really are. How much contempt for old-fashioned patriotic Americans they all share.
I swear, when I clicked on your link, I expected to see Tim Curry. I mean, Frank N. Furter might have said "We live by symbols".
I think her inflated lips got in the way.
Other than that.....she's an idiot.
If statues are just symbols, and of no importance, why are radicals expending so much energy on destroying them?
Nihilists don't need no stinkin' symbols.
More thimbles from Trump:
Don Moynihan
@donmoyn
Trump did a photo-op in front of a Kenosha business with its owner. "A day earlier would have saved his store,” said Trump.
But it wasn't the real owner, who had refused to join the photo-op. So Trump just pretended a prior owner was still in charge. https://tmj4.com/news/local-news/kenosha-business-owner-declines-president-trump-photo-op-former-owner-replaces-him
These symbols are the very core of who we are. That is why the fascists parading around as 'social justice warriors' spend so much time and effort to target them, to tie chains to them to pull them over, to paint over them, write over them, and to demand to change the names of streets, schools, buildings.
Washington, Jefferson, Madison et.al. were humans who created a country- out of thin air- the likes of which had never been seen on earth previously. There were no constitutionally limited republics around to base this experiment on. Those men did not put themselves up for sainthood. They owned slaves. They acknowledged that they knew that was not right, but left it up to later generations to make it so. They risked their lives and fortunes to try- just try- to create a nation that could be handed off, so that future generations may have a chance at better lives.
These symbols are what has drawn millions of people to these shores, people of every color, religion, shape, size, nationality, gender, and age. For generations. Millions were either killed or fled socialist countries around the globe, and millions risked their lives to come here. Why is that so? Because of the promise of the words and systems created and put into practice by those 'symbols', Washington, Jefferson, Madison, et al.
These symbols are larger than any thought ever held by any staffer of GW Bush. Larger than anything that has ever crossed the corrupt, twisted mind of Nancy Pelosi. And it does not surprise me that a Republican came out with this statement. I voted Libertarian for years because Democrats were becoming socialists and Republicans were tone deaf and blind. I started to vote Republican a few elections ago only because Democrats became outright dangerous for a free nation. That has only hastened. Trump is not a Republican, so I can vote for Trump to block socialist Democrats. But it seems like at least half of the Republican Party has still not learned a thing. Still tone deaf and blind.
Symbols are what binds us as a people. You only dismiss them if it is your goal to untie that which binds us.
The Bush GOP members just emphasize the truth of Angelo Codevilla's 2010 essay America's Ruling Class.
That was before Trump ever began his effort.
They explained neither the difference between the assets’ nominal and real values, nor precisely why letting the market find the latter would collapse America. The public objected immediately, by margins of three or four to one.
When this majority discovered that virtually no one in a position of power in either party or with a national voice would take their objections seriously, that decisions about their money were being made in bipartisan backroom deals with interested parties, and that the laws on these matters were being voted by people who had not read them, the term “political class” came into use. Then, after those in power changed their plans from buying toxic assets to buying up equity in banks and major industries but refused to explain why, when they reasserted their right to decide ad hoc on these and so many other matters, supposing them to be beyond the general public’s understanding, the American people started referring to those in and around government as the “ruling class.” And in fact Republican and Democratic office holders and their retinues show a similar presumption to dominate and fewer differences in tastes, habits, opinions, and sources of income among one another than between both and the rest of the country. They think, look, and act as a class.
Worth rereading from time to time.
No prominent Republican challenged the ruling class’s continued claim of superior insight, nor its denigration of the American people as irritable children who must learn their place. The Republican Party did not disparage the ruling class, because most of its officials are or would like to be part of it.
Trump is alone with a hostile ruling class. His only support is the people and a large share have been miss-educated.
I think we need to remove, relocate, or contextualize Muriel Bowser.
What's crazier?
Crazy people or sane people that let crazy people run the country and barely noticed?
I bet all these "just symbol" people in America love traveling to Europe and Asia and seeing all the tributes and buildings from past, defeated regimes and cultures.
Removing the Washington Monument is now the stated goal of the Democrat-controlled DC government.
In other words, insanity is now officially the default setting of the Democrat Marxist cult.
Wait, these people are concerned enough about these "symbols" enough to tear them down, but *we're* the ones overly concerned with them? did I get that right, we should just ignore and let them?
These friggin' people.
Rory said...
The capital is supposed to be in the center of the country. Let's move it to back to the center of the country.
My father proposed we move the capital to Fargo, ND, just to see who was serious about working in government.
Of course, people fixate on symbols!
Yeah, I mean if symbols weren't such a big deal these idiots wouldn't be spending so much time and effort trying to tear them down would they?
Why Ben Franklin?
He never owned slaves.
Perhaps because he was one of the world's leading scientists?
These people seem to HATE science. It would be fitting for them to try to scrub a scientist from memory.
John Henry
Elise Jordan, a former aide to George W. Bush
That woman drank the Jim Jones Kool-aid a few years ago.
A thimbleful is all it takes.
Typical MSNBC newscast:
1. The DC Committee wants the symbols changed or removed.
2. The White House won't change or remove them.
3. Attack the President for focusing on symbols!
So is she in favor of tearing down the Jefferthon Memorial or not?
"What matters to you is just a symbol but what matters to me is substance."
Last night, Bowser dreamed of the Washington Monument and awoke strangely disturbed. She felt at once dissatisfied with her life yet, somehow, fulfilled. She knew what she must do: remove, relocate, or contextualize the monument. It challenged yet fascinated her.
When you put idiots in charge (I'm looking at Bowser), you get idiocy.
A thimbleful of context from R/V. Thanks, kid. Don't take any wooden nickels.
"The SAT and ACT are dead and gone as far as the UC system is concerned."
We don't want any smart people in the UC system. They'd just upset things.
much the same has happened with netanyahu, that's why the lawfare has pushed to step down next year, to the blue and white lefty candidate, there is a similar dynamic with bolsanaro and the social christian party, vs the socialist, we see with arias and uribe, a similar dynamic in te liberal party,
I will probably sound like a Neanderthal to many Americans, but it seems to me that anyone who removes or damages a statue or monument who is not a government employee or hired contractor explicitly authorized to do so (with appropriate attention to safety and recycling) should be arrested and jailed. I also think that no statue should be removed without a referendum in the surrounding area, and that that should be a wider rather than a narrower area. In other words, statues in a small town (the beautiful dilophosaurus in front of the Dinosaur Discovery Museum in Kenosha) should be voted on by citizens of the town and any adjoining counties, and statues in state capitals (Heg in Madison, Confederate generals in Richmond) should be voted on by the entire state. A decision by a governor or legislature or city/county council is not enough.
If you can't get 50.1% of the voters to agree with you that some dead man's statue should be taken down, it needs to stay up and stay undamaged. If it is damaged or destroyed it needs to be repaired or replaced with the full cost paid by the persons who damaged it. Some of the payment could be 'in kind', with shackled prisoners using sandpaper to remove their idiotic slogans from the stone.
Is this too high a standard? 1. It's called majority rule, assholes. 2. I'm pretty sure a polite and fact-filled campaign would have convinced a majority of Virginians to remove at least half of the Confederate statues in the state. If it doesn't, maybe your arguments aren't very convincing.
Anyone who thinks I don't understand the pain of having to look at a monument to someone vile should remember: 1. You can always close your eyes or take a different route or move to a different city. 2. I know exactly what it's like, since I live literally next door to the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library, a massive monument to one of the very worst presidents, who was also (not the same thing) one of the very worst human beings ever to be president. (Hoover was the former but not the latter, Clinton the latter but not the former.)
P.S. Should have spelled out that monuments in the nation's capital should not be removed without a referendum of the entire nation. Let the morons who want to remove Washington and Lincoln and Columbus find out just how outnumbered they are.
Why Ben Franklin?
He's a White man.
If you haven't noticed, we've moved from "content of character" back to "color of skin", only this time Black is supposed to end up on top.
"For her pleasure."
Attack of the 50-foot woman?
Liberals are crazy.
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
So is she in favor of tearing down the Jefferthon Memorial or not?
To talk about your own ideas is to risk offending Big Brother and becoming an unperson.
Why do you think everyone at MSNBC begins each sentence with "Trump..."?
The capital is supposed to be in the center of the country. Let's move it to back to the center of the country.
My father proposed we move the capital to Fargo, ND, just to see who was serious about working in government.
We need a symbolic center of the country. Keep it in Washington D.C., but basically turn the city into a museum. The only legal residents of the city should be the president and his family. Buy up all the rest of the residential properties, turn them into parks, and eventually monuments. Build a set of condos just outside the city limits for Congress and their staff.
In he age of the internet and Zoom, we can move the federal bureaucracy out of Washington D.C. We don't have to keep it co-located either. Move the Department of Agriculture to the Midwest, say Ames. Move Energy to Texas. Move the IRS to Death Valley. (OK, that was a joke) Spread out the government jobs and paychecks and influence.
Why Ben Franklin?
He was white. The racists want to remove all the statues and monuments which feature white people. I thought that was obvious.
He never owned slaves.
Perhaps because he was one of the world's leading scientists?
"He initially owned and dealt in slaves but, by the late 1750s, he began arguing against slavery, became an abolitionist, and promoted education and the integration of blacks in American Society.
...
Benjamin Franklin thought that slavery was "an atrocious debasement of human nature" and "a source of serious evils.""
It's true humans tend to think in terms of symbols, but this is a tendency we should try to recognize and avoid or stop in ourselves as best we can. Talking in terms of symbols reduces arguments to simplistic binary thinking: black/white, good/bad, us/them, etc. This form of discussion works against achieving any kind of mutual understanding or tolerance. It keeps us trapped in, as Robert Anton Wilson termed them, our separate reality tunnels.
"Symbols are important. Symbols serve as a means of unifying us into one 'tribe' of Americans, and connecting our present with our past. They help create the American myth which serves as the foundation for a national identity."
Living according to a "national myth" also prevents us from seeing the reality of the world in which we live, including things we might wish to ignore about our own society. Symbols obscure, distort, and separate us as much as they may unify.
"Suppressing symbols is exactly the sort of thing that oppressors do to try to squash the culture of those they oppress. The whole point is to try to erase the native culture and replace it with something more manageable."
There is truth to this. Symbols should not necessarily be destroyed, but certainly they should be honestly discussed and understood for what they are, what they mean to respective audiences, what truths and/or lies they tell. As for oppressors "squash(ing)the culture of those they oppress," European settlers of this continent did more than destroy the symbols of the indigenous peoples living here, they destroyed the living people, and created symbols of the "civilizing" Europeans vanquishing the blood-thirsty and "savage" American Indians.
We don't want any smart people in the UC system. They'd just upset things.
The UC system could not turn out black and brown graduates in proportion to the population of the state.
Clearly the public education system did not prepare them for work at UC.
So UC is being brought in line with the public education system.
Trump did a photo-op in front of a Kenosha business with its owner. "A day earlier would have saved his store,” said Trump.
But it wasn't the real owner, who had refused to join the photo-op. So Trump just pretended a prior owner was still in charge. https://tmj4.com/news/local-news/kenosha-business-owner-declines-president-trump-photo-op-former-owner-replaces-him
More R/V bullshit. The guy who made himself the D hero by protesting is a RENTER of the building and the owner is the guy it is named for. The man Trump talked about owns the building and it still bears his name.
The name Washington, District of Columbia, is problematic in that it refers to not one but two Racists. I'm surprised there's no talk of renaming it.
Any fair minded person who looks at the full context and arc of their lives can see that Jacob Blake is a far worthier and more benign person than George Washington. Jacob Blake never owned slaves. He has that in his favor. However, it must also be admitted that George Washington never frittered his life away playing video games or looking at internet porn. Still, you've got to give the nod to Jacob Blake. He didn't own slaves. That's the important metric and, in fact, the only metric by which to judge people.
MSNBC: All their brains will fit inside a very small thimble.
"We don't want any smart people in the UC system. They'd just upset things."
When CA first went all in on affirmative action they admitted a lot of African American students who didn't have the grades or the test scores. They dropped out in droves.
To fix that, they continued to be admitted, but the word went out that they were not to be failed. So they put in four years doing mediocre work and graduated.
Blacks and minorities should hate affirmative action. The ones among them who are brilliant will always be seen as affirmative action, quota hires.
I think it is time to remove, relocate, or contextualize something.
Not those statues.
Amadeus 48 said...
Last night, Bowser dreamed of the Washington Monument and awoke strangely disturbed. She felt at once dissatisfied with her life yet, somehow, fulfilled. She knew what she must do: remove, relocate, or contextualize the monument. It challenged yet fascinated her.
When you put idiots in charge (I'm looking at Bowser), you get idiocy.
Idiocy is underestimating these people.
They are fighting for what they believe.
We will be required to do the same.
The Jefferson Monument was put up by FDR. He explicitly wanted that monument to stand as a counter-weight to the Lincoln Memorial....In my lifetime the Presidents who have had the steepest decline in prestige were Jefferson, Jackson and Wilson. The ones with the greatest increase were Grant and, to a lesser extent, Eisenhower and Reagan.See any kind of trend there?...There are all sorts of blemishes and fault lines in Jefferson's character, but he did write the Declaration of Independence. We may also criticize many of Wilson's policies, but it should be noted that his efforts were responsible for the creation of the income tax. The Declaration of Independence and the Federal Income Tax: have there been two greater quantum jumps in human liberty. (s/)
I always thought the point of the SAT and ACT was to help smart kids from poor areas and bad schools to get into good colleges. You go to a bad high school but spend a lot of your free time learning things not taught in your school so you score well on the test. Doing well on the test proves you can be successful in college.
I can see where one generation might have a different set of heroes than another generation, but I don't get from where comes this wish to not just dishonor but demolish the heroes of a previous generation.
First, of all 'former Bush aide" and "MSNBC contributor" of course. Is anyone surprised? All that's missing is "Life Long Republican".
Second, I absolutely hate this, "we shouldn't talk about this, when there are more important issues" argument. Its so Goddamn lame. Are words being rationed? Believe it or not, we can actually discuss CV-19 AND the statues. There are words enough to do both. After all, why is the DC Mayor talking about statues, shouldn't she be talking 100% about CV-19?
Third, If symbols are unimportant, lets tear down the MLK statue, the FDR statue, and the Stephen A. Douglas monument. After all, they're just "Inanimate Objects". Who can object? Certainly, not the former Bush aide.
Fourth, As Althouse states, symbols are actually important. That's why the Left wants to tear them down. The Bush Aide actually SUPPORTS tearing down George Washington and Ben Franklin's statue, she's just too cowardly to say it. So, she say's "why are people opposing this, go along and talk about more important things".
Never trust a Bush Aide or the Bush Family to defend America.
To r/v: The OWNER of the BUILDING showed up. HE was concerned about his community.
The person who leased the space from him could care less. He’ll just find other space to lease.
“ Rode does not own Rode’s Camera Shop. However, he does own the property, located at 2204 Roosevelt Road in Kenosha, the site of Rode's Camera Shop.”
Educate yourself moron!
https://www.tmj4.com/news/local-news/kenosha-business-owner-declines-president-trump-photo-op-former-owner-replaces-him
I hope Trump -before the election - holds a rally at Gettysburg. I thought that was a good idea to be "Pro-America" and "Pro-monument". Or maybe hold it front of the Lincoln Monument. Do you realize that if biden gets elected we might tear down the Jefferson Memorial or the Washington Monument?
Insanity!
As of yesterday evening a search for “remove the Washington Monument” produced links to several conservative or alternative media sites and Fox News covering the DC recommendations. It must have taken awhile for the leftmediaswine to decide how to spin the story.
All these men Jefferson, Washington, Lincoln built this country. Its their actions and ideals that gave us the constitution and the declaration of independence. And kept us as one nation, free and independent.
And now, some pissant Leftists come along and say "They're not good enough for our NEW AMERICA". Incredible. Its like inheriting your family home, and putting the portraits of your relatives - who built the house - in the trash can.
I really appreciate the blood red commie plague "DEATH TOTAL" box in the lower right hand corner of the screen. Imperative to keep the sheep shitting themselves in mortal terror and bleating for vote-by-mail.
They're caught between the SSBLM fist and neo-fascist foot. They want to abort the baby and have her, too. Surely, they are playing with a double-edged scalpel.
Here is a link to a PDF of the full report.
+++ ("We've given the word 'report' a bad name!") +++
The Working Group’s research revealed that more than 70% of assets named in the District of Columbia are named for white men, many of whom were not District residents.
Priority should be placed on ensuring future assets, especially and including those recommended for renaming by this Working Group, include more women, people of color and LGBTQ Washingtonians.
STATUES AND MEMORIALS
Recommendation:Using the Mayor’s position on the National Capital Memorial Advisory Commission, recommend the Federal government remove, relocate, or contextualize the following assets:
1. Christopher Columbus – Columbus Fountain (federal)
2. Benjamin Franklin – Benjamin Franklin Statue (federal)
3. Andrew Jackson – Andrew Jackson Statue (federal)
4. Thomas Jefferson – Jefferson Memorial (federal)
5. George Mason – George Mason Memorial (federal)
6. Francis Griffith Newlands – Newlands Memorial Fountain (federal)
7. Albert Pike – Albert Pike Statue (federal)
8. George Washington – Washington Monument, George Washington Statue (federal)
Remove or re contextualize the Washington Monument? What have those folks been drinking or smoking or dropping? I'd expect something like that from the hippie bums panhandling on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley circa 1968.
Now as an engineering proposition, just how would you remove it? I know it can be done, but it's task way beyond the bozos who recommend it.
As per Achilles above, let’s jet these folks to Venezuela if symbols and capitalism here bother them so much. Surely they will find what they’re looking for there.
tcrosse said...
The name Washington, District of Columbia, is problematic in that it refers to not one but two Racists. I'm surprised there's no talk of renaming it.
Not to mention the word District has problems of its own, being derived from a Western oppressor nation:
History and Etymology for District
Noun French, from Medieval Latin districtus
Clearly all three slave names must go. Rip out the racism root and branch and then shit in the hole that's leftover. It's the only way.
I always thought the point of the SAT and ACT was to help smart kids from poor areas and bad schools to get into good colleges.
Yes, the tests enable a measure of equity, where limited, exclusive openings are filled by people on the premise of not who, what, where you are, but what you know. It's an important metric to mitigate diversity and discrimination.
Once again R/V lies by omission. The business owner would not stand with his president. But the rest of the story found with a quick ddg search:
Later, Gram saw Trump on TV as he stood outside the store with John Rode III, who owns the shop’s property but sold the family business to Gram 8 years ago.
https://www.mediaite.com/trump/trump-replaces-kenosha-business-owner-with-former-owner-after-real-one-refused-to-join-him-for-photo-op/
Mediate did the same thing in their headline.
I suspect that of the 2, Gram and Rode, Rode suffered the greater loss.
It was wholly appropriate for him, not gram, to be in the pic.
You should apologize for your fake news, r/v
John Henry
There are Shundermans and there are Professor Elwells.
People Will Talk (1951)
Why are we even reacting to these mental midgets? I mean there is value in seeing what would happen if we let democrats have power over us but so far this wet dream of dismantling the american identity one statue at a time.
This is from a bunch of powerless DC radicals who just want attention. They will walk it back the minute it looks like it would cost them something. Plus there is the traditional democrat's dodge of "Well this is a big movement we don't agree on everything blah, blah, blah.
Did Ms. Jordan mention just what sort of substances she wants to talk about? Christ. A flack for George Bush, and she has a problem with George Washington. Can we get an Antifa crew out to her neighborhood, stat?
Maybe just circumcise it?
And...they Democrat Marxists, apparently realizing they went a bridge too far, have now deleted their own recommendations. Not disavowed them, mind you. Just pushed them down the memory hole, whereupon they may once again be extracted from someone's rectum, when the timing is deemed right:
ABC7 found Tuesday that the executive summary and recommendations list that’s currently on the DC FACES website only lists recommended changes to the aforementioned 49 assets, all of which are local (see full list below).
Kind of like the way Comrade Stalin used to airbrush inconvenient people out of his photos.
Our own homegrown Marxists learned well.
A previous version of the executive summary, though, also lists an additional eight federal statues and memorials — Columbus Fountain, the Benjamin Franklin Statue, the Andrew Jackson Statue, the Jefferson Memorial, the George Mason Memorial, the Newlands Memorial Fountain, the Albert Pike Statue, and the Washington Monument.
It recommends removing, relocating or contextualizing all of them.
The name Washington, District of Columbia, is problematic in that it refers to not one but two Racists. I'm surprised there's no talk of renaming it.
Right. That will come. “America,” too — both continent(s) and nation — will need to be cancelled. It's/they're named after Amerigo Vespucci (1451-1512), Italian navigator and explorer of the Age of Discovery — whose no doubt imperfect character not to speak of milieu will demand cancellation — to be replaced by mere continent numbers and (sub) administrative districts.
Much of what's now the (contiguous) U.S. or “United States of America,” for instance, will transform into “Continent 5” (continents will be numbered south-to-north — Continent 1 will be [what's now known as] Africa) “Central Administrative District.”
Such replacements for all “nations” and “states” — having no history behind them — ought to be nebulous enough concepts so as to inspire no “patriotism” — which will be verboten in any case.
Funny that the name is so close to DEFACES.
"And...they Democrat Marxists..."
...do not exist, except in the wilds of far right fever dreams.
Democrats, who today are actually Republicans, do exist, and Marxists also exist. There are no such chimera as Democrat Marxists, however.
Shorter Elise Jordan:
"Please, Trump supporters, stop trying to take advantage of our utter stupidity."
As for thimbles, I always chose that as my Monopoly token, by the way.
Thistlerose said...
I always thought the point of the SAT and ACT was to help smart kids from poor areas and bad schools to get into good colleges. You go to a bad high school but spend a lot of your free time learning things not taught in your school so you score well on the test. Doing well on the test proves you can be successful in college.
______________________________
While it may have not been the point of standardized tests, it was certainly a feature, not a bug.
Is there any more of a politically incorrect truth that the ACT and ACT were intended - and did - create a level playing field?
No man is a hero to his valet. The exception was George Washington. His valet was a slave and had many opportunities to reclaim his freedom. He chose to remain a slave and take his chances with Washington. He was not a coward. He served in the front lines with Washing during several battles. I don't understand his thinking, but that was his choice. As it worked out, he had a longer, happier life than Nat Turner.....I can't enter into the minds and morals of 18th century slaves and slave owners. The past isn't a different place. It's a different dimension.....Most of Washington's contemporaries, including even his slaves, recognized him as a great man. It takes a special kind of intellect to be effusive in the praise of, say, George Floyd and willing to put George Washington in the dustbin of history.
'“If other universities don’t follow, we’ll come after them as well,” he said, adding that he would be conferring with civil and disability rights advocates in other states.'
There are a couple of lines in the science fiction novel Friday where it is mentioned that the California government passed a law awarding all citizens college degrees because people with college degrees made more money than those without them and such discrimination could not be allowed.
Anyway, the real reason that they are going after SAT and ACT is because the people in charge don't want any impediments to using ideological conformity as the controlling factor in the admittance to the inner party.
Where is Freeman Hunt?
Cook, wanna name for us ANY country in the world where more technically-advanced people did NOT invade and displace Stone Age tribes?
You know, like the New Zealanders did with the Maori, the ancient Japanese Jomon culture did with the Ainu, the Romans did all over Western Europe, the Normans did with the Celts and Jutes, the Spanish did to the Inca and Aztecs, etc.
Seems really...disingenuous...that you want Americans to feel guilty about something that has been a universal phenomenon for all human history.
Has anybody commented
"Fuck every last fucking Bush ever born or not yet born!"
Because somebody really ought to say that.
The thing about a camera shop is that the owner of the cameras can very quickly and easily move out all of his valuable stock in an hour or so without much help or any special equipment: 100+ cameras and film for them will easily fit in the trunk and back seat of a car. It's not like trying to save the stock in a grocery store or drugstore or furniture store or car dealership.
If Gram had even an hour or two warning that "his" store was likely to be looted, he may very well have moved all his own stuff into his house or some safe place out in the county, leaving only empty shelves and the actual building (which he did not own) to be burned. It seems likely that Rode lost far more than Gram when his (Rode's, not Gram's) place was destroyed.
roesch/voltaire thinks the current owner - the victim of violence - is declining a photo op because... why?
One might consider the victim of violence might be scared of further violence.
I hope some day you will know what that is like.
I hope that day comes soon.
I always took the battleship in Monopoly.
While I was shocked at the statues that were coming down, U.S. Grant, Colonel Heg, the freaking Portland Elk [????], the defacement of the monument of the 54th Massachusetts was the absolute pinnacle of nihilist idiocy.
Today's Dems are really Republicans! Not Marxists! NOT MARXISTS!!
Straight from Robert Cook, so you can take it to the bank.
Narr
True, Bernie is listed as "I"
Democrats, who today are actually Republicans, do exist, and Marxists also exist. There are no such chimera as Democrat Marxists, however.
Says the expert on Stalinism, his choice over weak Marxism.
Every statue that is removed or relocated leaves space for another statue to be raised.
What will these new statues look like?
The old statues were symbols, symbols that were quite useful to the ruling order.
Statues of Confederate heros sent the message "Atone for your rebellion, and you will be welcome back into the fold -- respected, even. The good you have done will live on, while the evil you have done will be buried". A useful message to send to a population that was just defeated and might yet have risen up again.
Statues of founding fathers sent the message "Look! You do not have to be perfect to be good. You can help build something big, something lasting, something wonderful." A useful message to enlist people in the cause of building big things, defending big things.
What will the new statues say? There are many heroes from which to choose to raise a statue.
Those who tore down the old statues may not like some of the new statues. Perhaps they will even wish they left some of the old statues up. But that is the fate of those who tear things down instead of building them up.
Cook wrote: “Democrats, who today are actually Republicans, do exist, and Marxists also exist. There are no such chimera (sic.) as Democrat Marxists, however.” The plural of chimera is chimeras.
A bit confused, but exactly right, Cook. Democrat Marxists are not chimeras, they are real. Take the BLM women who were “trained as Marxists”, do you suppose they are Republicans waiting to vote for Trump?
Self in DC is a failed experiment. Congress needs to take it back.
Self Government in DC is a failed experiment. Congress needs to take it back.
Was it the Trumpers who focused on symbols? Did Trumpers completely make up the calls to tear down basically every statue of a person born pre-1900?
Whoever thought up the acronym TWANLOC had these people pegged.
They are going to instigate a return to federalism and segregation and I can't wait for it.
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