NorthDeltaBlues: 2011

Ok- I can't take it anymore. This speech has been making the rounds on Facebook as well as other blogs, emails, and the like. While I am not going to defend the maker of this speech- and reserve my right to evaluate their position if and when they may become a national candidate for the Presidency I must attempt to put a bit of a reality check on both sides in the hope that those who may stumble across this blog of mine will consider doing their own research when the likes of Anderson Cooper go off on a politician who falls on the opposite side of the political spectrum.

What precipitates this stems from the following speech given by Michele Bachmann of MN- widely rumored to be a contender for the Republican nomination of President in the upcoming 2012 election.

The items of her speech that Mr. Cooper finds so objectionable and open to ridicule are about 10 minutes into her speech..

Now as to Anderson Cooper- what follows is a transcript of his show shortly after the Bachmann speech-

-So, here's what she said. You can judge for yourself. Speaking to a group called Iowans for Tax Relief, Congressman Bachmann seemed to whitewash our painful history over slavery. Instead of facing some of the less pretty facts of America's founding, she airbrushed herself some new history.

Here she is talking about what people have faced throughout history when coming to America.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MICHELE BACHMANN (R), MINNESOTA: It didn't matter the color of their skin. It didn't matter their language. It didn't matter their economic status. It didn't matter whether they descended from nobility or whether they were of a higher class or a lower class. It made no difference. Once you got here, we were all the same.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: Now, as much as we wish that were the case, as good as that sounds, that's simply not true. Whether she was talking about the founding of our nation or the experience of immigrants throughout our history, we were not treated all the same.

Irish immigrants didn't feel the same walking past storefronts with signs reading "No Irish need not apply." Japanese Americans didn't feel the same when they were placed in internment camps during World War II. And, of course, enslaved Africans certainly didn't feel the same when they were brought here against their will.

Michele Bachmann mentioned slavery, but only to say it was something the founding fathers couldn't wait to get rid of.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BACHMANN: We know that was slavery that was still tolerated when the nation began. We know that was an evil and it was a scourge and a blot and a stain upon our history.

But we also know that the very founders that wrote those documents worked tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States. And I think it is high time that we recognize the contribution of our forbearers, who worked tirelessly, men like John Quincy Adams, who would not rest until slavery was extinguished in the country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: Now, again, Congresswoman Bachmann has her facts wrong. Many of the founders owned slaves. George Washington owned slaves. Thomas Jefferson, who wrote that all men are created equal, owned slaves.

Jefferson was certainly conflicted about it, but others were not. And let's remember, the Constitution itself, as glorious a document as it is, the Constitution itself established a slave as three-fifths of a person. It was a political compromise. As for John Quincy Adams, well, Ms. Bachmann is right.(-my note- this must have just about killed him to utter it-) He was a tireless campaigner against slavery, especially during his 17 years in Congress after leaving the White House. But he was not a founding father, as she sort of implied. He died years before emancipation and the Civil War.

Now, this is certainly not the first time that Congresswoman Bachmann has gotten the facts wrong or invented her own facts. Just recently on 360, she claimed President Obama's trip to Asia would cost $200 million a day. We showed how that report was completely unfounded, tracing it to an unnamed Indian official quoted by a foreign news service.

There are plenty of other examples, but we focus on this tonight, not just because Congresswoman Bachmann is going to be speaking tomorrow night, but because we believe facts matter, particularly where our history is concerned.

And one of the many things that makes this country great is that we are able to examine our past. We are at our best when we learn from the past, painful though it may be. Rewriting history does no one any good. It doesn't honor our real history. And it certainly doesn't help us learn about ourselves.

We invited Congresswoman Bachmann on the program tonight. She declined. We asked her for a statement that might explain her comments. She never responded.

Instead, we're joined by former Republican Congresswoman Susan Molinari. Currently, she's president of the consulting firm Susan Molinari Strategies. Also, Democratic strategist Paul Begala and historian Professor Eddie Glaude Jr., who chairs the African-American Studies Department at Princeton University.

Professor, what do you make of her comments. Is this a whitewashing of history?

EDDIE GLAUDE JR., CHAIR, AFRICAN-AMERICAN STUDIES DEPARTMENT, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY: Well, in part, I think it is.

But I think, you know, what it -- what it -- what it suggests is that she lacks a little nuance, to put it gently. We do know that there was debate among the founding fathers about slavery. Some opposed slavery outright. Others were indifferent.

But still others were quite committed to slavery, economically and socially. What happened as a result of that debate wasn't resolution, but, as you mentioned at the top of the piece, was compromise, the three-fifths compromise, and also the fugitive slave clause, which allowed slave owners to retrieve their escaped property.

What I think she would have been better equipped to do is not appeal necessarily to the founders, but appeal to a different tradition, a tradition of Americans who sought to correct the contradictions around our democratic principles evident in our practice. And that is the abolitionist movement in the 1830s.

She should have invoked William Lloyd Garrison, Lydia Maria Child, Frederick Douglass, Sojourner Truth, those who laid down their lives in interesting sorts of ways to protect democratic principles, to lift up the idea of democratic freedom. But I have a strange suspicion that Michele Bachmann would label many of them, shall we say, un-American or terrorists.

COOPER: Paul, does this matter? I mean, comments like this, does it matter?

PAUL BEGALA, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I -- look, you know, it's a good news/bad news thing, Anderson.

I suppose the good news is, there are some in her party who will appreciate this. Maybe even she -- maybe she can win the Republican nomination. The bad news is, probably can't win who's smarter than a fifth grader.

She is running at a fringe. You know, her party has a lot of terribly, terribly bright people. We just saw Rudy Giuliani, one of them, interviewed by Piers Morgan.

But there's a fringe in her party that does seem to want to go back to the old days of the Know Nothings, who, by the way, were a 19th century group who were bitterly prejudiced against Catholics, Jews, African-Americans, and almost everybody else they could think of.

I'm not saying that that's what she is. I'm just saying that there's a strain in her party that seems to say, I have -- I have got my mind made up, don't confuse me with the facts.

COOPER: Susan, do facts matter in this case?

SUSAN MOLINARI (R), FORMER U.S. CONGRESSWOMAN: Of course facts matter. Michele Bachmann is one individual of the Republican Party. But there's -- as -- as Paul has said, there's many great, wonderful spokespeople for the Republican Party.

I think what Michele Bachmann was trying to say was to -- to look more positively towards our history and -- and the history of the United States. I don't think she meant anything negative about it.....

My point in all of this- and I will give Anderson Cooper credit here- (more likely his staff for actually finding this tidbit in their research-so they could put it on Anderson's Teleprompter)- .."As for John Quincy Adams, well, Ms. Bachmann is right. He was a tireless campaigner against slavery, especially during his 17 years in Congress after leaving the White House. But he was not a founding father, as she sort of implied. He died years before emancipation and the Civil War."

Ok- John Q Adams was the 6th President of the United States. His Father John Adams was Vice President to George Washington and later 2nd President of the United States as well as a signer of the Declaration of Independence- so Is John Q Adams a founding father? Strictly no- but by only one degree of separation. Was John Q Adams values system more than likely strongly influenced by the experiences of his father? I would think so. So- semantics here on both parts. But- what many are un aware of is this-

John Quincy Adams was a Lawyer of note- and was admitted to the Bar and could argue cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. One of his most noted cases although generally unknown to most unless they be constitutional scholars is this-

United States, Appellants, vs. Cinque, and others, Africans, captured in the schooner Amistad, by Lieut. Gedney, Delivered on the 24th of February and 1st of March 1841. A case he argued on behalf of 'slaves' years after his presidency and a mere 20 years prior to the start of the Civil War. He died in 1848.

If Michele Bachmann is guilty of anything it is learning history by way of popular Cinema- as the Armistad case was made into a major motion picture- directed by Steven Spielberg no less.

As the politicos and the media continue to rant and rave- I'll be looking for the grain of truth in either side's argument. I'm quite confident this election year will give birth to many more posts - Sarah Palin being a wonderful source of fodder for this kind of thing. :)

PS- John Q Adams's argument to the Court was successful.

So I took a weeks vacation. 5 days to ostensibly get some shit done around my house. Once again..not to be. I have been sucked into setting up an electronic method for getting Mom's bills paid. Which in and of itself wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing except for the fact that my mother owns no computer and at this stage of her life...getting her internet savvy enough to deal with this kind of stuff on her own would well- be more work and trouble than me doing it myself. So I really need to get the shredder going as now- not only will I have to deal with my records, I'll be dealing with much of her financial records as well. So out of the 5 days I had to try to get my shit organized- 2 of them were spent driving down and back to deal with her stuff. So my stuff waits again. On the positive side- I did however go to Office Max and get a couple of file storage totes....baby steps- I keep telling myself- baby steps and eventually it will get done. :)