Pardon Me, Mr. President
Today is Presidents Day (or, as we used to call it, Lincoln’s Birthday). That makes it a good time to talk about one of the great anomalies in Presidential history: the fact that President Abraham Lincoln, our Commander in Chief during our bloodiest war, took the time to review over 1,600 cases of military convictions during his 1,503 days in office, and that Lincoln pardoned a myriad of soldiers condemned to death.[br /]
The test that Lincoln applied, as Lincoln himself put it, was “whether this soldier can better serve the country dead than living.” (This is a good example of “gallows humor,” with real gallows.)[br /]
In one case of desertion, President Lincoln said: “If a man had more than one life, I think a little hanging would not hurt this one; but after he is once dead we cannot bring him back, no matter how sorry we may be; so the boy shall be pardoned.”[br /]
In another case, the soldier’s father went to the White House to beg for mercy for him. President Lincoln, who had never met the father before, greeted him as “my old friend.” Lincoln listened to the father, and then wrote out on a piece of paper: “Job Smith is not to be shot until further orders from me – ABRAHAM LINCOLN.” The father started to cry, but he asked Lincoln why he had phrased it this way. Lincoln said: “If your son never looks on death till further orders come from me to shoot him, he will live to be a great deal older than Methuselah.”[br /]
Lincoln refused to release a slave trader from prison, however, despite a personal appeal from an influential Congressman. “If this man were guilty of the foulest murder that the arm of man could perpetrate, I might forgive him on such an appeal; but the man who could go to Africa, and rob her of her children, and sell them into interminable bondage, with no other motive than that which is furnished by dollars and cents, is so much worse than the most depraved murderer, that he can never receive a pardon at my hands. No!”[br /]
Yet time after time, President Lincoln pardoned soldiers who had been sentenced to death for sleeping during sentry duty, desertion, and even treason. Lincoln called the desertion convictions his “leg cases”: “If Almighty God gives a man a cowardly pair of legs, how can he help their running away with him?”[br /]
And why did Lincoln show this mercy? Because over 600,000 people died during the Civil War, more than one out of every 50 Americans. And Lincoln thought that that was more than enough death. As journalist David Locke said: “No man on earth hated blood as Lincoln did.”[br /]
In November 2009, I gave a speech on the Floor of the House, in which I recalled Lincoln’s love for life. I added: “In the same way, I’d like to think that whether I leave here after two years, or twenty years, that there will be no blood on my hands. That’s why I’m against the war in Iraq. That’s why I’m against the war in Afghanistan. And that’s why I’m so much in favor of health care reform that saves lives in America.”[br /]
Happy birthday, Abe. And happy birthday – happy birth -- to all the descendants of the men whose lives you gave back to them.[br /]
Courage,[br /]
Alan Grayson[br /]
= new reply since forum marked as read
...I will not deify him as so many other Americans have done. His treatment of Native Americans was appalling and unforgivable. But, given the era, probably to be expected. Much like our Pres. Jefferson's slave ownership. Our country was but a child and our Presidents battling to set the rules. They made compromises just as they do today. Until we can see a President as a whole person and not the face on a mountain, our history will never teach us.
He was a great man, but no saint.
They were men, that is all. Men who beat paths through humanity to provide for our future. There have been men and women far greater, far more compassionate and tolerant that will never have a holiday dedicated to their lives.
So, I wish you a Happy President's Day, in honor of each and every one of them. Yes, even "that one" that's name shall not be spoken. 
None were pure evil, none were angels. Some were just a lot dumber than the others.
...and thank you, Mr Lincoln.
You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their excuses.
[font size=5 color=green]Solidarity99![/font][font size=2 color=green]
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I'm glad to read this. And then be wiser.
The Rightwing Koch Brothers fund the DLC
http://www.democrats.com/node/7789
Do deep-pocketed "philanthropists" necessarily control the organizations they fund? That has certainly been the contention of those who truck in conspiracy theories about the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations funding liberal and neo-liberal organizations. As for the rightwing, journalists such as Joe Conason and Gene Lyons uncovered that the "vast right wing conspiracy" -- or the New Right network of think tanks, media outlets and pressure groups -- was marshalled under rightwing billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife for his Get-Clinton campaign. Prior to the work of Conason and Lyons, Russ Bellant extensively documented in "The Coors Connection" how the Coors Family, Scaife and other wealthy rightwingers have funded the New Right movement since the early '70's. Among these rightwing benefactors are the Koch brothers. But the Kochs have been working both sides of the fence. As Bill Berkowitz writes, the Koch brothers have also been funding the Democratic Leadership Council.
According to SourceWatch, a project of the Center for Media & Democracy, the brothers are "leading contributors to the Koch family foundations, which supports a network of Conservative organizations and think tanks, including Citizens for a Sound Economy, the Manhattan Institute the Heartland Institute, and the Democratic Leadership Council."
Charles Koch co-founded the Cato Institute in 1977, while David helped launch Citizens for a Sound Economy in 1986.
This is no less stunning than if Scaife or the Coors family were funding the DLC. So do the Kochs just throw money at the DLC -- as long as the Council supports a free-market" (i.e. unrestricted/unregulated corporate power) agenda that the Kochs generally agree with. Or is it more than just that -- does this really buttress what Greens and other disaffected liberals contend -- that the DNC has just become a party of "Republicrats", thanks especially to the DLC? They would say that corporate backers like the rightwing/libertarian Kochs have co-opted the Democratic establishment -- a hostile takeover of (what was once) the opposition. (continued)
Koch Industries gave funding to the DLC and served on its Executive Council
http://www.americablog.com/2010/08/koch-industries-gave-funding-to-dlc-and.html
But, here's a key piece of information: the Kochs haven't just given to right-wingers. Back in April of 2001, The American Prospect's Bob Dreyfuss reported that the Kochs also funded the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC):
And for $25,000, 28 giant companies found their way onto the DLC's executive council, including Aetna, AT&T, American Airlines, AIG, BellSouth, Chevron, DuPont, Enron, IBM, Merck and Company, Microsoft, Philip Morris, Texaco, and Verizon Communications. Few, if any, of these corporations would be seen as leaning Democratic, of course, but here and there are some real surprises. One member of the DLC's executive council is none other than Koch Industries, the privately held, Kansas-based oil company whose namesake family members are avatars of the far right, having helped to found archconservative institutions like the Cato Institute and Citizens for a Sound Economy. Not only that, but two Koch executives, Richard Fink and Robert P. Hall III, are listed as members of the board of trustees and the event committee, respectively--meaning that they gave significantly more than $25,000.
The DLC board of trustees is an elite body whose membership is reserved for major donors, and many of the trustees are financial wheeler-dealers who run investment companies and capital management firms--though senior executives from a handful of corporations, such as Koch, Aetna, and Coca-Cola, are included.
Fitting, isn't it? The entity that tries to undermine the progressive agenda from within the Democratic Party was getting funding from the guys who are trying to destroy the Democratic Party from the outside.
The New Team
http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=254886&kaid=86&subid=85
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Just cheer louder and pretend it doesn't exist.
