I knew President Lincoln and PEBO, you’re no Lincoln
OK, so I really never knew President Lincoln, but I guess nobody else does either, since everyone is comparing the president-elect to our 16th president.
Paul over at Power Line notes just some of the strange comparisons.
On “Meet the Press” today, Tom Brokaw compared Obama’s resilience after losing the New Hampshire primary (which made him 1-1 in the early contests) to Lincoln’s resilience after setbacks on the battle field during the Civil War.
Did Brokaw compare loosing the New Hampshire Democrat primary to loosing men on the battlefield during a civil war that lasted four years and cost more than 600,000 lives?
[Mario] Cuomo claimed that Obama becomes president at a time of even more profound crisis than Lincoln because the problems Lincoln faced in 1861 affected only the U.S., not the whole world.
I’m seeing a pattern…
Obama is tied closely to the Copperhead Democrats from 1864, and George W. Bush is more closely tied to Lincoln. (Hat tip to Gateway Pundit)
Less than 40 days after Lincoln was inaugurated, the Union and the south were at war. By 1864, the war had gone on four years and the country had grown tired of the bloodshed. The Democrats – nicknamed the Copperheads by the Republicans – wanted Lincoln out of office and demanded compromise with the south; slavery would remain legal.
By 1864, the Country had grown weary of the long and bloody Civil War. Hundreds of thousands of the countries’ best and bravest young men had fallen on the fields of Bull Run, Antietam, Shiloh, and countless more. Many began to think that the war was not worth it, and the price of freedom too great. The Republican Presidential Candidate Abraham Lincoln thought no price was too great for the abolition of slavery and the creation of a society in which a man was not judged by the color of his skin. Unfortunately, after four long years of war, Lincoln’s support was dropping fast, and people were looking for a way out of the war.
With this backdrop, the Democratic Party chose General George McClellan to be their Presidential Candidate at the Chicago National Convention in 1864. [It is written General McClellan did not agree with the Democrat Party platform.] The Democratic Party Platform presented a plan of “Compromise with the South”, which became known as “The Chicago Platform”. While on its surface the Chicago Platform was seductive in that it promised an immediate cessation of hostilities, and a restoration of the union. What was unsaid in the platform, but clearly implied, was that the “compromise” would be to agree to make permanent the institution of slavery in exchange for an end to the Civil War and restoration of the Union. In other words, the Democratic party was ready to “Sell Out” the enslaved, in order to stop further loss of white lives.
Like Lincoln, Bush stuck to his principles and wants the mission accomplished. The word compromise is a nice word, but when it involves ditching a core value or two, what are you left with?
If your daughter told you she was going to compromise on her choice for a boyfriend since she could not find the perfect guy, how would you feel? What if that compromise was this guy only hit her once per year instead of once per month?
So, where are the main stream media comparisons between Lincoln and George W. Bush?
A little more than one year after Lincoln’s second inaugural, the Civil War was over, there was peace, the Union was back together, and slaves were free. Lee surrendered to Grant on April 9, Lincoln was shot April 14, and died one day later.