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Friday, 30 March 2007
Confederate Radio
THAT drew you in, didn't it? And welcome to all our neo-Confederate friends who wouldn't be here except that they spend their days cruising the Web for stuff they can get indignant about.
Anyway, I thought I'd refer you to the streaming feed from my appearance on Public Radio this morning. The video stutters something fierce, but it you just want to listen to the audio, that works fine.
I spent most of my 10 minutes or so deconstructing David Beasley's overly rosy memories of his short-lived attempt to get the Confederate battle flag off the dome. While you listen, you might want to read over my last written assessment of ex-Gov. Beasley's performance on that issue:
THE STATE
THE FLAG IS STILL THERE BECAUSE THE GOVERNOR GAVE UP
Published on: 07/06/1997
Section: EDITORIAL
Edition: FINAL
Page: D2
By BRAD WARTHEN, Editorial Page Editor
There are basically two reasons why a relic of the Civil War still flies in the most ridiculous of places atop the seat of present-day South Carolina government:* Gov. David Beasley didn't actually try to move it elsewhere, despite his promise to do so. Oh, he started to try, but then he gave up right at the point when a person who was really trying would have rolled up his sleeves.
* Sen. Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston, wanted the flag to stay right where it is. And what Glenn McConnell doesn't want simply counts for more at the State House than what the governor does want. Sen. McConnell knows what he's about.There was a time, in late 1996, when it looked as if the governor was serious about this. At least he said he was, and just saying he was cost him so much political capital that he might as well have seen it through. To have kept going and succeeded would have been to achieve a measure of greatness. To have kept going and failed would at least have earned him respect.
But instead, he ran into resistance and simply gave up. He did this after getting virtually all of the state's living former governors to stand up with him to call for moving the flag. He did this after getting hundreds of ordained ministers of all faiths to stand up and endorse this historic bid for reconciliation. He did it after creating a rift within his own political party, one that could only be healed by hard work toward a mutually agreeable solution. He did it after getting the Palmetto Business Forum and others to contribute thousands to the ad hoc organization that was going to push this whole thing from a grass-roots level. (That group now has $100,000 that was never spent).
Most of all, he did it after a poll showed that for the first time, most voters wanted to move the flag. Legislators, elected from districts that are artificially polarized by race, are a different matter. That's why it is so incumbent upon the governor, elected by the whole state, to show leadership.
When Mr. Beasley said he was going to take this on, a lot of us praised him for his courage. But what really took gall was getting everybody stirred up on this issue and then leaving them hanging. A lot of people are never going to forget that.
Many wondered what caused the governor to suddenly take an interest in the battle flag last year: What political angle was he trying to play? Count me among those who believe it was a genuine, road-to-Damascus experience, born of true concern about race relations in this state. What puzzles me is not why he started, but why he quit. I think he was sincere. I just think he had no idea how to make it happen. It's as if, after being struck blind, the would-be Apostle Paul had simply gone wandering off into the desert, scratching his head. The governor, a veteran of the House, was apparently taken by surprise that leaders of the lower chamber resented being the last to know about his plans - even though they were the ones who would have to do the dirty work to make it happen. They were so peeved that early in the session they passed a measure to hold a public referendum - not to ask what people thought about the compromise plan to move the flag to the State House grounds, but to force them to choose between extremes (fly the flag, yes or no).
Despite a lot of silly "that's the end of that" rhetoric in the House, this move was widely recognized as a sort of opening gambit. It was expected that the Senate would come back with something far more reasonable, and eventually the House would agree to something that would allow everyone to save face, and perhaps even do some good for the people of the state along the way.
The House vote on the referendum was on Jan. 23. The legislative session wouldn't end until June. And yet, as far as the governor was concerned, the effort to move the flag was over. For all practical purposes, the governor would not be heard from on this issue again - except for one time. On March 4, Charleston Mayor Joe Riley, a staunch advocate for moving the flag, announced he would not run for governor. Four days later, Gov. Beasley signaled that the flag effort was over. He had not even waited to see a bill introduced in the Senate. There were still three months left in the legislative session.
It's not that the governor dropped off the face of the Earth. He could still be seen here and there, playing golf in charity tournaments, dressing in colorful costumes and riding motorcycles with celebrities at the beach. But somehow he never found time to bring up the flag.
The issue just never came up in the Senate - not because the Heritage Act didn't have support. It did. And not because anyone was afraid things would get as ugly in the Senate as they had in the House. It's just that everyone knew Glenn McConnell didn't want the flag to move - at least, not under any terms but his own absurdly unrealistic ones. And no one wanted to be so rude as to wound the senator from Charleston's delicate sensibilities on this matter by even bringing up the subject.
The senator is widely respected for his intimate knowledge of all things Confederate. More to the point, he knows how to get his way in the Senate better than anybody. He always knows what he wants and how to bring it about. He's even better at stopping what others want if it doesn't suit him. He does not shrink from pressing his point until he succeeds. For this, he is respected by many and feared by some.
Gov. Beasley, who likes to be liked, probably would not enjoy having such a reputation. Fortunately for him, after his performance on the flag, he's in no such danger.
Posted by Brad Warthen at 10:58 AM in History, Leadership, Media, South Carolina, Southern discomfort
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Comments
Just want to clarify your message.
The American Civil War needed a "political settlement" rather than the CSA losing by "force of arms."
The Iraqi civil war, OTOH, just needs a few more thousand Americans to die trying to settle it with force, huh?
You dead-enders can't see the forest for the trees.
January, 2009 can't get here fast enough.
Posted by: Ready to Hurl | Mar 30, 2007 1:52:12 PM
Oh Brad... well I'll have fun with this on my own blog. It's always fun to rehash the late 1990s.
Posted by: Gary | Mar 30, 2007 2:27:21 PM
Wonder what happens in January 2009? I mean besides the obvious RTHurl reference to the swearing in of our new president. Is a new president really the answer? Seems to me the "new" president will face exactly the same problems and challenges the "old" one faced. I assume that RTHurl is a liberal...I don't know her (or him). But, does anyone truly believe that Hillary or Barak or (God forbid!) John Edwards is really going to be more effective than our present Commander in Chief? If one defines effectiveness as pulling out of Iraq most quickly, I suppose any one of these empty suits could be "effective." Or maybe effectiveness means having dialogue and making nice with people who cut other peoples' heads off. Again, just about any democrat contender could be effective under this definition. Somehow I don't see RTHurls' vision for January 2009 as a particularly good one. Ed
Posted by: ed | Mar 30, 2007 2:28:47 PM
Hurl and other surrender monkeys and appeasers will celebrate if we get a new president who will feel the pain of the terrorists. Then, as the Israelis are driven into the sea and exterminated just as the Iranian president predicts, the leftists will want meetings with the U.N. and wring their hands like the weaklings they truly are. That is the scenario we face if a weakling appeaser gains office in January of 09. Lets hope not.
On the topic of this thread, Gov. Beasely was awarded the JFK Medal of Courage for his stand on the flag.
Posted by: Dave | Mar 30, 2007 7:25:05 PM
Now, we return to those thrilling days of yesteryear....
I got my JFK Medal of Courage at the Goodwill Store.
Posted by: Lee | Mar 30, 2007 10:13:05 PM
On the subject of the original post by Brad: I find the parallels between the former governor’s efforts have the CSA battle flag moved and the current governor’s efforts to reform the state government's structure enlightening.
Our legislature is nothing if not able to stymie the executive branch at every turn for the last century and a half. Maybe the SC DOT can get a new logo for its vehicles and equipment; something combining the Stars and Bars, school bus yellow and Sen. McConnell’s family crest would be appropriate.
Posted by: SGM (ret.) | Mar 31, 2007 6:10:16 AM
I suppose putting that new logo on a Hunley submarine shaped silhouette background would be too much, huh?
Posted by: SGM (ret.) | Mar 31, 2007 6:13:47 AM
By the way, with all due respect to JFK, the annual award given by Caroline, Teddy, et. al. is a pathetic fraud. I doubt JFK would have approved of it.
Posted by: Dave | Mar 31, 2007 6:25:39 AM
I've been off the blog trail for a bit but saw this topic and couldn't resist. I'm going to "re-post" a post from one of Brad's blogs on Jan. 24... this particular subject is one I feel strongly about. And Brad - I didn't miss your response on the women and the draft thing, I just haven't had time to play lately. But thanks... your thoughts were very interesting and while I might disagree with many of them, I can appreciate the reasoning behind your opinion. Maybe we can fight about it later!
I've also decided, with some trepidation, to drop my pseudonym, "Lily", and use my real name. I'm not quite sure why, but it doesn't feel quite right anymore not to speak with my real name as well as my real voice.
At any rate, here's what I had to say about the Confederate battle flag in January; I'm glad to have the opportunity to say it again.
"I'm as native a South Carolinian as they come... both sides of my (white) family stretch back into the history of this state until they disappear. I do not believe that most people who venerate the Confederate flag do so to align themselves with openly evil neo-Nazi or White Supremacist organizations. I think they fly it, and support the flying of it on the grounds of the state capitol building, to remember the illustrious history of the South as viewed through rose-colored glasses, the days when Cotton was King, and to celebrate its past. But in so doing they overlook the implications inherent in the fact that this flag flew over a confederacy of states who did not want to give up the legal right to own other human beings. It may represent a glorious heritage to a certain segment of our southern society, but in a greater sense it represents oppression, hate, murder, and wanton evil to a much, much larger population. Acknowledge this truth or not – the Confederate flag is a racist symbol that has been adopted for generations by hate groups all over this country; it is this association that defines its symbology."
Posted by: Claudia, aka "Lily" | Mar 31, 2007 9:17:45 AM
If JFK were alive today, he would be a Republican demanding more tax cuts.
Posted by: Lee | Mar 31, 2007 9:19:12 AM
Well, written, Claudia.
BTW, I'm sure that Brad's heart is gladdened since you dropped your nom de blog.
Brad, how many people in SC do you think are named "Claudia?"
Heh.
Posted by: Ready to Hurl | Mar 31, 2007 9:27:02 AM
Yeah... I know. Thanks, Mom! (But you oughta hear my LAST name!)
Posted by: Claudia | Mar 31, 2007 10:03:33 AM
Lee, you're wrong again. It's a Good Thing that you appointed yourself an economic expert.
[...]Kennedy did push tax cuts, and his plan, which passed in February 1964, three months after his death, did help spur economic growth. But they're wrong to see the tax reduction as a supply-side cut, like Reagan's and Bush's; it was a demand-side cut. "The Revenue Act of 1964 was aimed at the demand, rather than the supply, side of the economy," said Arthur Okun, one of Kennedy's economic advisers.
This distinction, taught in Economics 101, seldom makes it into the Washington sound-bite wars. A demand-side cut rests on the Keynesian theory that public consumption spurs economic activity. Government puts money in people's hands, as a temporary measure, so that they'll spend it. A supply-side cut sees business investment as the key to growth. Government gives money to businesses and wealthy individuals to invest, ultimately benefiting all Americans. Back in the early 1960s, tax cutting was as contentious as it is today, but it was liberal demand-siders who were calling for the cuts and generating the controversy.
When Kennedy ran for president in 1960 amid a sluggish economy, he vowed to "get the country moving again." After his election, his advisers, led by chief economist Walter Heller, urged a classically Keynesian solution: running a deficit to stimulate growth. (The $10 billion deficit Heller recommended, bold at the time, seems laughably small by today's standards.) In Keynesian theory, a tax cut aimed at consumers would have a "multiplier" effect, since each dollar that a taxpayer spent would go to another taxpayer, who would in effect spend it again—meaning the deficit would be short-lived.
Posted by: Ready to Hurl | Mar 31, 2007 10:10:24 AM
Two other economic advisors to JFK, Otto Eckstein and the very socialist John Kenneth Galbraith, both admitted later that they had been wrong in initially opposing the tax cuts.
Kennedy was also a staunch patriot, a Life Member of the National Rifle Association, and different in a great many other ways from the socialist McGovern Democrats who hijacked his party.
Posted by: Lee | Mar 31, 2007 11:26:11 AM
Wow, RTH and Lee both agree that Kennedy was a great president. Sometimes there is common ground.
I'm not sure there is much of a real world distinction between supply and demand side tax cuts. They both start with the same premise that cutting taxes stimulates the ecomomy and will eventually increase tax revenues. But conservatives only see half the picture. If taxes go mainly to the rich at a time when plant utilization is well below capacity people will not spend much extra nor will there be much in the way of investment by American business. The end result is a very large and eventually dangerous federal budget deficit. Since domestic investment opportunities are scarce the deficit is financed in large part by overseas investors, especially China and Japan. What extra revenue that is generated from the tax cut is offset many times over by the lower rates.
With the Bush tax cuts what we ended up with was an enormous windfall for a few very wealthy people who failed to invest much in plant and equipment (because it just isn't needed) and the lower classes. Inflation remains somewhat under control because wages are flat. But even with modest inflation real wages are slowly falling over time. The gap between the super rich and even the garden variety rich is widening. The income gap with middle and lower class people has become staggering.
John Kennedy faced a very different set of economic circumstances in the early 60s. The tax cuts he implemented were the right medicine then but should not serve as a model for the current economy. What we need today is a way to get real wages rising again. A good start would be a big increase in the minimum wage and a good national health care system that allows people to keep more money rather than spend it on medical matters.
Posted by: bud | Mar 31, 2007 12:00:12 PM
Mom? Somehow I was under the impression that RTH is a woman, but then it seemed not to fit. By the way, JFK can be credited with starting the arms race. I guess they all have jelly on their fingers . . . .
Posted by: Herb Brasher | Mar 31, 2007 1:13:04 PM
The NRA that JFK belonged to was a much different organization than today.
In 1934, the NRA formed its "Legislative Affairs Division". While it did not directly lobby until the formation of the Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) in 1975, it did mail out legislative analyses and facts to its members, so they could take action themselves. [...]In May 1977, the NRA began a rightward shift after controversy erupted within the organization over the possibility of banning "Saturday night specials." In the so-called "Cincinnati Revolt", more than 2,000 NRA members met in the Cincinnati Convention-Exposition Center until nearly 4 AM.[3] Harlon Carter, a member of the NRA's Executive Council who had been fired as political action director, was elected the new leader of the NRA. He announced:
Beginning in this place and at this hour, this period in NRA history is finished. There will be no more civil war in the National Rifle Association.[4]
Posted by: Ready to Hurl | Mar 31, 2007 1:34:43 PM
What a tragedy that someone who so desperately wants to be an expert is afflicted with chronic reading incomprehension (CRI) and cursed with blockheaded denial of reality (BDR). The second intellectual deficit is aggravated by blind belief in wingnut talking points (BBWTP).
Yet the Kennedy-Johnson team saw the supply-side effects of the bill as secondary, if not incidental, to its main goal of prodding near-term growth. "The tax cut is good for long-run growth," said James Tobin, another economist on JFK's team, "only in the general sense that prosperity is good for investment." The immediate boost to the economy was the main goal. In fact, Nixon's economic adviser Herb Stein noted that the 1964 plan led to a diminished output-per-person-employed—a fact that could argue against the supply-side tenet that lower marginal rates would unleash the productivity of workers deterred from working harder because of overtaxation.[...] As his speechwriter Ted Sorensen later explained, "It sounded like Hoover, but it was actually Heller." According to historian David Shreve of the Miller Center for Public Affairs—on whose excellent work I've drawn here—it is from this December 1962 speech that the supply-side appropriators of the Kennedy mystique usually cull their quotations. They skirt the ample documentary evidence showing that the pro-business rhetoric of the Economic Club speech was largely strategic.
There's a final problem with portraying Kennedy as the ideological kin of Reagan and Bush on tax policy. Kennedy, it turns out, initially wanted to use government spending, not tax cuts, as the means to put dollars in people's hands. [...] Still, even as Kennedy accepted tax reduction as the first step along the route to growth, he never gave up his spending idea. "First, we'll have your tax cut," he told Heller; "then we'll have my expenditures program."
Posted by: Ready to Hurl | Mar 31, 2007 1:51:50 PM
The NRA, founded in 1871 by General U.S. Grant and other military officers, did not need to create a legal affairs department until the socialist regime of Franklin Roosevelt begain to attack all of the Bill of Rights.
The real ramp up of repressive legislation began in 1968 with Senator Joseph Tydings and Thomas Dodd trying to take firearms from most law-abiding Americans.
Posted by: Lee | Mar 31, 2007 4:33:39 PM
President Bush's small 2001 roll back of Clinton's taxes on the middle class was enough to immediately end the Clinton Recession of 2000, and generated enough new revenue to ballance the budget, pay for the entire war in Iraq, and pay off more than $1.0 TRILLION of debt incurred during the Clinton years - except Congress blew the "excess revenue" on junk social programs.
Posted by: Lee | Mar 31, 2007 4:36:19 PM
JFK was not a great President. He was jacked up on amphetamines and pain killers most of the time, and unable to make big decisions. His insecurity caused him to surround himseslf with arrogant Ivy League academics who enjoyed experimenting with working people and the poor. They got us into the war in Vietnam, but did not have the ability or will to fight it.
Posted by: Lee | Mar 31, 2007 4:39:07 PM
They got us into the war in Vietnam, but did not have the ability or will to fight it.Translation: they wouldn't nuke North Vietnam. That's the only effective answer that the wingnuts proposed.
Of course, that tactic (just as invading the north) would have meant international condemnation; probable involvement of China and/or Russia; and isolation for the U.S. Not to mention that it would also been morally inexcusable.
But, why wouldn't the U.S. want to risk WW III to prop up the corrupt government of a geopolitically insignificant country? Why wouldn't we want to sacrifice more HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF AMERICANS instead of just 57,000 in a civil war of a country whose culture, history and politics we didn't understand?
At least Iraq has a lucrative supply of energy vital for the U.S. Of course, Dear Leader hasn't even been competent in securing the oil.
Posted by: Ready to Hurl | Mar 31, 2007 8:48:48 PM
[...] arrogant Ivy League academics who enjoyed experimenting with working people and the poor.Those "arrogant academics" sought to open the American Dream to many fellow Americans who had been left behind.
Conservatives saw the poor and victims of racial discrimination as unlucky or unworthy of a shot at equal education or equal opportunity. It was none of the gubmint's bidness that states refused to allow black Americans to vote. It was none of the gubmint's bidness that black Americans were discriminated against at almost every opportunity for bettering themselves. Finally, it was none of the gubmint's business that states refused to protect either the property or, even, the lives of black Americans.
Equal rights for ALL Americans weren't part of the conservative "American Dream." Those "arrogant" liberal academics thought that America owed the same rights to ALL Americans.
Posted by: Ready to Hurl | Mar 31, 2007 9:08:53 PM
I am a 53 year white male whose lineage extends backwards into the vanishing point colonial mists of South Carolinas' past, and I understand from others in my family that we had some ancestors who fought in the Civil War, although I haven't devoted any time to confirming that or finding out more about it. That was then, this is now. For me, here is the deal on the flag: Take it down. Right now. Take it down with honor, put it somewhere that people who want to can go reverence it or whatever, but remove it from the Statehouse grounds this coming Monday. Let's do this so as to get the issue off the table, and end the distraction it causes from things that are way more important and that we need to work on. Moreover, get it out of the way so that people who get all worked up over it can no longer use it for an excuse for their failures. That's right...I really do believe that many people who stay all foamed up and agitated about the flag issue do so because it enables them to shift blame and avoid taking responsibility for their own failures and wrongdoing. It seems we can argue about ANYTHING in this state as long as we do not attempt to tell the unvarnished truth about and face squarely certain things going on in certain "communities." I imagine that I have really "put the terd on the table" by being blunt about it, but it is what I believe, and I think getting rid of the flag would either end some of it, or really draw attention to these posers and their slight of hand when they move to the next distraction without beginning the hard work they need to do. Ed
Posted by: ed | Mar 31, 2007 9:45:11 PM
Where do you suppose RTH got the idea I thought "The American Civil War needed a 'political settlement' rather than the CSA losing by "force of arms."
And has he read nothing of what I or Gen. Petraeus have said about Iraq? It most certain does need a "political settlement." The point of the surge is to make possible a measure of security, without which no one has the guts to step out and take the risks necessary for such a political settlement to come about.
In fact, in a nutshell, that IS the Petraeus plan, as articulated effectively by Lindsey Graham in this phone interview.
Posted by: Brad Warthen | Mar 31, 2007 11:06:12 PM
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