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When Johnson signed the Voting Rights Acts, he knew he was going to lose the South's support for the Democratic Party for a generation, and right away, starting with the Election of 1964, you see this phenomenon, the only states Goldwater won were former Confederate states and Arizona. Ever since then, Republicans have been employing the "Southern Strategy", because they know there is a strongly disgruntled population there who will never vote Democrat for what Johnson did. King found Johnson much more willing to work with him concerning civil rights than John Kennedy was, and in a famous White House meeting, Johnson told King, I agree with you, now go out and make me do it. Ultimately, I don't think King really cared which party could secure civil rights for African-Americans, regardless of who he voted for in the 1950's. King towed no party line. After Johnson signed the pertinent legislation into law, King became very critical of Johnson's escalation of the Vietnam War, and Johnson and King never met again. King saw party politics as a means to an end, not the end itself, as many today see it. I still fail to see how any Republican could claim King as one of their own, when he was highly critical of everything Republicans stand for, when he was called a communist by the standard-bearers of all things Republican in this country, and especially when he was an outspoken proponent for democratic socialism.
King, along w/ many blacks in the South, had voted Republican his whole life until the 1960's. The GOP was touted as the party of Lincoln. Blacks began slowly matriculating to the Democratic Party after Harry Truman suddenly adopted civil rights, albeit token efforts at first, on the Democratic platform while also ordering the de-segregation of army units. Eisenhower had a huge opportunity w/ Brown v. the Board of Education; but he had the attitude that if the court was going to interpret it, then they can enforce it as well. With the Civil Rights and Voting Rights bills taken up by Kennedy and Johnson, blacks went over to the Democrats in droves. It was a huge opportunity lost for the Republicans. The Jim Crow South, and the negro, switched sides in an unprecedented change of voting demographics. The rest is history. The Democrats are now the party that seeks to protect the rights of the minorities in this country. The Republicans, already controlled by special interests and corporations since the time of Taft's presidency, now strenghthened its ranks by welcoming the states' rightists and Dixiecrats with open arms......The Republicans are the new Confederacy; and again, a man from Illinois kicked their a$$es.
And yet, such a man believed Norman Thomas, one of the most important socialists of the 20th century, the bravest man he ever met. I don't think being a Christian means you can't be critical concerning capitalism.
I wonder if Dr. King would have stood up with Justice Roy Moore for refusing to remove the monument of the 10 commandments even though a Federal judge ordered it. I bet he would have.
King would probably be the most consistent of all of us, disavowing both Darwinism and Social Darwinism.
Martin Luther King was a religious man. Maybe that is why Friday is claiming him. And this is not a religious blog. Would Martin Luther King believe in Darwinsm?
How is Martin Luther King, a proponent of democratic socialism and called a communist by J. Edgar Hoover, Barry Goldwater, and Ronald Reagan, possibly a Republican? How can King, someone a liberal like John Kennedy thought was too far to the left, a man who died while on a trip to defend a sanitation workers' union in Memphis, be considered a Republican wet dream?
Didn't Jesse Jackson suggest, or just say it out loud that he wanted to cut Barrack Obamas balls off?
I hope we can continue this at a later date (maybe tomorrow), I gotta go to work in the morning. All part of my evil scheme to survive.
You are the one calling half the country racist, I think you better offer some proof. The Party of Lincoln is still the party of MLK, Condi Rice, Michael Steele, Lynn Swann, JC Watts and others. The party of Jim Crow is now the party of William Jefferson, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and Barack Obama. One of these parties judges people based on their character, the other based on their race. Obama did not win the Democrat vote because his character was historic.
You mean the party of Henry Clay. If Obama wants to hitch his wagon to that racist, be our guest.
Sorry, Friday, but I will need proof of that. Otherwise, I think you are grasping at straws. It is a fact that many prominent Democrats who had risen to power on states' rights switched parties after the '60's (ie. Strom Thurmond ring a bell?). The South has voted Republican in just about every presidential election since except for '76 (Carter was from Georgia). You can put whatever lipstick you want on this pig; it will not change. At the beginning of the 20th Century, the Republicans were the progressives and the Democrats were the conservatives. With the advent of FDR carrying on the torch of his uncle, the progressives infiltrated the Democratic Party; and with the Civil Rights Act, the last remnants of the Solid South went GOP. The Party of Lincoln is now the Party of Obama.
In fact shoot, look at what the Democrats are going through to keep Robert Byrd in the Senate. It's like weekend at bernie's. I bet when the government starts euthanizing the elderly in order to ration healthcare, Byrd will get a pass.
It falls in line with his theory of Darwinsm. That Africans were our lesser ancestors. Its an English theory based upon bone fragments.
Or anti-nonsemite depending on your perspective :)
Well, clearly they don't totally believe in Darwinism ... otherwise they would be considered anti-Semites. lol
Jim Crow republicans like Robert Byrd? Oops. How about Jim Webb who used to terrorize blacks in his neighborhood? Oh, no, that's right. We are the monolithic christian old white male party. I wonder what Michael Steele would say to Howard Dean about that.
BD, you are missing a huge linke in history. Yes, you are correct that these ideas originated with the Democrats BEFORE the Civil Rights Act. As Lyndon Johnson prophetically said, the Jim Crow South left the Democratic Party after the Civil Rights Act was passed. Where did they go? The Republican Party. The South elected Richard Nixon in '68, even though they rejected him 8 years before. The Jim Crow southerners are now Republicans; and as far as I can say, they can keep 'em.
That is a good question, Progress. I have not evolved far enough to give you a correct answer though. lol
You are mistaking Republican policies for Darwinism. We don't avoid socialism because we think only the fit should survive, we avoid socialism because we believe that every single able human is not only fit to survive, but is good and kind and will also not let the non-able just die. We don't believe that fit humans will survive while non-fit will become instinct and we will become some sort of uber-mensch, that is nazi-ism. Hmm, kinda like advocating abortions for down syndrome babies... We believe that unless you are disabled, that you are fit to survive and thrive if given the opportunity. That is why Republicans advocate opportunity over equality of circumstances.
I always spell it that way. I know its wrong. But I also say dood. Its just a fact that the fattest guys on U4prez are liberals. It has to do with that type B personality and being slow. Like the hippo.
he is still talking... I hope he shuts up before 24! He does not want to piss of Jack Bauer
Yes I seen the press conference.. most of it anyway. It seems that Obama will be using the BUsh method of fighting the economic crisis... throw money at it. I wonder if he will take this approach to other problems like, The murder rate in KC is way up, will obama decide to send people into the streets to murder more people. The homeless problem is getting out of hand so maybe we should kick people out of their homes and have them live in the streets. Is crack a problem in your area? How about the government buy everyone some crack? This whole thing is absurd, our children will be pissed in a few years! Inflation is inevitable, the debt will never be paid down, our kids will be bankrupt!
Sorry. HIPPOCRITICAL. I'm giggling, thinking of someone standing on some riverbank in the Serengeti, criticizing a hippopotamus. God, you're fat. I didn't know something so big could be so buoyant. You'd get laid more often if you mixed in a little exercise. You can't be a vegetarian and be so fat, you must sneak a few Big Macs in. Back in a few minutes.
Get off my jock Erock. Go back to argueing why we should have stayed out of world war 2. Unless you wanna give Progress your skull so they can prove the Neanderthal lived in Minnisota. Go look at some porn.
O did you try to say something smart Wiz?
I caught it on the radio. Obama was talking up the stimulus plan and comparing it to the new deal. What ballz.
Did anybody catch the press conference? I forgot about it. I'm currently watching hockey.
Keep your penis beating comments on the right page Erock. Look down there below, you just argued yourself out of your own arguement.
Wow Wiz that must be like looking in a mirror.
No because he does not know where the term came from. It came from Herbert Spencer, who was a Deist and evolutionist himself. Applying it to Christian consevatives would be like suggesting that they are hippocritical, when in fact it is Progress that is being the hippocrit. He is suggesting that those who reject Darwinsim are in fact engaging in it. I have never heard a Christian conservative expose the philosphy of Herbert Spencer. He didn't do his homework.
No, Erock, it makes perfect sense, and there may yet be something other than corporations or governments that take over social power. Civilization is only 6000 years old, it's arrogant to think we have all the answers. I'd like to think our species will live for centuries to come. There's going to be political and economic concepts coming and going. I hope we figure out how to praise individualism without an elite stealing from us and without poverty enslaving most of us.
My biology teacher said there is no way we can know how old the Earth is because carbon dating has been proven to be erratic in determining the age of a fossil.
I think Progress raises an excellent point, because a big part of evolution is "natural selection", how Nature selects some species and gets rid of others. Social Darwinism dictates that some are picked by the nature of the free market to succeed, and some are destined to fail. THIS is the point of Progress's argument, how such a process can ben deemed garbage on one hand, yet accepted in the other. That is how this becomes and apples-to-apples argument.
I do not take the view that we need no government. The view I do take is that the government should not be overwhelming as it is today. I also agree that you can not have corporations running the show either. But nor do I take the view that the current union leadership is the best check on corporations as heck a true union leader would have support Pat Buchanan back in 96 as he was opposed to NAFTA. So clearly the system we have now is broke. I want a blance between government which allows the free market to work BUT checks that free market from becoming abusive as say the late 1800s early 1900s. I dont know if that makes much sense I hope it does.
Progress was being over simplistic and comparing apples to Orangatuans. The complex human systems in place right now are not comparable to the tribal lifestyles of the apes, which I assume he believe are our great grandparents. I think he was just trying to make a snide comment. Darwin himself probably never made the comparison as the term created after his death by Herbert Spencer. This was victorian age thinking. But why delve into something so deep when the author was just trying to get a rise out of people. BRB.
Erock, it's one thing to question norms, it should always be applauded. But questioning them merely to question them just runs us all in circles. All these dystopian novels address that question, what happens to the individual in these scanrios? Personally, I think a world run my corporations is far worse than a world run by governments. We are a social species. We can't partition the world into seven billion pieces. Individualism is a rather empty word without some sort of context. Society is that context.
As to what I originally wrote about Wells, I wrote it to get off the thought about what a theory is. I didn't think that line of thought was doing the author's orignial intent justice, which I assumed was, how can you discard Darwinism on one hand, but accept Social Darwinism in the other? It was a good question that I felt deserved more than just talking about evolution being a theory, and then merely analyzing what a theory is.
Yes but in both cases socialist and a facist state the government controls the industry, the distribution etc.etc. What is wrong with individualism? I got attacked for it back in high school why? Because I didnt just go with the social norm jocks and non jocks I moved freely between both groups. I had my own thought process. Communes can be just as pre-programed.
Wiz, Animal Farm was actually praising socialism, showing the difference between a society in which everyone has a relatively equal role in its function, everyone benefits from the world from the whole, and a society where those at the top confiscate the wealth and dole it out to those who will ensure their stay in power. Snowball comes up with an idea for a windmill so all animals could enjoy the luxury of electicity in their given stalls, he gets chased away, Napoleon seizes the idea but changes the motive. Animal Farm is a parable, a warning, that if you want to keep your society as free as possible, you have to maintain vigilance. We can disagree about literature, I certainly gave you my thoughts on the subject. The "savages" weren't exactly working their way up the corporate ladder, were they? They were living as families, a concept everyone either mocked or reeled back in horror, families being a collective, a commune of sorts, while everyone else was a pre-programmed individual. Mustafa Mond is no different from a J.P. Morgan or a William Randolph Hearst, men whose wealth and businesses propelled them to the kind of power that could overtake governments. We should talk more about literature around here, it beats the constant Rep/Dem backbiting.
Either system socialism or capatalism can be exploted into a lose of freedom if taken to their fullest extent.
No you went off the "animal farm" with the comments you are making, that pertain little to the tenacious simplicity of the authors blog comment. I will still contend that Huxelys commentary was in reference to the state. Mustafa Mond was the only character with any sort of power. It was those "savages" that did not want to be in the socialist system that were kept on the reservation. Those that wanted freedom that is.
What I'm saying is, Wells' novel was a precursor to the sort of novels that spoke of a future where the problems we deal with today are solved, for better or for worse. Wells' novel took Social Darwinism and ran with it. Jack London's "The Iron Heel" talked about capitalists so powerful that they could get away with bombing Congress. Huxley's novel was about the regimentation of the human condition, and I assume you read the novel, I think, when the characters in his novel talk about the date as "in the year of our Ford", he is taking a swipe at the faith we have in capitalism by taking one of the real perpetuators of capitalism and deifying him. The very first scene in the book is a tour of the hatchery, embryos on an assembly line, each given different conditions as to create a permanent caste system, Alphas being bred for brain work, Epsilons for dirty work. That doesn't sound like socialism to be, a system seeking a classless society and equality wherever possible. Sounds more like a system seeking a permament pool for cheap dumb labor, completely accepting of its place, never seeking more from their lives. That sounds a whole lot more like laissez-faire capitalism than socialism to me. The point, though, was that Wells spawned the modern dystopian novel, the concept of taking a particular aspect of current society and projecting it to the nth degree. I'm sure you've seen the movie "Soylent Green", that comes from a science fiction short story by I think Harry Harrison, that movie takes the fear of overpopulation and takes it to a gross extreme, where our ability to feed ourselves has been overwhelmed by the sheer number of people on the planet. Soylent Green is the solution, but I'm not going to give away what Charlton Heston is drug away screaming, in case anyone else wants to see the film. Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" takes the tenuous gains of feminism in the 1970's and envisions a world where those gains are not only lost, but destroyed for the sake of national preservation, where women are robbed of their identites and are seen as either laborers or broodmares. Need I continue, or do you get the point I'm making?
So are you saying that "Brave New World" the socialist system depicted in that novel is off the mark.
While H.G. Well's "The Time Machine" is considered a classic in early science fiction, it was actually an ancestor to the sort of dystopian novel later popularized by Aldous Huxley and George Orwell. It talks about a future where there are two distinct human species, separated by Social Darwinism, the Eloi live in the hills in relative luxury, the Molochs live in the earth like animals. It's important to have a little historical perspective; while we live in an era where capitalism is championed and socialism is demonized, it was just a century ago when laissez-faire capitalism was seen as enslaving humankind and socialist policies were sought to reign in the tyranny of robber-barons.
If someone can explain the mechanism of how gravity works please do. All that its tied to is a constant applied to mass. The Newtonian theorys apply well to the earth, but not so much in regards to space. Gravity is a fact, but its no understood as if it was we would all be in flying cars right now. Evolution is a theory based on observations. However since we cannot go back and time and observe the branching off of the species we are left to make up stories based on some jaw bones found in a cave. Thats about as scientifically flawed as finding some wood on mount ararat in Turkey and say its from the Noahs ark.
I was watching this show and they went over Creationism. Basically it came down to Scientific facts that formed a scientific theory vs a book of stories written by individuals that has zero backing other than the sheep who follow with/for no reason. In relation to to the everyday world it is the same the people who are cut throat will advance and leave the weak behind to pick up after them....
A theory is not fact, it is based on fact, is derived from fact, but is not fact. Now, as for the moronic attempts to bash conservatives by using fake profiles, Arjay, Gravity is a fact. Newton proved his Theories, making them fact. Progress, if I remember correctly, wasn't it White Southern Democrats like yourself who argued against the Civil Rights act f 1965? Isn't it also a fact that White Southern Dems, such as yourself the reason Narcotics were first made illegal, because your predacessors felt that "The Blacks" were getting high and raping white women? Isn't it also a Fact that there is a direct correlation to te rise of the Democratic party in the south and the birth and Growth of the Klu Klux Klan in the south and that as one lost power so did the other? So being as you are claiming Darwin's THEORY as a fact now, wouldn't it be yor wn party that has proven thru its racist actions that it itself does not support the idea?
In the interest of Manifest Destiny, it was accepted in our war with the Native Americans that we were strong and they were weak; so it was only "natural" that we win. In politics today, the far right has said that liberals-homosexuals, environmentalists, minorities-are the weak, and the stronger conservative and religious right will utlimately win. I see this everywhere. They reject Darwin's theories regarding science, in spite of some reasonable truth to it (although I personally reject survival of the fittest which I will get to), but they accept Darwin's theories in society. I talked to a man the other day who is upset that his child's school does not let them play dodge-ball anymore. He feels that this game teaches his child to toughen up; otherwise, his child is going to be a *slang-word-synonymous-with-women's anatomy*. (Why can't parents teach their children to be assertive at home?)
I think BD was stressing that evolution is "just a theory" as a way to discredit its validity. I was telling him what a theory actually is. I hate the "lol its just a theory" argument against evolution. Gravity is JUST A THEORY.
I'll stick with my Huh?
BigDaddy, Gravity is just a THEORY. Merriam-Webster's first definition of "theory" is: 'the analysis of a set of facts in their relation to one another'
Huh?
it is the THEORY of Evolution, and how does homosexuality fit in that theory? but that was a cheap shot,,, so here is the answer to your ignorant musing. We do not say survival of the fittest, as it is an over simplification. It i the strong will survive and that the assets of the weaker will be grabbed up to enhance the stronger. now i know everyone wants to debate a THEORY, but it is incorrect. it is devolution, just look at the profile pics of you people!
Some conservative will come along to correct me, but I think the reason why some live with this "hypocrisy" is because evolution and Social Darwinism aren't seen as the same thing. Evolution is a threat to religion, it is an argument that takes power of creation from God and gives it to Nature, fate, chance, whatever. The apparatus for that evolution is irrelevant, the fact that someone would dare say anyone other than God created the universe and animals and people is unfathomable. When they think of evolution, they think in scientific terms, in DNA, not in the cold reality of Nature. Perhaps it is an American bias, we're currently at the top of the world pecking order, we deem ourselves the fittest and with some made-up mandate to rule. We consider those who are failing in our society as lazy, undesirable, when the reality is, the majority of mankind lives in poverty. Unbridled capitalism is the perfect mechanism to weed out the weaklings. It's state-sponsored eugenics disguised as freedom. These are points in Social Darwinism not discussed by those seeking to put stickers on science books stating that evolution is just a theory. It's the same thinking concerning abortion, the same people who cry out infanticide are the same people who think funding health care for children isn't in our national interest.
Nah, Jackie, this is a far more effective way to get you to explain yourself. I'd rather you be seen for what you are through your own words, as you say them, than me be considered an accomplice for asking you to go into deeper detail. I'd rather frame your words as they stand than seek finer resolution.
I know what social Darwinism is Arjay ... I was commenting on the fact that Arch implied that those who are rejecting evolution are using 'social Darwinism" in their everyday life the ultimate hypocrisy if you ask me... My comment was more of a in public school people are educated on both but it is in many private schools that they are intent on keeping science out of the classroom and shove god down their throats... Arjay if you don't follow what I say just ask instead of trying to insult my intelligence... I can assure you, you can go on and on about whatever you want even write a blog about it but 9 outta 10 times you aren't taken seriously now if you don't mind I just got home from the worlds worst date and now I need to prepare for my second date of the day (which will be much better :) )
Progress, I hope this is an idea you expand into a full-blown essay instead of just leaving it here as a topic for conversation.
Dam Arch (sorry, Progress) I've been spending my spare time, I don't have much of it as of late, to writing a long blog about this very topic. It'll be out by the end of the week. And Jackie, I have been though the Catholic school system and can tell you that I was only taught about evolution in science class. In religious classes, it was only taught as an understanding of God's love and perfection, never as a historical fact. Although when I went to Boy's State I met a number of people from the middle and southern part of the state who went to Christian Academies who argued to the fullest extent the 7 day creation. So I guess outside the public curiculum it varies based on the type of school. Anyway, you will have my answer to this question pretty soon.
Jackie, it doesn't surprise me that someone who erroneously refers to George Orwell has no idea what Social Darwinism is. Not one bit.
I learned about evolution in my HS (public classroom) and about creationism in the same day. I believe firmly in evolution and am 'to the right'... so to whom are you referencing??? Also private schools typically only teach creationism (now under a new name to be more PC) 2 ex's of mine came from catholic school and looked at me like I had 10 heads when I explained what evolution was ... needless to say they are now evolutionary believers... there is nothing in the creationism theory that holds any water beyond a basic concept that I could have thought up in my bathtub... there is scientific proof behind evolution that far exceeds what the hand me down story tellers are saying...
It is adamantly opposed in the classroom; but feverishly practiced in the corporate boardroom. The phrase is used in weeding out the "strong" and the "weak" in society; and even in football training camps. So, seriously, what is up?
Excellent question. I've always wondered that about laissez-faire conservativism.
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