Recently two brunettes have been in the news and not for high fashion or some celebrity scandal involving Charlie Sheen. No these ladies are popular politicians who speak off-the cuff and in their minds historic events can be redefined by how they “see” them and not how they actually are.
Let’s start with Sarah Palin who last week equated the fall of the Soviet Union with their competing with the United States in the space race. She was ranting and perhaps smarting after the President’s State of the Union and told Greta van Susteren that the President needed to “remember” what happened back then with the former communist USSR and their victory in that race to space. Oh yes they won, Palin said, but they also incurred so much debt at the time that it resulted in the inevitable collapse of the Soviet Union. There is no denying the Soviets won the initial round when they put the first human into space in 1961 but the United States quickly caught up and surpassed them by the mid-60s with the ultimate achievement being Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin landing on the moon. But they didn’t win the space race and the U.S.S.R. was around for another 30 years after the Sputnik moment. Russia’s fall had more to do with the vicious arms race with the United States. Russia had to compete with our massive spending in the arms race, thanks to one of Sarah’s heroes Ronald Reagan, and racked up huge debt during the 80’s. Sound familiar? This is what I mean by speaking off-the-cuff and causing even historical facts such as this to be drawn into debate. W.T.F indeed!
Which brings me to my other favorite brunette, Michele Bachmann(R-MN) and here I thought blonds had all the fun. Speaking before an anti-tax group in Iowa Bachmann said that “the very founders that wrote those documents (the Constitution) worked tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States….Men like John Quincy Adams, who would not rest until slavery was extinguished in the country.” It is true that Adams (as a Congressman) fought tirelessly against the gag rule passed in 1836 by southern Congressmen that automatically tabled petitions against slavery.
Let’s get real though both Thomas Jefferson and George Washington owned slaves and everyone knows the story of Jefferson fathering children with his slave Sally Hemings. Oh and there is that whole a slave is 3/5 of a human being provision that was in the “so-called” great and historic document that Bachmann and others keep trotting out. Talk about scarring a race of people! As the NON-Conformist said in a recent post, it’s a good thing the document has been amended and changed. Slavery was indefensible but the Founding Fathers were only doing what everyone else was doing i.e., it was the climate of the time.
What concerns me is when Palin and Bachmann make these incorrect statements their devotees ponder and wonder are they remembering history correctly.
A Tea Party spokesperson appearing on the Chris Matthews Show was pressed on Bachmann’s incorrect facts about it taking the Civil War NOT the Founding Fathers to end slavery mumbled that some kind of slavery ended with the Civil War. What!
America has a past that is not always pleasant to remember but it’s just plain stupid for these two women to try to rewrite it. I know they feel that they can say whatever because there is a black president(and this somehow levels the playing field) but they
should continue to be called to task for their outright lies before some start to think what they say is really true.
Posted by Libergirl
