Update: After a bit of research, it may appear that Abraham Lincoln had suspended Habeas Corpus according to this account: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/813646/posts

I also read Lincoln arrested 13,000 people under martial law. Wow. Maybe John Wilkes Booth was a real patriot? Thoughts?

I've heard Free Republic members labeled with the epithet "freeper" and although GOPcapitalist's post there seems well researched i'm too thick to absorb it right now or do a lot of research. I do know that as with all historical accounts, the way we view notable characters from the past is through the miasma of time and the particular bent of the writers of history. Lincoln may not be the man we imagine. For example he wrote to Horace Greeley in 1862:

"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that."

So the man we think of as the great emancipator may in fact have had more in his mind than the freedom of men. His concerns were perhaps more economic and political than Mrs. Crabapple may have told us.

Discarding this video. It failed to receive enough votes to get sifted up to the front page within 4 days.

*promote

Promoting this video and sending it back into the queue for one more try; last queued Friday, December 28th, 2007 2:44am PST - promote requested by schmawy.

No doubt Lincoln was an authoritarian tyrant. In defiance of the Supreme Court (itself something of an authoritarian branch of government), he said something to the effect, "Well, I've got the army. What do they have?" Though it's debatable, solid evidence exists that he even issued an arrest warrant for Chief Justice Taney. Schmawy's quote above is apropos, because it highlights the difference between Lincoln's reasons for suspension of civil liberties with Bush's reasons. On the one hand, Lincoln was trying to preserve the Union, which he saw as implicitly perpetual in the Constitution. While on the other hand, Bush is either, a) promoting the empire of the U.S., or b) abusing the powers of commander in chief for his own and others personal financial gain, or both. I suppose there are other possible interpretations of the Bush Doctrine, but I've yet to hear or read a reasonable one.

Moving this video to blankfist's personal queue. It failed to receive enough votes to get sifted up to the front page within 3 days.

Here's a video that shows the power of the web.. the ability for information that lies outside of the usual dogma to reach a huge number of people... and not just through the spread of rumors and gossip from person to person, but with digital fidelity.
It's had to imagine that this didn't make the sift the first two times around.

Awesome to see something like this instead of the worship Lincoln gets on a daily basis. I STRONGLY recommend Thomas DiLorenzo's "The Real Lincoln." Its an amazing book. BTW this is exactly what Ron Paul got smeared by the media for... saying the civil war was unnecessary.

Oh and before "The Great Emancipator" was president, he was a proponent of colonization: shipping freed slaves back to Africa.

We need to be able to inter the media today...not unlike Lincoln's move on the press during the Civil War. They need to report instead of editorialize and indoctrinate, or be shut the fuck up....

*dead

This published video has been declared non-functional; embed code must be fixed within 2 days or it will be sent to the dead pool - declared dead by eric3579.

I feel it's only in America do people apply hagiographic accounts of their presidents.

I mean look how Ronald Reagan is considered by the Republican Party. Or Bush right after 9/11.

Historically one should however consider the historical context, Lincoln may have assaulted the US via infractions but look what his legacy created, a country on it's way emancipation and civil liberities. What has Bushes infractions created? Yeah.

I personally don't think any President should be viewed in overly rose tinted views.