Gotta love him!

=]

Awesomeness and so true about the history of Bush. There will be giant moves (as there already are) to change everything he did into a positive smart selfless decision. The only thing here he says that I don't agree with is his sarcasm when saying that the Civil War wasnt about slavery, hinting that it was. Which in fact it wasnt. Northerners at the the time werent completely sold on freeing the slaves as much as history (written by the victors) made out

Actually he's right there too, he's a pretty well educated individual. Saying it wasn't about freeing the slaves is true enough but that doesn't mean it had nothing to do with the issue. Many in the south were wary of the "slippery slope", same as we are today in ways and same as we justified Nam and other issues with in the past. They weren't happy with the fight to keep the new territories slave free, with the fight over it in Kansas, nor with the platform Lincoln was elected under.

Four of the States which rebelled signed not only the declarations of secession themselves but also documents on the causes for it. Some of them hardly mentioned slavery and some ranted on and on about the issue. How big a part slavery played would have depended in large part on who you asked, and where. http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/reasons.html

The following page contains a fair number of documents related to the issue, one of which is the Party Platforms and Secession Documents, inside that you'll find the 1860 Republican Party Platform. A decent part of the platform in the last election before the war was related to the issue of slavery and the south decided they would not be lead by that man under that platform, it was worth rebellion. http://members.aol.com/jfepperson/causes.html

So while it's true to say the Civil War wasn't about freeing the slaves it's also true that it was in large part about slavery and how this nation would live with it in the future. Not just about that, but it was one of the hot button issues of the time and we've got it in their own words.

The Future of Our Past Looks Bright...

I'm writing that quote down.

Personally I think it's silly to believe the Civil War wasn't about slavery. Sure there were a lot of other issues, but most of them had slavery as the root cause of them. The south was trying to establish a moral and philosophical high ground. This is a common tactic anytime there is opposition, the less moral your position the less likely people are to support you. Slavery by itself is a hard position to claim as moral, so you bring up other issues such as states rights, slavery fits under that, but then so does a lot of other things. You can change your argument from slavery isn't wrong to it's wrong for the federal government to interfere with state laws and democratic freedom. One of those sounds much more moral than the other. Sure there are other non-slavery related issues, but I think that's just more filler to support their position and show how bad the other side is. I'd liken it to character attacks in court cases. The worse you can make the other side look the more likely others are going to be willing to believe they are also wrong about the issue at hand.

So to sum it up while there was a lot of other stuff going on I think slavery was by far the central issue, and everything else was just being used to solidify each side's position.

If the Civil War was primarily about freeing the slaves, then why was the Emancipation Proclamation not signed until the Civil War had already been going on for almost 3 years? And why did it only free the slaves in the Confederate States? The Emancipation Proclamation did not free any slaves in the Union states or Southern states already under Union control.

It wasn't about freeing them, but that doesn't mean it wasn't about slavery or about fears of them being freed.

Look at it from the perspective of the South. The new territories were going to be slave free if the North got their way, there had been a bloody fight over it in Kansas, the platform Lincoln ran under was nearly half related to slavery or the other issues and they saw slippery slopes just like we do. With good cause probably, few were talking about freeing them but it did seem the direction things were heading. Encroaching on and weakening the tradition at the least.

Actually freeing them didn't come about until Lincoln felt he was able to do it and justify it politically, it helped to set a moral high ground which kept the Europeans out of the war. That had to be timed right with a win in battle and such so that's why we had the timing we did. Lincoln was also quoted as saying if he could have ended the war without freeing a slave he'd have done it, so while it was about the subject it certainly wasn't about the impending act. More the fear of it. And like I said above, not just that but it was a big hot button issue of the time and we do have it in their own words.

If you're interested in the subject of the Civil War in general you could spend a month following the links in the following page and not be done. A collection of collections and some of the best on the web, used for research and including lots of historical documents in their own words such as what I pointed to in the last post. I've read a bit of it

http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/warweb.html

I have been a life time fan of Henry Rollins, and what he says is true on the subject of recent history as in the over writing of it, to make it sound better. But the basis of this rant is off. A creationism museum is in theory a good and needed thing. It is as close minded about history its version if history as a museum of 'natural' history is about the possible existence of God. Both bring of valid sounding points, depending on what you base stance is on the existence of a supernatural force. I am an Xian yes but I have not decided if I believe one stance or the other. the 7000 year old earth theory sounds like a lot of bullshit to me. But at the same time there is not proof of any thing more then micro evolution.
I could go on about the xians being biased in their view about the bible, and the atheist scients being biased in trying to prov evolution. but I will leave it at that.

"But at the same time there is not proof of any thing more then micro evolution."

http://www.videosift.com/video/How-Chimp-Chromosome-13-Proves-Evolution
http://www.videosift.com/video/The-Theory-of-Evolution-Made-Easy
http://www.videosift.com/video/Carl-Sagan-on-Evolution
http://www.videosift.com/video/Genetic-Evidence-Planted-by-SATAN

Sanguis trying to sound smart and "reasoned".

Bullcrap. The evidence for evolution is everywhere - if you don't "believe" in evolution then you can fall off the end of the world too.

Unfortunately I couldn't ignore this video. Funny - while this site claims to provide quality videos, it only seems to provide the vast majority's view when it comes to issues of creationism vs evolution - usually ending up in evolutionary bias. No surprise there though, considering the public essentially sets the standard.

Strangely, this video starts off by attacking a creation museum, then goes off on a tangent about nations, crazy denials of various people and then... Bush lie-berry? Going on about Iraq? Winning the war on terror? Where to start? What connection do they have? I was wondering if this video's script would ever come back to the initial topic in a more logical manner. Guess not.

The initial reason why I'm posting this message is that the script in this video is very shoddy to say the least and I'm certainly no scholar when it comes to good writing (this post is a great example). But it becomes clearly apparent, even for a basic man like myself, that this is rabid, maniacal insanity of the most common order.

...and by the way, Bush does not share the same beliefs that Christians do.

"it only seems to provide the vast majority's view when it comes to issues of creationism vs evolution - usually ending up in evolutionary bias"

Thank God for that, eh

Have any of you read about Pope Benedict's explanation of how creationism and the theory of evolution can coexist? I'm glad that someone influential finally started pushing this idea. It not only promotes the undeterred teaching of evolution in schools, but it promotes environmentalism. I believe in God, but I can see that evolution is the real deal just as well as anyone. I also believe that God created man in His own image. How can these things coexist? Read some of the pope's literature. He's a smart guy. P.S. I'm not Catholic so don't go knocking the Catholic church. It won't hurt my feelings.

Noooo, it's *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 jimnms.

Awarding kronosposeidon with one star point for fixing this video's dead embed code.

*dead again

This 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 Sagemind.

Awarding dystopianfuturetoday with one Power Point for fixing this video's dead embed code.

*talks

Adding video to channels (Talks) - requested by xxovercastxx.

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The duration of this video has been updated from unknown to 2:45 - length declared by ReverendTed.