JW wrote:
I hope you recall that the KKK was predominantly southern Democrats. As for extremist, etc., it pretty much depends on where you sit when you define your terms. From my perspective, as a JFK Democrat, (that is a conservative in today's terms), people on your side of the aisle are pretty much C*******ts. You can't get much more extreme than that.
Bottom line, we each have our own ideas of what constitutes a "nutcase". About 65% of the people in the USA figure it's people on your side of the argument that fell out of the nut tree.
I hope you recall that the KKK was predominantly s... (
show quote)
...who now are predominantly Southern Republicans.
So anyone "on my side of the aisle are pretty much C*******ts." That statement is about as nutcase as it gets.
I v**ed for Nixon in 1960 and in 1968 and 1972 (and would again), and for Reagan in 1980, but not in 1984 after I realized the future consequences of Reaganomics and realized the GOP had become the equivalent of the 1800s Jacksonians and populists. From my junior year American history class, my political thoughts have been Hamiltonian Federalist, Whig, Lincolnian Republican, and now "conservative" Democrat. My favorite Dems are the Clintons. My unfavorite Dems are Howard Dean and Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie S. as extremist and uncompromising. My favorite GOPpers are Sen. Corker and Govs. Christie and Bush. My unfavorite GOPper is Sen. Rand Paul--followed by Cruz and Walker. Strictly a matter of political positions, not personalities.
Actually, you missed my point about the KKK as a grass roots civic organization acting like Tassine's idea of community law or populist enforcement...the equivalent of sharia law...the intent being good but the way being wrong. The KKK and Sharia comparisons were meant to demonstrate that what seems good in intent may be horribly wrong in practice. You miss the cited fact that KKK chapters existed in the north--in the cited instance in rural far northern Illinois--without the awful atrocities in some Southern communities but still wrong, though with what those KKK chapters thought was good civic intent. My intent was to get the fanatics on this thread to think whether the extremes that seem to them intending to good may in practice be awful and wrong and contrary to American ideals.
Yes, there are and have been contradictions to American ideals. Segregation was a contradiction of the ideal of e******y (as obviously was s***ery before emancipation). The former s***es were not made equal in practical terms by emancipation, and "separate but equal" (community separateness, segregation) was the pragmatic "rule of law" compromise regarding the very real social, economic, and aspirational differences between established order and the former s***es (primative equivalent of manorial serfdom) unequipped to function equally. It would be a hundred years before desegregation and integration could become the rule of law and America step again nearer its ideal of e******y. Not that color does not still statistically involve degrees of economic and social practices differences (and thus arrest frequency)--lingering effects of the past. Nevertheless, America has moved beyond its version of the caste system toward real e******y, not just in theory, law, and ideal but in essential practice. We shall overcome...someday. The civil rights movement was very careful to avoid extremes and fanaticism and pose their goals in terms of patience, overcoming, determination, and "someday." I know--I was there. Of course, there were those who were extremists (Black Panthers) who had other intentions and a different day in mind. Well, also of course, there were extremists (and moderates, for that matter) opposed to integration. The "moderates" had no idea of the degree to which b****s were denied v****g rights. I had no idea either, until I was introduced to one of three b****s in Birmingham who had the right to v**e in the 1960 P**********l e******n...only 3!!
"Conservatives"? Fanatics are radicals--extremists who would in their extremism destroy the rule of law and compromise upon which rests movement toward freedom and e******y for all. The fanatics and radicals on this thread and on OPP should reconsider their extremist ideas.