Another Scholar speaks on Lincoln...

[fastpat]

History Channel: Was the Atheistic Lincoln Suicidally Insane?
Posted by Thomas DiLorenzo at 06:13 PM

The web site of the History Channel is advertising a Monday, Jan. 16, 8 PM EST show on Lincoln that will purportedly inform the public of some of the Dark Secrets about Abe that the self-proclaimed Gatekeepers of history have swept under the rug. It's a sure bet that some of these facts will be quickly recited, followed by a gaggle of Gatekeepers armed with a variety of knee-slapping excuses and rationales. That's what it means to be a "Lincoln scholar," after all.

In any event, here are some of the little-known facts about the dictator that the History Channel claims to be exploring:

"Lincoln refused his [dying father's] request for a deathbed visit."

"Lincoln suffered two nervous breakdowns -- so severe that both times his friends mounted suicide watches."

"As a young man . . . Lincoln stopped carrying a knife because he feared he might use it to commit suicide."
http://blog.lewrockwell.com/

"In his adult years he wrote a poem contemplating his own suicide . . ."

"Even in the White House, Lincoln frequently spoke of his fear that he might commit suicide."

"As a teenager, Lincoln watched one of his friends suddenly go mad and try to kill his mother, and for years afterwards Lincoln was plagued by fears that he might too suddenly lose his reason."

"Lincoln's second nervous breakdown came after he had abruptly broken his engagement with Mary Todd . . . . Historians are divided about he reasons for breaking the engagement, citing homosexuality, another woman and syphillis."

"New evidence has recently emerged in the form of eyewitness accounts that suggest Lincoln, during his presidency, had a continuing homosexual relationship with a Captain of the Guard."

"Lincoln had a history of visiting prostitutes before his marriage, and he was convinced throughout his life that he caught syphillis from one in 1832."

"As a rising politician in Illinois, Lincoln developed a reputation for dirty tricks, and for writing libelous, anonymous letters (he was even challenged to a duel for one) . . ."

"In the White House, Mary Lincoln would hold seances to try to speak with her dead son Willie and Lincoln attended them."

"Lincoln was not a practicing Christian in any way, and as a young man he published a book about his reluctance to accept the Jesus story."

[tabs]

Lets see now...Licolns Mother died when he was a child, a Brother died when he was a Child, his beloved older sister died during childbirth when she was 19, Lincolns true love died at 22 of Typhoid Fever....Lincolns Father was abusive of him, partially because Abe had a desire for education, and the old man was jealous. Lincoln admitted tthat after the Love of his life died of Typhoid that he "went off the tracks" for a while.

Abe also slept in the same bed with another man for 6 years....but before one jumps to conclusions you better realize that a Bed was a luxury...and that everything wasn't sexualized in those times...it was commone for soldiers marching off to battle to hold hands...so society was different than today.

Mary Todd came from a Good Kentucky family and during the war she was distrusted by Northeners and felt out of place in Washington society. After Willie died she retreated into depression and NEVER fully recovered. Her oldest and last surviving son even had her commited in the 1870s...so Lincoln appeased her.

Even old Thomas Jefferson himself wasn't a practicing Christians..as were a large number of the Founders of this Nation. Why do U think they wanted a seperation of church and state.

[Superman]

Lincoln's understanding of his role in this nation's history, and his grasp of public policy and moral code, was beyond human. I suspect he was an alien.

Anybody trying to disparage his contributions using exaggerated stories of his eccentric behavior is an idiot. You, Pat?

[fastpat]

Originally posted by Superman
Lincoln's understanding of his role in this nation's history, and his grasp of public policy and moral code, was beyond human. I suspect he was an alien.

Anybody trying to disparage his contributions using exaggerated stories of his eccentric behavior is an idiot. You, Pat?

No, I didn't produce the program on the history channel, and in fact haven't seen it.

However, I'll state this for the record in the event you've no seen my writings in another thread that touched on this subject.
Worst presidents

And that is Lincoln was the worst president in US history, a bloodthirsty monster of the first order, and gave us the leviathan state that we have today.

Is that plain enough for you?

[Hugh R]

Superman

That's kind of uncalled for. If I give you a fact (and granted I don't know if Fast is posting facts or not) why do you call him an idiot, as opposed to saying show me the facts/references. An idiot is someone who doesn't know what they're talking about, but who thinks he does, as opposed to someone who is saying something that you don't agree with or want to read.

For example, saying a Brand X car is the best car in the world, and you saying if you thing Brand X is the worst car, and you're an idiot for believing that. I think in actually that would make you the idiot because your basing your opinion on some pre-conceived notion, not facts, or issues for discussion/debate. If I remember correctly Superman, your a liberal. To me you present the classic liberal attitude which to me is that if you don't agree with me, then they must be an idiot/facist/racist/insert your own deragotary invictive here. Why don't you try interacting on a slightly higher plane by engaging Fast or anyone else and challenge them rather than dismissing them by calling them an idiot, which is actually a pretty easy/low bar dismissive. You can do better than that, I hope.

It would be like saying Clinton was a great president but he like to get his dick sucked by at least one intern and saying your "using exaggerated stories of his eccentric behavior" If he did it, he did, if the documented history shows it to be true, then so be it. Me personally, I may look at a persons human fraility and say "hey, he's kinky/or weird, but he did good work" If Lincoln was a homosexual, or just plain weird, so what. I'd rather look at what he actually did. As far as whether or not he was a good president, or a lousy one who needlessly participated in the deaths of over one million americans during the Civil War, I'll leave that to others to decide.

BTW, regarding the Clinton getting his dick sucked thing, I think it was bad judgement and he should have just admitted or walked away from it claiming the 5th. Although I'm sort of a republican (and embarrased by their drunk spending habits) I give Clinton credit for actually balancing the budget his last year and actually sort of trying to pay off the national debt.

[Dixie]

I give Clinton credit for actually balancing the budget his last year and actually sort of trying to pay off the national debt.

What? He gets no credit for getting blown? Come on! Why else do men gravitate to politics? For the women, of course.

[Hugh R]

Gotta give you that Captain.

[Superman]

What I'm saying is that, if you want, you can assemble all the facts necessary to make a cogent-sounding argument that George W. Bush is the second coming of the Messiah. Or perhaps you'd like to assemble a set of facts and present them in a way that makes someone think that George Washington was a British spy. In either case, you might fool somebody. But most folks are going to dismiss you as a fruitcake.

Abraham Lincoln was a tortured individual. His wife was crazy as a loon, and he suffered from severe depression. But if you're going to pretend (or worse, believe) that he was some sort of selfish monster, then you've got WAY mnore imagination than information and lots of folks are going to dismiss you. There, did I say that in a way that's sufficiently objective?

Frankly, I thin the sane world has recognized for decades, and will continue to recognize for centures and hopefully millennia, that Lincoln came out of nowhere, with a perspective and moral compass that was at the limit of human understanding, and saved a nation from bifurcating in two.

Taking the position that he was anything other than a towering public policy genius and a leader of the first order, a savior of a nation, (I chuckle when I say this) is like Dubya the Dense gambling that unilaterally attacking a sovereign nation is going to work out positively for America and assure him a 'good' paragraph in futurs history texts. That is, as long as everyone else is incorrect.

Frankly, anybody considering Lincoln to be what you way, Pat, is to be dismissed for purposes of this topic, and drawn into suspicion in others. It's WAY below credible.

Yes I did see the other thread. How about you guys take the position that Jesus was a time traveller from Berkeley in the 1960's. That'd make more sense.

[cool_chick]

Originally posted by Capt. Carrera
What? He gets no credit for getting blown? Come on! Why else do men gravitate to politics? For the women, of course.

They're just jealous of Clinton.

[speeder]

I'd be a lot more jealous if he got caught being blown by Christy Turlington, or even Sheryl Crow. Still, it's incredibly unimportant in the big picture, and the rest of the world saw it that way. The international embarrassment was the impeachment and the Rush Limbaugh crowd.

[techweenie]

Originally posted by cool_chick
They're just jealous of Clinton.

That has been consistently apparent, if you review who brings it up and how often.

Someone once said that if more men were completely satisfied sexually, we'd have far fewer wars. For sure, we woudn't have Congress bringing bills to a vote at 2, 3 and 4AM.

As for Lincoln, sounds like clinical depression. Isn't that what they're medicating Bush for?

[tabs]

Lincoln in the mid 1830s move to the little town of New Salem, Ill. Shortly after moving to New Salem he ran for a seat in the State House of Ill. He lost his first campaign, however he was proud of the fact that of the 300 votes cast in New Salem, he recieved 277 of them. In his next campaign for the State House he easily won simply because he was better known throughout his district. So the conclusion you can make is that people who knew Lincoln thought very highly of him.

[fastpat]

Originally posted by Capt. Carrera
What? He gets no credit for getting blown? Come on! Why else do men gravitate to politics? For the women, of course.

A BJ from a fat girl with a nice complexion? What's remarkable about that? FDR and Eisenhower were getting a lot more than that from young women when the former was in a wheelchair and the latter, well, you know how he looked.

Come on, let's keep a little perspective.

[Moses]

Read a lot of books about Lincoln. The Gore Vidal biography is a good one. Captures the complexity of the man.

[fastpat]

Originally posted by Moses
Read a lot of books about Lincoln. The Gore Vidal biography is a good one. Captures the complexity of the man.

I haven't read that biography, but most of them are uncritical and are written by the same sort that began the Lincoln idolatry just after his death, sycophants all.

The most recent definitive book on Lincoln the politician is the one by Thomas Dilorenzo, professor at Loyola Maryland.

[Moses]

Originally posted by fastpat
The most recent definitive book on Lincoln the politician is the one by Thomas Dilorenzo, professor at Loyola Maryland.

Dilorenzo is an economics professor with a serious political agenda that is outside the main stream. His book would likely be a poor choice if you're looking for an objective historical biography.

[Seahawk]

Originally posted by fastpat
A BJ from a fat girl with a nice complexion? What's remarkable about that?
Come on, let's keep a little perspective.

That is my favorite plank of Clinton fans, but it is as shallow and listless as Monica:

I am a Naval Officer who runs a large, diverse Program Office. If I get a BJ from an intern in my office I should be fired...you are prior military and know the rules, just as Bill did. There is no grey area.

[fastpat]

Originally posted by Seahawk
That is my favorite plank of Clinton fans, but it is as shallow and listless as Monica:

I am a Naval Officer who runs a large, diverse Program Office. If I get a BJ from an intern in my office I should be fired...you are prior military and know the rules, just as Bill did. There is no grey area.

Un huh, and both you and I know that these rules are essentially those of political correctness of the last 20 years or less. When I first served, 1967-71, there were almost no restrictions on personal contact except chain of command. The stories I could tell you from that time, whew!

Sure, Clinton ought to have done better, but since an intern is a political appointment, not a civil service career; it's both technically and legally different. Very stupid with hindsight.

There were a myriad of things Clinton ought to have been impeached for; but the Republicans didn't and wouldn't impeach over those things because they wanted those same avenues open to their guy, currently G. W. Bush.

You know, abuse of power, illegal wire taps, illegal military aggression against a sovereign foreign nation, accepting bribes in the form of junkets and book purchases. Oh, wait a minute, that last one is what congressmen do, not the president; never mind.

[Halm]

Originally posted by fastpat
Un huh, and both you and I know that these rules are essentially those of political correctness of the last 20 years or less. When I first served, 1967-71, there were almost no restrictions on personal contact except chain of command. The stories I could tell you from that time, whew!

HORSE FEATHERS! 1971-1974, USMC. Fraternization with female EM's was strictly of limits. Even among fellow officers you had to be careful and discrete. As a matter of fact I had a female 2nd Lt. assigned to me awaiting court marshal for “conduct unbecoming an officer” for exactly this behavior.

[Dixie]

So the conclusion you can make is that people who knew Lincoln thought very highly of him.

Or people voted based on name recognition. Just as the majority of today's voters do.


(Just stirring the pot.)