1 hour ago, Green Dog said:

Unlike the buildings of Minneapolis at this point...

I understand people are angry but doing all this damage makes them look bad.  Doesnt help the cause.

11 minutes ago, greend said:

At Gettysburg I agree.

Gettysburg was truly the high watermark of the Confederacy. If Jackson was alive he likely pushes up Cemetery Hill on the 1st day and thus ends the battle.

At that point Lee has the high ground and the tactical defensive/strategically offensive strategy of Longstreet works like a charm.

If, on the 2nd day, Lee listens to Longstreet and goes around the Roundtops, he'll run into 5th and 6th Corps in reserve. Who knows what happens then.

Pickett's charge was just Malvern Hill redux with higher losses of irreplaceable veterans. Lee could have done a Bush, declared victory, and marched around Meade forcing him to make a mistake.

Lots of if then maybes...

 

 

 

1 hour ago, D-Shiznit said:

As a Canadian, one thing I never really understood was why there was such a sense of anger and frustration in US society. I have lived in Canada nearly all my life, lived for a while in New Zealand, Singapore, and Dubai. Each one of those countries also have issues through the roof and serious divergence of views, but I've never seen anger so prevalent in a society as I have in the US, what gives?

The US is a greater, more successful and prosperous country than all four of those countries combined 10x over, so what gives?

Those in power will stay in power if they can convince they masses that nothing bad is their fault, it's all the "other side".

Can't have a revolution or societal change when the populace thinks of each other as the enemy instead of the morons pulling all the strings in government only interested in staying there.

Both sides are hypocrites, both are corrupt, but somehow the paradigm has shifted from those in power vs those not to nothing but right vs left.

These things happen when the system is based on who can raise the most money.

It's a completely broken system.

8 hours ago, BigEFly said:

Not as simple as that.  There was a lot of sentiment in the union about the cost of the war and whether it might not be best to let the South go. As the war dragged on, there was more and more opposition in the Union.  The politics were significant and those impacted everything from military leadership to the degree of punitive action to be taken against the South both during and after the war.  The Emancipation Proclamation is an example.   It did not argue to free slaves in the Union, just in the rebellious states. (Of course, it would have been Unconstitutional if challenged as it would have been taking property without compensation (from the government).). Johnson really did a good job in moving the plan forward for reconciliation and got impeached for it.  I am heartened to see Interest in the history in fellow Bloggers. 

I don't know that the Emancipation proclamation would have been found to be unconstitutional.  Sure it was from a legal perspective a taking but it was not a taking of property from lawful citizens of the United States.  First, the proclamation was more of a culmination of events dealing with the slavery question in the South than a unilateral Act of a President.  Military officials had previously entered orders freeing slaves in Southern States via proclamation.  The Union was also allowing escaped slaves to enlist and otherwise work for the army.  I think this is the crux of the question.  War powers certainly allow the taking of enemy property and resources to prosecute a war.  In some ways, emancipating slaves is no different than taking over housing, taking supplies, cattle or other goods.  I think the question would have been whether the slaves, once emancipated, could have been returned to slavery at the conclusion of the war.  This is why Lincoln and other abolitionists rightfully saw the need for the ratification of the 13th amendment prior to the end of the war.  

The point the proclamation would have potentially had legal challenges would have been if the 13th amendment had not been ratified.  The proclamation permanently freed the slaves in slave holding states.  I think the question would have been whether the would have been permanently freed.  

1 hour ago, greend said:

Well maybe we're kinda spoiled. 

Very

😅

1 hour ago, D-Shiznit said:

As a Canadian, one thing I never really understood was why there was such a sense of anger and frustration in US society. I have lived in Canada nearly all my life, lived for a while in New Zealand, Singapore, and Dubai. Each one of those countries also have issues through the roof and serious divergence of views, but I've never seen anger so prevalent in a society as I have in the US, what gives?

The US is a greater, more successful and prosperous country than all four of those countries combined 10x over, so what gives?

Let’s not forget the FLQ bombings.  Quebec separatism gives the Basque ample competition.  Let’s not lose sight of anti-immigration sentiments north of the border in a country where it is much harder to immigrate to and green cards?  Try to get a work visa in Canada.   Singapore with its issues is hardly an example of an open government where opposition is tolerated.  Kiwis have a dark history with the treatment of its native population much like the US.  Every country has its warts.

19 minutes ago, Duckwing said:

Gettysburg was truly the high watermark of the Confederacy. If Jackson was alive he likely pushes up Cemetery Hill on the 1st day and thus ends the battle.

At that point Lee has the high ground and the tactical defensive/strategically offensive strategy of Longstreet works like a charm.

If, on the 2nd day, Lee listens to Longstreet and goes around the Roundtops, he'll run into 5th and 6th Corps in reserve. Who knows what happens then.

Pickett's charge was just Malvern Hill redux with higher losses of irreplaceable veterans. Lee could have done a Bush, declared victory, and marched around Meade forcing him to make a mistake.

Lots of if then maybes...

That's what my teacher used to reference, he used to say that would have been checkmate for the North at Gettysburg if Jackson was still alive, and that could have demoralized the North enough to force an end to the war.

4 minutes ago, BigEFly said:

Let’s not forget the FLQ bombings.  Quebec separatism gives the Basque ample competition.  Let’s not lose sight of anti-immigration sentiments north of the border in a country where it is much harder to immigrate to and green cards?  Try to get a work visa in Canada.   Singapore with its issues is hardly an example of an open government where opposition is tolerated.  Kiwis have a dark history with the treatment of its native population much like the US.  Every country has its warts.

All great points if I was arguing that those countries are better than the US, I actually said the US was better than all 4 combined, which is why the level of anger and frustration found in US society is so baffling to me.

43 minutes ago, NCiggles said:

I don't know that the Emancipation proclamation would have been found to be unconstitutional.  Sure it was from a legal perspective a taking but it was not a taking of property from lawful citizens of the United States.  First, the proclamation was more of a culmination of events dealing with the slavery question in the South than a unilateral Act of a President.  Military officials had previously entered orders freeing slaves in Southern States via proclamation.  The Union was also allowing escaped slaves to enlist and otherwise work for the army.  I think this is the crux of the question.  War powers certainly allow the taking of enemy property and resources to prosecute a war.  In some ways, emancipating slaves is no different than taking over housing, taking supplies, cattle or other goods.  I think the question would have been whether the slaves, once emancipated, could have been returned to slavery at the conclusion of the war.  This is why Lincoln and other abolitionists rightfully saw the need for the ratification of the 13th amendment prior to the end of the war.  

No disagreement with what you said above.  The problem, legally speaking was the Union did not recognize secession and thus it was a slippery slope because there was a long judicial history of recognizing property rights with slaves.   That why the Emancipation Proclamation only extended to the seceding states.  Other states allowed slavery that did not leave the Union.  It is interesting that many northern states as they outlawed slavery made the freeing of existing slaves gradual over just this legal issue.  That is why the thirteenth amendment was paramount.  

27 minutes ago, D-Shiznit said:

All great points if I was arguing that those countries are better than the US, I actually said the US was better than all 4 combined, which is why the level of anger and frustration found in US society is so baffling to me.

Freedom

Don't want to make anything political(head to CVON for that). Just that if you're in one of those areas... stay safe

Is it too much to ask that a bunch of looters get covid virus?  Also the guilty cops get prosecuted ?

11 hours ago, Mike31mt said:

These are interesting conclusions to make considering the vast advantages the Union had in terms of troops, materiel... nearly everything.

All the Union had to do was outlast the Confederacy. 

In simplest terms, all the Confederacy had to do was not lose, whereas the Union had to win. The Confederacy began the war with every goal achieved. They had their land, their government, their economic system all intact. They controlled cotton, greatly valued throughout the "civilized" world. They had two-thirds of the trained military officers. They had internal lines and vast territory. They had four million slaves to farm and dig and build, freeing the whites for military service. They had thriving ports. While they did not have the level of industrialization that the North had, they did not lack for weaponry. Not only did they have the Tredegar works, but they seized numerous Union arsenals, including that at Harpers Ferry, with all their arms and ammunition. In the four years of the war they would never lose a battle because of lack of arms.

The number of men under arms at the start of the war were approximately equal for both sides. For the Union, however, those soldiers were needed out west on the frontier. So, in fact, the Union began the war with fewer troops than the Confederates and, as noted earlier, significantly fewer trained officers.

It was never the intent of the South to conquer the North, only to be left alone. Lee's forays into Northern territory were raids, not invasions. More on them presently. Conversely, the North had to invade and conquer, a much more daunting task. It was the intent of the South to sap the Northern will, exact a price in blood and treasure higher than the North would be willing to pay. This had, after all, been a successful strategy in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812.

Not all Northerners supported the war, far from it. Copperheads abounded. There were peace Democrats. As the casualty lists mounted, resistance to the war increased with them. Riots broke out when the draft was instituted. Immediately after winning at Gettysburg, Meade had to send troops to New York City to put down riots. In late summer, early fall of 1864, it appeared that Lincoln would lose the Fall election. The Democratic candidate, George McClellan, was a peace Democrat, who wanted to negotiate a settlement. It  seems inconceivable to me that the North would stop the war and then restart it. In that election, if McClellan had a few thousand more votes in a small number of states, he could have won, much as Trump won the 2016 election but not the popular vote.

Then there was King Cotton. The Confederacy withheld cotton from European buyers who discovered they could do quite well without it, thank you. In so doing, the South deprived themselves of treasure and fomented ill will among potential allies, not wartime allies to be sure, but economic allies.

Getting back to Lee. I would argue that Lee's tactics were disastrous. He could ill afford to lose men yet he squandered them. @Duckwing mentioned Malvern Hill, which I believe was the only battle of the war won exclusively by artillery. Then there were Antietam, Second Manassas, Gettysburg. Someone, can't remember who, said of Lee. "In defense he was perfect." With the weaponry of the time, defense was way ahead of offense yet Lee failed to realize this until he had devastated his army with his raids and offensive maneuvers in 1862 and 1863.

Finally, and this is the single greatest edge the Union had: Lincoln. Exchange the two presidents and the Confederacy would have won, that is, not lost. We think of Lincoln as the man of compassion, the man who appeals to the better angels of our nature, but he was also a man with an iron will. He was prepared to pay any price to preserve the Union. He went through a slew of generals, each more incompetent than the last, until he settled on Grant, a man with a will as iron as his own. Jeff Davis, on the other hand was a weak president, played favorites, was more politician than wartime president. He wanted to fight a defensive war but never could control Lee. In that he was right and Lee was wrong.

5 minutes ago, greend said:

Is it too much to ask that a bunch of looters get covid virus?  Also the guilty cops get prosecuted ?

This very simple course of action would settle things down.  The video has been publicly consumed for 3 days now, and law enforcement apparently does not want to arrest those responsible; they will only do so under the most immense public pressure.

A 10-year-old kid would be able to successfully prosecute criminal negligence causing death, if not second-degree murder — with the already available evidence.

Just my rant for the morning.

1 hour ago, D-Shiznit said:

That's what my teacher used to reference, he used to say that would have been checkmate for the North at Gettysburg if Jackson was still alive, and that could have demoralized the North enough to force an end to the war.

Uhhhh no. Interesting opinion that I’ve heard before but no. 

3 hours ago, D-Shiznit said:

My Junior High history teacher in Toronto used to swear up and down that if Stonewall Jackson had not died a few weeks before, the South would have won the Battle of Gettysburg and most likely the war. Used to say that Jackson was the most brilliant tactician the US had ever produced and that the Lee/Jackson combo was unbeatable.

Not likely. The North was essentially fighting with one hand behind it's back. Losing at Gettysburg would probably have prompted the untying of the other hand. I'm not a historian but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.

1 hour ago, NCiggles said:

I don't know that the Emancipation proclamation would have been found to be unconstitutional.  Sure it was from a legal perspective a taking but it was not a taking of property from lawful citizens of the United States.  First, the proclamation was more of a culmination of events dealing with the slavery question in the South than a unilateral Act of a President.  Military officials had previously entered orders freeing slaves in Southern States via proclamation.  The Union was also allowing escaped slaves to enlist and otherwise work for the army.  I think this is the crux of the question.  War powers certainly allow the taking of enemy property and resources to prosecute a war.  In some ways, emancipating slaves is no different than taking over housing, taking supplies, cattle or other goods.  I think the question would have been whether the slaves, once emancipated, could have been returned to slavery at the conclusion of the war.  This is why Lincoln and other abolitionists rightfully saw the need for the ratification of the 13th amendment prior to the end of the war.  

The point the proclamation would have potentially had legal challenges would have been if the 13th amendment had not been ratified.  The proclamation permanently freed the slaves in slave holding states.  I think the question would have been whether the would have been permanently freed.  

One of the most enjoyable history books I've ever read is Arguing About Slavery: John Quincy Adams and the Great Battle in the United States Congress, by William Lee Miller. I can only describe it as rollicking. Much of it is taken from the Congressional Record and one of the quotes from J. Q. Adams predicts that the president would use his war powers to abolish slavery in the event of a civil war. His argument was used some 20 years later, in 1862, by William Whiting, who held the same seat in Congress that Adams had held, and who wrote The War Powers of the President and the Legislative Powers of Congress in Relation to Rebellion, Treason, and Slavery. This was the Constitutional argument in support of the Emancipation Proclamation.

I know I'm a broken record but the more I go back and watch Miles the happier I get.  Kid is an all around stud.

 

European powers were watching how things unfolded, had the confederacy left GB successful,  they would have received European support.

They also moved north to get union out of the south, crops needed in the ground.

Davis was also about to move some troops west ,another reason lee came north.

GB was not meant to happen, was never Lee's intention to battle in GB.

7 minutes ago, justrelax said:

One of the most enjoyable history books I've ever read is Arguing About Slavery: John Quincy Adams and the Great Battle in the United States Congress, by William Lee Miller. I can only describe it as rollicking. Much of it is taken from the Congressional Record and one of the quotes from J. Q. Adams predicts that the president would use his war powers to abolish slavery in the event of a civil war. His argument was used some 20 years later, in 1862, by William Whiting, who held the same seat in Congress that Adams had held, and who wrote The War Powers of the President and the Legislative Powers of Congress in Relation to Rebellion, Treason, and Slavery. This was the Constitutional argument in support of the Emancipation Proclamation.

I will have to give it a read.  It's interesting because war powers and what happens with property obtained during war has it's own jurisprudence that is not really Constitutional Law as much as admiralty prize law.  One reason the President believed the Proclamation was Constitutional was the Supreme Court upholding the seizure as prizes of northern owned merchant ships as the result of a blockade.  

 

1 hour ago, BigEFly said:

No disagreement with what you said above.  The problem, legally speaking was the Union did not recognize secession and thus it was a slippery slope because there was a long judicial history of recognizing property rights with slaves.   That why the Emancipation Proclamation only extended to the seceding states.  Other states allowed slavery that did not leave the Union.  It is interesting that many northern states as they outlawed slavery made the freeing of existing slaves gradual over just this legal issue.  That is why the thirteenth amendment was paramount.  

Freedom

Not recognizing the secession isn't really the issue.  The President's war powers are what come in to play.  Congress authorized the President to prosecute a war against the Southern states.  So the President clearly had authority to make the proclamation under the War Powers Act.  

42 minutes ago, DEagle7 said:

I know I'm a broken record but the more I go back and watch Miles the happier I get.  Kid is an all around stud.

 

But he didn't make some subjective list, therefore the Eagles fail at drafting.

2 hours ago, D-Shiznit said:

All great points if I was arguing that those countries are better than the US, I actually said the US was better than all 4 combined, which is why the level of anger and frustration found in US society is so baffling to me.

We are still relatively young as a country and we have high expectations

5 hours ago, D-Shiznit said:

As a Canadian, one thing I never really understood was why there was such a sense of anger and frustration in US society. I have lived in Canada nearly all my life, lived for a while in New Zealand, Singapore, and Dubai. Each one of those countries also have issues through the roof and serious divergence of views, but I've never seen anger so prevalent in a society as I have in the US, what gives?

The US is a greater, more successful and prosperous country than all four of those countries combined 10x over, so what gives?

I'll give my take on why the US has a such high level of anger and frustration. There's obviously a myriad of issues at play, but IMO the greatest culprit is the American higher education system. Critical thinking and the Socratic method have been the bedrock of the modern enlightenment age. However, our educational system has perverted the idea of critical thinking over the past 30 years or so. Critical thinking has now devolved into simply being critical. In short, look at a subject matter and find things to criticize. This subtle, yet profound change in our educational system has produced a society of people that constantly need to find the fault in anything and everything in life. If anyone is interested more in this, I recommend the Coddling of the American Mind.

1 hour ago, NCiggles said:

I will have to give it a read.  It's interesting because war powers and what happens with property obtained during war has it's own jurisprudence that is not really Constitutional Law as much as admiralty prize law.  One reason the President believed the Proclamation was Constitutional was the Supreme Court upholding the seizure as prizes of northern owned merchant ships as the result of a blockade.  

 

Not recognizing the secession isn't really the issue.  The President's war powers are what come in to play.  Congress authorized the President to prosecute a war against the Southern states.  So the President clearly had authority to make the proclamation under the War Powers Act.  

Here's a link to the William Whiting essay on the War Powers that I mentioned elsewhere. Not a bad read. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/moa/aew5618.0001.001/1?view=image&size=100

7 minutes ago, Giddyunc said:

I'll give my take on why the US has a such high level of anger and frustration. There's obviously a myriad of issues at play, but IMO the greatest culprit is the American higher education system. Critical thinking and the Socratic method have been the bedrock of the modern enlightenment age. However, our educational system has perverted the idea of critical thinking over the past 30 years or so. Critical thinking has now devolved into simply being critical. In short, look at a subject matter and find things to criticize. This subtle, yet profound change in our educational system has produced a society of people that constantly need to find the fault in anything and everything in life. If anyone is interested more in this, I recommend the Coddling of the American Mind.

Thanks. I will read it.

20 hours ago, LeanMeanGM said:

No idea why Reid wouldn't like it. It's built for Mahommes to thrive in.

He said he has the best ST coach in the game in Toub so he likes letting him go to work