Tennessee Tea Party Wants to Erase "Slavery" From U.S. Textbooks
Tennessee Tea Party members are trying to eliminate references to slavery in American history textbooks.
Salon.com reports that Tea Partiers, who idolize America’s Founding Fathers, do not want students to learn that many of them owned slaves:
For a bunch of people who worship the Founders and like to play dress-up American Revolutionary War, Tea Partyers sure hate knowing anything remotely reality-based about the Founding Fathers. Tennessee Tea Party groups have introduced a proposal to take what few minorities there are in American history textbooks out of American history textbooks, along with any negative portrayals of the wealthy white men who led this young nation in its infancy.
At a press conference, two dozen activists presented their proposals — I’m sorry, their “demands” — for the new state legislative session. Among them are sweeping changes to school materials that they probably have not actually read.
Fayette County attorney Hal Rounds, the group’s lead spokesman during the news conference, said the group wants to address “an awful lot of made-up criticism about, for instance, the founders intruding on the Indians or having slaves or being hypocrites in one way or another.”
In reality, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin owned slaves. Thomas Jefferson fathered children with his slave Sally Hemings and James Madison brought a slave with him to the White House when he became president.
Rep. Michele Bachmann, founder of the congressional Tea Party caucus, once claimed that the Founding Fathers “worked tirelessly” to end slavery.
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It wasnt the Tea Party who owned slaves, idiot, it was rich white folk. Learn the difference and stop playing politics.
The people I have met at Tea Party events have been from all walks of life. From religious to atheist and rich to poor with a common thread that they are the 49% of the citizens paying taxes that are supporting the 51% who don't pay their fair share or pay nothing. That is the real difference and the biggest rub. Freedom of thought as well as personal and Governmental responsibility are not the sole purview of the religious right and are not claimed to be. In fact, what I see is that many on both side of the issue confuse religious beliefs with a desire for morality.
I see personal and Governmental fiscal responsibility as a moral obligation. The Tea Party supporters for the most part want the American Government to be morally and fiscally responsible. This current administration with its naiveté in Foreign policy, overtly apologetic deference to the Muslim world, its adoption of asinine environmental and energy policies that pander to inept Greens as well as its desire to magically balance 200 years of some real but largely perceived social inequity has driven America to the brink of social and financial collapse.
So perhaps we need to stop shouting at each other and start by getting the 51 percenters, who produce little and squander American wealth, paying their fair share. Everyone needs to pay taxes and get up off their dead asses and produce something even if it picking up trash or cleaning street. All Americans need to Man-up, no job is too small or demeaning if it improves life.
Airdale
Here's the funny thing... almost *ALL* people pay taxes - sales taxes, fuel taxes, excise taxes, property taxes, etc. What you are pointing out is federal income tax. Of the 49% not paying federal income tax, most of them are the *WORKING POOR*!
If someone is working at minimum wage, paying FICA and not on public assistance, are they "dead assess?" Last I looked unemployment is less than 10% nationally. At most 20% of the public is on some sort of social support, which can also include food stamps or medicaid for the working poor. So... if someone is working full time, but still can't properly feed his family or pay for health insurance, shouldn't we do something to help them?
Welfare reform in the 90s made it so all people on public assistance have to work or be seeking work or be otherwise unable to work. This myth that there are generations of people in the millions sucking from the public teat without an end in site is more Tea Bagger mythology.
What you guys want to do is get a bracing dose of reality. Go volunteer at a homeless shelter or a soup kitchen and see how well the bottom is doing!
Didn't the economic collapse start under the Bush administration? By the time BO took office, the tsunami had already hit and we are dealing with the fallout. I have disagreed with many of his decisions, but I also know he is getting blamed for things he had nothing to do with.
By the way... I own a business and I have paid more in taxes in the last 5 years than you will probably gross over your lifetime, so I know what reality is, and I can tell you that my marginal personal tax rate has not once impacted my decision on whether to hire a new employee. No business owner I know has ever made a hiring decision based on personal income tax because it has *ZERO* impact on business income.
Tea Baggers - selfish, delusional, utopian morons with no grasp of reality.
CRW, Why are the "Working Poor" Poor? Are the “Working Poor” poor because they live beyond their means? Everyone I know that lives within their means is not poor. Could this be an idea for eliminating the “Working Poor”, teaching them how to live within their means? Possibly; what do you think?
I too am a business owner. It appears that you are saying that as a business owner and a tax payer I should have to support the bad habits of those who lack self-control? Consider that Government cannot save those who will not help themselves no matter how much they promise "Hope and Change". Poor is poor because being poor is beneficial or they wound not be poor. That is just human nature. The real pity is that the "poor" are used by the Progressive Democrats as political fodder for their parties’ political self-interest. Perhaps you don't see it that way and that is ok. Please tell me why without resorting to name calling.
To answer your second assumption, I have and do volunteer in soup-kitchens. I do help those who, for health or mental reason, cannot help themselves and yes I still believe in Personal and Governmental fiscal Responsibility. Helping people and believing in personal responsibility are not mutual exclusive, in fact they are inclusive. I happen to have worked my through many years of higher education and I use that knowledge to try to teach those who don’t know but are capable of understanding and worth my time and effort. Yet I also find that the Tea Party concepts agree with my core beliefs far better than the “sit on ass as long as you vote Democrat” preaching of the Progressives. Yes, some of that belief is because I have spent time in Socialist countries and have first-hand knowledge of the pit falls associated with socialism. So before you assume that I am a blind follower of the Tea Party or any other socio- political concept please realize that as people we are all complex and multi-dimensional. The Tea Party people I have met and discussed issues with are far more open to discussion and listening than most of the Progressives with whom I have come in contact. Just read some of the comments on this web page. It certainly appears that the Obama big Government supporters are lashing out. Could this be because if the Obama Socialist Progressive machine fails the Progressive will have to be more personally responsible? Perhaps not, I can only assume based on what I read because too few actually stop screaming long enough to speak.
Perhaps before you brand the Tea Party supporters as being just uncaring, overtly privileged religious wakos, try listening to what they and others are saying without the assumption that they are wrong simply because they see things differently than you do. That is what conversation, dialogue and “Opposing Views” are all about. None of us are 100% correct but we are mostly Americans and we all have a piece of the puzzle that needs to be twisted and turned to fit correctly so that the answers appear. An open mind will change situations faster and more effectively than any Government sponsored program. Have a nice afternoon.
Airdale
Would you like to see this perspective brought to its logical conclusion?
Go to Brazil. In particular, walk around Rio late at night dressed in a suit with a nice watch. If you aren't dead by dawn, you will certainly be naked and unconscious, attacked by street kids abandoned by their families. Why are things so bad? ZERO social supports. Things are slowly getting better, and it has come through better government intervention and not "self-reliance."
The myth of personal financial responsibility is just that - a myth. Yes, we need to encourage personal responsibility and there should be rewards and punishments for good and bad behavior. However, saying that if we just kick everyone to curb, things will get better is just crap.
Let's say we followed the Tea Bagger proposals - end public funding of social support services, education, etc. The US would go up in flames, ending up as a third world country. Some states would thrive like Massachusetts and Washington, but what about Louisiana and Mississippi?
Again, you are spouting utopian trash that has no grounding in reality.
If we don't provide social supports then we better arm the rest of the country and start pouring trillions into prisons because the next civil war will start within a year or two.
You know what countries have the best standard of living, best health systems, best education systems, etc.? Some of the most socialist countries in the world such as Denmark. Google it for yourself.
In my experience, the Tea Baggers are made up of the following:
- Libertarian types who take the concept of "freedom" to an absurd conclusion, calling things like tax "theft."
- Blue collar conservatives who think we need to deport the poor.
- Idealists who think if forced to do so everyone will pull themselves up by their bootstraps.
Since you have worked in a soup kitchen, do you actually believe that some of the poor wretches that came looking for food are actually capable of becoming self-reliant? Really? If you say yes, you are even more hopeless than I think.
@Airdale-j.....That's a load of bullshit.
Chuck
I think people need to know what has happened in history. Good or bad. There has been many things done wrongly by all races and the only way to avoid mistakes is to look at history.
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I think you cant erase history. It will be recorded somewhere.
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This is really crazy that they would ever consider doing this. I believe that we can all learn a great deal from history. This is really amazing.
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typical Tea Party rhetoric, they already have a revisionist history of the founding Fathers and the Constitution might as well go all the way.
Chuck