Well, it depends.
People don't fight other people. Political entities fight other political entities for political or economic reasons.
Soldiers simply fight to defend their homes and families. With some exceptions, soldiers are the greatest victims of war.
I'm opposed to monuments that celebrate the Confederacy itself. The Confederacy existed and went to war for the simple economic reason of defending slavery. This historical revisionism about state's rights is bunk. The only state's right they cared about was the right to keep slavery legal.
As for monuments memorializing the soldiers that fought for their homes and families, such as those at Gettysburg, those I'm inclined to accept.
Does this includes statues of Confederate Generals such as Robert E. Lee? Yes it does. Does it include the carvings at Stone Mountain Georgia? No it doesn't. Because in addition to Lee and Stonewall Jackson the carving includes Jefferson Davis. Davis wasn't a soldier but the top of the political structure of the Confederacy.
What do I base this on?
First, because on Christmas Day 1868 President Johnson extended full amnesty to Confederate soldiers and restored to them full citizenship rights. He didn't make an exception for officers.
Second, in 1958 Congress passed Public Law 85-425 related to the pension rate for the widows of veterans. This law defined "veteran" for the purposes of the law to include "a person who served in the military or naval forces of the Confederate States of America during the Civil War…”
Also in 1958, Congress passed Public Law 85-811 dealing with the procurement of headstones for veterans. This law stated “That the Secretary of the Army is authorized and directed to furnish, when requested, appropriate Government headstones or markers at the expense of the United States for the unmarked graves of the following…” The first category listed is “Soldiers of the Union and Confederate Armies of the Civil War.”
In neither of these two laws does Congress make an exception for officers, high ranking or otherwise.
So while Congress never specifically declared that soldiers of the Confederacy are US veterans, the implication of these two laws is that they should be considered as such.
Sunday, August 20, 2017
Tuesday, August 15, 2017
Extra Biblical Evidence for Jesus
I've done this before but I'm going to do it again in order to provide a safe place to stick my most recent thoughts on the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth.
The argument is not that there is no evidence, the argument is that the evidence is weak and better explanations exist for the emergence of Christianity than it originated with a historical figure. I keep running into Youtube videos repeating the same old supposed evidence. Tacitus - There is a major flaw with the Tacitus passage. Pontius Pilate wasn't a procurator, he was a prefect. This makes it almost certain that Tacitus did not get his information from official Roman records. Tacitus was writing in the early 2nd century about the Emperor Nero who had been dead for over 40 years. Tacitus is listing all of the attempts by Nero to dispel the rumors that he was responsible for the great fire of Rome in 64 C.E. He lists these items and ultimately gets to Nero supposedly trying to pin the blame on the Christians. "Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace." "Called Christians by the populace" implies he is in fact working from hearsay or common knowledge. Accuracy in describing the Christians or their beliefs is not one of Tacitus' priorities here as it's just one more example of Nero trying to shed blame. Lucien - He is describing Christians and their beliefs. He never mentions Jesus by name. The beliefs of Christians are not in doubt. Suetonius - The position that "Chrestus" is the misspelled title "Christus" of someone not in Rome at the time is no more likely than it is the proper name of someone that was in Rome. Thallus - This is simply Julius Africanus arguing that Thallus is wrong about a solar eclipse he records. Why should anyone believe Africanus over Thallus? Pliny the Younger - Like Lucien, Pliny is talking about Christians and their beliefs. Again, Christian beliefs are not in doubt. As for their willingness to die, people are dying today in the Middle East for Allah and the promise of 72 virgins. Mara Bar-Sepion - The letter mentions the men of Samos burning Pythagoras but there is no record of this happening. How Pythagoras dies is unknown so how reliable should one consider the rest of the letter? Josephus - Then there's Josephus. Josephus was a Pharisaic Jew. He would never have called Jesus the Messiah so if it actually says that then it is almost certain that the main passage is at least a partial interpolation. If he was recording the beliefs of others then the entire passage is hearsay isn't it? Yes there is evidence but it isn't very strong and the silence of people such as Philo of Alexandria is deafening. Personally I was always of the position that Jesus was a historical character despite the weak evidence. Recently however Richard Carrier has been winning me over a bit so now I have to say I'm uncertain. The web site you reference presents nothing new. In order to accept that as sufficient evidence one would already have to be a believer.
The argument is not that there is no evidence, the argument is that the evidence is weak and better explanations exist for the emergence of Christianity than it originated with a historical figure. I keep running into Youtube videos repeating the same old supposed evidence. Tacitus - There is a major flaw with the Tacitus passage. Pontius Pilate wasn't a procurator, he was a prefect. This makes it almost certain that Tacitus did not get his information from official Roman records. Tacitus was writing in the early 2nd century about the Emperor Nero who had been dead for over 40 years. Tacitus is listing all of the attempts by Nero to dispel the rumors that he was responsible for the great fire of Rome in 64 C.E. He lists these items and ultimately gets to Nero supposedly trying to pin the blame on the Christians. "Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace." "Called Christians by the populace" implies he is in fact working from hearsay or common knowledge. Accuracy in describing the Christians or their beliefs is not one of Tacitus' priorities here as it's just one more example of Nero trying to shed blame. Lucien - He is describing Christians and their beliefs. He never mentions Jesus by name. The beliefs of Christians are not in doubt. Suetonius - The position that "Chrestus" is the misspelled title "Christus" of someone not in Rome at the time is no more likely than it is the proper name of someone that was in Rome. Thallus - This is simply Julius Africanus arguing that Thallus is wrong about a solar eclipse he records. Why should anyone believe Africanus over Thallus? Pliny the Younger - Like Lucien, Pliny is talking about Christians and their beliefs. Again, Christian beliefs are not in doubt. As for their willingness to die, people are dying today in the Middle East for Allah and the promise of 72 virgins. Mara Bar-Sepion - The letter mentions the men of Samos burning Pythagoras but there is no record of this happening. How Pythagoras dies is unknown so how reliable should one consider the rest of the letter? Josephus - Then there's Josephus. Josephus was a Pharisaic Jew. He would never have called Jesus the Messiah so if it actually says that then it is almost certain that the main passage is at least a partial interpolation. If he was recording the beliefs of others then the entire passage is hearsay isn't it? Yes there is evidence but it isn't very strong and the silence of people such as Philo of Alexandria is deafening. Personally I was always of the position that Jesus was a historical character despite the weak evidence. Recently however Richard Carrier has been winning me over a bit so now I have to say I'm uncertain. The web site you reference presents nothing new. In order to accept that as sufficient evidence one would already have to be a believer.
Charlottesville
Thing just keep going from bad to worse.
I admit that I've been a bad boy. I've haven't done any posts because they're too depressing but I can't let this one go by.
The background is a slow but steady movement to tear down monuments to the Confederacy across the south. The complaint is that they glorify the defense of slavery and slavery itself. The defense is that they are simply representative of "Southern Heritage."
You know, like lynchings and Jim Crow laws.
There is a statue in Charlottesville Virginia that some people want taken down. White Nationalists, including Neo-Nazis and the KKK, emboldened by a Trump White House, rallied in solidarity to protest any removal of Confederate monuments.
Left Wing elements, including Black Lives Matter and a group known as Antifa (Anti-fascist), rallied to counter protest.
Now, I wasn't there; I'm too old for that sort of stuff, so I really don't know what went on and neither do I care. When you put two such groups of people together there are going to be sparks, fist fights and flying debris. The Charlottesville police force would probably quickly find itself out of ideas for keeping things under control.
That seems to be just about what was going on but then something else occurred. A 20 year old right wing supporter from Ohio drove his car into the counter protest crowd killing one women and injuring 19 others.
He's been arrested and is being held without bail to face a 2nd degree murder charge in addition to a dozen or so other charges.
This reminds me of the 1960s and the Civil Rights and Vietnam War clashes but it's different, Those were conflicts surrounding mostly a single issue. This strikes me as a conflict about cultures and covers a broader range of issues.
The other thing that is different, and dangerous, is that we have a major political party in the Republicans that appears to be supportive of right wing radical politics.
Now, I'm going to be honest. I'm not sure if the GOP actually agrees with the extreme right wing or just wants their votes. I used to think it was the latter but I'm no longer so sure about that.
Worse is we have a president that first declares that blame is on both sides, then declares he's opposed to white nationalism, then declares that blame in on both sides and finally declares that there are some "very fine people" among the white nationalist demonstrators.
Someone seriously needs to put a muzzle on Trump. Every time he opens his mouth he sticks his head up his rear end.
I admit that I've been a bad boy. I've haven't done any posts because they're too depressing but I can't let this one go by.
The background is a slow but steady movement to tear down monuments to the Confederacy across the south. The complaint is that they glorify the defense of slavery and slavery itself. The defense is that they are simply representative of "Southern Heritage."
You know, like lynchings and Jim Crow laws.
There is a statue in Charlottesville Virginia that some people want taken down. White Nationalists, including Neo-Nazis and the KKK, emboldened by a Trump White House, rallied in solidarity to protest any removal of Confederate monuments.
Left Wing elements, including Black Lives Matter and a group known as Antifa (Anti-fascist), rallied to counter protest.
Now, I wasn't there; I'm too old for that sort of stuff, so I really don't know what went on and neither do I care. When you put two such groups of people together there are going to be sparks, fist fights and flying debris. The Charlottesville police force would probably quickly find itself out of ideas for keeping things under control.
That seems to be just about what was going on but then something else occurred. A 20 year old right wing supporter from Ohio drove his car into the counter protest crowd killing one women and injuring 19 others.
He's been arrested and is being held without bail to face a 2nd degree murder charge in addition to a dozen or so other charges.
This reminds me of the 1960s and the Civil Rights and Vietnam War clashes but it's different, Those were conflicts surrounding mostly a single issue. This strikes me as a conflict about cultures and covers a broader range of issues.
The other thing that is different, and dangerous, is that we have a major political party in the Republicans that appears to be supportive of right wing radical politics.
Now, I'm going to be honest. I'm not sure if the GOP actually agrees with the extreme right wing or just wants their votes. I used to think it was the latter but I'm no longer so sure about that.
Worse is we have a president that first declares that blame is on both sides, then declares he's opposed to white nationalism, then declares that blame in on both sides and finally declares that there are some "very fine people" among the white nationalist demonstrators.
Someone seriously needs to put a muzzle on Trump. Every time he opens his mouth he sticks his head up his rear end.
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