Bill Mahar on Slavery

Bill Mahar went on a bit of a rant about slavery that some "progressive" sites have labeled as horrendous. I watched the clip and I didn't see anything horrendous about it beyond some truths that some folks don't want to acknowledge.

The whole point Maher is making is that slavery was a common horror all over the word and that's true. Modern "progressives" seem to think that slavery was unique to North America. OK, when he started talking about "you have to cancel Jesus" because he never spoke out against it, that was a little weird I'll give you that. 

He then went on to complain about people wanting to cancel historical figures because they owned slaves. Yes, people have demanded that statues of Washington, Jefferson and even Ulysses S. Grant, because he had a slave that he freed, be torn down because they owned slaves in an era where lots of people, including black people in the US, owned slaves. Can you spell "presentism?" 

The authors of the Constitution mistakenly thought that slavery was on the way out and would disappear within the next ten or twenty years. Even the slaveholding states thought that this was the case which is why they didn't get too upset over Article 1, Section 9 which allowed Congress to make the importation of slaves illegal in 20 years. That's exactly what happened on January 1, 1808 based upon an 1807 bill signed into law by Thomas Jefferson. 

In the meantime slavery was either abolished or being phased out in all of the northern states by 1808.

Unfortunately, the gods laugh at the foolishness of mortals and the invention of the Cotton Gin in 1793 suddenly made an institution of questionable economic value into one that appeared to be enormously profitable. Cotton production exploded from 700 hectares in 1790 to 17,000 hectares in 1800 and then to over a million hectares in 1861. 

The ironic thing was that slavery was still a millstone around the southern economy. It made a handful of people rich but generally kept the entire area as something of an economic backwater. Free labor would have been much more productive and improved things for everyone including the plantation owners.

Was Social Security Racist?

I ran into a claim today that the original Social Security bill was racist because it excluded agricultural and domestic workers most of whom were black.

A little background investigation led me to understand that this claim was accurate but misleading. It was accurate that agricultural and domestic workers were originally not eligible but NOT because they were specifically excluded but because they were outside of the groups that were included.

The Social Security Act of 1935 was a complicated bill that contained 11 Titles and authorized 7 distinct programs. Only Title II was what we now know as Social Security. It was the only one of the 7 programs that was solely a federal program. The rest were federal and state supported (think today's Medicaid). 

All of the racism claims, even those by well known historians, confuse the racial motives associated with programs other than Title II with Title II. Title II did not exclude blacks, nor did it exclude agricultural and domestic workers, rather it only included those workers regularly employed in commerce and industry. 

This left out a whole slew of occupations in addition to agricultural and domestic workers (which usually drives the racism claim) including the self employed, merchant seamen and members of congress. Of the 20 million workers excluded 15 million were white.

So this is a highly dubious claim based upon manipulating the truth to make it say what you want it to say even though it's bullshit.

So...I'm a lot Poorer

I got my taxes done today and had to fork over $9,642 for the federal government and $1,273 for the state bringing my total tax bills to $35,251 for the feds and $5,326 for the state.

Well, I suppose it could be worse.

The War in Gaza

Why is it only the Jews that aren't allowed to strike back when they're attacked? 

I'd like to ask those protesting against Israel whether they agree that Hamas needs to be destroyed. If yes then how do they propose that can be done? If no then I'd like to know why not?

It's not a genocide. That's just name-calling which is a well known propaganda technique. It's war and war sucks. That's why you don't start one. Clearly these youngsters have never had the misfortune of engaging in urban warfare. Every death should be laid at the feet of Hamas. They were the ones that crossed the border and murdered 1400 people, raped helpless women and kidnapped 250 others or have they forgotten that? Hamas is the problem that needs to be eradicated. I don't understand why these young people are supporting terrorists, rapists and murderers. 

Were the Allies committing genocide during World War II against the Germans and Japanese? On February 13-15, 1945 over a thousand British and US bombers destroyed the city of Dresden killing an estimated 25,000 civilians. On March 9, 1945 280 US B-29s dropped incendiary bombs on Tokyo killing an estimated 100,000 civilians. Then there was Hiroshima, 70,000 dead and Nagasaki, 40,000 dead. An estimated 125,000 civilians died during the battle of Berlin. Like I said, war sucks. That's why you don't start one.

Great and Small Minds

 A quote originally attributed to Socrates and then paraphrased by Eleanor Roosevelt goes like this:

Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people."

Trump Stays on the Ballot

Unsurprisingly the Supreme Court has decided, in a 9-0 decision, that Trump can't be kept off the ballot based upon the 14th Amendments clause about insurrection barring someone from holding office.

Three states, Colorado, Maine and Illinois, had wanted to keep him off the primary ballot.

I say "unsurprisingly" because Trump hasn't actually been convicted of anything.