From one secessionist war to another.  Amnesty: Tens of thousands at risk in Sri Lanka as fighting escalates.

For 30 years the Tamil Tigers have controlled an area in the North of Sri Lanka known as the Vanni, with the town of Kilinochchi at its centre.  Following a series of recent government victories in other areas, this area is now all that remains of the Tigers’ de facto separatist homeland state.

But maybe not for much longer.  The entire region is surrounded by government forces, and is being squeezed on three fronts.  The bubble is shrinking as the forward defensive lines are creeping in, slowly converging on Kilinochchi.

The juxtaposition of historic events is just too rich to ignore and the story too full of fun and promise not to tell.  

Our little town of Culpeper in red, RED Virginia opened it's Obama office Saturday (8/16) -- the first Democratic presidential headquarters in this sleepy village since 1964 (Probably not coincidently, that is also the last time that a Democratic presidential candidate won the state).  Let me repeat that for emphasis:  The Democrats have not had a presidential candidate office in this town for 44 years!

So opening any office at all is a really big deal for the fellowship-starved, lonely progressive souls out here in the Virginia hinterlands.  But where the office is located, perhaps, is as much of a tale.  You see, about 175 years ago, our Obama office was the boyhood home of Confederate General Ambrose Powell Hill.

This saga [complete with photos] continues after the jump....

Great article, video series, and photo essay that follows Union General William Sherman's war-route through Tennessee, Georgia, and the Carolinas in the present year to examine the slowly changing culture of the south and its impact on the election.

The article questions the role of the past in the present, and how accepting - or not - the evolving South has become, as well as how far it has to go. In addition to old black-white racism wounds, the new scapegoat of illegal immigration is impacting the cultural debate as well. The article begins:

George W. Bush and Barack Hussein Obama have unsettled the South: the first with a reckless war and a weakened economy, the second with the color of his skin, the foreignness of his name, the lofty liberalism of his language. Suddenly the palliative prosperity that salved old, deep wounds no longer seems adequate to the task.

The article was written after a roadtrip by the son of Deliverance writer James Dickey. Links and more below the fold.

McClatchy:

By Nicholas Spangler and Hussein Kadhim | McClatchy Newspapers
BAGHDAD — Female suicide bombers attacked crowds in Baghdad and the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk on Monday morning as part of a series of four bombings that left at least 46 people dead and more than 200 wounded, security officials said

Associated Press is reporting a higher death toll although both accounts have three women with suicide attacks in Baghdad and one woman in a crowd in Kirkuk.

Seeing Gavin Newsom at Netroots Nation has inspired me to write this diary that I never thought I would write.

I had to thank Mayor Newsom on Sunday because my father is no longer here to thank him personally.  

Gavin Newsom showed courage when he agreed to allow the installation of the Veterans of American Lincoln Brigade monument to be installed this spring in Embarcadero Plaza.

More beyond the fold.

Hezbollah recently occupied a string of locations in the mountain chain that begins in the Lebanese town of Jezzine and extends throughout the mountainous region of Sannine.  Violent actions against residents, hikers and picnickers in the area accompanied the action.  That region of Lebanon really holds no strategic importance to the borders or in their fight with Israel, although it is in the middle southern region of the nation.  Hezbollah took a week to issue a statement on the upswing in the number of forces in those remote areas.  In the statement they claimed the forces were there to counter any Israeli airdrops into the remote regions.  It soon became clear to the Lebanese Army Intelligence Directorate that Hezbollah's claim was false, and that the group has increased fighter levels in the Oyoun al-Simane and Jbeil mountainous regions as well.

What are they really doing there?
They are preparing for a war to prevent any Lebanese resistance to aiding Iranian interests.  The perceived threats to Iran from Israel and the U.S., if carried out, will likely lead to a much larger conflict than the public anticipates.  It will be like all wars: terrible.

More after the flip.

I love to blame cable tv for almost everything, but in my heart I know better.  I have even diaried a few times about what I think the problem is:  our national ignorance and pride in stupidity, most recently here then here.

But in my own foolish attempt to decide who the worst president of them all--- the two prime candidates seem to be James Buchanan and the current guy--- something jumps off the age that seems to confirm my theory in a truly depressing way.

Hang in there and join me after the jump.  This could be fun or make you want to hide.

Recently much of the discussion on this board has centered around Obama's position on issues such as FISA as well as other issues in which many members of this community feel he has betrayed his strongest supporters. The sense that I get is that it is not the specific issues that people are concerned (though the issues themselves are important) but to larger extent what it means about Obama as a candidate and future leader. The question is asked, are we heading towards another Bill Clinton style Presidency full of triangulation a little accomplishment? Every speech he gives, every comment he makes is heavily analyzed by those who would take both sides of this question. Before we judge Obama we must wait until we see how he acts when in power with congress solidly behind him. Comparing the campaigns of leaders such as Lincoln and Roosevelt with what they later accomplished shows why this is the case.

As of this moment, the top ranked diary calls the Constitution a piece of toilet paper, that the erosion of liberties and rule of law that privileged technocrats enjoy is something that persons of color have dealt with all their lives and long before. That, in so many words, it's a war, an ideological struggle, with the latest insult being hand-wringing over a bill that amends a piece of toilet paper.

I will set aside the transparent retort that such bills ended slavery and gave women the vote, among other valuable public goods, because the same author demanded but one thing in answer - are you with the Blue Prince, or do you stand against him? For she is with him, and she will not have her time wasted with the likes of fools and villains who do not raise their guns and cry loudly their oaths of fealty to the new champion.

She says it's war.

So be it.

War it is.

Just building on a comment I added elsewhere that won't get a viewing.

The fact is we won't actually hold the Bush administration accountable.  We'll make the same mistakes again as a nation and not punish our right wing anti-democratic extremists who are trying to destroy our nation and take us away from the constitution on which it is founded.

This is what allowed some of these idiots back in power after they should have been punished for Iran Contra.  

As I'll briefly outline below, personally, I think we'll point back to this as the inaction that led to the disintegration of our nation.  Yes quite seriously I see the violent demise of America in these actions, extreme though that may seem... if you're interested follow me below...

No. Not in Iran (yet).
And not another invented cause for staying at war in Iraq (they've run out of excuses).
The Republican "Dirty Tricks" brigade has been redeployed... this time to reinvent the American Civil War.

The newest battle rages around the Republican Attack Machine's attempt to turn Jim Webb into Scarlett's Webb (my apologies to both Margaret Mitchell and E.B. White). Senator Webb has written extensively and with authority and thoughtfulness on the Civil War and the socio-economic roots of the South. Of course, The GOP "Dirty Tricks" class of 2008 has been parsing these and other Webb writings in order to leave their usual slime trail of fabricated controversy. The greatest enabler of these societal slugs remains the abject ignorance of the American voter - but the ignorance is now enhanced but the sheer stupidity and spinelessness of the American press.

The issue of race has been injected into this presidential campaign both as a source of pride and progress and as a wedge to scare and intimidate. Of course, this is often true in our election seasons as Republican voter suppression takes center stage and the taking for granted of the African-American vote by the Democrats is often a problem.

This election, perhaps, draws the most stark contrast between presidential candidates as Barack Obama represents the first African-American to be nominated by a major party, and John McCain features one of the most checkered pasts in memory on the other side. There are three major issues on the McCain side that I want to explore here.

1. The "Gook" Issue

2. The MLK Holiday Issue

3. The Confederate Flag Issue

Right now, it appears as though Hillary Clinton still has roughly the same chance of being the Democratic nominee as the Confederacy had of winning the Civil War on the day before Lee's surrender at Appomatox Courthouse.  Lee had received orders from Jefferson Davis to disperse the Army of Northern Virginia to get them past the Union lines, and then to continue to fight a guerilla war in the mountains.  There's a book, April 1865: The Month That Saved America, of which that episode forms a big part.

But Lee and his top subordinate generals had been horrified at the carnage that had accompanied guerilla war in Kansas, Kentucky, and West Virginia, looked at the situation, realized that it was over, and that their obligation to the people of the South, and indeed of the entire country that they had considered theirs until a few years previously, was to accept reality with dignity and grace, and not to cause any more useless carnage.

I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,
I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.
I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you.

~ Walt Whitman
 Song of Myself

When the Color Sergeant was shot down, this soldier grasped the flag, led the way to the parapet, and planted the colors thereon. When the troops fell back he brought off the flag, under a fierce fire in which he was twice severely wounded.

-Medal of Honor citation for William H. Carney

Carney was born a slave in Virginia. Some sources say he was emancipated when his owner died. Others say he and his father escaped slavery and the latter bought the family's freedom.

All sources agree that when Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, Carney was among those who signed up for the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment, also referred to as the 54th Massachusetts Colored Infantry.

Those sources also agree that Carney took up the colors (the flag) and never let them touch anything but Fort Wagner air. And on this date in 1900, Sgt. Carney was awarded the Medal of Honor for his service to our country.

I learned something today. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz--Florida Congresswoman and Clinton surrogate--doesn't know her history. In this, Wasserman-Schultz is not unique, of course. These politicians, these freaks, consistently get it wrong. And in getting it wrong they betray their lack of historical imagination. What is the Congresswoman's sin?

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing


click to enlarge

Ever since the Nixon campaign introduced the "southern strategy" (code for scare the crap out of white people so they'll vote for us), race has played a particularly important role in politics.