Book Reviews: Necessary Evil

Necessary Evil
by David A. Van Meter

This is a very creepy thriller/horror revenge story. It's told in first person so you never get the chance to step outside of the subject's mind. This was a short novel, just over 300 pages. It's an older book, written a little over twenty years ago. It was very graphic for the times, but still retains its ability to shock even in today's grindcore market. Revenge is not really a morally good feeling is it? We try to get rid of it by outsourcing private revenge to a dispassionate justice system. But for some crimes and for some people that's not enough. Some people are able to forgive the worst trespasses as indeed Christianity argues that they should. Vengeance is not man's but God's. Other people scoff at such arguments. If someone hurts them or gives them trouble they want to repay evil for evil, hurt for hurt, pain for pain to bitter end. For some people turning the other cheek only invites further attacks. And even if it didn't it would still be morally wrong to do so. You come after me with a bat; I get my gun. You put my brother in the hospital; I leave your son's casket on your front door. And so on. Most societies can not operate if everyone behaved in such a fashion because we'd live in a Hobbesian state of nature where no one can trust anyone who is stronger than they are. So in order to have the benefits of society we all implicitly agree to give up our private desires of revenge or retribution to accept the dictates of judges, juries and the law. But what if the law lets us down? Then what? Do we accept that sometimes a guilty person gets away with his or her crime? Or does that haunt us? In Necessary Evil, Van Meter shows almost in a clinical way how an act of evil impacts a child and warps him for life. If you have ever wondered where an adult psychopath came from, Necessary Evil gives a pretty good, though occasionally cliched, depiction of just how such a human being is created. The story jumps back and forward through time. We get childhood memories, teenage memories and finally present day descriptions from a thirty three year old man.

Billy McIlwaine is a thirty three year old man who has just been released from prison for a horrific crime which is not important to know about in this review. He's seemingly adjusted to being back in society. He has a job as a security guard and does his best to stay out of trouble. All the same though Billy is haunted by memories of a better time. Twenty three years prior when Billy was just ten he was forced to witness the murder of his maternal grandfather. In part Billy blames himself for his grandfather's murder. Not only did the lowlife perpetrators not go to jail they were able to claim self-defense and even successfully sued the estate. Billy's father Ned cared nothing for his father-in-law or wife and son. As soon as he learned there was no money forthcoming, he left. Even when he was around he wasn't much of a husband or father. He abused and cheated religiously on his wife, Billy's mother Grace. Grace is an alcoholic who has attempted suicide. Left to grow up with the clingy and oft inappropriate Grace (this is quite a Freudian story) Billy becomes alienated in some very real ways that go unnoticed. By the time Billy is a teen, Grace has turned her life around and become very financially successful in real estate. She doesn't have a lot of time left to tend to Billy. She has work to do. But Billy is obsessed with finding the two men who murdered his beloved grandfather.    

The book sort of dragged a bit in the middle. I did like the idea that people can often be in love with a false memory of a person or in love with who that person used to be and not realize that that person doesn't exist any longer. Our experiences define us and can also twist us. If evil is anything it's the inability to empathize, to put yourself in the other person's shoes. Over time, Billy gradually loses the ability to do this. As everything is told from Billy's POV, the story can get kind of claustrophobic at times. And because Billy is not always certain that what he's seeing is actually there, there are some deliberately unanswered questions. All in all this was an ok book. Not horrible, not the best. Evil can invoke pity at the same time as we know that we must remove the infected person from society, perhaps even from the planet.

Chris Christie is running for President: You gotta problem with that?

If it's Tuesday it must be time for another man or woman to announce that he or she is running for President. Today it was New Jersey governor Chris Christie. I think, similar to what happens after someone you know hits the lottery there's a feeling that if that person got lucky why not you. I think that after President Obama pulled off the longest of longshots by getting elected, not just once but twice, that a lot of would be candidates have reached the conclusion that if he can, they can. 

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) announced he's running for president in 2016. Christie told supporters of his plans in a phone call Tuesday morning, according to NBC and the AP. Christie made a public announcement Tuesday afternoon at Livingston High School, his alma mater, in Livingston, New Jersey. I am now ready to fight for the people of the United States of America," Christie said at the public announcement. He praised his home state during his speech, sharing how working as governor inspired him to run for president. Christie also took hits at lawmakers in Washington, including President Barack Obama, claiming a lack of productivity from Congress is giving Americans anxiety. "Both parties have failed our country... both parties have led us to believe that America, a country that was built on compromise -- that compromise is somehow a dirty word," Christie said. "We need to have the courage to choose, we need to have the courage to stand up and say 'enough,'" Christie added.

LINK

When I think of Governor Christie I think of aggression. To me that seems to be his defining characteristic. Some of that could just be my discomfort with his particular communication style, which is very stereotypically East Coast blunt. He reminds me of a few bosses or co-workers I had whom I did not like one bit. But then again what difference does it make if someone tells you that "Your idea stinks. Why are you even wasting my time with this bovine emission?" instead of telling you "Your idea needs a few tweaks. Let's discuss it later." Either way, someone is telling you that your idea is not what they needed. Christie strikes me as a man much more comfortable with the former phrasing. I tend to use the latter. Before the 2012 Presidential Election, people who were unhappy with what they saw as Romney's genteel style, tried to get Christie to run for President or get Romney to put Christie on the ticket as Vice-President. Christie's big draw would supposedly have been his pugnacious nature. Obviously neither event occurred and here we are. Christie has a few problems this time around. He may have missed his chance for the big time. There's the Bridgegate thingie. There's the fact that despite Christie's slow move to the right and his flip flops on social issues, I don't think too many Bible Belt Republican primary voters are thinking , Chris Christie, culture warrior. He's entering a very crowded field. He has low approval ratings in his home state. On the other hand Christie relishes attention and a good fight. Unlike Trump, Christie has actually won elected office. And doing so as a Republican in a reliably Democratic state shows that if nothing else, he's had good political instincts. 

I don't see Christie winning the nomination but there will be some fireworks between Christie and Paul, assuming both men make it to the televised debates. Christie has the confidence and deftness to make an appeal to moderates and independents should he somehow win the nomination. The question is how far right will he be willing to tack to appeal to the kinds of people who are calling for massive resistance to the Obergefell decision.

HBO Game of Thrones Season Five Differences/Analysis

*There will be some spoiler type material here below the fold. 
If you've read Mario Puzo's book The Godfather and watched Francis Ford Coppola's films The Godfather and The Godfather II, you will know Coppola excised many book plots from his film adaptation. Although I don't think Puzo was a horrible writer I do think that Coppola was a better filmmaker than Puzo was an author. The Godfather novel featured Puzo rambling on at length about Lucy Mancini's anatomical sexual abnormalities, the racist, familial and job related frustrations of NYPD police officer Albert Neri, Hollywood's poor treatment of writers and third tier talent, and the noble sacrifices of a friendly abortionist with the guts (however fleeting) to stand up to Michael Corleone. I thought that this was tedious reading and would have made for boring viewing. Coppola was right to drop it. There were other better written book subplots that weren't necessarily key to Coppola's story or were excessively detailed. Some of this material found its way into Godfather II, but some of it is unadapted, waiting for a Godfather IV film perhaps? I mention this because although I'm generally supportive of the author's original intent, I believe there are always things that simply don't translate well from text to screen. So I'm not a book purist or rather not only a book purist. When I read some books I hope that certain characters are massively redone or dropped from a possible film version. Just as I was relieved not to have to watch Lucy Mancini's gynecological melodrama in The Godfather, I thought that HBO's Game of Thrones was well served by (so far?) skipping or possibly rewriting Strong Belwas, a black obese eunuch former slave, who fights for Daenerys and often relieves his bowels upon or at those he defeats while speaking of himself in the third person (and often broken English). Yeah, no thanks on that one GRRM.

Season Five of HBO's Game of Thrones took several steps away from the published books. It wasn't always clear why the showrunners did this. We didn't know if the new material was their own creation or instead something which GRRM told them about but hadn't published yet. GRRM's British editor and some of his collaborators on other works have panned many text deviations. There are far too many changes to discuss but I did want to list four I thought most significant. Again there will be some inevitable spoilers listed. But, honestly there's not much left to spoil. Most main characters are now at the same place on screen and book. The last book was published in 2011. This year viewers saw things book readers didn't know about. I wasn't crazy about Season Five but I also wasn't crazy about the source material upon which it largely drew, the books A Feast For Crows and A Dance With Dragons.

Shireen, Stannis and Selyse are still alive. 

This all grew out a fundamental difference in how Benioff and Weiss saw Stannis and how Martin wrote him. Stannis is an unpleasant man. Virtually no one in the Seven Kingdoms likes the man. He has the personality of a lobster. He's married to a less than attractive woman. He has no sons. No one wants to marry his daughter. Still, Stannis' defining characteristic so far in the published books has not been ambition, as Benioff and Weiss have shown, but rather duty. This is repeated over and over and over in the books. Stannis does things which are required because they are required. His own personal desires are less important. Stannis almost starved to death resisting a year long siege during Robert's Rebellion, long after most men would have surrendered because his older brother, whom he saw as the rightful king, told him to hold Storm's End. Stannis, at least in the books, was less interested in being king because of his desires but because according to the rules, after Robert's demise, Stannis was the man who should have become king. Rules and duty. It's only later that Stannis considers that he can do good for the realm as king. That's partly why he was the only Lord to take seriously the Night Watch's call for assistance. I'm not saying that Stannis has no ambition or hypocrisies. He's not a "good" man. But at this point in the books whatever ambition he has is still outweighed by his outrage that the rules have been broken. Of course in Stannis' case he would be well served by the rules being followed so no matter what he does in book or show he will be seen as self-serving. If, after your parents pass away, and someone steals your entire inheritance, will you really listen to a third person who tells you to let it go and stop being greedy and self-serving? Or will you perhaps decide that the fight is worth it. If the Shireen burning really did come from Word of God (Martin) then it is what it is I guess. But for Stannis to murder his only heir seems grotesque and completely out of character for a man who made these quotes in the books:

It is not a question of wanting. The throne is mine, as Robert's heir. That is law. After me, it must pass to my daughter, unless Selyse should finally give me a son. I am king. Wants do not enter into it. I have a duty to my daughter. To the realm. Even to Robert. He loved me but little, I know, yet he was my brother. The Lannister woman gave him horns and made a motley fool of him. She may have murdered him as well, as she murdered Jon Arryn and Ned Stark. For such crimes there must be justice. Starting with Cersei and her abominations. But only starting. I mean to scour that court clean. As Robert should have done after the Trident.

In the books Stannis has marched off to an offpage battle against the Bolton armies. Despite setbacks he's alive and kicking in the last published book and released excerpts from book six. And as he explains to Theon Greyjoy, whom he immediately despises, he's not exactly messing his pants at the prospect of throwing down with Ramsay Snow.

I defeated your uncle Victarion and his Iron Fleet off Fair Isle, the first time your father crowned himself. I held Storm's End against the power of the Reach for a year, and took Dragonstone from the Targaryens. I smashed Mance Rayder at the Wall, though he had twenty times my numbers. Tell me, turncloak, what battles has the Bastard of Bolton ever won that I should fear him?

Sansa was not married to Ramsay Bolton or raped by him.

This may have been the biggest single deviation from the books this season and the one which worked the least. This got all sorts of criticism because of the wedding night rape scene, which caused some bloggers and other viewers to stop watching the show. Ramsay is who he is. He rapes, murders and tortures. The fact of the rape didn't bother me as much as the fact that Sansa never should have been there in the first place. In the books, there was a wedding scene and a rape. It was FAR worse in the book. I had to put the book down for a moment to wonder about the mind that conceived such things. But it wasn't Sansa who suffered. It was Theon (will he ever get a break) and Jeyne Poole. Jeyne Poole is Sansa's friend and the daughter of the Winterfell Steward. When Ned Stark and his household were murdered in King's Landing, Jeyne was seized by Littlefinger and put to work in his brothels. When the Boltons have taken over Winterfell and need a patina of legitimacy, Littlefinger sells or gifts Jeyne to the Boltons. Jeyne is forced to pretend that she is Arya Stark. Obviously Roose, Ramsay and Theon know that this isn't the case, and probably so do some of the Northern Lords who attend the wedding. But with Roose, appearances must be kept up. No one, least of all Theon, has the guts to say that Jeyne isn't Arya. Some of Ramsay's abuse of Jeyne may well be related to the fact that she's not a real Stark. In the books, Sansa is still under Littlefinger's control. They are in The Vale. No one knows who Sansa is though some suspect. Sansa is governess to her sickly cousin Robert/Robin Arryn, also kept under close watch by Littlefinger.
It's very strongly hinted that Littlefinger struggles to maintain control of himself around Sansa. He jumps back and forth between trying to creep on her and portraying himself as her impressive intelligent father figure (who also still wants to creep on her). He reveals to Sansa how he's bribed and corrupted some of the Vale Lords. Littlefinger drops a few hints about his master plan, which may involve getting rid of Sansa's cousin, and marrying off Sansa to the Vale heir before revealing Sansa's true identity. This would allow her to make a claim to the Riverlands (through Catelyn) and The North (through Ned) backed up by the unvarnished power of The Vale (which stayed out of the wars). She could theoretically control almost half of the Seven Kingdoms.

Of course this is Littlefinger we're talking about so it's doubtful he's telling all or even any of the truth. Nevertheless he definitely views Sansa as an important asset. For both political and more personal reasons Littlefinger would not let Sansa out of his sight. This is why the televised version didn't ring true. Given that the Iron Throne still wants Sansa Stark for the murder of Joffrey (something arranged by Littlefinger and the Queen of Thorns) even a coldly ambitious Lord like Roose Bolton would think twice before allowing Ramsay to marry Sansa and thus make an open enemy of the Lannisters. I understand that the show runners didn't want to have Sophie Turner stuck all season in the Vale watching Littlefinger twirl his mustache and laugh evilly but it simply didn't make sense for Sansa to willingly walk into the clutches of a family that was well known for betraying her own. It did violence to her character and storyline. I don't think it added anything to the tale. In the books, Brienne is not in the North. She's still wandering around the Riverlands looking for Sansa Stark.



Northern Resistance

Speaking of Sansa the sole television Northern Resistance seems to have been reduced to a few grimy peasants muttering "The North Remembers" and an offscreen Northern Lord refusing to pay Bolton taxes. Well it's important to remember that the Starks have been in charge of the North since time immemorial. They aren't always liked but they are generally respected and even loved. In the books, Northerners who don't even know or like Stannis decide to join his march on Winterfell to save "The Ned's little girl". Other Northerners who can't act openly because some of their relatives are still held as hostages find other devious and deadly ways to express their displeasure. The Lannisters and Boltons aren't the only people who can get down and dirty. I hope that this will be shown in greater detail next season. In the Riverlands, Arya's wolf, Nymeria is still attacking Freys and Lannisters, though (like Arya?) she may have become completely feral. She's leading a wolfpack of over one hundred. Someone else is also killing Freys both in the North (several of them came North with Roose) and in the Riverlands. Again I'd like to see a lot of this shown next season. Time will tell. It was only nodded to in the show via an offhand remark by Roose, but the Boltons can't rule solely by terror. The North is too big and has too many other scary people. There were a lot of families who lost people at the Red Wedding. They're mad. They want revenge. Their patience is at an end. And the Boltons and Theon are not the only people who know that Rickon is alive. Purely for context it also would have been nice if the show had more greatly emphasized the long planned treachery of the Freys and especially the Boltons. The Boltons have had it in for the Starks for centuries. The Frey's sigil is a double cross. That tells you all you need to know right there. In the books, Roose Bolton, once he had a command and relative independence of action from Robb, proceeded to use houses that were more loyal to the Starks as cannon fodder. Most of the people who are aware of Roose's deliberately suicidal orders are dead, which is just the way Roose likes it. Unlike his illegitimate son, Roose is a very cautious calculating man.



Jaime is not in Dorne. Myrcella is still alive.

Myrcella didn't die in the books. She was wounded by a Dornish retainer who wanted to start a war. I thought the Dorne sections of the books were interminable. They contributed a lot to my dislike of A Feast For Crows. I understand that Martin wanted to move away from the Stark-Lannister battle royale that had consumed much of the story but I wasn't ready for him to do that. This was made worse by the fact that virtually nothing happened in Dorne. The ruler, Prince Doran likes it this way. As he explains to his nieces, the Sand Snakes:

I am not blind, nor deaf. I know you all believe me weak, frightened, feeble. Your father knew me better. Oberyn was ever the viper. Deadly, dangerous, unpredictable. No man dared tread on him. I was the grass. Pleasant, complaisant, sweet-smelling, swaying with every breeze. Who fears to walk upon the grass? But it is the grass that hides the viper from his enemies and shelters him until he strikes.

Doran is playing a very long game, the details of which aren't important now and/or are too spoilery. But suffice it to say that he, like Oberyn and many other people in Dorne, has not forgotten the rape and murder of his sister Elia and her children. Another difference is that as Dorne practices equal inheritance, Trystane, Doran's son, is not his heir. Doran's heir is his oldest child, his daughter Arianne Martell, apparently dropped from the HBO adaptation. It's Arianne who schemes, not to kill Myrcella, but to declare Myrcella as Queen, attempting to apply Dornish succession laws to King's Landing. Rather than being insanely vengeful towards Myrcella on account of Oberyn's death, Ellaria thinks enough blood has been shed. She counsels patience and acceptance. Jaime doesn't ever go to Dorne. He's in the Riverlands trying to clean up after the war, live up to his oath to Catelyn Stark to find the Stark girls and not take up arms against Tullys or Starks (not that there are many left). Jaime is undergoing a lot of introspection about his past actions and what it means to be a knight and Kingsguard member. So I get that this might not make for exciting television. But I thought that a daughter finding out a horrible family secret, being okay with it and then apparently dying in her father's arms was horribly cliched. In the books the Sand Snakes merely ask Doran for vengeance for Oberyn. He has them all arrested and imprisoned. 


So I understand why Benioff and Weiss made many changes from books I thought were less than gripping. Some of their changes were actually good ones. In the books Jon Snow does not go to Hardhome and engage in a desperate battle against the White Walkers and the Night King. Many show only viewers I know thought that was a high point of the season. But too often the showrunners tried to ante up the shocks and violence, often needlessly. I sometimes think that the showrunners (and GRRM?) have fallen in love with shocking people too much. The books may have had too many details of political manipulation and the war's aftermath. But the show went too far in the other direction. Barristan is still alive in the books. I thought his show death was well done but unnecessary. Loras is never arrested. Jorah never got greyscale. I did like the increasingly strong hints that maybe, just maybe Ned didn't break his marriage vows, a theory which is not confirmed in the books.

What did you think of this season?

Movie Reviews: Run All Night

Run All Night

directed by Jaume Collet-Serra

The director who helmed this film also directed Orphan and Non-Stop as well as the film Unknown. The latter two films also featured Liam Neeson, as does Run All Night. So I was interested in seeing this film not just because of Neeson but also because of the director. I wasn't too disappointed. Neeson brings his usual gravelly authority to his role as a wastrel. Collet-Serra uses a tremendous number of closeups and other intimate filmic and camera techniques to make you emotionally bond with and believe in this story even though it is a tale which you have seen and read a million times before. In some many most respects this is just a remake or update of Sam Mendes' Road to Perdition. So though it's a cliche to say so, if you liked that movie you may well like this one. The only real difference is that in this film the protective father is not seen through the guileless and loving eyes of his underage son but rather is viewed through the judgmental and even hateful eyes of an adult son who does not consider his father to be part of his family. And the son has very good reasons for feeling that way. I know some people who have or too often had (time moves on) great relations with their father. I know others who have or had somewhat conflicted relations with their father. And I know a small handful of people who hate or hated their father with the white hot burning intensity of a thousand supernova. I can't really understand the last group of people but then again my experiences were very different. Run All Night, to its credit, doesn't immediately try to force you into wanting a reconciliation between father and son, even though it's something which the father needs very much. There are only a few initial sentimental tugs at the heartstrings. I suppose they are very well done if you are partial to that sort of thing. I thought some of this was a little bit unrealistic but that's just me.

Jimmy Conlan (Neeson) is an aging and nearly broken down executioner for the Irish mob in New York. If it is a sign of our humanity that most of us are bothered by killing, then Jimmy is all too human. He's killed more people than cancer. He's tortured by his past actions. He suffers nightmares. Jimmy drinks to dull the pain. And then he drinks just to drink. For whatever reason Jimmy doesn't have very much wealth to show for his long life of criminality and murder. He barely has two dimes to rub together. The same can't be said of Jimmy's best and oldest friend, Shawn Maguire (Ed Harris in a typically intense performance), the organization's boss and a very wealthy man. Although Shawn's the boss and also a murderer, it was Jimmy's moves that put him in the big seat and kept him there. Shawn remembers this, which is why he's always looking out for Jimmy and forgiving him trespasses which would have seen other people left floating in the river. Shawn is a loyal man who believes in doing things by the code. Each man has a son who vexes him. For Jimmy, it's Mike (Joel Kinnaman), a boxing trainer and limo driver who likes to pretend that his father doesn't exist. For Shawn it's Danny (Boyd Holbrook), a member of his father's organization who is obviously not there on merit. Danny is too ambitious to realize when he makes bad decisions. When he does something stupid and disobeys his father's orders he crosses one of Jimmy's redlines. Well. Blood is thicker than water for most people. Usually anyway. If someone I'm related to gets into it with someone else I'm going to take my relative's side even if he's wrong. We can work out those details later. I'm not going to be neutral about someone laying hands on my kin, even if it's deserved. And wouldn't you know it, Shawn feels the same way. A lifetime of friendship is destroyed in one night. And in one night a father and son must find a way to trust each other if they want to see morning. Common and Vincent D'Onofrio give yeoman work as a freelance hitman and a cynical but uncorrupted detective, respectively.

This was not a great movie but I enjoyed it. Both Neeson and Harris are getting a little long in the tooth for these roles. But each actor exudes authority when they walk into the room. The film is much the better for their presence. Nick Nolte has a blink and you'll miss it cameo. There is the normal amount of mayhem, rough language and mano-a-mano showdowns.

TRAILER

The Real Housewives of Westeros

Because, why not? I liked the little details in this video, such as Sansa's constant snacking on lemon cakes, Ellaria's accent, Stannis' obsession with grammar and Cersei's snarky guarantee that her wine is "poison free". There is a soap opera quality to some of Martin's written work so a Real Housewives of Westeros makes sense.

Bobby Jindal: Mr. Rogers runs for President

You may have heard that Louisiana Governor Piyush "Bobby"Jindal recently declared that he was running for President. I suppose that's just wonderful. Go big or go home I always say. At only 44 years old and a two term governor, former Congressman, former head of the Louisiana University system, and Rhodes Scholar, Jindal is an intelligent ambitious man. He's also a less than impressive public speaker. Remember this?  But more importantly he's a man who panders to the constant conservative feelings of being under siege and needing to strike out at the "other". In Jindal's worldview this other includes everyone from non-Christians and liberals, which to him appear to be the same, to especially Muslims.  His stupid repeating of a myth about London "no go zones" and his stubborn refusal to correct his statement when called out on it show that he's eager to appeal to bigotry against Muslims. His announcement speech was full of aggrieved rants about liberals who are supposedly at war with Christians and God. Why is it important if someone believes in a supernatural being or not? That's not the source of morality or political legitimacy.  Additionally, although it may be difficult for Governor Jindal to process this, there are millions of people who believe in the same faith as he does but see things very different politically. There are folks who read through the New Testament and didn't really pick up the ideas that Jesus said to hell with poor people, that it should be every man for himself, that the free market was the best way to organize everything in life, or that the road to prosperity is paved with corporate tax breaks. It's hard to believe I know but there you are. Governor Jindal may be the only Presidential candidate who ever conducted an exorcism, but I'm not sure that level of religious devotion is really what the American electorate is looking for in a President. The sort of Manichean worldview does fit in much more with the conservative mindset than it does with the liberal one. But the tide is turning (has turned?) on some of the issues of gender and sexuality which are near and dear to the social conservative heart. I think Jindal and company are going to find that out to their dismay. Well they would if they ever reached the general election. Jindal won't win the nomination because besides being somewhat goofy looking with an odd voice, he's trying to appeal to a base which is not necessarily inclined to nominate someone who's not a white male. As discussed previously, speaking of Hillary Clinton, NRA leader Wayne LaPierre sneered that eight years of one demographically symbolic President is enough, while recently Ann Coulter (wrongly) accused South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley of being an immigrant (based apparently on her South Asian heritage) who thus didn't understand American history.

So those are the sorts of people to whom Jindal will have to appeal. It's possible he could do just that. He was elected to Governor twice in Louisiana, after all. But I'm not seeing it on a larger stage. Not now. It would be a win for Jindal just to make it into the first debate. Fortunately for Jindal though, people from his parents' country can't vote in Republican primaries, because many seem less than impressed with Jindal and his perceived rejection of his ethnicity. Go figure.

Charleston, Roof and the Confederacy

Lilly Belle, your hair is golden brown / I've seen your black man coming 'round 
Swear by God, I'm gonna cut him down
Southern Man-Neil Young

I was reminded of the above quote from the classic rock song "Southern Man" when it was alleged that an event which evidently pushed killer Dylan Roof into his downwards spiral from garden variety racist to murderous savage was the fact that he lost out romantically to a black man. This sort of hatred based in real or more often perceived sexual rivalry or sexual assault has been the basis for many racist actions, from slavery to Jim Crow to lynchings to police shootings on down through the years. Just as a totem of racial hatred and treason like the Confederate Battle Flag has survived, so have the emotions which the flag embodies. So no one should be surprised that a man who says that he hates and wants to kill black people was drawn to Confederate imagery. Many modern day Confederate Flag supporters either do not want to think about or admit the nature of the state which they are defending. They will blather on at length about their Confederate veteran great-great-great-grandfather veteran and how brave and honorable he was ad nauseaum. Well to paraphrase George Carlin, my great-great-great-grandfather said F*** your great-great-great-grandfather. The Confederacy was created to protect and extend slavery and white supremacy. This is emphatically not a modern day interpretation of historical events and motives. The Confederate military, political, journalistic and philosophical leaders were crystal clear about why they were fighting, what they thought the proper relationship of black and white was, and how long slavery would continue if they won (indefinitely). We've been over this before but it is evidently worth pointing out again. The Confederate states seceded because they believed that President Lincoln in particular and the North in general were both at the very least insufficiently dedicated to and at the worst openly hostile to the twin causes of slavery and white supremacy. Check it out for yourself. The secession declarations put in plain English for posterity's sake just what the drafters thought of black people. Southern politicians appealed directly to racism to motivate their base. Federalism, tariffs and industrialization mattered to them only to the extent that that slavery was threatened.


Mississippi
In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course. Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin.

Texas
We hold as undeniable truths that the governments of the various States, and of the confederacy itself, were established exclusively by the white race, for themselves and their posterity; that the African race had no agency in their establishment; that they were rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and dependent race, and in that condition only could their existence in this country be rendered beneficial or tolerable.

Alexander Stephens 
Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition....
Our system commits no such violation of nature’s laws. With us, all of the white race, however high or low, rich or poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro. Subordination is his place. He, by nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system. Link

And so on. Slavery was the animating cause of the Civil War. Of course many whites who fought for the south did not own slaves but they, with some notable exceptions previously discussed here, generally did believe wholeheartedly in white supremacy. The idea of black people having citizenship or voting was anathema to the Confederacy, thus the post war ratification of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments. Post war, did white southerners graciously and quickly move to extend citizenship rights to the newly freed Africans? No. No they didn't. Rather, white southerners practiced sullen and violent resistance to any attempt to recognize, much less enforce, basic human rights for Black Americans. After reconciliation with the white North, the gloves came off completely. The South became a terror state for black people. The white southern population zealously enforced Jim Crow laws and customs in which a black person could be murdered for something as innocuous as looking a white person in the eye, refusing to move aside when a white person was walking on the sidewalk, or not letting themselves be cheated in a business transaction. Does any of this sound like the actions of people who went to war for any reason other than white supremacy? Except for the more honest present day racists such as Michael Hill, who wants a white state in the South, most Confederate flag supporters will not look too deeply into the history of the Confederacy and why the Confederacy attempted to secede. There's a denial that has grown up around the Confederacy and the very nature of slavery. Even conservatives who would wax indignant about dead enders in other situations still can't bring themselves to admit that slavery was wrong, a crime against humanity and that resistance to it was morally praiseworthy. Bill Kristol, who has the dubious distinction of being generally wrong about just about everything, thinks that it's problematic for the "left" to be insufficiently respectful of the Confederacy. It's hard for me to wrap my head about how backwards this viewpoint is, even coming from someone like Kristol, who makes a good living being wrong. There were SS men who fought tooth and nail against the Soviet invasion of Germany. Some were even heroic. But if a German today wrapped herself in Nazi regalia claiming she was only honoring the ultimate sacrifice of her brave ancestors, I doubt Kristol would see that as something worthy of respect or recognition. Hmm.

The Left's 21st century agenda: expunging every trace of respect, recognition or acknowledgment of Americans who fought for the Confederacy.

— Bill Kristol (@BillKristol) June 23, 2015

The fundamental issue is that the South never really went under anything approaching de-Nazification. Although they lost the war, for decades afterwards white southern political leaders and citizens adamantly refused to concede that slavery was wrong or that black people had human rights. It's only in the past 50 years that the South was forced,kicking and screaming, grudgingly and slowly, to give up legal segregation and white domination. It's ridiculous that 150 years after the South waved the white flag and ended the bloodiest war this nation ever endured, we as a country might finally be realizing that the regalia of traitor and racists isn't deserving of respect. But unfortunately that's what happens when you don't deal with problems when they first arise. Things fester and get worse. So it's a good thing that in places like Alabama, Mississippi and yes South Carolina, legislators and other political leaders are beginning to question the prevalence of the Confederate Flag on state grounds and insignia. Of course it's fair and accurate to point out that the US flag flew over slavery and other horrific acts. We shouldn't forget that. But unlike the Confederate Flag the US flag now at least theoretically contains the possibility of equal treatment under the law. The Confederate Flag is fixed forever in the belief of slavery and white supremacy. Roof chose exactly the correct flag for his actions. It's silly to pretend otherwise