With respect to Hal Sobel’s historically revisionist letter of Jan. 25, I respectfully submit to the good doctor the following information (a.k.a. facts):
First, to quote leftist Aaron Sorkin as having the best argument for your side illustrates just how intellectually bankrupt liberals are when it comes to debating the issues, viz, liberals ending slavery. Really?
I always thought it was the group of “radical Republicans” in Washington during the Civil War that accomplished that noble cause.
People such as Republican Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania, Massachusetts Sen. Charles Sumner in the Senate and Republican congressman James Mitchell Ashley of Ohio, who started the whole movement to abolish slavery nationwide in December 1863, are the real heroes here, not the Democrats, particularly the southern Democrats, who fought long and hard against that noble effort; and for decades after losing that fight, continued with their repugnant Jim Crow laws, poll taxes, etc. Remember that South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond was a “Dixiecrat” for most of his (long) political life.
Furthermore, it was the Republican-led Congress that enacted the 13th Amendment in 1868 abolishing slavery forever, over the vociferous objections of Democrats, historians have noted.
When Thaddeus Stevens died in 1868, his body lied in state in the Capitol rotunda, guarded by black U.S. Army soldiers.
To further burst the liberal Democrats revisionist argument, it must be mentioned that the first African-American to serve in Congress, Hiram Rhodes Revels, served as the U.S. Senator from (of all places) Mississippi as a Republican in 1870-71. It was noted at the time how every southern congressman opposed seating Revels in the Senate chamber.
More recently, it must be mentioned that it was then-President Nixon who signed into law the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, not Democrats.
Now with respect to Rand Paul of Kentucky, he is frequently referred to as a “RINO” (Republican In Name Only), and is hardly reflective of the Republican party, who he has frequently criticized to buttress his own (failed) efforts in running for the presidency.
Question for Sobel: Do you really want to take credit for the authoritarian Nancy Pelosi returning as the speaker of the House?
Two final points for the good doctor: 1. Liberals did not end segregation — a broad spectrum of the American people, including various religious groups, helped end it, including conservatives and Republicans. 2. I would remind Sobel that throughout most of American political history, the party holding the presidency traditionally loses the majority in the Congress in the mid-term elections.
And in closing, I would just ask the question to my worthy opponent — if the word liberal is not a bad word, why then did New York’s liberal party change its name years ago to “The Working Families Party”? Just asking.
Paul Giarmo
Carle Place
