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| Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) |
Rest In Peace
Nelson Mandela
He may have been a Communist, but he was also a selfless man of extraordinary grace, faith, courage, tenacity and good humor. That he never succumbed to bitterness or gave way to a lust for vengeance –– even after twenty-seven-years as a political prisoner –– was remarkable enough in itself, but his manifest ability to lead an entire nation –– peacefully ––from Apartheid to Native African Rule, –– and then to step away from power –– voluntarily with dignity and grace –– puts him in a league with George Washington, among the greatest leaders in recorded history.
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| Nelson Mandela in 1990 |
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ReplyDeleteAndie,
ReplyDelete"A little, knowledge is a very dangerous thing."
"One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter." As always it depends on whose ox is being gored.
In the long run Nelson Mandela turned out to one of the greatest statesmen in modern history.
I doubt if any of us is pacifist enough to completely renounce violence.
ReplyDeleteLife's a complicated thing, and I don't think the broad strokes used by either FT or DT have all that much to do with the reality.
I don't know much about Mandella's involvement with the armed wing of the ANC, but he probably wasn't blameless. Nevertheless, in my opinion the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is among the greatest political achievements of the late 20th centuries.
"One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."
Some acts are purely terrorist IMO.
In the practical world -- the REAL world -- "RESULTS are ALL that COUNT, Jez.
ReplyDeleteHe was instrumental in ending Apartheid -- a laudable achievement surely any leftist such as yourself could do nothing but applaud.
Maintaining the status quo established by the Dutch and the British would have meant that a large majority of South African natives would have continued to be subjugated, exploited and treated as inferiors with hopelessly limited prospects in their OWN land by Dutch and British invading forces.
As a self-proclaimed "Tory of the Old School," even I could see that a situation of that sort was morally untenable, and in the long run impractical.
Mandela's great achievement was in managing the NON-VIOLENT transfer of power from harsh, cruel, White-Segregationist to Native South African Rule with remarkable grace, efficiency and the absence of rancor and desire for retribution.
Mandela was, indeed, identified with Communism, and did believe early on in defeating the Apartheid Rule by main force. His cause was just. His methodology flawed. He served TWENTY-SEVEN-YEARS in JAIL,however, and came out unbowed, with his dignity intact, but also with the charismatic aura of an heroic martyred saint, because of the equanimity and good humor with which he bore his suffering and unjust punishment. He proved himself a bigger, better man than any of his captors, and won a tremendous moral and temporal victory.
Winnie Poohmandela said
ReplyDeleteNo one could deny that Nelson's face was a lot better looking than Michelle Obama's arse.
I doubt that a true portrait of Nelson Mandela exists. Being lauded as the saviour of South Africa in the MSM by freeing the country from arpartheid after being released having served 27 years in prison for being a so-called radical communist seems more like window dressing hiding the real essence of what really happened. What he may have been in the early sixties would pale in comparison to the rabid frothing at the mouth bee ess that's served up on a daily basis by the likes of MSNBC, and they're worshiped by the loose screws of the left day in and day out. They head there to lean forward, grab their ankles and pick up their daily talking points to regurgitate.
ReplyDeleteI happen to feel entirely uncomfortable in a mob of Mandela worshipers and why would I want to be part of a mob that features the likes of the good Reverend Al Sharpton gushing about Nelson Mandela when he's about as corrupt a human being that ever took a breath of air on this planet?
I'm thinking there's way more to the story of Nelson Mandela that lies buried in the past about his timely release from prison the be raised up as leader of a country—in other words, he had plenty of help acting behind the scenes in his rise to fame and fortune after doing hard time in prison.
"RESULTS are all that count"
ReplyDeleteNot that I completely agree with this (raw pragmatism is dangerous), but surely you'd want to account for the dozens of civilians who died as a result of ANC bombings?
Look, I like Mandela too -- see third para of my last comment. You're clearly more binary about these things than I.
While I understand Jez's nuanced approach, I take FreeThinke's view. I was thinking about this on the way to work this morning, and FreeThinke has expressed how I feel much more eloquently than I ever could.
ReplyDeleteToday is a day to praise a great man who has died.
Waylon: That mobs of race hustlers and leftwing morons congregating around the memory and iconography of Nelson Mandela takes nothing away from the man himself and his accomplishments.
With apologies to John the Baptist, resident jackass Al Sharpton is not worthy to tie Nelson Mandela's shoelace.
Amid the wave of Liberal/Progressive/ Communist grief over Nelson Mandela’s passing, and President Obama’s words of historical tribute and all the outpouring of “greatness”running amok. Let’s not forget he was a communist.
ReplyDeleteYes, thers’s going to be a lot of “tributes” and there already are, Bit lets not forget so easily. There’s is a lot of other things to remember about Mandela, but MOST OF ALL, we should not forget that he was a Communist. Just keep remembering the facts as you hear all the praises. He wasn’t sitting in a prison cell all those years for nothing.
While President Obama said very forcefully that his very first endeavor as a political activist, was that of opposing apartheid. Wow. That was just plain difficult to watch - it really was. And the final slice of the cake was when Obozo ordered flags fly at half staff until Monday at dusk for this piece of sh*t. I will fly my flag at half staff on Dec. 7th only in honor of real heroes who died at Pearl.. Was there ever ANY FOREIGN person that was given that honor before? I can think of foreign more than a few leaders worthy of this honor and it́s not Mandela, most recently Margaret Thatcher for example.
I for one have never revered this racist Mandela. for the crimes he committed no matter what his justification was.
When someone plants bombs to insure that black people go to school, was it a terrorist action? Or was it a communist action? Who cares, both or either is pathetic, not heroic! So I guess that Obama supports terrorism as long as they are Black? Nelson Mandela was a Commie and a Murderer , He went to prison for planting bombs for a attempted coop on the government of South Africa.
For Marxist terrorist scum around the world, subjugation to Apartheid or any other repressive regime was a convenient cover to seize power for their own sick ends. Mandela, Guevara, Castro, Stalin, Pol Pot - all birds of a feather. Communism murdered 100's of millions of people worldwide.
But this is the kind of person the left likes to prop up. The man was no saint, and because of him South Africa is but a shell of it's former self. I couldn't bear to listen to the fake in chief slobber over this communist-of course he had to pander to his base. Maybe Obama will take down the statue of George Washington and put a statue of Mandela in the White House.
Ben Gazi:
ReplyDeleteYou are an ignorant moron. No liberty-loving person could post what you have just drooled out upon this fine blog.
So he and millions of others should have been happy sitting in servitude? Is that what you are saying? Freedom isn't for everyone?
FreeThinke: Ben Gazi is a shit-slinging baboon, posting the same boilerplate at multiple blogs.
And my feeling is closer to FreeThinke's than to DT's.
ReplyDeleteSometimes the truth hurts!
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteDivine:
ReplyDeleteNeither FT nor I are arguing that this is not a multi-faceted issue.
Yes he was a communist (he praised Castro!) and yes he used violence, but he was fighting for freedom against a very anti-freedom system.
Also, once in power, he provided a lesson in magnanimosity, when murder and mayhem could have been, if not justified, at least understandable.
As you know all too well, life is not pristine.
Your Hitler, Pol Pot and Mao analogies are inapt. All three of those were progressive tyrants.
A better analogy would be Ho Chi Min, a communist, but a fighter for his people's freedoms, first against China and Japan, later against the US.
As a libertarian, freedom first, not ideology or party.
The fact that Obama and other execrable leftwingers will glom onto the events surrounding Nelson Mandela's death should not becloud our clear-eyed view of the man, good and bad.
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ReplyDeleteDivine: I respect you, but we disagree.
ReplyDeleteBy your logic, the founding fathers should never have fired a shot.
Black South Africans were living under tyranny. They had the God-given right to fight for their God-given liberty.
Such is life.
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ReplyDeleteI'll be glad when this, ad nauseam, eulogy is put to rest and we can return the focus on the very serious issues facing [us], NOW!
ReplyDeleteAndie,
ReplyDeleteChildren die in all wars, and we agree deliberately targeting innocent people is morally wrong.
Apartheid was also a morally reprehensible regime that killed innocent people, including children.
Blow them up or slowly kill them through starvation and disease-ridden squalor, they are all equally dead.
Andie,
ReplyDeleteYou are still very young, terribly idealistic, decidedly headstrong, and tend to see things in too simplistic a fashion.
NOTHING in this world is strictly black and white, or cut and dried. There ARE no absolutes.
Absolutism is akin to fanaticism -- a dangerous mental condition that has led to the tragic, unnecessary deaths of many millions over the millennia.
You are, of course, entitled to your feelings, but please don't start to act like the "Progressives" who mistake THEIR raw emotions for Absolute Immutable, Unchallengeable, Unquestionable Truth. The corollary to the typical Progressive Fanatic is utter intolerance of and disrespect for disagreement or deviation from THEIR ideas of right and wrong.
This kind of narrow mindedness and intransigence is EXACTLY what is KILLING our society today.
If you realized how peremptory, how insulting and how potentially dictatorial you sound, I'm sure you would reconsider the manner in which you allow yourself to respond to stimuli.
I am, as you must know, very fond of you, and have high regard for your manifest abilities and glorious ambitions on the domestic front, but I not appreciate you -- or anyone else -- coming here and suggesting that I must be out of my mind to harbor views that don't happen to set well with you at first glance.
A beloved, world renowned leader has just died at the age of 95. It's not only disrespectful to speak ill of the dead, but also in poor taste.
I, myself, would reserve such a tone only for the sudden demise of someone as thoroughly rotten as Her Heinous or George Soros, or myriad others who work night and day to make OUR lives poorer, more miserable and less free. Nelson Mandela never belonged in that category.
Mandela was a master statesman. He transcended mere politics, and achieved something as close to secular sainthood as one might hope to get.
"What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."
ReplyDelete~ Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
I hope the meaning of this famous quotation will not be lost on anyone as it applies to the context of the subject we've been considering today.
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ReplyDeleteI'm with Ben Gazi and Divine Theatre, I remember the day he was released from prison. The first words out of his mouth were to thank the communist party of South Africa.
ReplyDeleteToo bad Winny didn't Croak also.
Can we stop praizing this Commies death please?
Wondering how many children died when the USA dropped the Atomic Bomb on two Major Japanese cities in the name of freedom.
DeleteStudy Mandela with clarity and only purpose being to understand.
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ReplyDeleteMy Message:
ReplyDeleteHere is the real question you should ask:
What did Mandela do when the system was overturned and he sat on top of it all? Impose communism on South Africa? Kill all the white people?
No, he didn't. Despite earlier historical events we've discussed here, that too says much about his character.
GallistWarrior:
ReplyDeleteYou didn't offend anyone, but you are sorry.
Why don't you suck it and move on?
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ReplyDeleteIt's pretty simple, you have to consider the total package not just pick out what you want to believe or have been told to believe. Mandela had a lot to atone for .. and many died because of his terrorist activities. You can be pro-terrorist to your hearts content. You have your opinions, and I have mine.
ReplyDeleteNow whata ya say we go get some free stuff and go party!
Now let's all hold hands, get a few candles and sing Kumbaya!
@ "It's pretty simple, you have to consider the total package not just pick out what you want to believe or have been told to believe."
ReplyDeleteIndeed, we should take the totality of Mandela's action into account.
And you are free to be anti-liberty and pro-apartheid to your heart's content.
@ Gallistwarrior "So suck it up, stick it, or shove it, who cares? I don't "
ReplyDeleteObviously, you do, or you wouldn't have answered back
Found on The Wicked Witches Blog today.
ReplyDelete“Nelson Mandela a Terrorist?
If he can be labeled a "terrorist" because he fought injustice and tyranny, then all of our founding fathers were terrorists as well.”
Well really? Nelson Mandela the hero of the anti-apartheid was not the saint some people want him to be..maybe in his old age he became a kindly old man, but in most of his life he WAS a Communist and a terrorist, like it or not.
Does anyone even bother to research anymore or do these moronic Progressives just accept the praised heaped upon a person because the is Black, or because he was ALSO a COMMUNIST!
Nelson Mandela was the head of UmKhonto we Sizwe, the terrorist wing of the ANC and South African Communist Party. At his trial, he had pleaded guilty to 156 acts of public violence including mobilizing terrorist bombing campaigns, where he planted bombs in public places, including the Johannesburg railway station. There were many innocent people including women and children, who were killed by Nelson Mandela’s MK terrorist organization. One of the ANC’s biggest donors, was Muammar Gaddafi of Libya, another TERRORIST,
It just do happens that Nelson Mandela Was On The U.S. Terrorist Watch List Until 2008. Perhaps he was taken off that list when Barack Obama another Black Commie became the president ! Coincidence? Maybe?
Ghandi, Mother Theresa, Reagan, .....they did great things, NO, they were not saints. They were human. One nations terrorist is another nations freedom fighter. I would put Mandela on the terrorist list, period.
Funny how Liberals, /Progressives can say all kinds of politically incorrect things when it pleases them. The misconceptions about Mandela are vast, and typical of the left.
And by the way, He was jailed up for a good reason, don’t believe it? Just ask the families of people he murdered
I don't think anyone here denied he did violence or that he was a terrorist, so perhaps you should go scream at those blogs where people are denying those facts.
ReplyDeleteAs stated earlier, when Aparheid was overturned, Mandela was magnanimous in victory.
We can quibble over what constitutes terrorism, but he and his fellow communists were fighting a tyrannical regime. We all have a God-given right to fight for our God-given liberties.
@Andie --- The Founding Fathers fought military targets, not children and innocent civilians.
ReplyDeleteLet's just disagree.
----
Have you studied the virtual civil war in the south? Britain felt the southern royalists would keep the south under control.
Or maybe you got your history form that Mel Gibson film.
I am really shocked at the level of almost hatred for a man that kept South Africa from degenerating into massive bloodshed.
ReplyDeleteMaybe he should have just been silent like a good little pickaninny?
It was a great moment for the Republican party when they defied Reagan and his moll Thatcher to join the Dems instituting sanctions. Those were the days when we had a soul.
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ReplyDeleteThanks to those who made polite, reasoned responses.
ReplyDeleteWe live in an age madly in love with the unfettered expression of self-righteous rage, disapproval, insolence and contempt both thoughtless and calculated.
Anyone who makes an earnest attempt to avoid giving hair trigger reactions with raw, unfiltered, unthinking emotion is to be commended.
Divine Theater,
ReplyDeleteI tire of your caustic, hateful tone. We are all deserving of civility.
Am I the only one who sees the hilarity in you accusing Ducky of ad hominemen immediately after calling him a childish elderly man??
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteYou must hate the USA then, to be consistent. Think about the Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Think about Dresden.
DeleteAnd think about what Ducky said.
My sweet Grandpa was a die-hard Reagan republican and he despised Mandela. I was sad that he seemed incapable of recognizing the good Mandela had done, but focused only on the bad.
ReplyDeleteIt's an interesting theme: to do good sometimes necessitates going harm.
I can't say it any better than SF, jez, and yourself.
(Grrrrr....autocorrect!)
Have a good night, Andie.
ReplyDeleteFT, my 6:06 pm comment was addressed to you. :-)
ReplyDeleteAnd I regret engaging in the mud-slinging, even for a minute.
Life is too short to waste even a minute on futile activities.
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ReplyDeleteLet us consider Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, William Tecumseh Sherman, Woodrow Wilson, FDR and Harry Truman, among many others we could name. In light of much of the misguided reasoning and false equivalency used in a vain attempt to dishonor, discredit and condemn Nelson Mandela, every one of those prominent American leaders would qualify as terrorists, mass murderers and war criminals worthy of repudiation, condemnation and eternal vilification.
ReplyDeleteIf you don't know why, please study history.
Several years ago I wrote this satiric poem:
_______ HAPPILY ENSLAVED _______
_____ To Robert Mugabe, et al._____
When'er the Brits are driven away
Black tyrants often come to prey.
When White Men let their burden down
Savages will take the crown
Place it on their nappy heads
Throw themselves in with the Reds
Rule their folk with iron hand
Wreaking havoc o'er the land.
When blacks rule blacks, no one is free
Their nature turns to tyranny.
How much blood might have been saved
If they'd stayed happily enslaved!
~ FreeThinke
While that has been sadly true in most cases after British Colonial Rule ended, it was most emphatically NOT true in the case of Nelson Mandela, and that is why we laud him here today.
Naturally, the Red Diaper Babies, Parlor Pinks, Massachusetts Marxicrats and other Leftist Dodos among us will worship Mandela NOT because of his superior statesmanship and enlightened handling of Power once achieved, but simply because he WAS a COMMUNIST.
That deranged element still prefers to take its nourishment directly from Karl Marx's mummified posterior.
Fanatics of ANY stripe who FEEL their way through life, instead of taking time to THINK beyond the obvious, very often miss the deeper significance in events -- as we are permitted to see them.
There is always much to know beyond what may seem obvious.
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ReplyDeleteThoughtless formulaic commentary born of adamant prejudice that takes no notice of and makes not attempt to learn from the contributions others make is not welcome here.
ReplyDeleteOnce again, as Wal Whitman said:
"BE CURIOUS; NOT JUDGMENTAL."
ReplyDelete"We can never be sure that the opinion we wish to stifle is a false opinion; and if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still."
~ John Stuart Mill (1806-1873)
here is no wisdom whatsoever in absolutism.
ReplyDeleteJustice Holmes may have been a liberal, but I've always liked this quotation:
"If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought – not free thought for those that agree with us, but freedom for the thought that we hate."
~ Oliver Wendell Holmes (1841-1935)
I hasten to add that mindless spamming of BOILERPLATE does not qualify as "thought" at least at this blog.
"The Founding Fathers fought military targets, not children and innocent civilians."
ReplyDeleteYou need to dig a little deeper there, atrocities were committed on both sides in the American Revolution.
Kings Mountain, in which Patriots slaughtered American Loyalist forces after surrender.
Charles Lynch, who hanged suspected loyalist civilians in Bedford County Virginia.
As thge saying goes "He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."
"WAR IS HELL."
ReplyDeleteThere's nothing else that needs to be said.
If you are subjected to the whims of a tyrant and you don't rebel, and do your best to topple him from his high and mighty position, you will remain his SLAVE and his VICTIM forever, and so will your children and all future generations of your people who failed to stand up and fight for FREEDOM.
There is no NICE, TIDY, PRIMLY MORAL way to rid yourself of a menace.
Like it or not, we live in a KILL or BE KILLED world.
If you want to be so God-damned MORAL, by all means lay down, let yourself be trampled and DIE. You richly deserve your fate.
The world is not a cricket match, a friendly game of croquet, or a hand or two of bridge. Neither is it run by Roberts Rules of Order. Underneath the wafer-thin crust of Civilization we are all still savages.
From MANDELA's point of view his people were in the thrall of the moral equivalent of VlAD the IMPALER. If I had been cursed with such a fate, you may be sure I would gladly lie, cheat, steal, kill, torture, maim, rape and loot if THAT is what it would take to end the reign of VLAD.
Sorry, dear people, but there really ARE times when the ends do, INDEED, justify the means.
The same thing goes if called upon to defend my property or my person from attack. My first objective when beset by an attacker would be to do my best to KILL the God-damned son-of-a-bitch.
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ReplyDeleteDivine, Do you REALLY want to know, and would it change your position.
Delete" Please refrain from doing so.
ReplyDeleteIf you have something to add, perhaps you can do so without the [ad hominem]?"
Hey, that's all THEY have left!
Jen Nifer said...
ReplyDelete"My sweet Grandpa was a die-hard Reagan republican and he despised Mandela"
Your sweet Grandpa was a VERY SMART MAN AND SO WAS RONNIE REAGAN!
A perfect example of the sick minds that make comments in the PROGRESSIVE’S blogsphere:
ReplyDeleteAs a group, they want Nelson Mandela to be looked upon as a great man., a SO CALLED "Last pure hero." They revered as a saint, and a symbol of freedom.
NO! The SO CALLED hero of the anti-apartheid struggle was not the saint that they want him to be. Not in the least. The fact is that even Amnesty International refused to take on Nelson Mandela’s case because they asserted that he was no political prisoner but had committed numerous violent crimes and had had a fair trial and a reasonable sentence. He was a bloody terrorist! People forget so quickly. He was involved in premeditated bombings and murders. So what if he changed his mind when in prison and denounced his previous beliefs? Once a terrorist, always a terrorist. South Africans were desperate to have someone to worship and since this dude made headlines they clutched onto him. He figured, and quite rightly, that terrorist turned politician is the way to go (like those born again Christians in prison sham) simple as that. Then, he was just riding the gravy train enjoying life of luxury (legally this time) allowing others to write his speeches and do all the other stuff politicians do. Try to find out more about this asshole before glorifying him. - See more at: http://perezhilton.com/2013-12-05-nelson-mandela-dies-95/#sthash.7uCHvcrn.dpuf
Nelson Mandela was the head of UmKhonto we Sizwe, the terrorist wing of The African National Congress and South African Communist Party. At his trial, he had pleaded guilty to 156 acts of public violence including mobilizing terrorist bombing campaigns, which planted bombs in public places, including the Johannesburg railway station. Many innocent people, including women and children, were killed by Nelson Mandela’s MK terrorists.
And his former wife Winnie Mandela was a murderous whore! She was despicable.
For these people to worship this man is to be be pro-terrorist.
And these are the same people that call Ronald Reagan those disgusting names. Go figure.
I believe that Mandela actually "repented" his former terrorist ways. And for his later acts of redemption, I, personally, am willing to forgive him (but not to the extent of hiding his former acts through expressions of ideological purity). Overcoming his former convictions is what led to his "great"-ness.
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ReplyDelete...and yes, I am being highly "judgemental" in saying that I "forgive" him, not that he ever wronged "me", personally.
ReplyDeleteFJ said...
ReplyDelete"I believe that Mandela actually "repented" his former terrorist ways. And for his later acts of redemption, I, personally, am willing to forgive him"
With all due respect to you FJ, are you also willing to forgive Bill Ayers,George Metesky, the "Mad Bomber",who placed over 30 bombs in New York City, The IRA, Fatah (PLO), The members of the Black Liberation Army, Joanne Chesimard,Angela Davis,Shakur,Timothy McVeigh, or Terry Nichols, the Times Square bomber, Richard Reid the airplane sock bomber or any other of these Skumbags that committed Terrorist attacks and attempted attacks if they “Repented”?
Maybe you would, but I wouldn’t, and i wouldn’t forgive a Nelson Mandela or a Osama bin Laden either!
...and I do NOT forgive the others, for they NEVER demonstrated "repentance", as Mandela DID.
ReplyDelete...and yes, if Bill Ayers and his wife were to stand up tomorrow and repent their formers ways, and QUIT trying to indoctrinate the children of Chicago and students at Northwestern in the merits of radical (vice peaceful) "activism", I would forgive them. But I see no evidence of it.
ReplyDeleteBill Ayers has all his father's vast resources at his disposal. Let him put it to better use.
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ReplyDelete...and when he finally attained political power, did he take vengeance upon all his former enemies, divest them of their property, and/or banish them?
ReplyDeleteNo, he attempted to reconcile with them, and instill a system of equal justice before the law.
Mandela's former acts of violence did NOT make him great. What made him great was that when placed in a position of power when he could have done REAL and LASTING damage, he renounced his former "vengeful" ways and initiated a program of reconciliation with his former "masters".
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteYes, he was a repentant former-terrorist, who prevented the deaths and anguish of many whites, had he not held a sincere belief in universal "justice" (as opposed to "social justice" for his own "tribe").
ReplyDeleteMandela had a lot to “repent” for .. and many innocent people died because of his terrorist activities man, women and children alike..
ReplyDeleteWe cannot promote conservative principles by embracing Marxist heroes.
...but we can leave the lenses of conservative ideology off and acknowledge certain more "universal" and less "partisan", principles.
ReplyDeleteFor "conservative" principals ARE different from those who espouse universal humanism.
Apparently there can be no redemption for prior bad acts, no matter how sincere, for some in this thread. I wonder we would all stand with Christ if he held us to that standard.
ReplyDeleteNelson Mandela was a terrorist... it was a past and lifestyle he renounced and worked the remainder of his life to change. When presented with his moment to continue his decision, as many have noted here, was not more death and destruction, but life.
As Free has pointed out, war is hell. Whether people choose to believe it or not, our soldiers have contributed some horrible atrocities over the years in the name of freedom. They have killed women, children and ripped infants from wombs. We're they terrorists? You tell me?
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DeleteIn other words, ideologies "conceal" certain facts/truths. So long as we don't "conceal" Mandela's shortcomings, we've nothing to fear from promoting Mandela.
ReplyDeleteIt's when a hagiography of Mandela gets broadcast that leaves out any mention of Mandela's former terrorist activities, that we should object... but perhaps at the precise moment of his death, we can temporarily suspend that rule out of respect for the "good" he did accomplish.
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ReplyDeleteI believe it, too. He WAS a terrorist. A sharky one! And once the funeral's over, I'll go back to pointing out that "Mackies" back in town!
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteYou're right FJ - time for some perspective:- tell that to the 100's of families who lost their loved ones.
I will, once they bury the man. I'm sure that no one praised Mandela at their funerals.
ReplyDeleteEcclesiastes 3
Anyone notice that Radical Redneck in his list of terrorists fails to list the pinnacle of southern manhood responsible for turning Birmingham into "Bombingham".
ReplyDeleteIdeologies conceal, ducky. But please, don't try and tell me that the Left doesn't "conceal".
ReplyDeleteLike how Barrack Obama's chief political sponsor and his wife are BOTH terrorists.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeletethink about the rape of Nanking... and Auswitz... not just Hiroshima and dresden.
ReplyDeletethere are two sides to a scale of balance.
ReplyDeleteits okay to be judgemental of THAT result.
ReplyDeleteDucky... My Lai... Sand Creek... actions of true patriots I assume...
ReplyDeleteA question for the naysayers...
If a government, or military kills innocents in the case of it's actions, is that terrorism, or is that justified?
Is there ever justification for a person to kill another person when they are fighting against an unjust government, or system?
Is there ever justification for a person to kill another person when they are fighting against an unjust government, or system.
ReplyDeleteEvery "system" has a seamy and/or uncanny under-side. For those who defended Communism, it was the gulag. For those who defend Democracy, there was racism/ tribalism (or today's "reverse racism" of affirmative action).
Now I'm not ready to kill anybody over affirmative action, yet. But if my future is one day completely eclipsed because of it and I see no prospect for my being able to advance myself in the future, you can BET that I will kill someone. Socialists, take note.
Either your system "works" for ALL its' citizens sans "scapegoats", or it's "ripe" for a justified revolution.
ReplyDeleteAnd killing "innocents" is only justifiable if your own innocents are similarly taking losses. Killing those directly responsible, (ie government officials directly responsible for repression) is, hjowever, perfectly acceptable, in my limited view.
The most revealing insight into the character of Nelson Mandela that I've seen in the blanket coverage from the media of the world doesn't erect a cardboard cut-out of the man and fill a page with common perceptions that all genuflect before, but show rather than tell something of a personal perception about Mr. Mandela. This is from a former journalist whose experience with him dates to before his imprisonment.
ReplyDelete"Possibly because he was only able to spend quality time with his own children when they were adults, Mandela was obsessed with children. If they were present, he would focus on them, not the adults. He told tween Jess Heard that she would live to realize her dream of taking the stage, and she has. He assured young Tyler Pike he would overcome a birth defect to his arm to become a cartoonist, and he has. Then we all joined in singing Happy Christmas."
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2013/12/05/raymond-heard-farewell-madiba/
That's not the only reference to his attention to young people that I've seen. But this seems to indicate something like a common touch and a genuine interest in those young people to advance to a better life. That could be an indication that he's reformed his evil ways. Does it mean that those slugs hanging onto his coat tails as he's buried (the likes of Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and other assorted "progressive" slugs worshiping him with a clenched fist salute belong in an adoring throng of the so-called common people?) There's something wrong with that last picture and the one painted by most of the MSM.
_________ THIS BEARS REPETITION __________
ReplyDeleteLet us consider Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, William Tecumseh Sherman, Woodrow Wilson, FDR and Harry Truman, among many others we could name.
In light of much of the misguided reasoning and false equivalency used in a vain attempt to dishonor, discredit and condemn Nelson Mandela, every one of those prominent American leaders would qualify as terrorists, mass murderers and war criminals worthy of repudiation, condemnation and eternal vilification.
If you don't know why, please study history.
Several years ago I wrote this satiric poem:
________ HAPPILY ENSLAVED _________
_______ To Robert Mugabe, et al._______
When'er the Brits are driven away
Black tyrants often come to prey.
When White Men let their burden down
Savages will take the crown
Place it on their nappy heads
Throw themselves in with the Reds
Rule their folk with iron hand
Wreaking havoc o'er the land.
When blacks rule blacks, no one is free
Their nature turns to tyranny.
How much blood might have been saved
If they'd stayed happily enslaved!
~ FreeThinke
While that very sadly has been true in most cases after British Colonial Rule ended, it was most emphatically NOT true in the case of Nelson Mandela, and that is why we laud him here today.
Naturally, the Red Diaper Babies, Parlor Pinks, Massachusetts Marxicrats and other Leftist Dodos among us will worship Mandela NOT because of his superior statesmanship and enlightened handling of Power once achieved, but simply because he WAS a COMMUNIST.
That deranged element still prefers to take its nourishment directly from Karl Marx's mummified posterior.
Fanatics of ANY stripe who FEEL their way through life, instead of taking time to THINK beyond the obvious, very often miss the deeper significance in events -- as we are permitted to see them.
There is always much to know beyond what may seem obvious.
I doubt that it's simply "because the Brits were driven away" that the Dark Continent has sunken deeper into an enslavement quagmire. The Brits most responsible were the likes of Cecil Rhodes. He has bequeathed to the world a band of Rhodesians (the Rhodes scholars and Bill Clinton is a good example today)a rapacious band of greed driven swine out to rule the world through a central government whilst driving the greater part of the population to extinction or outright slavery to the rule of the committee of the elect.
ReplyDeleteThe apparatus of this all encompassing enslavement has been built piece by piece over the better part of the past century. I think it should be apparent that we are almost at the arrival at the terminal "of their hearts desire".
"How many children did they blow up?"
ReplyDeleteCome now, you're being disingenuous.
I could be obnoxious and retort by asking you "white, black, or native?" Or point you towards Colonial atrocities against the French, or Puritan atrocities against the Accadians, but the point is, you're lying to yourself if you think atrocities did not occur or were one sided.
The question is why?
Good question Finn and a good point Free...
ReplyDeleteI'd like to hear a well reasoned response...
From what Divine Theater has herself said on other blogs, she suffered greatly during her childhood. It looks like she is haunted by the evils that she experienced, and projects her (justified) hatred onto anyone who hurts children. Although understandable, this projection is in active denial of much of history, and I can't imagine that fostering such an active, bitter resentment in her heart is good for her physical or spiritual health.
ReplyDeleteJust a guess......
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ReplyDeleteNelson Mandela Quotes You Probably Won’t See In The U.S. Media:
ReplyDelete“If there is a country that has committed unspeakable atrocities in the world, it is the United States of America. They don’t care for human beings.”
“All that (Mr. Bush) wants is Iraqi oil.”
“From its earliest days, the Cuban Revolution has also been a source of
inspiration to all freedom-loving people. We admire the sacrifices of the Cuban people in maintaining their independence and sovereignty in the face of the vicious imperialist-orquestrated campaign to destroy the impressive gain made in the Cuban Revolution. … Long live the Cuban Revolution. Long live comrade Fidel Castro.”
“It is our duty to give support to our brother Moammar Gadhafi, our longtime supporter: … especially in regards to the sanctions which are not hitting just him, they are hitting the ordinary masses of the people … our African brothers and sisters.”
“If you look at those matters, you will come to the conclusion that the attitude of the United States of America is a threat to world peace.”
“we know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.”
Think about those, when you think about defending this Terrorist!
Don't believe them? Google them.
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ReplyDeleteBeatrice Fowler said
ReplyDeleteIt's always very sad to see a person ... or groups of people ... who are incapable of seeing or listening to anything outside the dinning contents of their own tiny minds.
Nothing is more dangerous than the little man or woman who knows he or she is right no matter what others think, or what evidence comes to light that indicates otherwise.
Such a person sets a perfect example of bigotry at its worst.
"A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small package."
______________ CONSIDER THIS ______________
ReplyDeleteABRAHAM LINCOLN:
SIX-HUNDRED-THIRTY-FIVE-THOUSAND DEAD
Countless hundreds of thousands MAIMED
Countless hundreds of thousands WOUNDED
Countless hundreds of thousands made ILL
Countless hundreds of thousands driven INSANE
Countless hundreds of thousands WIDOWED
Countless hundreds of thousands ORPHANED
Countless hundreds of thousands IMPOVERISHED
Countless MILLIONS of DOLLARS worth of PROPERTY DESTROYED.
I'd advise each and every one to THINK a little -- and consider carefully what OTHERS have said -- before delivering a hair-trigger response next time.
I apologized if my observation hurt you. I also said that I hope you will find healing for your trauma. I was being totally sincere. I said that I was anonymous because your vitriol is hurtful.
ReplyDeleteI was right.
Please don't direct anymore comments at me, or about me. And do not mention my children again.
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ReplyDeleteThank you for the deletions, FT.
ReplyDeleteEye-opening, and sad.
Jen, I do my best to discourage personal feuds and antagonistic remarks. I believe we are all entitled to our feelings and opinions, but not to express them inisistently and repeatedly in ways that disrupt the primary purpose of the discussion.
ReplyDeleteIt's discouraging, because even though I have made my views abundantly clear, most disregard them when their feelings are running high. The atmosphere then becomes toxic, and having a serious discussion becomes more and more difficult as discourse degenerates into little more than a repetitious exchange of preconceived notions and bigoted opinions that take no differing perspective or new information into consideration.
There is enough pain, injustice, anger and contempt in the world. I don't believe we have any inherent right to add to it.
I'm sorry if I did wrong in making this post. I thought it a courteous, thoughtful, appropriate gesture. It seemed completely uncontroversial to me. It never occurred to me that it might start a conflagration.
"LIFE IS A MINEFIELD"
One just never knows what could happen no matter where you step.
There is enough pain, injustice, anger and contempt in the world. I don't believe we have any inherent right to add to it.
ReplyDelete----
I agree. I probably added to it today. :(
As for the post, you have inspired me to do more research. So, thank you. :-)
The older I get, the more interested I become in history. I have a LOT of reading to do!
FreeThinke said...
ReplyDeleteJen, I do my best to discourage personal feuds and antagonistic remarks.
Zisek on Mandela.
ReplyDeleteGingrich on Mandela:
ReplyDeletehttp://rationalnationusa.blogspot.com/2013/12/what-would-you-have-done-newt-gingrich.html