The Readers' Forum: Monday letters
Credit: THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
By: | Winston-Salem Journal
Published: March 05, 2012
Published: March 05, 2012
Misleading points
Cal Thomas makes technically accurate but misleading historical points in his Feb. 24 column, "Black (liberal) history month."
Thomas writes that it was Republicans who supported the constitutional amendments that "ended slavery, provided for equal protection under the law and gave voting rights to blacks," and that a Republican president, former Union General Ulysses S. Grant, signed the Civil Rights Act of 1875. He also says that the "Klu Klux Klan was founded by a group of Southern Democrats; white Democratic politicians in the South tried to derail civil-rights legislation; (and) white Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace stood in a schoolhouse door to keep African-American students out."
Also this is true (though President Kennedy, also a Democrat, ran over Wallace in that schoolhouse door at the University of Alabama in 1963).
What Thomas does not say is that those Republicans were the liberals of their day, and the Democrats were the conservatives. Southern Democrats, or conservatives, implemented and enforced segregation laws, opposed 1960s Civil Rights laws, and were consistently hostile to the interests of minorities.
Conservatives are getting better, though. The election of two black Republican congressmen from the South is proof. And for all his many faults, President George W. Bush had a good heart on matters of race and consistently reached out to and promoted minorities.
If the rest of the Republican Party will follow his path, the country will be better off. And we can look forward to the day that we elect a black Republican president.
CHRIS GEIS
Winston-Salem
Israel and Palestine
On Feb. 23 you ran a column by Jeffrey Goldberg (Bloomberg News) titled "With these enemies, Israel needs more friends." Goldberg makes an extensive tally of atrocities by Israel's enemies (which are undeniable) but he glosses over Israel's atrocities toward the Palestinians with the simple summation that Israel has "behaved in counterproductive and sometimes brutal ways." The gist of his argument is that Israel should be excused for its violations of international law — settling occupied territories — and its atrocities toward the Palestinian people (which if anyone bothers to look are myriad) in the spirit of moral relativism.
Sorry, but this is all a mass of rationalizations. As my daddy used to tell me, two wrongs don't make a right. Goldberg is unashamedly trying to paint Israel's malfeasance as noble in contrast to its enemies, trying to make them our enemies.
Give it up; Abraham's children need to get along. Get back to the bargaining table and seek peace. Quit trying to justify doing to the Palestinians what the white man did to American Indians; "Manifest Destiny" was just a convenient mass of rationalizations, too.
MARK ALDEN GRAMM
Tobaccoville
It's complicated
The well-written editorial "Blame the speculators" from The Charlotte Observer (Feb. 28) blames much of the rising gasoline cost on Wall Street. It also mentions that a president has little control over the price increases, but leaves out one important factor that could be controlled by state and national governments.
In 1985 there were two blends of gasoline, regular and high test, with three octane levels for each. There was also one blend of diesel fuel. Today there are at least 18 mandated blends and three octane levels along with three diesel blends for a total of 57 different blends of gasoline. States and the feds have mandated different blends using different components at differing levels that experts estimate add somewhere from $1 to $2 a gallon to the price.
North Carolina gas cannot be sold in California and California gas cannot be sold in Oregon. Refineries have to "reboot" when they change from one state-approved blend to another and this adds cost. To further complicate things, imagine a Category 4 storm like Hurricane Katrina forcing a Louisiana refinery to close. Say that refinery produces North Carolina gas. Now that production has to be moved to a Texas refinery and it "reboots" as necessary. Let's also say that ethanol now has to be trucked to Texas instead of Louisiana and costs rise even further.
This can and should be controlled if there existed some legislators willing to fight for a common sense solution. Let's not blame everything on Wall Street.
TOM D. JONES
Winston-Salem
It's complicated. Yes it is and you have added another piece very well. It's funny, those "speculators" always show up right on que when it comes to gas prices. They appear like locusts or the hoards of Hari Krishnas and over run the markets, airport terminals, college campii, and bus stations. In addition, it is amazing that a letter about our economy found its way onto the Journal forum. Maybe as November approaches, a few more letters like this will appear.
ReplyDeleteGood afternoon folks!
ReplyDeleteLTE 1: Good points. It's not about the party, it's about the ideology. If Wallace had been the D POTUS winning candidate in 1960 instead of Kennedy, who knows, the ideologies of the parties may very well be reversed today. I've always found it fascinating that LBJ, a wealthy TX southerner, signed off on the Civil Rights Act of '64 knowing that he was signing the south over to the R's.
LTE 2: The Israeli govt has indeed not been innocent bystanders either. I do believe there is room for both Israel and Palestine to coexist if the TB's on both sides will allow it to happen. Unfortunately, the TB's on both sides make the most noise which means the conflict will continue.
LTE 3: Another LTE with very good points. Yes, the various blends could be condensed which would lower the price. My guess is that Mr. Jones has never lived out west where fumes from car exhausts hang visibly in the air the entire summer. A few times, I thought I needed an oxygen mask when I went outside in the valley right before monsoon season arrived to move out the exhaust cloud. More refineries would also make a difference, but there are many along the Gulf Coast who are opposed which means we most likely have to live with what we've got.
Funny how Dotnet makes the assumption that the Republicans are racists like Democrat George Wallace was. Then he makes another leap by 'assuming' that southerners, in general, are so racist that they would never have supported the Civil Rights Act. Just goes to show you there's all kinds of bigots in this world.
DeleteLBJ not only signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, he worked diligently and did a lot of arm twisting beforehand to ensure that the racists in Congress did not water it down before passage. Even so, he had to support a second bill, the Voting Rights Act, and others, to repair the damage done by southern racists to the first bill.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, he knew that the white racist southerners would switch to another party. When asked later by a friend why he did it, he simply said "Because it was the right thing to do."
As to George Wallace being a Democrat, that is laughable. As soon as he and his racist ilk such as Jesse Helms, Strom Thurmond and Ross Barnett saw that the tide was turning against the old stupid bigots, they all became Republicans overnight.
But first, Georgie Porgie ran for President in 1968 as a third party candidate...the American Independent Party, abbreviated KKK. I remember it well, because I was in the Caribbean in October that year and every third person asked me if Wallace could win, which could not be good news for them. I just laughed and told them that there was a much worse menace in the race. Turned out I was right about that.