WINNING AND LOSING

I watched a documentary on the Ku Klux Klan the other night. Over the years I have watched many documentaries on the Klan and they all have one thing in common. They never highlight the role of the Democrat party in the Klan. The history of its original formation in Pulaski Tennessee is portrayed accurately and how it was meant to be a social club similar to a college Greek fraternity where young men met to drink, entertaining themselves by pulling pranks on the local community. Dressing up in Halloween like costumes and scaring people. Nashville's role in the Klan is never mentioned, however. It was where the hierarchy of the Klan was organized and it's main mission as a terrorist arm of the Democrat party was defined. It's goal was to keep the Republican party out of the Democrat South by any means necessary. Their bottom line was to keep the South Democrat and white. A one party region. Sound familiar? Nathan Bedford Forrest was picked as the Grand Wizard of the Klan in Nashville. It is not clear whether Forrest was chosen in absentia or if he was actually present. Forrest always claimed that he was not there.

The problem with this kind of history is that it is very misleading. By excluding the Democrat party's role in the Klan's formation people tend to look at the Civil War and Reconstruction as a North vs. South conflict rather than a Democrat vs Republican conflict. I know because this is the way that I saw it for years. Until my eyes were opened I didn't understand American history as well as I thought I did. By making it a North South conflict the Democrat party has been able to deceive the majority of the American people. They deflect blame from themselves to a particular region of the country. They can then make up myths such as the "Lost Cause" myth and the "Big Switch" myth. The Big Switch meaning that the Republican party became the oppressor of the black man and the Democrats became the protector of the black man during the 1960's. They have been very successful promoting these myths. Conservatives and the Republican party have had some success in recent years because of podcasts and other means changing minds but it has been an uphill battle. By making racism a regional thing we overlook the racism of the whole country. Malcolm X once said that "we should quit picking on the South because when you cross the Canadian border you are in the South". He also warned us about "white liberals". This national racism was perpetrated by the Northern and Southern wings of the Democrat party. Malcolm X was a victim of racism his entire life and he never lived in the South.

We need to see the American Civil War and Reconstruction as two separate conflicts. The Civil War was a hot war and Reconstruction was a cold war. The Republicans won the hot war but lost the cold war. The Republicans won the Civil War with the surrenders of Robert E. Lee and Joseph Johnston in 1865. They lost Reconstruction with the Compromise of 1877 after the election of Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876. By winning the Civil War the Republicans saved the Union and ended slavery. By winning Reconstruction the Democrats nullified the Republican passed 14th Amendment and 15th Amendments to the Constitution for almost the next 100 years. They were able to segregate the blacks depriving them of their civil and voting rights until the Republicans were able to restore them in the 1950's and 60's. Although living conditions were generally better for blacks outside of the South after the Civil War there was segregation nationwide and it was generally because of Northern Democrats. Things haven't changed much in the last 200 years. Donald Trump is fighting to protect black people in Washington DC and big cities like Chicago. As always Democrats stand in the way. The moral of this story is that the Democrat party has been a curse on this land from its very beginning and that is not a myth.