Trump's VA secretary praised Jefferson Davis and the Confederate cause in speech - Polidicks

https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/07/politics/va-secretary-confederate-president/index.html (CNN) Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert Wilkie praised Confederate States President Jefferson Davis effusively in a 1995 speech, calling him a "martyr to 'The Lost Cause'" and an "exceptional man in an exceptional age." Wilkie, who delivered the speech in front of a statue of Davis at the US Capitol during an event sponsored by the United Daughters of Confederacy, also said that while he was "no apologist for the South," viewing Confederate "history and the ferocity of the Confederate soldier solely through the lens of slavery and by the slovenly standards of the present is dishonest and a disservice to our ancestors." "Today marks the 187th anniversary of the birth of Jefferson Davis; planter, soldier, statesman, President of the Confederate States of America, martyr to 'The Lost Cause,' and finally the gray-clad phoenix ---- an exceptional man in an exceptional age," Wilkie, who at the time was a staffer for Republican then-Rep. David Funderburk, said in the 1995 speech, according to the transcript. Professor David Blight, a Civil War historian at Yale, told CNN in an interview that Wilkie's comments were "right from the neo-Confederate playbook." "That is standard Lost Cause ideology circa 1890 to 1910," he said. "This man, that language right there, is the standard defense of the Lost Cause built over the period of decades as an ideology explaining confederate defeat, but also as a racial ideology." Wilkie began his career as an aide to Sen. Jesse Helms, the North Carolina Republican known for criticizing Martin Luther King Jr. and opposing a holiday in his honor. Wilkie later worked for Sen. Trent Lott from Mississippi, who resigned as Republican Leader in 2002 after praising Strom Thurmond's 1948 segregationist presidential campaign. He mislead senators on his past speeches at his confirmation hearings.

Here's a fun little snippet from the ol' Wikipedia. Wilkie also spoke about Robert E. Leeto the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) at a pro-Confederate event in 2009. He also called abolitionists who opposed slavery "radical", "mendacious", and "enemies of liberty", and stated that the Confederate "cause was honorable,"[14] while also condemning slavery as "a stain on our story as it is a stain on every civilization in history". Seems like a real fine individual.

Neo-Confederates are disgusting.

Nothing says liberty like slavery.

Is this the guy who hanged a painting of a Confederate general turned KKK member.

No Borealis, no! You have to respect neo-Confederates and their right to practice free speech! After all, they're simply longing to go back to the 1850s when their forefathers committed treason and declared war on their fellow countrymen resulting in a million American casualties, tens of thousands of dead civilians, mass outbreaks of disease, millions of dollars of destroyed property resulting in mass starvation and poverty throughout the Southern United States whose impact is arguably still noticeable to this day, and a resulting animosity between the north and south. Is that really so bad?

If anything, the Civil War should be a reminder that, no matter how organized you try to make yourselves, you WILL get your ass handed to you if you try to fight against a "tyrannical" government.

I thought for a sec this was about Jeff Davis from "Whose Line is it Anyway".

Jefferson davis was a traitor who should've been hanged

Hey wanna see how much America cares for its vets? Here you go. Our VA secretary praises fucking traitors.

He loves veterans so much he even loves the traitorous ones, what a guy. :'^)

One Sherman wasn't enough.

Worst President ever Andrew Johnson

I have to wonder what Lincoln would do if he could hear modern members of his party say this.

LMAO the Confederates lost, what a pathetic side to pick, you pretty much lose by default

How little of worth in your life do you need to sift through the dumpster of our history to pick the tiniest grains of pride from one of our most shameful chapters.

Lincoln might not have punished the former Confederates either, he wasn't a Radical Republican really.

thaddeus stevens and john brown were fucking heroes