Posted on 08/04/2006 12:59:47 PM PDT by churchillbuff
Variety reviewer Robert Koehler (formerly of the L.A. Times) recently reviewed a new documentary titled "Mr. Conservative: Goldwater on Goldwater." The main driver behind the project is his granddaughter, C.C. Goldwater, and it's scheduled to air on HBO on September 18. The list of interviewees underlines it's not a big right-wing project: it includes Walter Cronkite, Ted Kennedy, Al Franken, Helen Thomas, James Carville, Bob Schieffer, Andy Rooney, Julian Bond, Ben Bradlee and Sally Quinn, John Dean, and erstwhile Goldwater Girl Hillary Rodham Clinton. A few righties appear (Richard Viguerie, George Will) and some more centrist GOP types do, too (John Warner, Sandra Day O'Connor).
Here's how Koehler sums the film up: "Pic reflects on a contempo religious GOP right wing that would have profoundly alienated Goldwater, who rarely brought God into his politics."
Koehler extolled the film for showing "some of the contradictions of Goldwater, who opposed expansion of civil rights for African-Americans in the '60s and -- as various family anecdotes illustrate -- was tolerant toward gays and lesbians as well as female reproductive rights. (Daughter Joanne tells of her abortion as a young woman, and gay grandson Ty speaks warmly of him.)"
At first, Koehler seems unhappy there's not enough angst toward the religious right: "Even with an impressive roster of journos and political sharpies (including Hillary Clinton, who was a Goldwater Girl in '64 and a devout conservative in her teens), little is made of libertarian Goldwater's differences with the right-wing Christian movement that swept into the GOP in the 1980s. John Dean, whose new book, 'Conservatives Without Conscience,' began as a collaboration with longtime friend Goldwater, articulates best how Goldwater's straight-talking politics was rejected by his Bush-era party."
But he later concludes: "Response to the pic from GOP pundits and opinionmakers will provide a telling indicator of the current political climate. Walter Cronkite overstates the case that the older Goldwater turned liberal, while George Will is more on point, noting that what changed wasn't Goldwater but the GOP's extreme shift toward moralistic conservatism."
It will be interesting to hear if that's exactly how it sounds out of the mouth of Will.
Thomas Jefferson was sympathetic to the Jacobin Revolution in France and was supported by Jacobinical types in his political career. Ironically, it was the "secular northeast" that was terrified of Jacobinism while the cavalier South tended to be friendly, if only because it preferred Continental Europe to capitalist-mercantilist Britain.
Of course, Madison and Monroe were pro-French too.
Uh , what MrSmorch said.
I can repeat what I said earlier:
Maybe it just means that though I strongly supported his run for President and read his book . . .
given all I've heard and seen in AZ over the years about him and his family etc.
I wouldn't exactly list him as my most trustworthy friends. I also doubt he was the kind of conservative I'd have a lot of faith in. I think he was too compromised by too many big people . . . not all of them all that kosher in a list of ways.
Just my opinion.
Odd how the MSM never does the same with dems... Would there ever be a program with a young Kennedy trashing JFK or a young Kennedy being used against organized labor... NEVER. It would never happen.
The MSM's hatred of conservatives is beyond transparent... and it's sick.
And the MSM can always some nobody who wants face time on TV -- someone who can't get on any other way.
I'm sure if Goldwater had relatives who were conservative and weren't willing to trash other conservatives they wouldn't be on the show.
Yeah, no bias there.
The MSM never does the same kind of stroy with dems. Would there ever be a program with a young Kennedy trashing JFK or a young Kennedy being used against organized labor? or black poverty pimps? Nah, that wouldn't happen.
It might make dems look bad. And the unbiased MSM doesn't do that... NEVER. EVER.
Seems the MSM's hatred of conservatives is beyond transparent ... and getting sicker... We'll get to hear how progressive and open minded Goldwater was - and his one or two positive comments about gays... But his life work being a conservative? It'll get short shrift...
Liberals are soooo predictable.
Burr was a typical Jeffersonian Democrat corrupt and concerned only with self-advancement helping to form the Axis of Evil between the Southern slavers and Big City bosses which almost destroyed the Union and still plagues us today. His pique at Hamilton thwarting his career produced the killing. He would have been president but for the great man.
Like most crooks Jefferson and Burr fell out when a Constitutional anomaly produced a tie for the Presidency in 1800. Jefferson was upset that Burr would not concede that the voters' intention had been to elect Jefferson and after Hamilton (typically putting the Union above personal or party advantage) ensured his presidency turned on Burr with a fury and destroyed what was left of him after his killing of Hamilton had turned the public upon him.
It was beautiful to watch those vipers go after each other while the greatest patriot of that generation after Washington lay in the grave.
Hamilton was the man most responsible for the growth of capitalism in America rather than the Jeffersonian economic system. The latter would have condemned the US to dependence on European manufactures and cultural backwardness. His statecraft in establishing a strong foundation for the modern economy is rarely equalled in history. It assures his eternal fame and regard among those who have studied these issues further than the superficial hatred the Left has generated against him.
Hamilton's legal ideas triumphed over Jefferson's at every point culminating in the Marshall Court's iron intrepretation of the Constitution Hamilton had helped as much as ANY man to create. Hamilton's argument for the constitutionality of National Banks compared to Jefferson's against was like a man toying with a boy's argument for more candy. Jefferson's superficial and absurd argument was easily ripped to shreds and showed either a lack of understanding of the Constitution or an opportunistic venality in using arguments he could not have believed valid. I give him too much credit for intelligence to believe it was the first.
General Hamilton was, as Jefferson had to concede, "A Colossus", "A Host Within Himself". A True Lover of Liberty who fought from the earliest beginnings of the Revolution for independence. A patriot who influenced public opinion as much as any American from 1775 until his death Hamilton had no equal in the legal, financial or geo-political realms.
Jefferson's early rhetorical contributions were not matched by his later career of power. At the end of his life Washington (Hamilton's closest ally) had had so much of Jefferson's perfidy and treachery that he would not allow the name be mentioned in his presence. Washington's 20+ yr regard for Hamilton stood as high as ever and no man was ever closer to or more loved by the President than the great Alexander, the Son he never had.
No he was not. Franklin was older than Hamilton's father.
Some of Jefferson's ravings about the French Revolution are worthy of Moveon.org and Michael MOOer.
He also worked as hard as he could to keep America militarily weak. Hence, Washington was burned by 5,000 British troops in the War of 1812 brought on, in part, by the military shortsightedness of the Jeffersonians. Very Democratic.
Yep. You must read a thorough biography of Franklin, if you have not already. The most amazing man to grace America with his presence.
In fariness, Jefferson re-evaluated his support for the French Revolution as it continued to go sideways.
Watch how the Rats have turned on their VP nominee from 2000.
A re-writing of history has been going on concerning Barry Goldwater. The idea is that America was a socially liberal, "tolerant" place until the Religious Right arose back around 1980 or so. Up until that time, even conservatives were "tolerant" of homosexuality, abortion, pornography, secularism, etc.
In fact, Goldwater did not adopt the pro-abortion, pro-homosexual, anti-religious right agenda until the last few years of his life. In his old age, he married a leftist woman who was a Planned Parenthood activist. Until then, he had a 100% pro-life voting record, never once mentioned supporting gay "rights" or anything of that kind, voted for school prayer (and, yes, he did support an amendment to the Constitution), and never had a bad thing to say about conservative Christians.
Psychologically, I can't explain Goldwater's change of heart. Maybe he was growing senile. Maybe he liked the attention of a younger woman and changed his outlook to please her. Who knows? But once he changed, the media, which had hated him his entire career, began lauding him as the voice of "true conservatism", by which they meant social liberalism. Since that time, efforts have been made to apply Goldwater's late-in-life conversion retroactively. It's being implied that Goldwater was a Christian-bashing supporter of abortion and gay "rights" from the beginning of his career, and that "true conservatism" embraces those things. Why, up until the rise of the Religious Right circa 1980, everyone universally accepted the idea that Christians should sit down and shut up, that abortion should be available on demand, that gays should have special laws protecting them and should be allowed to "marry", that prayers at graduations are unthinkable, and so on. Of course, such assertions are nonsense.
Goldwater may indeed have procured an illegal abortion for a family member in the 1950s. It's not something to be proud of, for sure. But it didn't affect his later politics. He appears to have regarded the incident as a tragic mistake, because he certainly didn't vote pro-abortion until the late 1980s. Nor did he ever say anything positive about legal abortion. In his 1980 re-election campaign for the Senate, he used his pro-life stance successfully against a well-financed Democrat opponent. Was he being hypocritical? Perhaps. We can never really know. But the so-called "Goldwater conservatism" trumpeted by the liberal media (and often here at FR by libertarians) didn't exist until very late in Goldwater's life. Nothing in his voting, speech, or campaign record until then would have been any different from what Jerry Falwell would have delivered.
2. Jefferson was by far the better man than and also had the interests of all Americans at heart not just the interests of New York commercial manipulators.
3. Burr's marksmanship on the field of honor was a wonderful service to the U.S. whatever his motivations.
4. I'll take Boss Tweed over Averill Harriman anytime. Andrew Jackson over John Quincy Adams. Stephen Douglas (or Bell or Breckenridge or Seward most of all) over Lincoln. Grover Cleveland over Blaine. Chief Justice Tawney over Chief Justice Marshall, the Dred Scott decision notwithstanding. Charles Manson did less damage than Marshall. Jesse James over General Sherman or Kenny Lay or other neo-Federalist criminals.
5. Whose brainstorm was it to federally tax frontier whiskey production rather than New York shipping and to back it up with a federal army suppressing the frontier small business folks?
6. Stalin and Hitler might also be described as "Colossus" but you will forgive me for not wanting them running our country.
7. Burr was also Jonathan Edwards's grandson.
8. It was beautiful that Hamilton was in his grave. You cannot seriously mean that his commercial obsessions amounted to great patriotism, though.
9. Nicholas Biddle's National Bank was a slush fund for corrupt interests to manipulate events, investments and elections. Fortunately it was squashed by Andrew Jackson after a lengthy war against it on behalf of America.
10. As to Chief Justice John Marshall and his remarkable discovery of the non-existent SCOTUS power to overturn legislation as "unconstitutional", it is a great misfortune that Burr did not get an opportunity to apply his marksmanship on the field of honor to miscreant Marshall before Marshall had a chance to do such damage. As Chief Justice, he was the very embodiment of the idea of the dead hand of the discredited Federalist past until he finally croaked. It was not for nothing that the Federalists were extinguished or the Whigs after them. Each of those parties richly deserved extermination and got it.
11. If you dislike "slavers," is it not inconsistent to favor centralized power slavers like Hamilton????
12. I note that the public did not so sympathize with Hamilton as to restore Federalists to even public notice much less power. Consider that the Hartford Convention (motivated by a treasonous desire to restore commerce with England while the US was at war with England) was merely the last gasp of the Federalistas infuriated that their game was up.
Meanwhile, the rump Federalists of New England were holding the Hartford Convention to discuss secession over that most noble of human motives: their commerce with England had been interrupted by the politics of (sniff!) border ruffians. That is a remarkable attempt of yours to turn the tables. As to the military, Jackson was a Jeffersonian Democrat who sure kicked Brit patoot at the Battle of New Orleans (oh, they ran through the briars and they ran through the brambles and they ran into places where a gator wouldn't go), ventilated Brit General Packenham, stuffed his carcass in a whiskey barrel and sent the remains to his widow. Perhaps, you are imagining Jean Lafitte as a tea time Federalist????
How can you be sure? Only Hamilton's mother really knew.
He also worked as hard as he could to keep America militarily weak. Hence, Washington was burned by 5,000 British troops in the War of 1812 brought on, in part, by the military shortsightedness of the Jeffersonians. Very Democratic.
But because he advocated the smallest possible government he is a hero to "palaeos" (especially neo-Confedrates, who despise the Federalists). Never mind that he was an "enlightenment" deist who mutilated his Bible with a razor blade to remove everything he regarded as "irrational." And btw, he enjoyed enthusiastic Jewish support despite his low opinion of the "old testament" and its "primitive" G-d. But "separation of church and state" is all that matters, right? [/sarcasm]
To this day many "palaeos" regard the US military as a NWO force for the conquest of the American people. I have often wondered why "palaeos" object to pacifism, since like their leftist brethren, they are opposed to any possible war other than one waged by some foreign dictator they might happen to admire.
I wish conservatives would stop talking and writing as if reducing the size of government were the only thing conservatism was about. Critiques of "big government" by admirers and apologists for Franco, Pinochet, Trujillo, and Stroessner are as silly as attacks on "the Bush dictatorship" by admirers of Mao and Castro.
As wonderful as Franklin was he left no work behind comparable to the Federalist. A fascinating man no doubt.
Do you take nominees? If so, I would like to nominate Walter Williams, Rush Limbaugh, and Mark Levin.
He left a body of work that is not the same as the Federalist Papers, to be sure. But his understanding of human nature, of the world around him, and of the politics of the day was second to none.
Read his autobiograpy, read his speeches before the british parliament (talk about brave), his many, many letters he wrote to various politicos. It's amazing. Then consider his work in science, printing, civil affairs, and massaging the french during the war and it's hard to believe one man could be so talented.
They are on the short list of future inductees. How's that? LOL
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.