Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Slashing Mandela for Fun and Profit

There's nothing like kicking the bones of a dead guy to get Fox News as about as excited as it can get.  However, there's nothing particularly original in slashing Nelson Mandela as William F Buckley started the conservative parade against him back in the sixties.  (ThinkProgress:  The Right Wing’s Campaign To Discredit And Undermine Mandela, In One Timeline)

Going back to ancient history to damn the present isn't always particularly useful and what motivates it is, in part, because of the glib crap from David Cameron about how Mandela was a great man.  That slimy poltroon of a leader was a very long-term opponent of Mandela and what he says now in no way reflects how he treated Mandela.  (Historical note:  Cameron is accused all over Facebook of being part of the Hang Mandela poster campaign in England quite some time ago but that isn't true.  However, it certainly is true that he was part of a trade delegation to South Africa that was in no way supportive of sanctions against apartheid and regarded Mandela as a terrorist.)

Calling Mandela a terrorist has been a popular theme with conservatives for decades.  Reagan did it.  Thatcher did it.  But they abhor racism, don't they.  Somehow, their abhorrence just wasn't enough to get them to do anything about apartheid, tho.

So Fox News has thought it important in recent days to say repeatedly that Mandela was a terrorist.  Bill O'Reilly has thought it important as well to remind that Mandela was affiliated with Communism.  Naturally, being a terrorist is bad and being a Communist is bad but being a Communist terrorist, obviously that's the worst of all.  O'Reilly strikes me as that southern belle who flirts with those rich southern landowners by playing with her parasol.  You like it dirty, don't you, boys.

So, yeah, Mandela was a terrorist.  That terrorism is the only way to strike back at an overpowering state doesn't seem to penetrate with the Fox News crew.  Menachem Begin, one-time Prime Minister of Israel, was once the leader of the Irgun and may have been involved with the bombing of the King David Hotel during the drive for Israeli independence.  Yep, the Brits considered him a terrorist too.  For that matter, they probably regarded the people involved with the Boston Tea Party as terrorists, they just couldn't get all sexy like modern terrorists with their sniper rifles and C4 explosives.  (WIKI:  Menachem Begin)

A terrorist is also a freedom fighter's guerrilla so what's it going to be, homeboy.

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