Evidence Strongly Points to Willis Hart Being "Total Moron"

It's all about slavery. But I think Americans, unfortunately, don't know our own history, first of all. And, at some point, of course, after the war, the nation sort of came together and decided that it was going to forget what the real cause was, because it was too painful to remember that slavery was what divided the nation ~ Edna Greene Medford, a professor of history at Howard University who specializes in 19th-century African-American history. Quote from a 4/12/2011 installment of the PBS News Hour titled, "Civil War's Causes: Historians Largely United on Slavery, But Public Divided".

In regards to my disagreement with the blogger Willis Hart on the issue of slavery being the root cause of the Civil War (see previous commentary), the history-revising enthusiast had this to say about yours truly...

Willis Hart: He's a total moron... Anybody who's taken as little as an introductory history course knows that slavery wasn't the predominant reason for Lincoln's actions or even the South's ... slavery wasn't even remotely in trouble and so it had to have been economic and nationalistic reasons for those states to secede... But, yes, he has to have narrative and anybody who challenges it he has to label as evil. The man is utterly grade-school... (3/22/2014 AT 2:44pm).

This was after the idiot authored a post titled "on holding on to slights, perceived inequities, etc". He says he's against acting in such a manner, but is that NOT what he just did with this selective criticism of me? I mean, my commentary on the subject has numerous others agreeing with me, and Willis got the same disagreements from at least two other Liberals on his OWN BLOG! (see here and here for examples).

Yet I'm the only one who gets labeled a "total moron" and "utterly grade-school" despite plenty of other disagreement with the Hartster's history rewriting. Not to mention that the dude is totally full of shit in regards to his sureness concerning what people who have taken an introductory history class learn about the Civil War. It just so happens that history was one of my better subjects in school. Not to brag, but I aced my history tests.

For the record, one can find many commentaries on the interwebs in which tariffs and States' Rights being given as causes of the Civil War are correctly labeled as MYTHS, but I, unlike Willis, acknowledge that both theories are out there. Mr. Hart flat out lies about slavery being the root cause not being in introductory history books and his take being the widely accepted one - which it most certainly IS NOT.

I acknowledge there is some dispute, at least... even if I judge those stirring up the dispute to have an agenda of obscuring what really happened for either racist and/or political reasons. But Hart dissembles and says there is no dispute at all, even though all thinking people know this is complete nonsense. Yeah, he knows he can get away with this on his own blog (and the blog of rAtional nAtion), but I suspect many people would laugh at his ridiculous BS about things introductory history books say when they DO NOT say them!

Or, at least 38 percent of the public would agree that the Civil War was "mainly about slavery" (plus 9 percent who said it was both about slavery and states' rights) according to a PEW research poll. However, in regards to what historians believe, a 3/16/2013 Salon.com article titled "the South still lies about the Civil War" reveals that they are largely united on slavery being at the root of why the Civil War was fought. That would be the historians who WRITE HISTORY BOOKS! Those historians mostly agree the Civil War was fought over slavery and NOT tariffs and NOT States' Rights!

"No respected historian has argued for decades that the Civil War was fought over tariffs... or that only constitutional concerns drove secessionists" (i.e. States' Rights) according to American historian Edward Ayers - a professor & the 9th president of the University of Richmond - as well as an author of four, and editor of seven books on the history of 19th-century America.

The real causes were swept under the rug, says Yale historian and director of the Gilder-Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance and Abolition, David Blight, who "describes a national fervor for reconciliation that began in the 1880s and lasted through the end of World War I, fueled in large part by the South's desire to attract industry, Northern investors' desire to make money, and the desire of White people everywhere to push the Negro question aside".

I don't know about you, but if one person seeks out the opinions of the experts, and then finds that the written words of the seceding states reasons for leaving agree with what the experts are saying - and from that concludes that the experts must be right - I surely would not call that person a "total moron".

If, on the other hand, there was an individual who insisted that the history books agreed with his point of view - despite historians (the people who write those books) largely being on the same page in disagreement with him... I might just conclude that this 2nd person was a "total moron".

I might just conclude it with certainty, in fact. Also, I never said a damn thing about "evil", but this sounds like exactly the kind of grade-school insult a total moron would accuse someone of. If the facts disprove the argument they're making - the desperate (and stupid) usually resort to ad hominem.

SWTD #243, wDel #54.