On men rebranding into women and Democrats
re-branding into Independents

Socialism is deconstructive, and it is Slavery. It is the slave-owners sticking to their old habits. Socialism eats Freedom. Then it eats the People. Then it eats itself.

Beaton clearly was educated and has lived exclusively in the north, has the pure Yankee semi-true version of the Civil War solidly wedged into his mind. In reality, slavery was a secondary, but significant issue. Norther factory owners blocking imports from abroad of cheaper manufactured goods to subsidize their factories, via tariffs was a major issue. The south had very few factories making manufactured goods, some of it due to the tidewater not having as many good water power streams and rivers, but a lot due to other issues, such as access to capital often concentrated in a few big NE cities. In any case, it was NOT primarily about slavery, that issue had largely been settled, with the border states of Kansas and Missouri still part of the problem. But few in Missouri had slaves, yet whether a state voted for slavery or not was a big enough issue that rabble rousers like John Brown murdering lots of folks stirred things up a lot. And here in the KS/MO border area, Union raides murdered Missouri farmers and then the Missouri farmers fought back, organizing their own guerilla forces. Huge amounts of viciousness against civilians embittered both sides. Slavery was the watchword, but it really was a package of issues all flying under that flag....big city NE factories or rural farmers....that was more of the issue than actual slavery when 95% of poor farmers had no slaves, ever. It is not nearly as neat and simple as the Yankee version, written by the victors of "we were against slaves, they were for them". Yes, that was a big issue, and the south was totally wrong on that, but there were a LOT of economic issues that underlay that, and were crucial to driving the country to war.

If slavery was the key issue in the Civil War, why did Lincoln not free the slaves right off? He waited until the war was essentially over to do it. Because it was a secondary issue.

Dems offer nothing to the body politic. Their philosophy is wrong and they are grossly incompetent, even with things they actually want to accomplish. Their answer to this, in the past and now, is to CALL themselves something else. When you think about it, i tis not surprising. As the dem party and all their support implodes, the likelihood of rebuilding it is cratoring to zero. So they are trying to pack up as much as they can and move to a different tent but still trying to sell the same old swill. That might have worked in a pre internet America. But now everything is tracked and linked. The background people that might try to change clothes will be quickly identified. Beyond all that, people are used to and loyal to the party they support. Even if they are registered independent, they often vote either dem or Republican. It takes a LOT for those patterns to change. There is only about 10% of voters that swing their actual voting choices between elections for various reasons. Third party candidates simply don't do well. They can drain votes and change the outcome between the major parties but they don't themselves, win. So, dems may be rats jumping from a sinking ship but they are not going to find a safe haven elsewhere. Maybe over time they can reorganize but it could that several election cycles to accomplish that and pull the voters that they need.

The Democrats still enslave the blacks only now they do it in a political party that feeds them BS and entitlements to buy their votes.

Even before this article, when I heard or read "Independent" I always thought "Democrat" and was never wrong. Their stance on any issue we might discuss was always lockstep with the Democrats.