President Lincoln

As I watch the current Presidential race I am struck by the obvious similarities to another such race over 140 years ago. As the presidential race of 1864 drew near President Abraham Lincoln, stuck in a bloody civil war, had serious doubts about his reelection chances. On a daily basis the war casualties came in and the newspapers attacked his administration and his thoughtless war. After three years of bloody war in which over 300,000 soldiers had been killed the general feeling was Lincoln would not be reelected, yet he stayed the course. He knew and saw well into the future that the United States must remain intact rather than a series of small countries. If the Confederacy endured, then what, in the future would keep other states intact. The US would end up consisting of as many as 4,5, or 6 individual countries.

Lincoln was also suffering from the death of his small son Tad who had recently died. Lincoln sent young men to their deaths almost daily in this brutal war but yet he would not change the course. He anguished daily about it. The Democratic ''peace at any cost''candidate was none other than Gen. George McClellan. The same George McClellan who Lincoln had put in charge of the Union army. The same George McClellan who had proclaimed himself the savior of the Union. The same cocky George McClellan who strutted around and talked about what he would soon do to those damn rebels. But it soon became apparent that McClellan's talk was just that. His real ability lay in ''outcamping the enemy''. Lincoln fired McClellan, not once, but twice and he soon became the Democratic nominee for president. He again began to remind the country of his great war record, [sound familiar?] although he was now the anti-war candidate and against it!!![sound familiar?].

Lincoln knew he would soon be defeated by a man he knew had no abilities in running the nation. A man who could not make up his mind about what he stood for [sound familiar?]. Lincoln knew McClellan would stop the war just as it seemed victory was at hand. The deaths of over 300,000 would be in vain and the union divided. But Lincoln was reelected by a land slide and the union restored.

There is a serious lesson here. The United States remains the greatest and most powerful nation on earth. What is the one truth of all of this? it is this, ''those who forget the problems of the past are doomed to repeat them.” The war on the Islamic terrorists will last many more years and may never end. But we must not give up. Support our troops, reelect President Bush. God Bess America!
Mike

Presidential Race 2004

George W. Bush VS John Kerry