Because a horse’s eyes are on the side of its

We’ve been here before

Ihope you are enjoying summer and some respite from the cares of coronavirus and the national uproar for social justice after the death of George Floyd last month in Minneapolis. It’s been quite a few weeks, to say the least. As someone who can vividly recall the madness of 1968, I am struck by how little things seem to change in our nation. Issues bubble to forefront and fade over time, only to reappear later in our history.

I recently watched the History Channel’s three part documentary about the life of Ulysses S. Grant. It was very well done, in Publisher my opinion. Since much of his life involved the Civil War and Tom Stangl Reconstruction, racial equality and justice and the government’s role were common themes.

I have learned more about history as an adult than I ever did in school. It’s not the fault of my teachers. The subjects are so immense, even for our relatively young nation, there’s no way they can be covered in a semester or a year.

That’s one of the reasons I enjoy reading and watching these types of programs. In addition to dramatizations of events in Grant’s life, military experts and historians offer their opinions to carry the narrative of the story.

At the conclusion of the six hours we learn Grant, who was compared to George Washington in stature after his death over a century ago, faded from history as the narrative of the Civil War was recast. The “Lost Cause” was a movement that romanticized the cause of Confederacy as just and about state’s rights and not slavery. Grant was cast as the butcher in this version of thinking and Robert E. Lee as the tragic hero.

I’m smart enough to know history is written by the victors and there are two sides to every story. That’s why learning about Grant’s childhood as the son of abolitionists who married a daughter of a slave owner and how the dual forces formed his thinking and actions was a revelation to me.

Grant was a failure many times in many things in his life but excelled in the military and in leading men. He was the logical person to succeed Andrew Johnson as president to do his best with Reconstruction.

I found this passage from his fi rst inaugural address in 1869 timeless, in the worst possible way:

“The country having just emerged from a great rebellion, many questions will come before it for settlement in the next four years which preceding Administrations have never had to deal with. In meeting these it is desirable that they should be approached calmly, without prejudice, hate, or sectional pride, remembering that the greatest good to the greatest number is the object to be attained.

“This requires security of person, property, and free religious and political opinion in every part of our common country, without regard to local prejudice. All laws to secure these ends will receive my best efforts for their enforcement.

“I ask patient forbearance one toward another throughout the land, and a determined effort on the part of every citizen to do his share toward cementing a happy union..”

Great words 151 years ago. I just wish we didn’t need to heed them in the 21st century.

But the great thing is we can learn this lesson now, if we have the will to do so.

As always, I welcome your comments. You can reach me by email at tstangl@theameryfreepress. com, telephone 715-268-8101 or write me at P.O. Box 424, Amery, WI, 54001.

Thanks for reading I’ll keep in touch. Feel free to do the same.

Pro-nuance, anti-bull

Ithink nuance is my new favorite word.

I’ve noticed myself using it more than normal lately. A podcast I listen to likes to say they’re “pro-nuance, anti-B.S.” and I’ve adopted that as my de facto mantra.

At a time when feet are rooted more fi rmly in camps than ever before, examining subtle truths and diving deeply into the rationale for our opinions is much more useful than lashing out in grand gestures of right and wrong. The country’s been blindly towing the

Editor

C.L. Sill party line so long we didn’t notice the rope has wrapped around our ankle and is slowing dragging us all under. At no time has that been more evident than in the spring of 2020.

Togetherness abounded for about two weeks in midMarch, before partisan nonsense took back control of our newsfeeds and TVs, instructing us to either revolt against COVID-19 regulations or accept them without question, when in reality the most helpful path was somewhere in the middle.

Then came George Floyd and the uprising that followed, where many across the country tuned in to watch protesters face off against riot police and cheered for one side or the other like a football game. Red or blue. It’s all left me feeling a little lost and has solidifi ed the notion that I am a man without a political party.

I voted for John McCain in 2008 and would do it again if the election was tomorrow. I believed in him as an American and a politician. He was a good man.

I believe the same thing about Barack Obama, who I gladly voted for in 2012. Both of them made me proud to go to the polls, something I can’t say of the current inhabitant of the White House.

I’m a gun owner and an advocate of the 2 nd amendment. I don’t own an assault rifl e, nor to I see the need to. But if my neighbor wants to own 50 of them, it’s really none of my damn business as long as he doesn’t shoot holes in my house. Democratic led gun control efforts have not proven an effective deterrent to mass shootings and gun violence and they never will — that’s just the truth.

I’m also outspoken about the environment, public land access and the scientifi c realities of climate change. Republicans have been and continue to be obscenely detrimental to all three of those topics, despite overwhelming evidence that what they’re doing is wrong — that’s just the truth.

It took me a long time to shake off my biased outer layer and admit both of these things are true. But once I did, I discovered the realm of legitimate political truths was so much sweeter than the cable news wasteland that was sucking the life out of the rest of the country.

I don’t mean to present myself as some kind of all knowing, political genie here to shame the rest of you into submission, or enlightenment. I think tons of Americans hold the same, dual-sided, well thought out (if I do say so myself) beliefs, but are being drowned out by the incessant blathering of people like Tucker Carlson and Rachel Maddow.

We’re what author Steven Rinella would call ‘radical centrists,’ which has completely ceased to be an

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