Monday, July 7, 2008

We've Always Been at War with Eastasia...

Ed Brayton's blog had a pretty good entry the other day (I found it through Trotsky's blog):

President Bush was at Monticello for a 4th of July celebration and he delivered an address. But it's quite telling that his speechwriters, in quoting Jefferson, cut out an anti-religious statement from a long and famous quote. Here's the way Bush put it:
Thomas Jefferson understood that these rights do not belong to Americans alone. They belong to all mankind. And he looked to the day when all people could secure them. On the 50th anniversary of America's independence, Thomas Jefferson passed away. But before leaving this world, he explained that the principles of the Declaration of Independence were universal. In one of the final letters of his life, he wrote, "May it be to the world, what I believe it will be -- to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all -- the Signal of arousing men to burst the chains, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government."

Now let's look at the full quote, including the part that was cut out. This is from a letter he wrote to Roger Weightman reflecting on the upcoming 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence (which, it turns out, was the day both he and John Adams died):

May it be to the world, what I believe it will be, (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all,) the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government.
Jefferson made many such statements, of course. Clearly they are best edited out by those who advocate nothing if not monkish ignorance and superstition.

http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2008/07/bush_edits_out_jeffersons_reli.php


Yup, that's Bush and Co. editing out Jefferson's religious views. The Ministry decides what is history...

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

And that answers how Bush was going to fuck up Jefferson's legacy in that speech. Now to figure out how he worked in anti-immigrantion and terrorism into it.

And to think it was such a nice place with hundreds of folding chairs the day before. I could have even gotten tickets to witness our illustrious failure at a leader blunder our history.