Posted by
federal rb on Monday, October 20, 2008 2:32:13 PM
"Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war. . .testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated. . . can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.
We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate. . .we cannot consecrate. . . we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us. . .that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion. . . that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain. . . that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. . . and that government of the people. . .by the people. . .for the people. . . shall not perish from the earth. "
It was a rather short address but has become one of the most important speeches in our nation's history. But why, remembering the dead in our civil war? No, it was more about the last two lines, about the rebirth of the nation and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth.
So why are these supposed Republicans coming out against Sarah Palin. Supposedly she doesn't have the qualifiucations to even be running for Vice President. She need not apply. Even though the framers purposely left those qualifications low so that we could have people from our midst that could govern us. The beauty of the qualification being so low is that we wouldn't have a ruling class. So people like Biden wouldn't spend their whole lives in our capital governing the whole country. Biden wouldn't even be able to relate to me in anyway.
So when the first of the things Lincoln mentions is the government "of the people", then Sarah would be the quintessential person that Lincoln would be refrring to. So why Does Peggy Noonan, David Frum, Kathleen Parker (and the list goes on) keep criticizing Sarah Palin as unqualified to be our Vice President. Do we want to choose the White House as some sort of Trivial Pursuit challenge? Some wonk that will know every detail of foreign and international policy. Or is the Presidency more than that? Maybe judgement should be considered as to what they have done then extrapolating what they might do? And if someone has to have a firm grasp on every issue
then why does Obama have 300 advisors?
So I stand with Lincoln, we need to get back to a government of the people. Sarah is one of us, that's pretty refreshing in my book.