Allen's father's people were from Michigan.  His mother was French-Arab. He grew up (sort of) in Southern California.

Webb is the descendent of Virginians and had two ancestors who were in the Confederate Army (and one in the Union Army as well).

What the Miller attack weasels and Tyler Whitley left out of the story was this paragraph:

"And I would also like to say a special thanks to my good friend Nelson Jones for sharing this day with us. Nelson is a fellow Marine, a fellow alumnus of both the Naval Academy and the Georgetown Law Center, and like so many others here a child of the South. The last twenty five years in this country have shown again and again that, despite the regrettable and well-publicized turmoil of the Civil Rights years, those Americans of African ancestry are the people with whom our history in this country most closely intertwines, whose struggles in an odd but compelling way most resemble our own, and whose rights as full citizens we above all should celebrate and insist upon."

That's right: Jim Webb brought an African American friend with him to this event and called attention to the need to "celebrate and insist upon" the rights of African Americans. More race-baiting from the RTD and, if Miller's people were behind this, they should be ashamed.

Mark Warner has it.
Tim Kaine has it.

GeorgeBushAllen is another classic example of the cynical politics of division; greed, ignorance, hate, that have run our nation in to the ground and threaten to destroy what millions have died to create.

Allen's Conservatism, the kind of conservatims we have in the US House, US Senate, White House, and the VA House are all antithetical to the greatness that is America, and the potential that is the American Dream.

Democrats like Warner, Kaine, and Webb unite in their leadership.  Conservatives like Frist, DeLay, Bush and Allen always divide.

Although though some in power are truly unsavory I cannot say that about all members of the US Congress, be they Democrat or Republican.  For instance, I have trememdous respect for our Republican Senator John Warner.  We should be a much better country should our politicians follow his example of fairness, dignity, and decency.  And certainly there are those who do.  Virginia's other promenent Warner comes to mind, and Time Kaine, Creigh Deeds, and of course Jim Webb....and there are many others.  Many who do the best by us they can, whether or not we always agree with there views.

oh

and this weasel

<--------------

Allen dissapointed me with his comments.

But, like me, Allen hasn't a bit of Dixie in his veins (I myself am born to transplanted Yankees from NY and PA, the ancestors of whom fought on the northern side in the Civil War).  That means Allen's slight obsession with all things southern is likely born of something else.  Something that seems to me connected with the darker side of the south's history.

That, I think, is why this story makes even many southerners unnerved.

I see some in Virginia are spinning this as some sort of justification that makes Harris Miller the better candidate or that George Allen is 'safe'. Harris Miller still sucks, as does the RTD, and George Allen is going down. Not a moment too soon for my taste; he is an embarassment to a modern Virginia and its citizens.

There's not a drop of hatred or prejudice in my husband's family and they are very proud of their heritage and their culture. And not above "how to love a Yankee without guilt" type jokes (it was the title of a book one of them gave me one Christmas). Yet they also think of me as a "Southerner by choice." Although don't go looking for a drawl. I don't have one.

My husband, however, has always resented Allen's misappropriation of the Confederate flag. That and the noose Allen used to keep in his office don't indicate somebody honoring Southern culture but merely indulging in bigotry. Allen only looks like a fool when he wraps himself in the Confederate flag.

Webb doesn't need it to prove his Virginia bona fides.

car·pet·bag·ger  ( P )  Pronunciation Key  (kärpt-bgr)
n.

1. A Northerner who went to the South after the Civil War for political or financial advantage.

2. An outsider, especially a politician, who presumptuously seeks a position or success in a new locality.

I have used this term previously to describe Harris Miller. George Allen well satisfies the description as well...

Focus on the idea of tranplant to the South "for political or financial advantage". The word "opportunity" is not used. The idea of underhanded, conniving, behind the scenes manipulation seems closely tied to the word "carpetbagger".

My great-great-grandfather served in the Michigan Cavalry. He arrived from Prussia just in time to be pressed into military service. My family has no glorious memory of the war alternately called "The War Between the States" or the "Civil War". It happened long ago in a time far different from today. The issues of that time are long past.

The issue today is whether America shall remain a middle class nation or whether wealthy self-interested elites will successfully seize overwhelming control of this country's wealth and political power.

On the one hand, Virginians can choose a real democrat who was born fighting. On the other hand, there are two carpetbaggers whose views are indistinguisable with regard to economic power and jobs for the American middle class.

When people tell me "chivalry is dead", I say that's not an excuse, it's a problem.

I believe that "Southern Hospitality" is a creed to live by, in both my private life and politics.

I'm incredibly patriotic.

I respect and understand my heritage, but I never allow hatreds of the past to become a part of the present.

There's nothing wrong with simplicity.  Sometimes the best time you can have is just relaxing out on a summer night with a cigar, chatting with friends. 

People need to understand that being proud of your roots doesn't mean your racist.  You respect where you've come from.  Jim Webb respects his past, but understands that mistakes were made.  Jefferson had slaves, as did Washington.  That's no reason to forget the rest of their amazing accomplishments.  I feel the same with Lee.  Sure, he owned slaves.  And yes, he held loyalty to Virginia rather the America (but that was a sin many were guilty of).  That doesn't change the fact that he is one of the most gifted generals we've ever seen.  He was a true Southern Gentleman.  He had his faults, as everybody does.  But he was still a good man, and one I try to emulate in many ways.

I was raised until I was 10 years old in Jackson, MS, and I've never agreed with the confederate flag. The only people I ever saw wave it was a bunch of rednecks who used the word nigger between every breath.

I did see an honorable use of the confederate flag one time, and that was during a civil war re-enactment. The south should be proud of the valiant and heroic soldiers from that war. It was a war of many things, but neither side was right (get that correct, both sides were in the wrong). But sometimes, these things have to happen to make a strong country, it's part of our history, and I'm proud of my country and its history (good or bad).

In the same sense, we're taught that the south was where segregation lived, but as my bat-shit (thanks ditzies) crazy grandmother said to me last year, when I was visiting in Carthage, MS, "That gawddamn Kennedy come down here riling up everyone over segregation, and theys had segregation up north there too."

The point is that history is never 100% accurate. Try telling a friend an accurate history of 9-11, and see what I mean. The south fought for what they believed in, the north fought for what they believed in, and a lot of people died to make this country a better place. The confederate flag has a place in that. Just because you lose doesn't mean you lost your heritage. However, it does mean that when you wave a flag that, to a good many people, represented slavery and civil oppression of a race, you just might get your ass kicked for it.

I don't like to see the confederate flag compared to the swastika because there is no comparision. One stood for a unity of states that believed so strongly in something (understand, it's not about slavery, it's about states rights, slavery isn't the whole story), that they risked losing everything and made a choice. The other was a bunch of racists murderers. (Sen. Allen, if you're reading this, the racists murders are the Nazis. E-mail me and I'll send you some wikipedia articles)

As soon as we stop teaching our children that the civil war was fought only over slavery, and start teaching them more of the history, I think they will see the confederate flag in a better light. And I think it's important to teach every part of our history, and honor every part of our history.

We didn't get here because we were fair, and we were nice and good, we got here because we fucked up...over and over. Change doesn't happen when everything is going well, it happens when the country is unhappy (Sen. Allen, I'll e-mail you some polling numbers). We can't hide the horrible parts of our past. We should air every dirty, nasty thing we did as a country. Write about it, talk about it, understand it. Hiding it doesn't make it less, it makes it worse.

Anyone, Sen. Allen, quit being a stupid fuck, give the flag to some re-enactment people, and quit acting like you know anything about southern heritage. Oh, and you're lucky you didn't bring that shit to Colorado. We beat up little white southern california boys out there, especially if you can't play football.

I like to say the War wasn't started because of slavery in the same way the War in Iraq wasn't started because of oil.

Oil was not the reason we were taken to war, but if Oil didn't exist in Iraq, you can be sure we would not care a lick about old Sadam.  Without slavery, there would have been no "Right" so imporatant as to precipitate a war.

I'm not tinfoilhat crazy enough to think that Bush intended 9/11.  That's stupid.  But Bush knew that it's better to be Commander in chief of a successful war than it is to be President over a failing economy.

Politics. 

I agree that we wouldn't have cared about Saddam if there wasn't oil there.  Hell, look at Korea and Lybia.  Oil was a reason, but not THE reason.  Bush sent people to die so taht he could get his agenda through congress and get elected in 2004.

There are many memories that I cherish from that time in St. Louis.  But because of homesickness, around 1980, I subscribed to Southern Exposure magazine.

They are celebrating their 25th anniversary, and quote from their 1973 edition.

"As the South blends into the national picture, its problems are less unique, more national in character. Yet there is a continuing uniqueness to the region-both in its history of struggle and its possibilities for developing alternatives to the rest of America's crisis-prone growth."

I realize that many people don't agree with all of the values of the Institute for Southern Studies, and without more reading I can't say that I do either.  Nevertheless, this is a group that has been struggling with some of these ideas for a long time. 

For example, how do we understand the realities of our heritage, both positive and negative, without being drawn into a painful refighting of the Civil War?  For reasonable minds it is possible to do this in an authentic way that avoids needless hurt.

These absurd conflicts are almost always brought about by either someone who doesn't get it, doesn't want to get it, or gets it and doesn't care.

Frankly, Jim Webb is sometimes unpolished.  And that's why he can be made to look bad when he's quoted out of context.  The reason that I am so comfortable giving that occasional lack of polish a pass, is that I myself have also gone through the extended process of getting at the truth of my heritage, so I can relate to it. 

Culturally, I come from the heart of Richmond's Catholic community, my mom's side.  For a number of historical reasons there was a fair amount of insularity, and the first time that I heard someone - my wonderful Scotch-Irish step-grandfather - refer to the butt of a chicken as the "Pope's nose" I was genuinely horrified.

That was his heritage, his momentary lack of polish, and hardly a desire to refight wars that took place across the Atlantic.  It took substantive work to come to grips with that one small thing.  It seems funny now, but it wasn't funny to a literally minded kid.

Most everyone goes through these things in one form or another, and when people outside of the experience deliberately try to stir the pot and pit one group against another, it really is outrageous and insensitive behavior no matter how you slice it.

Anyway, one of my great-great grandfathers, of mostly English descent, was a foot soldier in Lee's army.  When the war was finally over he walked home (it wasn't far), went back to farming and started a family.  His wife's family went back to Charlemagne, and I'm neither a Crusades apologist or proponent. One of his sons-in-law, my great-grandfather, was a Baptist minister who ran off with another woman abandoning his wife and children.  His daughter, my Episcopalian grandmother never quite got over that and we used to talk about it when she was in the nursing home.  And she had only fond memories of her grandfather, the one who had been in the Civil War.

I'll be among the last to minimize the horrors of slavery, but I'm not going to deny my heritage and hang my head in shame like I'm descended from some mutant strain of psychopaths.

This is exactly one of the points that Webb makes in his book, a small veneer of wealthy people playing the lower classes against one another.  Some people sniff and scoff at this theory as "simplistic."  But good grief, it's obviously going on right here and now.

"Hate is not a family value."