Abraham Lincoln

In which we confront the stop sign that exists at the intersection of metaphysics and politics.

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing


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I would like to think that I am motivated by the desire to do good and to be of service to the country I was born in, including its people, who have been part and parcel responsible for helping me along the way.

Sometime during my life’s journey I came to the conclusion that: Good always prevails in this world. Although it may take some time, and even though great suffering may occur, ultimately Good always prevails over evil. Long ago I determined to be a force for good in what is left of my life.

In May of this year I filed with the FEC to become a Democratic candidate for Congress in the 3rd district of North Carolina. I still sort-of wonder why anyone would be desirous of putting themselves through the rigors of trying to get elected to The United States Congress. Nevertheless, I always knew I would someday aspire to this office. This story may not be what you are anticipating.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon 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 battle field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of it, as a final resting place for those who died here, that the nation might live. This we may, in all propriety do. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow, this ground -- The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have hallowed it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here; while it can never forget what they did here.

It is rather for us, the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that, from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here, gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve these dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation, 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.

--the nicolay draft of the gettysburg address; courtesy library of congress

Government by the People, for the People, and of the People.

The kind of government where you grab it with your own two hands and run the darn thing.