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Slave Auctions Never Happened!! Really! Just Ask DeSantis! [1]

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Date: 2022-11-22

DeSantis says this never happened

I became “woke” at the age of 9 during a fourth-grade history lesson. This was in the 1960’s, during the height of the modern-day civil rights movement, an era when blacks were still lynched in public and told to sit at the back of the bus. I was young, the times were explosive, the future was both exciting and perilous. It was a decade that included powerful speeches by Martin Luther King, Jr. and George Wallace. Robert Kennedy and Lester Maddux.

My fourth-grade teacher was a sweetheart. A middle-aged, buttoned- down, no- nonsense teacher who possessed both superb classroom management skills as well as a kindness that radiated even through an occasional scolding of us boys who could, every now and then, test the patience of a saint. I’m sure that in today’s world, most of my “gang” would have been labelled ADHD and treated with an array of medications all designed to obliterate those young boy impulses and naturally occurring oppositional behaviors. But not back then. Not in 1964. We were treated instead by teachers and parents who shaped behaviors through an evil eye technique that was supremely effective in altering our various misbehaviors.

One of her history lessons included a lesson on the civil war and slavery. She told us about slave auctions and how entire families were sold off to the highest bidders, father went downriver, mother upriver and kids who knows where? We were in disbelief. We were shocked. Out little nine-year old psyches were stunned and saddened. What none of us felt was white guilt. Anyone today who thinks kids feel any sense of guilt about these atrocities simply doesn’t understand kids or childhood development. Kids feel all sorts of things at nine-years old, but guilt is reserved for immediate actions or words, not something that happened a hundred years ago.

The latest Republican party smear on “wokeness” is simply another in a decades long string of dog whistles aimed directly at the anti-elite, anti-LGBTQ, pro-racist crowd that now comprises a good deal of the GOP base. It’s a rehash of the Reagan era “welfare queen” trope and the “light in the loafers” tagline from a bygone era. The GOP has been expert for years in the fine art of subtle hateful messaging. If nothing else, the republicans know how to appeal to the resentful and the aggrieved. Most of the resentful feel aggrieved about their own personal circumstances and their inability to thrive in the current day global economy. Of course, some are just racist or homophobic, but not most.

The GOP’s only significant legislation since 1980 has been tax cuts that by and large have benefitted the well-to-do. They haven’t passed one bill in 42 years that has been squarely aimed at helping the middle- or lower-income working classes. Not one. It’s the democrats who have passed every piece of legislation, from Medicare to unemployment insurance, that have benefitted the working classes. It’s the democrats who have consistently crafted legislation to improve the lives of the average American.

So why do so 40 percent or more of the voters keep voting for republicans? I guarantee it’s not because the republicans have ever gone to bat for them economically. They never have. It’s because they argue that the reasons many people are hard-off in the modern economy is due to the “illegals” and the elite. For some odd reason, they never considered Trump a billionaire elitist! They further argue that families are being torn apart by the LGBTQ community, their teachers, the mainstream media and a whole host of other boogeymen the GOP creates to keep the working masses ginned up and steered clear from any debate about economic policy. CRT was a ghost enemy, a brilliant concoction by Republican spinmeisters who knew exactly how to play to a racist fantasy. Kitty litter boxes in schools and teachers “grooming” six-year-olds was yet another load of BS unleashed by the same national spin group the GOP keeps on hand near elections.

Florida’s governor recently stated that his state is “where woke comes to die”. What a silly, stupid little line. Who falls for this stuff? Obviously, 60 percent of Floridians did, but that says way too much about them. Does he really think he’s a tough guy ready to pounce all over someone as sweet as my fourth-grade teacher who taught a lesson on the civil war and slavery? She’d whoop him in a heartbeat. The governor is a mental midget. Good luck translating his puny and freakish presence into a national candidacy. Millions of evil eyes will stare him right down.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/11/22/2137884/-The-Florida-Governor-Who-s-Still-Asleep

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