Nelson Mandela dead

[Esmeralda]

Neither was Pope John Paul II...or wait...maybe he was.

We should not have flown the flag at half staff for Pope John Paul II either. No foreign leader should mean no foreign leader, period, end of sentence.

I agree. Don't half-mast your flags for any foreigners.

Mrs Thatcher was a close ally of the US and other NATO members. Mr Mandela was not. His achievement was to make the end of apartheid a bit less bloody that it might have been. Nothing to do with the US. He failed to build a genuinely democratic S Africa. Not all his fault of course, but what he left behind was a corrupt one-party state, drifting slowly downwards. Not much different from the African norm

Nelson Mandela does not fall within the category of just a foreign leader. In fact, he was only president of South Africa for one term. Before that and since then, he has represented to the world the face of courage, dignity, resistance to oppression, and reconcilation. He is a hero to people all over the world, of all races. His death is far more than the death of an ordinary foreign leader. He is a man loved and admired by millions around the world.

 

[Kondor3]

Nelson Mandela gets the flags flown at half mast because of his contribution of the Mandela Necklace to mankind...

Would that be the WINNIE Mandela Necklace you're referring to?

That particularly brutal form of summary execution that began to be adopted by ANC supporters during the middle 1980s, while Nelson was in prison and not directing operations nor tactics, and that his wife, Winnie, stupidly and un-thinkingly endorsed during a public speech, and that was even more foolishly attributed to Nelson over time?

Necklacing - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"...The man was very old. He was never going to live forever. He was very sick. He's been on his deathbed for a year..."

Nolo contendre - although I'm not sure what that has to do with anything.

"...His wife dumped him after he was released from prison after waiting 27 years for his release..."

Nelson was 18 years her senior - they'd been separated for 27 years - Winnie was walking the halls of power while Nelson was in the slammer - and things apparently went sour and they separate within a year or two of his release. Not all that surprising, and I'm not sure what bearing that has upon Nelson's merits as a leader and peacemaker.

"...We should not fly American flags at half mast for any foreigner."

Perhaps. Then again, it's merely a symbol of the collective respect of the Republic and its People.

Personally, I would have zero problem with doing that for the likes of Mahatma Gandhi, or Winston Churchill, or the Marquis de Lafayette, or Sophie Scholl, or Anwar Sadat or Desmond Tutu or others, great and small, friend and foe, who either started-out as or morphed into one of the Good Guys and who ended-up making a huge difference for the Good. But that's just me.

 

[Kondor3]

"...It's called the Race Card Card....and it's seen a lot around here. Hope that helps."

As in: Over-belaboring the Race Card routine, as a tactic in discussion?

Is that what you saw in my contribution to this?

Hope not, 'cause I'm just not seein' it - mebbe I"m havin' a denser-than-usual morning.

Or are you merely telling me what I'm looking at - giving it a label that hasn't come-up on my own scope yet?

Which is what I'm hoping.

I dunno - I've been dodging bullets since my first in that sequence, and it's getting to me... I'm a little kornfused...

 

[g5000]

Requiescat in pace, Mr. Mandela.

 

[bodecea]

"...It's called the Race Card Card....and it's seen a lot around here. Hope that helps."

As in: Over-belaboring the Race Card routine, as a tactic in discussion?

Is that what you saw in my contribution to this?

Hope not, 'cause I'm just not seein' it - mebbe I"m havin' a denser-than-usual morning.

Or are you merely telling me what I'm looking at - giving it a label that hasn't come-up on my own scope yet?

I dunno.

No, not you. I'm pointing out what you are currently facing.

 

[Kondor3]

"...It's called the Race Card Card....and it's seen a lot around here. Hope that helps."

As in: Over-belaboring the Race Card routine, as a tactic in discussion?

Is that what you saw in my contribution to this?

Hope not, 'cause I'm just not seein' it - mebbe I"m havin' a denser-than-usual morning.

Or are you merely telling me what I'm looking at - giving it a label that hasn't come-up on my own scope yet?

I dunno.

No, not you. I'm pointing out what you are currently facing.

That's what I was hoping for, when I went back and edited that text.

Thanks for the clarification... after all that flap, I was gettin' a little worried that there might be something in all of that which could have been easily misconstrued, and that I'd missed. Much obliged.

Who would have thought that such an innocuous bit of feedback over a half-staff flag flown for Mandela, would drag-on for so long? Jeeze.

Now... enough of the sidebar... back to the main theme again...

 

[Claudette]

there is no need to disparage the guy. you may not agree with his politics, but the guy spent nearly half his life imprisoned for political reasons and he emerged into freedom and was a huge force for positive change, not only in his homeland, but around the world.

he is an inspiration.

I agree. He was inspiring all right.

RIP Nelson Mandela and may you never be forgotten.

 

[Dr.Traveler]

Mandela legacy: South African economy worse than before Apartheid was dissolved - National Finance Examiner | Examiner.com

I guess for those that value money over human rights, that is important

Very few posts make me just drop my jaw in surprise any longer. Reading that one actually made me read it twice to double check. He was actually arguing in-favor of a system whereby you are legally less of a person than others because the economy was better.

Folks that make that argument are folks that make buys like Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini possible. If all that matters is the trains running on time, no one cares if they run folks off to camps.

 

[Black_Man1]

Nelson Mandela

FOREVER!

 

[Dr.Traveler]

I have seen no 'hate' of Mandela, just a little scepticism whether he was in fact the greatest man who ever lived.

Greatest ever? No. But I think the Onion Nailed it:

Nelson Mandela Becomes First Politician To Be Missed.

Nelson Mandela Becomes First Politician To Be Missed

JOHANNESBURG—Following the death of former South African president and civil rights leader Nelson Mandela today at the age of 95, sources confirmed that the revered humanitarian has become the first politician in recorded history to actually be missed. “Today we lost not only an international hero and a symbol of the resilient human spirit, but also the very first political figure ever who people actively wish was still alive and affecting world affairs,” said political historian Wallace M. Delaney of Columbia University, adding that Mandela will long be remembered for enduring 27 years in prison in the fight against apartheid, championing equality across the globe, and standing alone as the only world leader whose passing left the international community grief-stricken and feeling a palpable void in their lives. ...

 

[Amelia]

The hating from both right and left in this thread is over the top.

/unsubscribe

 

[Katzndogz]

My heart is heavy, but he lived a long life, accomplished a great deal - and made it home in time for Christmas.

Who could ask for anything more?

Well, I'd be a lot happier if he had not spent 27 years of that long life in prison.

He was a terrorist and a criminal. Had he not spent 27 years of that long life in prison, he would not have had a long life.

 

[Dr.Traveler]

Mrs Thatcher was a close ally of the US and other NATO members.

Thatcher's legacy is viewed with some controversy inside her own country. General consensus on Mandela is fairly universally positive. Not a lot of comparison between the two to be had.

 

[Dr.Traveler]

He was a terrorist and a criminal. Had he not spent 27 years of that long life in prison, he would not have had a long life.

And in some systems, being a criminal is the only honorable thing to do.

I recall he was in poor health in the late nineties and talking with a history professor who was an expert on African history. He was very doubtful that South Africa would survive Mandela's passing as his example was considered one of the only things keep the country from slipping into a new race war. Thankfully, Mandela lived long enough that I don't hear anyone voicing that fear now. Some rare people change the world by their example. Mandela was indeed one of them.

 

[Derideo_Te]

I guess for those that value money over human rights, that is important

Very few posts make me just drop my jaw in surprise any longer. Reading that one actually made me read it twice to double check. He was actually arguing in-favor of a system whereby you are legally less of a person than others because the economy was better.

Folks that make that argument are folks that make buys like Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini possible. If all that matters is the trains running on time, no one cares if they run folks off to camps.

The irony being that the extreme right fail to see that South Africa has now become their "libertarian paradise" where there is "small government" that has little to no power when it comes to "regulations", the "free market" reigns supreme and this is why there is widespread poverty, rape and murder.

 

[Black_Man1]

Out of his 27 years in prison, the first 19 he was allowed only one visitor a YEAR.

For only 30 minutes.







That hurt me to even READ that!




This was a giant of a man!

 

[bigrebnc1775]

if that remark was directed towards me (and it appears to have been), i'm not sure what leads you to believe such a thing, nor how that relates to the mandela theme here.

what exactly was your intent on mentioning race?

Your post, below, initiated that sequence...

He was a communist.

That's a fact, junior.

Gonna have to suck it up and move on...

obama orders flags flown at half staff for mandela but not for Margaret Thatcher

A reasonable person, seeing that, would probably infer that you were objecting to doing (flag-flying) for one, and not the other, because of (1) Race or (2) Partisanship.

I merely served-up some calm, rational feedback saying why I believe that the doing for one and not the other was not attributable to either Race nor Partisanship, but, instead, had more to do with Merit and Lasting Impact - real or perceived.

I went on to loosely and imperfectly reinforce the idea that it was not Racial in nature, by 'fessing-up that it was a White Guy, with his own share of knee-jerk Reactionary perceptions, who was giving that a re-think and reaching a non-Racial / non-Partisan conclusion.

And, to further and loosely and imperfectly reinforce that opinion, I even tossed a valid bone to the large Anti-Obama Fan Club, by stating that I didn't think Obama was all that free from such Racial and Partisan tendencies himself, but that I simply didn't think that THIS was such an example.

However-in-the-heck you got from THERE to charges of Racism is absolutely and positively beyond my ability to understand; not that that's terribly important, in the larger scheme of things.

I've got my own good share of prejudices and biases, but how you connected THOSE particular dots is WAY-the-hell over my head.

Hope that helps.

Not that it's much skin off my nose, one way or another.

Are you done throwing rocks at me yet?

I stand by my observation that I do not believe that Obama's half-staff-flag decision was either Racial nor Partisan, vis a vis the Margaret Thatcher comparison.

You are the one that brought up race, it was on your mind. You're using it now.

 

[paperview]

I recommend this video which gives a fair amount of depth (in the short time allowed) to Mandela's story.

She talks about the history of apartheid in South Africa, with scenes of what it was like to be a person of color there,
the pass system, the appalling laws that were codified in the 50's, the relocation Act, and that 80% of the country lived without representation,
the police massacre at Sharpsville, etc...imprisonment of Mandela, conditions there, his release, and the global movement inspired by him.

Then Congressman John Lewis joins Rachel Maddow to what it meant to him. Well worth watching.

 

[bigrebnc1775]

of course msnbc would pay tribute to a suspected communist.

 

[Katzndogz]

He was a terrorist and a criminal. Had he not spent 27 years of that long life in prison, he would not have had a long life.

And in some systems, being a criminal is the only honorable thing to do.

I recall he was in poor health in the late nineties and talking with a history professor who was an expert on African history. He was very doubtful that South Africa would survive Mandela's passing as his example was considered one of the only things keep the country from slipping into a new race war. Thankfully, Mandela lived long enough that I don't hear anyone voicing that fear now. Some rare people change the world by their example. Mandela was indeed one of them.

Then you have not been paying attention.

Mandela's passing and the looming threat of a race war against South Africa's whites as a widow mourns the latest murdered white farmer, a chilling dispatch from a nation holding its breath | Mail Online

It might have already started.

South Africa might not survive Mandela's passing because it is at the end of its rope. Unemployment is at 33%, SA struggled along redistributing the nation's wealth, now it's been redistributed. There isn't anything left to loot. This has nothing to do with Mandela particularly, it's a convergence of poor circumstances.