Tag: Donald Smith
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Why Stonewall Jackson Is Still Worth Honoring
by Donald Smith The Capitol Square Preservation Council, which has the mission to review any major changes to the monuments in Capitol Square. Although it still exists, it has been defunded and no longer operates. These are my prepared remarks for the presentation I would gladly offer to the council, should it convene again, to…
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The Surreptitious Disappearance of the Capitol Square Preservation Council
by Don Smith Breathtaking. Unsettling. Healing. Those meant-to-catch-your-attention words come from an article by the British newspaper The Guardian on the “reimagined” statue of Stonewall Jackson, currently on display at a contemporary “art” museum in Los Angeles. Now, as members of The Guardian’s target audience — progressives — take full control of Virginia’s state government,…
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The Rest of America Comments on Jones’ Murderous Texts
By Donald Smith, “Why are so many Democrats such hateful, ‘I hope people die’ bastards?” That’s the headline on the “Irons in The Fire” blog on October 6th. I won’t recap what the blogger, “Firehand,” wrote. We’ve all seen it before, over and over the past few days. It’s about Jay Jones. What’s noteworthy is…
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Restore the Battle Streamers
by Donald Smith Summertime in Washington, D.C., is NDAA Time. NDAA, as in the National Defense Authorization Act. The federal government dispensed with proper budget procedures a long time ago. Everything it does is now funded by continuing resolutions, omnibus bills, or other confounding mechanisms. The NDAA, though, always passes because it funds the Defense Department. Hence, crafty…
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Why Stonewall Jackson Is Worth Remembering
by Donald Smith In early August, the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park (FSNMP) placed a sign inside the Stonewall Jackson Death Site. Known to many people as the Jackson Shrine, it’s a plantation office building where Jackson died after being mortally wounded at the Battle of Chancellorsville. The sign said this: “Stonewall Jackson led…
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What Would You Have Done in 1861?
by Donald Smith “The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there.” — British writer L.P. Hartley “Being woke is like a magic moral time machine, where you judge everyone [who lived in the past] against what you would have done in 1066, and you always win. Presentism is just a way to…
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Congress Values Names More Than Housing for Service Members
by Donald Smith “Removing the last vestiges of Confederate history from the U.S. military, including renaming nine Army posts, will cost more than $62 million, a congressional commission said Tuesday.” That quote is from Alex Horton’s Washington Post article on the recommendations of the Naming Commission, dated September 13th, 2022. “For the base names,” wrote Horton, “the changes will…
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Youngkin and Confederate Heritage
by Donald Smith Does the Virginia GOP want the help and support of the Confederate heritage community? We should get a pretty good indicator this week. Three bills just passed by the General Assembly will soon land on Governor Youngkin’s desk, if they haven’t already. They will remove the tax exemptions of the United Daughters…
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Rep. Bob Good Calls for Hearing on Naming Commission
by Donald Smith The Virginia congressman who represents Appomattox, where the Civil War started to end,* wants the House of Representatives to examine the impacts of Congress’ attempt to grapple with the legacy of that war — an attempt that could lay the groundwork for the legacies of Confederate generals and soldiers to be deemed…
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Congress, Commission Renounce Reconciliation
by Donald Smith ‘In passing the 2021 William M. “Mac” Thornberry National Defense Authorization Act, the United States Congress determined that Confederates and the Confederacy no longer warrant commemoration through Department of Defense assets.’ *** At such a time and under such conditions I thought it eminently fitting to show some token of our feeling,…
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The Enduring Value of Arlington’s Endangered Monument to Reconciliation
by Donald Smith Jim Webb, former U.S. Senator from Virginia, former Navy Secretary, and certified badass (Navy Cross, Silver Star and two Purple Hearts from his service as a Marine officer in Vietnam) grabbed quite a bit of attention last week. On August 18 he called for the Confederate Memorial at Arlington Cemetery to be…
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Too Fearful to Cross the Rubicon
by Donald Smith Maximus: Still no word? Quintus: Not a sign. Maximus: How long has he been gone? Quintus: Nearly two hours. “He” was a Roman liaison sent to see if the Germanic tribes lined up across the valley from Maximus’ (and Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius’) legions wanted to avoid a fight. Shortly after Maximus’…
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The Pettiness of Canceling John S. Mosby
by Donald Smith In April, in Georgia, a correction morphed into an overreaction. As part of the ongoing process to change the names of military bases named for Confederate generals, Fort Benning became Fort Moore. Around the same time, the National Ranger Memorial Foundation (NRMF) responded to a directive from U.S. government officials. The NRMF sent workmen…
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The Naming Commission’s Declaration of Intent
by Donald Smith I’ve written a lot about the Congressional Naming Commission (CNC). In my opinion, the CNC has expressed contempt, and even disgust, for the legacy of people who served for the Confederacy. I base that assessment largely on the opinions and judgments the CNC declared in the Preamble to its Final Report. That Preamble is…
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Europe’s Complex Rebuttal to American Wokesters
by Donald Smith On the periphery of Rome, not far from the Vatican, stands a towering obelisk named for Benito Mussolini, Italy’s fascist dictator and ally of Adolf Hitler. On a recent visit to the city, my taxi driver knew exactly where it was and found nothing remarkable about a request to go there. The…