Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Congressman Joe Wilson's Neo-Confederate Past

In "Joe Wilson's Dixie Partisans," writer Joe Conason at Truthout offers a deeper perspective on U.S. House of Representatives member Joe Wilson (R-S.C.), now infamous for shouting "You lie" to President Barack Obama during his recent speech before a joint session of Congress. Conason's article lends credence to those who have claimed that Wilson is bigot.

Highlights:

Nothing surprising there, however, to anyone familiar with the Wilson entourage and outlook. The consultant behind the excitable right-wing congressman is Richard Quinn, long a central figure in both South Carolina Republican politics and the "neo-Confederate" movement, notably as editor and publisher of a periodical called The Southern Partisan.

Long before Quinn started selling those Joe Wilson tees, his magazine used to market T-shirts denigrating Abraham Lincoln, which displayed a portrait of him above the slogan "Sic Semper Tyrannis" - the phrase shouted by John Wilkes Booth after shooting the Civil War president. No doubt Quinn considered that to be an expression of "patriotism," too, although not to the United States of America.

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