General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMirror, mirror on the wall, who is the best president of them all ? :-)))))))))))))
Dennis Donovan
(18,770 posts)syringis
(5,101 posts)In addition to all my sincere wishes to Trump, I wish him to get stuck in front of that mirror with no way out.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100210679839
Aristus
(66,462 posts)Right up there with John F. Kennedy.
Chester Arthur was often called handsome in his day, but by modern standards, come on!...
Yes, true.
He's nice to look at, and so is his wife. He and Michelle make a great couple.
I don't know much about Chester Arthur.
I only have a fairly general knowledge of US history. I can draw a rough general timeline, cite a few salient facts, a few characters, situate this or that president correctly, no doubt a little more than what is taught in our countries, but it does not go any further.
It's still very schematic.
I won't say Chester Arthur is handsome. This is only a personal appreciation, it being understood that beauty is a very relative notion.
Aristus
(66,462 posts)I'm an American History nut. Presidential trivia is one of my favorite cocktail party discussion subjects.
Naturally, it irritates me when these right-wing pseudopatriots reveal that they actually know nothing about the history of the U.S.A. When they spew their ignorant idiocies and insist that: "I'm entitled ta m'bleefs!" I want to tell them to drag out a book on American History and read it for once.
syringis
(5,101 posts)I'm passionate about history.
I think it is important, because we are the fruit of it. Just as our descendants will be the fruit of our actions. After all, to oversimplify, what we call history today is only yesterday's politics.
Interconnecting, understanding, often restoring historical truth, allows us to better understand our present world.
Unfortunately, history in our school curricula is often, almost always, a poor relative, a minor discipline.
Aristus
(66,462 posts)is to take a close look at the pictures of people from long ago. It can be very moving to look past the strange clothes, the funny hats, and the weird hairstyles and facial whiskers, and just look at the people, the human beings, who were just like us. They had no conception that they were living in a distinct historical period on which other people would look back as either better or worse than the one from which they are observing.
People with emotions, ideas, families, friends, loved ones, dreams. Things that can't always be conveyed in flat, motionless, black-and-white images.
lunatica
(53,410 posts)is that they pretty much developed their personalities by learning from their immediate family and peers. Someone growing up in a small town in the Midwest would have very different life views, beliefs, and behavior from someone growing up in New York City.
Im probably not making my point very clear but maybe I can narrow it down to comparing todays media savvy Millenials with their reality to people who grew up a 100 years ago, when virtually no gadgets, not even telephones were part of the mix.
Ive often wondered about that, especially as the ability to communicate with modern equipment expands our lives and at the same time shrinks the world.
Just ruminations.
syringis
(5,101 posts)Last edited Sun Jun 3, 2018, 07:40 AM - Edit history (1)
In reality, only great events and famous people are precisely dated and documented.
History is what the contemporaries of the time chose to make us known .
The choice is not necessarily conscious. We will relate important facts but not all the little things that make everyday life.
In this sense, even if the black and white photos of the very beginning do not always reflect all the emotions, are not very natural and for good reason, being photographed was an event, they posed for the photo, they give a better overview of the period compared to the time when they did not exist.
Moreover, history as a science, and thus following a rigorous methodology, is relatively recent.
One only has to read the historical archives, which were often written by the people of the Church. Practically the only ones besides the nobles, namely reading and writing.
And as usual, history is written by the winners. In other words, many of the so-called historical facts are fiction rather than reality. There is also the political dimension and the message we wanted to give
Louis XIV never said "L'Etat c'est moi" or Marie-Antoinette : "let them eat cake"...
treestar
(82,383 posts)lol
treestar
(82,383 posts)NastyRiffraff
(12,448 posts)Obama is great inside and outside. Trump? Well, his outside reflects his inside.