Blue Skies in Camelot: An Alternate 60's and Beyond
- Thread starter President_Lincoln
- Start date
Thank you to everyone for the discussion, compliments, and continued readership! 
I apologize once again for missing a scheduled update this past Friday, and though I won't offer excuses, I will say that the personal issues previously mentioned involving a friend are finally being resolved in a safe, healthy, and meaningful way. My hope is that these missed updates can be made up for and that I will be able to resume the previous schedule without further interruptions on that front.
Speaking on the issue of Falwell, Wallace and "Cartoonish Evil", I will do my best to remain fair in my presentation of historical figures that I will admit I possess personal animosity toward. In the same way that I don't want to turn JFK into Superman, I don't want Falwell to be tying maidens to railroad tracks. I appreciate you all holding me to my word in that regard, and hope that the TL will continue to maintain its sense of fun and realism at the same time.
The best,
President_Lincoln
I apologize once again for missing a scheduled update this past Friday, and though I won't offer excuses, I will say that the personal issues previously mentioned involving a friend are finally being resolved in a safe, healthy, and meaningful way. My hope is that these missed updates can be made up for and that I will be able to resume the previous schedule without further interruptions on that front. Speaking on the issue of Falwell, Wallace and "Cartoonish Evil", I will do my best to remain fair in my presentation of historical figures that I will admit I possess personal animosity toward. In the same way that I don't want to turn JFK into Superman, I don't want Falwell to be tying maidens to railroad tracks. I appreciate you all holding me to my word in that regard, and hope that the TL will continue to maintain its sense of fun and realism at the same time.
The best,
President_Lincoln
Take your time, we'll be here; glad your friend is doing OK.Thank you to everyone for the discussion, compliments, and continued readership!
Take your time. May have more ideas, whenever you're ready to message me on here.
I pegged him at about an 8.5 on the asswipe scale and a solid 9.5 on the sniveling coward index.
If, as you imply, Falwell was a Johnny-One-Note bigot, who furthered his agenda of hate by posing as a religious leader and whose motivation for everything he did in his life was his hatred of Black people, then I couldn't agree with you more: He would be to me a horrible, wicked, abominable human being for whom the fires of hell couldn't be hot enough. Maybe you're right...and forgive an old man his memory lapse, but I just don't remember Falwell being the "bombastic," cliche' unreconstructed Ku-Klux-Klan-sympathizer Southern preacher that he is being portrayed as in this timeline. Falwell began his ministry before I was born. My memories of him during the Reagan years were more of a slightly sleazy car or snake-oil salesman than of a hood-and-sheet wearing burner of crosses...I just don't remember him oozing hate like George Wallace. Maybe he was. Do you seriously KNOW this was his sole motivation? He could have just as easily been an amoral opportunist saying what people wanted to hear in order to line his own pockets (as "some" so-called religious leaders have done elsewhere) and held no profound core beliefs other than benefiting himself. He could just as easily have been a man of integrity who was really, really wrong about some really, really important things. Are the only people of integrity to be found in this world folks who only agree with you on everything? Don't religious people in this country still have the right to have their opinions heard or should they have their voting privileges stripped from them and the running of things only be put into the hands of those non-religious people who think "correctly?" That smacks of a different form of bigotry to my old ear...which I suspect may have been one of the motivations why Jerry Falwell started the Moral Majority in the first place.
I still resent the implication that I see betimes on this forum that all religious people are ignorant, reactionary morons, and that all white Southern Americans are unreconstructed racists. To paint all religious people and Southern Americans (and Southern Baptists for that matter) with this broad brush is still, in my opinion, cartoonish. When this cliche is perpetuated, an injustice is done to all the people of faith who fought (and still fight) for civil rights all over the United States, some of whom were (and are) actually white Southerners and Southern Baptists.
Glad you're back Mr. President. I really AM enjoying your well-written timeline. I hope you understand that my caution against "cartoonizing" really amounts to nitpicks inspired by my own personal pet peeves. I shouldn't have even mentioned this and I apologize. I will keep my mouth shut in the future. I hope my nitpicks won't deflate your enthusiasm and that you'll keep going with this.
No one is saying all religious people are morons and it's asinine to suggest that anyone was saying that there voting rights of religious people should be restricted was implied, nice stretch there. Were pointing out the fact that Falwell was a bigoted prick, and that no amount of opining about what his motivations were or might have been is going to change that, as his actions and words speak plenty for him which you seem determined to ignore to push the woe is us religious people narrative. Plenty of horrible people think they have good reasons to do things, and your defense of him is frankly sickening. Hitchens was 100% correct when he said that if they'd given his body an enema they would have been able to bury him in a matchbox.
To be fair, George Wallace did just that to win the Governor's Mansion back in 1962.
I have come to abhor George C. Wallace for being an opportunist more than I abhor him
for being a race-baiter. His American Experience documentary does a good job of showing black Alabamians who knew him before and after 1958. They seemed genuinely disappointed, if not betrayed, that Wallace had turned to being the dog whistler he was, and think that is his worst crime. He wasn’t a bad man, just a greatly flawed man who like most of us had the power to do great works, but chose to stoop to such low levels.
Yeah, Wallace was an opportunist who used the turmoil to his advantage. One of the better portrayals of him is in @The Congressman's A New Deal Coalition Retained, where he actually becomes president--but manages to modify many of his racial stances (to be fair, he did this OTL as well)...
Thank you, I'm glad to hear you're enjoying the TL! Please do not apologize or "keep your mouth shut" as you say!
I really do welcome all feedback, criticism, and ideas for Blue Skies. I never want to create an echo chamber for myself and just hear what I want to hear, as it were. Please feel free to continue pushing me to be my best through any critiques you can! Your nitpicks don't deflate my enthusiasm, but rather help me challenge myself, and I appreciate them.
Thanks again!Don't really want to derail this further, but I will say this regarding Falwell:
Matthew - 7:16
Just caught up with this TL, and I'm glad I found it! I eagerly await the next update.
"By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?"