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John Kelly appeared Monday on the first night of Laura Ingraham’s new show, The Ingraham Angle. When asked about taking down Confederate monuments, he defended Robert E. Lee and then said “the lack of an ability to compromise led to the Civil War.”Donald Trump is freaking out over the Russia indictments, so naturally his chief of staff went on Fox News and went into damage control mode. Or he basically defended the Confederacy’s position on slavery. One of the two.
Wow. Gen. John Kelly just said “the lack of ability to compromise led to the Civil War.”
Compromise on what, exactly?
— Christina Wilkie (@christinawilkie)
Yeah, not great. Fun history lesson: The Civil War was very much, explicitly about slavery. So yes, lawmakers could have compromised to avoid the Civil War. But that compromise would have involved protecting slavery.
Pundit: “Today couldn’t possibly have gone worse for Trump.”
John Kelly: “Hold my beer.”
compromise is only “always possible” in a world where nothing actually matters https://twitter.com/nedwelch1/status/925204492227960833 …
Were lots of last ditch compromise efforts in 1860/1861 following Lincoln’s win. All of them kept slavery in place. https://twitter.com/christinawilkie/status/925188350205710336 …
Thank you John Kelly for finally dispelling the rumor that John Kelly is a better man than any of Trump’s other racist enablers. https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/925193491445112832 …
The Civil War was fought over slavery
The Civil War was fought over slavery
The Civil War was fought over slavery.
This will be on the test. https://twitter.com/christinawilkie/status/925188350205710336 …The Civil War wasn’t caused by a “lack of ability to compromise.” It was caused by slavery. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/05/why-there-was-a-civil-war/524925/ …
Kelly: “The lack of ability to compromise caused the Civil War.”
I prefer Lincoln’s analysis:
You get off twitter for like two hours and when you come back, the chief of staff is defending the confederacy. #thisis2017
More and more, the picture of Kelly as the “adult in the room” is looking ridiculous. To make these comments — especially after Charlottesville, and Trump’s defense of people who marched with neo-Nazis — is inexcusable.
andrew kaczynski
