Eric Zorn's "Long Knives' Comment to Commenter:Hurtful Anti-Irish Catholic Hate Speech

Oh, wow. Hate Speech from Eric Zorn?
Following a dignified and rather sober question from an obviously intelligent and patriotic reader, the fiery Zorn let's fly with what can only be described as a Hate Trope!

Behold the exchange and avert your eyes, if needs be, as the second in 1-2 Zorn Knockout combination hits home.

Why is it "cowardly" to challenge bad petitions? If a candidate can't follow the law to get on the ballot, why should he or she be exempt from challenge?

I wonder if Eric would find an objection cowardly if a candidate for, say, governor filed petitions with 2 signatures? In the absence of a challenge, he gets on the ballot.

ZORN REPLY -- I'm pretty clear in the column: I think ballot-access fees are the way to go and that those who want to get on the ballot and make a good-faith showing of intent and energy and interest should be allowed on the ballot.

Get ready to watch the long knives *come out to knock Claypool off the ballot. And you know the motivation: Fear. Plain and simple fear. Mr. "Reformer," you ought to know that.

Posted by: Reformer | Tuesday, May 04, 2010 at 11:11 AM

"the long knives" is that not anti-Irish Hate Language? Madigan, Burke, Daley????????

Long Knives was a Native American euphemism for the US Cavalry of who the largest demographic were Irish Catholics, a minority group long considered 'close-knit, tribally racist and politically dominant' - Why this is nothing more than Hate Speech! Oh, Wounded Knees, Indeed!!!! Brush up your Ward Churchill! This is Hateful, hurtful. Hozanna Hannah!

Hath not a Mick feelings? Hath not Harp a Home? Hath not a Raw Jaw children?

He hath.


We know Hate Code, Eric. Joe Medill was a master. These are much better**!




* Long Knives

The full complement of the 7th Cavalry in June 1876 was 43 officers and 793 enlisted men. Of that number 473 were native born and 320 foreign born. The two largest foreign-born groups in the regiment comprised 129 Irish and 127 Germans. The remaining 64 foreign born were drawn from 14 other nationalities, including six Italians. These were: 1st Lt. Charles Camillus DeRudio (a k a Count Carlo Camillo Di Rudio) of Company A; Private Augustus L. De Voto (a k a Augusto De Voto) of Company B; Private John James (a k a Giovanni Casella) of Company E; Private Frank Lombard (a k a Frank Lombardy, Francesco Lombardi) of the regimental band; Private John Martin (a k a Giovanni Martini), trumpeter of Company H; and Chief Musician Felix Villiet Vinatieri (a k a Felice Villiet Vinatieri) of the regimental band. Two of the six were married. As might be expected, given that the pay of the era made it virtually impossible for junior enlisted personnel to wed and support a family, they were the two highest ranking: DeRudio and Vinatieri.

Unlike native-born Americans, Irish and Germans, the Italians were too few to constitute a group or subculture in the regiment. They were individuals who had come to the United States for a variety of reasons, both political and economic. In many cases the latter flowed from the former. Irish and Germans constituted major immigrant groups during the 19th century. Both nationalities immigrated largely for economic reasons by the mid-1800s. Socially, the Germans were more acceptable; they frequently were skilled craftsmen, and a very large percentage were Protestants. The Irish were much less socially acceptable; they were mostly unskilled, usually dirt-poor and Roman Catholic. In 1876 they constituted a clearly defined minority group that suffered very real social and economic discrimination. The Italians shared many of the social disadvantages of the Irish as well as some unique to themselves. They, too, were Roman Catholics; they were poor and, as southern Europeans, tended to be short and swarthy, and thus further removed in appearance from the northern European norm. Further, they came to the new country speaking a foreign tongue. The only advantage the Italians had over the Irish was that they were so few that they were not objects of such organized discrimination.

http://www.historynet.com/the-7th-us-cavalry-regiment-fought-in-the-battle-of-the-little-bighorn.htm

They live on beasts only, and live like beasts. They have not progressed at all from the habits of pastoral living. ..This is a filthy people, wallowing in vice. Of all peoples it is the least instructed in the rudiments of the faith. They do not yet pay tithes or first fruits or contract marriages. They do not avoid incest.
- Giraldus Cambrensis/Gerald of Wales, The History and Topography of Ireland, 12th Century

How godly a deed it is to overthrow so wicked a race the world may judge: for my part I think there cannot be a greater sacrifice to God.
- Edward Barkley, describing how the forces of the Earl of Essex slaughtered the entire population of Rathlin Island, Co. Antrim, 1575

Marry those be the most barbaric and loathy conditions of any people (I think) under heaven...They do use all the beastly behaviour that may be, they oppress all men, they spoil as well the subject, as the enemy; they steal, they are cruel and bloody, full of revenge, and delighting in deadly execution, licentious, swearers and blasphemers, common ravishers of women, and murderers of children.
- Edmund Spenser, A View of the State of Ireland, 1596

And first I have to find fault with the abuse of language; that is, for the speaking of Irish among the English, which as it is unnatural that any people should love another's language more than their own, so it is very inconvenient and the cause of many other evils. ...It seemeth strange to me that the English should take more delight to speak that language than their own, whereas they should, methinks, rather take scorn to acquaint their tongues thereto. For it hath ever been the use of the conqueror to despise the language of the conquered and to force him by all means to learn his.
- A View of the State of Ireland

I have often said, and written, it is Famine which must consume [the Irish]; our swords and other endeavours work not that speedy effect which is expected for their overthrow.
- English Viceroy Arthur Chichester writing to Elizabeth I's chief advisor, Nov. 1601

The time hath been, when they lived like Barbarians, in woods, in bogs, and in desolate places, without politic law, or civil government, neither embracing religion, law or mutual love. That which is hateful to all the world besides is only beloved and embraced by the Irish, I mean civil wars and domestic dissensions .... the Cannibals, devourers of men's flesh, do learn to be fierce amongst themselves, but the Irish, without all respect, are even more cruel to their neighbours.
- Barnaby Rich, A New Description of Ireland, 1610

All wisdom advises us to keep this [Irish] kingdom as much subordinate and dependent on England as possible; and, holding them from manufacture of wool (which unless otherwise directed, I shall by all means discourage), and then enforcing them to fetch their cloth from England, how can they depart from us without nakedness and beggary?
- Lord Stafford, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, in a letter to King Charles I, 1634

So ended the fairest promise that Ireland had ever known of becoming a prosperous and a happy country.
- Sir William Temple, about 1673, (the export of wool from Ireland to England was forbidden in 1660)

In all countries, more or less, paupers may be discovered; but an entire nation of paupers is what was never seen until it was shown in Ireland. To explain the social condition of such a country, it would be only necessary to recount its miseries and its sufferings; the history of the poor is the history of Ireland.
- Gustave de Beaumont, French visitor, 1839

Ireland is like a half-starved rat that crosses the path of an elephant. What must the elephant do? Squelch it - by heavens - squelch it.
- Thomas Carlyle, British essayist, 1840s

...being altogether beyond the power of man, the cure had been applied by the direct stroke of an all-wise Providence in a manner as unexpected and as unthought of as it is likely to be effectual.

The judgement of God sent the calamity to teach the Irish a lesson, that calamity must not be too much mitigated. …The real evil with which we have to contend is not the physical evil of the Famine, but the moral evil of the selfish, perverse and turbulent character of the people.
Charles Trevelyan, head of administration for famine relief, 1840s

[existing policies] will not kill more than one million Irish in 1848 and that will scarcely be enough to do much good.
- Queen Victoria's economist, Nassau Senior

A Celt will soon be as rare on the banks of the Shannon as the red man on the banks of Manhattan.
- The Times, editorial, 1848

I am haunted by the human chimpanzees I saw along that hundred miles of horrible country...to see white chimpanzees is dreadful; if they were black one would not see it so much, but their skins, except where tanned by exposure, are as white as ours.
- Cambridge historian Charles Kingsley, letter to his wife from Ireland, 1860

A creature manifestly between the Gorilla and the Negro is to be met with in some of the lowest districts of London and Liverpool by adventurous explorers. It comes from Ireland, whence it has contrived to migrate; it belongs in fact to a tribe of Irish savages: the lowest species of Irish Yahoo. When conversing with its kind it talks a sort of gibberish. It is, moreover, a climbing animal, and may sometimes be seen ascending a ladder ladden with a hod of bricks.
Satire entitled "The Missing Link", from the British magazine Punch, 1862

This would be a grand land if only every Irishman would kill a Negro, and be hanged for it. I find this sentiment generally approved - sometimes with the qualification that they want Irish and Negroes for servants, not being able to get any other.
- British historian Edward Freeman, writing on his return from America, about 1881

...Furious fanaticism; a love of war and disorder; a hatred for order and patient industry; no accumulative habits; restless; treacherous and uncertain: look to Ireland...
As a Saxon, I abhor all dynasties, monarchies and bayonet governments, but this latter seems to be the only one suitable for the Celtic man.
Robert Knox, anatomist, describing his views on the "Celtic character", 1850

The Celts are not among the progressive, initiative races, but among those which supply the materials rather than the impulse of history...The Persians, the Greeks, the Romans and the Teutons are the only makers of history, the only authors of advancement. ...Subjection to a people of a higher capacity for government is of itself no misfortune; and it is to most countries the condition of their political advancement.
- British historian Lord Acton, 1862

You would not confide free representative institutions to the Hottentots [savages], for instance.
- Lord Salisbury, who opposed Home Rule for Ireland, 1886

...more like squalid apes than human beings. ...unstable as water. ...only efficient military despotism [can succeed in Ireland] ...the wild Irish understand only force.
- James Anthony Froude, Professor of history, Oxford