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Nelson Mandela Dead At 95
New submitter Emilio Hodge writes "Nelson Mandela, the revered statesman who emerged from prison after 27 years to lead South Africa out of decades of apartheid, has died, President Jacob Zuma announces. He was 95." Mandela's death is covered by lots of news sources, of course, including The New York Times and The Washington Post.
To be imprisoned for 27 years but still have the selflessness to bring peace and freedom to his country so that nobody should share his fate is the essence of compassion, generosity, and forgiveness. He is a shinning example of the human spirit.
I hesitated to respond to you because we live in entirely different worlds, and I don't think any number of Slashdot posts is going to fix that.
However, to be clear, I wasn't implying that Reagan or Thatcher had a problem with violence.
On the contrary; they had a problem with South Africa becoming a communist satellite. When the communist agitators resort to violence, that just makes it easier to convince the domestic public that the communists are bad. Obviously when it is bin Laden fighting the Soviets, violence is just fine. We both understand how it works.
Regarding your last point: South Africa of today is one of the most dangerous and violent places on earth; Mandela did next to nothing to address black on white or even black-on-black violence. There was a huge white-flight out of SA during the 90s.
Perhaps you think this is a positive outcome. I don't.
No racial reconciliation is perfect, of course. I would say that the US probably didn't do enough to help re-enfranchise blacks, and that South Africa may have done a bit too much.
The bottom line is this: I very much enjoyed living in the Reagan years America. I very much would NOT have liked living in the Mandela years SA.
I think Reagan and Thatcher were both great, as far as people who have actually held office go, and I am disappointed that the Reagan we got was nowhere close to the Reagan that campaigned. I was all for abolishing the Depts of Ed, Energy, and the ATF. Very disappointed with Reagan on that score...
The other transgressions in his career (military adventurism) bother me, but I don't think they actually bother Reagan detractors that much. The people who bitterly hate Reagan tend to hate him for reasons that his supporters like him. Similarly, if you accuse Thatcher of being a union buster or for cleaning up free loaders on the dole, people like me will say "bravo Thatcher".
The bottom line is that you and I probably agree that Reagan/Thatcher supported a bunch of wars and terrorists that they shouldn't have. But you shouldn't pretend like that is the basis for your displeasure with them. Especially not when every other US and UK leader since (some of which you've certainly hated LESS, if not mildly supported) has done the same exact shit...
My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
Mandela was working against a government who developed such things as the 'street sweeper' ultra-high capacity shotgun for crowd control
When a freaking beast has their boot on your throat it is impossible to play nice
The greatest credit to Mandela is that when he did gain power he did not succumb to stupid behavior (land grabs, nepotism and economic decline) like his neighbor Mugabe
The Nazis were democratically elected into power. If you supported democracy, you had to support the Nazis in 1939 (prior to their invasion of Poland in September). I opposed the younger Bush and voted against him both times, but I supported his government because he fairly won a democratic election.
There's this baffling tendency for people to try to oversimplify other people's actions and motivations to one single factor. That's almost never the case. Support or opposition is usually based on a myriad of factors, and quite often one's support can be a borderline thing chosen only because it's the lesser of two evils. It's very possible to oppose apartheid, yet support the (then) current government of South Africa because you feared if they lost power the government which replaced it would be much worse than apartheid.
If all choices were easy, politics wouldn't exist. Politics is all about having to decide between difficult (and often unpalatable) choices. Armchair quarterbacking is all about criticizing those making those difficult choices, by pretending that the negative consequences of the other choices don't exist.