Here’s another recent article from my favorite magazine (even though it’s so goddamn big and ungainly it’s hard to fold in half to fit in my little shoulder bag that I wear sometimes so I can
look all faggy and elitist).

Gary Willis compares two speeches by Illinois know-nothings:

The most damaging charge against each was an alleged connection with unpatriotic and potentially violent radicals. Lincoln’s Republican Party was accused of supporting abolitionists
like William Lloyd Garrison, who burned the Constitution, or John Brown, who took arms against United States troops, or those who rejected the Supreme Court because of its Dred Scott decision.
Obama was suspected of Muslim associations and of following the teachings of an inflammatory preacher who damned the United States. How to face such charges?
Each decided to address them openly in a prominent national venue, well before their parties’ nominating conventions.

Speaking of which: I just noticed something disturbing. . . I have never seen a photo of Abraham Lincoln wearing a flag pin on his lapel. What’s up with that? Weren’t we at war while he was President?