What John Adams really thought about Thomas Jefferson: “I shudder at the calamities”
Don't expect some kind of Buzzfeed article you can read in a minute. This is a long excerpt from a lively piece of scholarship by an author who is obsessed with this particular topic.
It needs to be remembered that John Adams was a blunt person who tended to not care what people thought about him.
ReplyDeleteJohn Adams is a hero of mine.
That's all well and good to some extent. I would hope it would take more than that to make a hero, though, since those are the same words that people use to excuse Trump.
DeleteI hope you are not comparing John Adams, The 2nd President of our Republic, Leading Founding Father, one of the reasons America is free today because of the role he played in the Sons of Liberty, with that baffling baffoon, Donald Trump.
DeleteYes John Adams was sometimes blunt, but rarely in public, and never to put on a show. There is a HUGE difference between him and our current President.
If you actually read what I wrote, I never compared Trump to Adams. I commented on the use of "he doesn't care what people think about him" as some kind of a praiseworthy character trait.
DeleteIn fact, it's not meaningful for two reasons: (1) it's a trait that can be found equally in principled people and complete assholes (maybe even more so in assholes), and (2) Adams actually cared very deeply what people thought about him, which is why he spent so much of his later years defending his reputation.
Oh, and John Adams had nothing to do with the Sons of Liberty. That was his cousin Sam Adams.
DeleteJohn Adams was not involved with the Sons of Liberty.
Deletefwald, fair point, my comment was more of a throwaway in response to the lead. And, if I was trying to compare anybody to John Adams, I was trying to compare myself. :)
ReplyDeleteThe difference between John Adams and Donald Trump is that Donald Trump isn't actually a truth teller at all, he's just a liar who engages in scapegoating that losers like to believe is truth telling.
Such as "Mexicans and Chinese are stealing your jobs."
Real truth telling is more along the lines of "White men have been the beneficiaries of mediocre white male privilege for a long time, but mediocre white males can't compete with automation, so, for the first time in your lives, you're actually going to have to work hard to make the living you've become accustomed to."
Yes, that it partly hyperbole, but John Adams was a blunt truth teller, and that is much closer to blunt truth telling than anything Trump tells his idiot supporters.
@Adam T: I thought maybe you just liked him for his name. :-)
ReplyDeleteI admit I was set off because "he doesn't care what people think" is the go-to justification you always hear used by the Trump crowd.
How I feel about Adams is that, in addition to his intellect, he was exceptionally principled, which is a character trait that can make up for a lot of other personality issues. On the other hand, being principled plus being blunt and vain and a bit of an ass will often rub people the wrong way.
Of course, this stands in direct contrast to Trump et al, who have absolutely no principles.