There are statues of people like Captain John Mason who led massacres of Pequots in which English colonizers killed approximately 600 people, mostly women, children and old men.
Many early US presidents owned slaves and were dedicated white supremacists. Throughout the South there are monuments to revered leaders who started the bloodiest war the US has ever fought because they wished to continue enslaving people. In the Midwest there are schools and parks named after generals who slaughtered Indians, including non-combatants. In Miami, people like Luis Posada Carilles still walk free despite involvement in bombing attacks on Cuban airliners and night clubs.
And Mandela's a terrorist?
It's amazing to me that many of the same people who like to take inspiration from such quotes as "don't tread on me" or "give me liberty or give me death" and other pro-resistance sayings suddenly get cold feet when the person who's resisting happens to be black. Apartheid was a crime against humanity and one which Mandela and freedom loving people of every background had every right to resist. If someone tries to tell me that I can't vote, can't live freely in my own country, and that me and mine can be beaten or shot down in the street at another's whim you better believe I will fight back.
If someone as far to the right as
Newt Gingrich can see this you wonder why some other conservatives can't.
Some of the people who are most opposed to oppression from Washington attack Mandela when he was opposed to oppression in his own country.
After years of preaching non-violence, using the political system, making his case as a defendant in court, Mandela resorted to violence against a government that was ruthless and violent in its suppression of free speech.
As Americans we celebrate the farmers at Lexington and Concord who used force to oppose British tyranny. We praise George Washington for spending eight years in the field fighting the British Army’s dictatorial assault on our freedom...
I would ask of his critics: where were some of these conservatives as allies against tyranny? Where were the masses of conservatives opposing Apartheid? In a desperate struggle against an overpowering government, you accept the allies you have just as Washington was grateful for a French monarchy helping him defeat the British.
