[Plantagenet]

In the story of Robin Hood, Robin Hood supported the legitimate government (King Richard) against the usurpers led by his brother John. He was against the injustices of John impoverishing the people through harvesting ALL of the wealth of the nation, as is happening today. And not by the legitimate government or through taxes but through pillage.

Yes---thats the Disneyland version of the story. But the actual history is different. You aren't going to understand the reality of anything, Cid, if you base your understanding of the world on Disney Cartoons.

Start with the fact that although Richard was King of England for 10 years, he spent only 6 months in England. Thats right---Richard spent only 6 months in England---he was either in his home in France or on crusade or imprisioned by various people who wanted ransom payments after he got captured trying to return to England. I hate to break it to you, Cid, but in spite of what you saw in a Disney Cartoon or an Errol Flynn swashbuckling movie from the 1930s King Richard was not a very good king.

Your Disney fantasy about John "usurping" the crown is also just a cartoon fantasy. In the real world John Lackland didn't usurp the crown---thats right he didn't usurp the crown. Its almost unheard of in a royal family for a king to be able to leave the Kingdom for years to go on crusade, and then instantly regain it when he returns but thats what happened. There was no usurpation.

Yes---John Lackland wasn't a "usurper." When King Richard left England to go on the crusades, he selected three people to rule in his stead while he was away. Unfortunately one of Richard's own surrogates died immediately and the other two started to quarrel with one-another, leaving no one in control. As things got worse Richard himself told John to leave Normandy and return to England, where things were somewhat chaotic. Then Richard disappeared on his way back from the crusades. A few parts of England asked John to take direct control because he was the brother of King Richard. Later it came out that Richard had been captured by the King of Austria and was being held for ransom.

After Richard was ransomed he returned to England and he immediately took up his duties as king---John Lackland hadn't usurped the Kingship as you wrongly believe.

Then when Richard died five years layer he indicated John was to be his successor---again no sign of usurpation there. The facts are clear--- King John was no usurper---he acted on Richard's account and he never declared himself king while Richard was away---even when Richard disappeared and was thought dead--- and then King John ruled England for 50 years after Richard passed away.

Yes, John was a unpleasant person and the taxes were very high in England during King Richards time. Yes there was friction between John and King Richard when Richard returned. But there was no usurpation. Richard was always the King of England---there was some doubt when Richard disappeared and was thought dead, of course--- but John never was crowned King until after Richard's death.

But if Richard was always King, your next question will be, why were the taxes high? You don't know? The Disney cartoon you saw about Robin Hood didn't go into it? Well--- something not in the Disney version of the story is that King Richard had to tax and borrow to pay to equip an army and then he had to pay a small fortune to ship the army to Palestine for his little crusade in the Holy Land. Thats a very expensive undertaking. Richard borrowed much of the money from Jewish moneylenders (and allowed anti-Jewish programs to occur---but thats another story). The bottom line is that War taxes are always high, and Richard was set on having a glorious little war in Palestine. Then while Richard was in Palestine, a revolt broke out in Brittany which then was ruled by England. More war---more expense----more taxes. Then on the way back from the crusades Richard was captured and ransomed. The ransom for King Richard was HUGE---amounting to 3 times England's annual GDP. Much of the money for Richard's crusade was borrowed, and Richard's ransom was borrowed from his mom Eleanor of Acquaitaine, creating a huge national debt. The debt had to be repaid, just like the current US debt has to be repaid. This high level of government spending on war is what led to high taxes in England just as it drives taxes higher in the US today.

Finally, your suggestion that Robin Hood wasn't an anti-tax activist and was actually fighting the usurper for Richard is silly. TO start with, there was no usurper (see above).

Robin Hoods oppositions to the high taxes and government land seizures is the whole central point of the story---Robin Hood was against the high tax rates and high-handed treatment of the people by the British government----which was under King Richard's rule the whole time. This story is superimposed on the long standing friction between the Norman ruling class descended from the Norman Conquest, and the indigenous Saxon population which had been conquered 150 years earlier. The Norman rulers were out to keep the conquered Saxons down.


There was no "usurpation"----King Richard left a mess in England when he went off to fight the crusades and then he asked John to go to England to help sort things out. When King Richard returned John Lackland then voluntarily relinquished power and returned the Kingdom to King Richard, even though Richard returned almost alone and penniless---thats not the act of a usurper. And then when King Richard died after 10 years as King, he favored his brother John as his successor and so John then was crowned and ruled for 50 years---thus King John was no usurper was in fact the legal King of England for decades after Richard died..

Cheers!

[ennui2]

Yes---thats the Disneyland version of the story. But the actual history is different.

What are you doing, writing a history book on Robin Hood? What have you been smoking, man? Get on your meds and stay on topic.



See? Now you know how it feels to be on the receiving end of your cheap attempt to shut down discussions with animated gifs. Your demythologizing of RH is no different from me de-mythologizing John Lennon.

[Plantagenet]

Your demythologizing of RH is no different from me de-mythologizing John Lennon.

Hmmmm....thats a good point.

OK--you've convinced me ---I've changed my mind and now I agree with you 100% on that, ennui.

Cheers!


George Harrison as Robin Hood, John Lennon as a cat.

[Cid_Yama]

Plant, I haven't called you on this yet, but YOU introduced the Disney version in an attempt to trivialize and degrade the conversation.

I actually showed the trailer for the Adventures of Robin Hood with Errol Flynn.

AND, you miss the point completely (probably intentionally).

I merely thanked Cog for alluding to the Story of Robin Hood. It is the myths we culturally share that provides our cultural viewpoints. Robin Hood is a mythical character, part of a cultural story. It's the myth not the history that culturally informs us. It is allegorical.

It was an aside. Not a real part of the conversation, but you ran with it and tried to use it to trivialize the original conversation and derail this topic. In your usual Trollish manner.

You are like a 10 yr old child trolling the adults in the room and running away giggling. What a sorry commentary on you as a person.

[Cid_Yama]

I do not think it is so naive. The Native Americans Indians lived for a thousand or more years in relative harmony. .

You cant be serious. Cultures where every adult male is a "Brave" or "Warrior"
Others that sacrificed a baby every sunrise and at least one adult every sunset on top of blood drenched pyramids. You call that relative harmony?

Obviously VT, your knowledge of American Indians comes from Saturday morning Westerns. Around 1600 there were close to 1000 tribes in North America. Some as small as extended families, some covering large areas.

There were nearly 100 different languages spoken. Life styles varied. Some were agricultural, some semi-nomadic, some traders, some hunter gatherers. Sometimes there was fighting between tribes over differences, but these were not very lethal nor long lasting. Before the arrival of Europeans relations between tribes were generally peaceful. Especially compared to Europeans. They tended to be egalitarian groupings, not hierarchical. The American Indian tribes of the Northeast were agricultural and fished and hunted as well. They had friendly relations before the Europeans and engaged in trading and sharing, coming to each others aid in times of trouble. They formed confederations to formalize these relations.

You can't just lump them all together.

One thing noted during the early days of colonization, many whites left to live among the Indians, but almost never did an Indian chose to live among the white men.

The Aztec are the only tribe I know of that engaged in ceremonial sacrifice and certainly not every day. Usually coinciding with religious holidays. They were certainly not representative of other American Indian tribes.

[Plantagenet]

It was an aside. Not a real part of the conversation, but you ran with it

If its just an aside and not part of the conversation then why are you posting about it again and again? Looks like you are the one who is running with it.

Actually, IMHO its been an interesting discussion.

This discussion started when you posted the Disneyland version of the Robin Hood story and said he was a model for progressives. I then pointed out the real, historical Robin Hood, King Richard, John Lackland etc. were nothing like the way they were portrayed in the Disneyland/Errol Flynn movies you remembered, and Robin Hood himself probably had more in common with modern tax protestors then modern progressives.

Dohboi said that he doesn't even think Robin Hood was real. OK---thats possible too, but the name does occur in various legal documents from the time of King Richard.

Finally Ennui summed it up by noting that we were "de-mythologizing" Robin Hood. I like that---- "de-mythologizing". +++++

Now you are all bent out of shape because your concept of Robin Hood as a prototypical Progressive does't seem to match the historical Robin. So you were wrong----so what? I don't see why you are being such a baby about it----no one expects you to know everything about every topic, you know.

Hey---I've got an idea---if you don't want to talk about Robin Hood then stop posting about Robin Hood. Lets just discuss Progressives and Progressivism ---- its a good topic. You can quit all the childish name-calling too, OK? It just makes you look dumb.

Lets start now---Here's a suggested topic. What do you think of my earlier proposal that instead of Robin Hood we turn to someone like Emperor Marucus Aurelius, i.e. he might be a considered a prototypical progressive from history. Aurelius is a real philosopher king---he was a good ruler----he spent Rome's tax income efficiently and the made the Roman Empire run as smoothly as possible----ie. he was a Progressive.

Cheers!


Was Robin Hood a Progressive? A liberal? A Saxon Nationalist? Not a real person?

[vtsnowedin]

I do not think it is so naive. The Native Americans Indians lived for a thousand or more years in relative harmony. .

You cant be serious. Cultures where every adult male is a "Brave" or "Warrior"
Others that sacrificed a baby every sunrise and at least one adult every sunset on top of blood drenched pyramids. You call that relative harmony?

Obviously VT, your knowledge of American Indians comes from Saturday morning Westerns. Around 1600 there were close to 1000 tribes in North America. Some as small as extended families, some covering large areas.

There were nearly 100 different languages spoken. Life styles varied. Some were agricultural, some semi-nomadic, some traders, some hunter gatherers. Sometimes there was fighting between tribes over differences, but these were not very lethal nor long lasting. Before the arrival of Europeans relations between tribes were generally peaceful. Especially compared to Europeans. They tended to be egalitarian groupings, not hierarchical. The American Indian tribes of the Northeast were agricultural and fished and hunted as well. They had friendly relations before the Europeans and engaged in trading and sharing, coming to each others aid in times of trouble. They formed confederations to formalize these relations.

You can't just lump them all together.

One thing noted during the early days of colonization, many whites left to live among the Indians, but almost never did an Indian chose to live among the white men.

The Aztec are the only tribe I know of that engaged in ceremonial sacrifice and certainly not every day. Usually coinciding with religious holidays. They were certainly not representative of other American Indian tribes.

Having lost more then one ancestor to Indian wars between 1634 and 1890 I must disagree. Champlain chose sides and fought in a battle between the Algonquin and Iroquois 7/29/1609 on the west bank of Lake Champlain and he did not start that war, it was an ongoing and customary thing. Sending out war parties to steal and enslave other tribes women and children was a right of passage. Sacagawea (1804) was one such captured slave that had been gambled away to her "husband" Charbonneau a half breed trapper pedophile. If there were any "peaceful " Indians encountered it was because small pox and other plaques had swept westward much faster then the white settlers and devastated the native population.
Peaceful Indians? Tell it to Custer.

[vtsnowedin]

It is sad actually. The original post to this thread had a lot of potential and I tried to bring it along by suggesting several things worth discussing if we actually want to make "Progress" , but instead of arguing for and against any of those points the discussion has devolved into a discussion of Disney movies and native American "culture".
As I put them out I expected strong comments both for and against my points or planks as they are a deliberately mixed bag that everybody could find something to chew on.

[Plantagenet]

It is sad actually. The original post to this thread had a lot of potential ....

Yes. WELL, enough kvetching ---- I've been trying to get this thread back on track. Lets try again.....

The contrast between a progressive (Sanders) and a liberal (Hillary) in this years D primary couldn't be clearer.

However, D voters and the D establishment have already made their choice. The D party wants their nominee to be Hillary. This shows today's D party is liberal --- not progressive.

And what does liberalism mean in 2016?

1. Liberalism means corporate bailouts in return for huge corporate donations to D candidates.

2. Liberalism means government subsidies for big Pharma and big insurance companies and big defense manufacturers.

3. Liberalism means Obamacare instead of single payer.

4. Liberalism means no criminal prosecutions of rich powerful banksters after they crash the economy in return for huge donations from Wall Street to D candidates like Obama and now Hillary.

5. Liberalism means no criminal prosecutions of well-connected rich powerful D politicians and bureaucrats after they run guns to Mexican gangs, or politicize the IRS, or break espionage act laws.

6. AND Liberalism means thousands of drone strikes and illegal US wars done without Congressional authorization in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, and endless war in Afghanistan (what liberals call "the good war.").

These are all things progressives oppose and liberals endorse and do when in power---IMHO its unfortunate the liberals outnumber progressives in the D party so their policies are prevailing, but thats how it is.

Cheers!

[ennui2]

Progressive and liberal are interchangeable terms as far as I'm concerned, and accepting AGW is another tenet of the left, something you won't find in the GOP, Planty, hence your cognitive dissonance.



Cheers!

[Plantagenet]

Progressive and liberal are interchangeable terms as far as I'm concerned
Cheers!

So you don't agree with the first post that Cid put up in this thread distinguishing between Hillary as a liberal and Bernie as a progressive?

Clearly there is quite a bit of difference between Hillary and Bernie---and in spite of your claim that the terms progressive and liberal are synonyms, they actually aren't. But no doubt you don't accept the dictionary definitions of liberal and conservative either, since you have convinced yourself they are the same.

Your insistence that two things that are different are actually the same is just more evidence of your cognitive dissonance. Even little kids on Sesame Street can tell when things aren't the same


ho ho ho!

Cheers!

GO BERNIE GO!

[ItalyRules]

Plant, for your info, there was no clearly identifiable 'historical' Robin Hood.

"It is simply not possible to locate the historical Robin Hood with any certainty. "

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/mi ... n_01.shtml

I hate to take this off topic again, but what Dohboi says is true.

The first clear reference to "rhymes of Robin Hood" is from c1377, the late-14th-century poem Piers Plowman, but the earliest surviving copies of the narrative ballads that tell his story date to the second half of 15th century (i.e. the 1400s), or the first decade of the 16th century (1500s). In these early accounts, Robin Hood's partisanship of the lower classes, his Marianism and associated special regard for women, his outstanding skill as an archer, his anti-clericalism, and his particular animosity towards the Sheriff of Nottingham are already clear.

As well as ballads, the legend was also transmitted by "Robin Hood games" or plays that were an important part of the late medieval and early modern May Day festivities. The first record of a Robin Hood game was in 1426 in Exeter, but the reference does not indicate how old or widespread this custom was at the time. The Robin Hood games are known to have flourished in the later 15th and 16th centuries.[11] It is commonly stated as fact that Maid Marian and a jolly friar (at least partly identifiable with Friar Tuck) entered the legend through the May Games.[12]

And seems to be from a much later period.

The early compilation, A Gest of Robyn Hode, names the king as "Edward"; and while it does show Robin Hood accepting the King's pardon, he later repudiates it and returns to the greenwood.

He doesn't appear to be historical at all, but political fiction among the lower classes from the late 1400s.

[Plantagenet]

I hate to take this off topic again, but ....

The first clear reference to "rhymes of Robin Hood" is from c1377, the late-14th-century poem Piers Plowman.....
He doesn't appear to be historical at all, but political fiction among the lower classes from the late 1400s.

I'm sorry but the dates in your post don't make any sense. You end by saying that Robin Hood is a "political fiction ...from the late 1400s" but at the beginning of your own post you say the first written reference to Robin Hood comes from "c1377".

I know dates are difficult for people to keep straight, but please----the year 1377 is not in the late 1400s---its in the late 1300s---a century earlier.

Why is this important? Because the first written version of the Robin Hood story from .c1377 is clearly based on existing oral traditions, and this means the story of Robin Hood is even older. King Richard's reign ended in 1189---188 years before the first written telling of the story. That certainly makes it possible that the Robin Hood story originates from some kind of actual events dating back to King Richard's time. Thats usually how stories get started----people start talking about something and the story gets retold and maybe exaggerated and improved and somebody writes a song or a poem about it and it gets handed down and becomes a folkloric tradition, and oral folkloric stories and traditions can easily be retold and retold and handed down for hundreds of years.

Is the Robin Hood story 100% as Walt Disney or Errol Flynn portrayed it in their films. No, of course not, as I've already shown in posts above. But does this mean the story isn't based on actual event or events? No---mostly likely there was some interesting story about some real happenings that was retold and then retold with embellishments until it entered the oral folk tradition.

cheers!


Somewhere there was an "ur-Robin Hood"

[Timo]

It is sad actually. The original post to this thread had a lot of potential ....

Yes. WELL, enough kvetching ---- I've been trying to get this thread back on track. Lets try again.....

The contrast between a progressive (Sanders) and a liberal (Hillary) in this years D primary couldn't be clearer.

However, D voters and the D establishment have already made their choice. The D party wants their nominee to be Hillary. This shows today's D party is liberal --- not progressive.

And what does liberalism mean in 2016?

1. Liberalism means corporate bailouts in return for huge corporate donations to D candidates.

2. Liberalism means government subsidies for big Pharma and big insurance companies and big defense manufacturers.

3. Liberalism means Obamacare instead of single payer.

4. Liberalism means no criminal prosecutions of rich powerful banksters after they crash the economy in return for huge donations from Wall Street to D candidates like Obama and now Hillary.

5. Liberalism means no criminal prosecutions of well-connected rich powerful D politicians and bureaucrats after they run guns to Mexican gangs, or politicize the IRS, or break espionage act laws.

6. AND Liberalism means thousands of drone strikes and illegal US wars done without Congressional authorization in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, and endless war in Afghanistan (what liberals call "the good war.").

These are all things progressives oppose and liberals endorse and do when in power---IMHO its unfortunate the liberals outnumber progressives in the D party so their policies are prevailing, but thats how it is.

Cheers!

Geeze, Plant! You make being liberal sound like a bad thing!!! I'm a liberal, or at least i used to be, before i became a socialist progressive. You actually did a good job of describing my rationales for making that switch. Still, being a liberal today is almost better than being a conservative. Almost. If you attempt to describe the virtues of being a conservative, make sure you don't forget the unicorns and rainbows. No one would confuse that description with one of a liberal on any day. Good luck!

[Plantagenet]

Geeze, Plant! You make being liberal sound like a bad thing!!! I'm a liberal, or at least i used to be, before i became a socialist progressive. You actually did a good job of describing my rationales for making that switch.

Good to hear.

You know what they say---great minds think alike.

Cheers!

GO BERNIE GO!

[vtsnowedin]

Looking at the other side, Conservatism I have to say that I am not a Wall street conservative nor a T Partyer. My own agnostic Red neck Vermonter conservatism goes something like this:
1. Budget :
Deficit spending is always bad. In all cases other then all out war if it is worth doing it is worth raising all the taxes to pay for it this year.
2, Defense :
Have a strong well equipped and trained armed forces and have leaders that know how to use them with effect without wasting lives for little gain.
At the same time constantly guard against $1000 toilet seat expenditures.
3. Veterans:
No veteran should ever pay a doctors or hospital bill ever or have to wait longer for an appointment the a civilian with good insurance. All charities to help veterans should become useless and unneeded.
4.Infrastructure.
The work should be turned over to the states and the feds should get out of the way.
5. Abortion/ Roe vs. Wade.
Leave it alone as long as every woman is free to not have an abortion.
Provide services and options so that they are not financial pressured to have one.
6. Social security.
The government should keep its promises and should raise taxes to cover the cost. No expansion of the program is feasible.
7. Welfare.
Set payments so going to work if possible is always a better option. Test for drug use and kick out users.
8. Immigration.
Close the border, what ever it takes, Speed up admission process for those we want to let in and speed up deportation process for those that commit crimes here. create automatic citizenship for those with an honorable discharge from the armed forces for soldier spouse and children.
9. Education.
Close federal department of ed. They don't know how to do it.
Drop interest rate on student loans and collect with tax withholding.
10. Tax law.
rewrite federal tax code from a blank sheet, goal of two hundred pages or less. no special loopholes, top tax bracket goal of 25 percent. (balanced budget overrules) No way to transfer money to trusts and foundations without paying tax first. All income/profits taxed one time minimum and maximum.
Corporate taxes set at competitive rates compared to rest of world. No loop holes. No body gets to pay zero. Profits paid out as dividends to stock holders taxed on their return but not on the corporations return. Profits retained as cash pool taxed every year. (use it or lose it).
Replace capital gains tax with portfolio profits tax so the rich can't let their winners ride while cashing in their losers and pay no tax.

11. Environment:
Use good judgement about the cost effectiveness of requirements. Don't worry about the frogs in a man made ditch "wetland" but don't let the big developer fill in a tide flat.

12. Trade.
Renegotiate or cancel out trade deals to reach "Fair trade". If they are subsidizing a product $200 a ton and we are taxing it $100 a ton then the import duty should be $300 a ton until they drop their subsidy.
Etc, Etc. Etc.

[Timo]

Apparently Redneck Vermont Conservatism is not based on unicorns or rainbows.

Please tell me that you at least have pixie dust!

[vtsnowedin]

Apparently Redneck Vermont Conservatism is not based on unicorns or rainbows.

Please tell me that you at least have pixie dust!

Maple syrup yes. Pixie dust no.

[Cid_Yama]

Talk about dishonest. You cut off his quote EXACTLY where it said late 1400s. then attacked him with this,

I know dates are difficult for people to keep straight, but please----the year 1377 is not in the late 1400s---its in the late 1300s---a century earlier.

The first clear reference to "rhymes of Robin Hood" is from c1377, the late-14th-century poem Piers Plowman, but the earliest surviving copies of the narrative ballads that tell his story date to the second half of 15th century (i.e. the 1400s), or the first decade of the 16th century (1500s). In these early accounts, Robin Hood's partisanship of the lower classes, his Marianism and associated special regard for women, his outstanding skill as an archer, his anti-clericalism, and his particular animosity towards the Sheriff of Nottingham are already clear.

As well as ballads, the legend was also transmitted by "Robin Hood games" or plays that were an important part of the late medieval and early modern May Day festivities. The first record of a Robin Hood game was in 1426 in Exeter, but the reference does not indicate how old or widespread this custom was at the time. The Robin Hood games are known to have flourished in the later 15th and 16th centuries.[11] It is commonly stated as fact that Maid Marian and a jolly friar (at least partly identifiable with Friar Tuck) entered the legend through the May Games.[12]

And if you want to talk about dates, lets talk dates. Richard I (September 8, 1157 – April 6, 1199). Richard died 178 YEARS before the first clear reference to Robin Hood.

Over the years the figures of Robin Hood and Richard I have become closely linked. However, in the earliest Robin Hood ballads the only king mentioned is "Edward our comely king", presumably Edward I, II, or III. It was not until much later that a connection came to be made between the two men.

link

I guess SOME people have problems with dates, and it wasn't the poster.

You engage in this type of dishonesty all of the time, usually attacking someone who has posted a truth you don't like, and I am constantly forced to call you on it. You have proved yourself not to be an honest person or have integrity. I wouldn't want you on my bandwagon. Go back to the Republicans where you belong.

The Progressive fight is one of honest men with integrity standing against injustice.