GOP Chief: House More Divided Now Than Over Slavery

August 15th, 2008 at 01:50pm Aaron Chambers

I’ve got to hand it to Andy McKenna, chairman of the Illinois Republican Party, for taking rhetoric to an extraordinary height. When he introduced a news conference at the foot of the Lincoln statue outside the Capitol Thursday, McKenna tied the modern Illinois GOP to Lincoln and compared the divided government of Illinois to no less a struggle than the Civil War.

“I’m here to say that we’re a party that stands together and stands with Abraham Lincoln,” McKenna said. “Abraham Lincoln was famous for his House Divided speech. If he were here today, he would have to tell a story of a house divided that’s even more outrageous than the one that lived in his time.”

When Lincoln spoke of a house divided, he was referring to the division of this nation between slave and free states. The Civil War subsequently ensued, prompting some 500,000 casualties — a conservative estimate.

Yet McKenna saw fit to not only presume what Lincoln might say if he were alive today. He also had the gall to suggest that division in Illinois government – which comes down to a trio of Chicago Democrats in an over-blown ego war – somehow is “even more outrageous” than slavery our nation’s bloody war onto itself.

Amazing.

Entry Filed under: Illinois Republican Party, Illinois politics