February 15, 2008 journal, phony fear is the fuel of this foreign lead administration. Keith Oberman addressed the president directly disputing his every word last night. I have never heard such a blatant rebuke and especially not on MSNBC Network. Most of the federal taxes were paid by the Southern states. 13 states succeeded. Somewhere along the way we must face the truth of who runs this country and why. Everyday there is a new crisis & now a long-term agreement to stay in Iraq is being negotiated according to Public Radio, "they do not know what they are doing at all". I expect to see everything collapse around this little president and his stupid cabinet. He's up there early this morning sounding off about the House adjourning for 10 days without passing his eavesdropping bill to continue spying on the American people as AT&T and others have thousands of lawsuits against them for sharing the privacy of American citizens with the government which was illegal until Congress passed their temporary bill approving it. This madman president thinks he can dictate to Congress every move. After Republican housemen exited the Congressional chamber yesterday in protest of the Democrats' refusal to act on the bill, the Democrats then adjourned Congress for 10 days and that's a good thing. The nation is safer without Congress. Trade Tariffs and the Civil War is title of a letter to the Editor of weekly The Times Examiner newspaper. "On 1-30-08 the president gave a talk to Hoover Helicopter Coop. and spoke about tariffs how they hurt free-trade and U.S. products abroad and that tariff should be dropped to level the playing field. In 1860 when Abe Lincoln was elected president of the United States, he enacted the Morrell tariff against the Southern states who sold goods to England, France and Spain and this imposed a 50% tax on products sold to these countries. Also at this time the South was paying over 70 % of all federal income taxes to support the Union of States. That was the straw that broke the camel's back, the federal government over stepped it authority, and violated states' rights and South Carolina seceded from the voluntary union of states as allowed in the constitution. Now these Northern historians did not want to address this issue among several others which included money and power over the 13 Southern states that eventually succeeded from the voluntary union of states these northern historians attempted to place the blame for the Civil War on slavery and this was/has been taught to a our parents and our grand parents but they failed to mention that 94 percent of all Southerners did not own a slave and that before and during the war many people from the North owned slaves but left this out of most history books. The South fought off Lincoln's invaders who blockaded Charleston to prevent Goods raised in the South being sold to other countries without paying the 50 percent excise tax on these items. If the South had invaded the North and caused this evil war which killed over 630,000 Americans, the South would have been labeled invaders, terrorist, etc., but the northern writers of history did not state that the North invaded the South because they had lawfully succeeded from the Union of States, which was fully allowed in their Constitution. Eventually the truth will be revealed about the real cause of Lincoln's war against the South and the atrocities committed by his soldiers against Southern citizens". Thomas McClain, Cameron, South Carolina. These are banker's wars like all of the other wars. The banks demand war of this government. These are the simple and undisputable facts about the Civil War why and how it began. The Union used new Irish immigrants to fight and die in this foolish war as is revealed in the movie Gangs of New York. Ron Paul knows & says the war could of been avoided.