The British are coming?

by Clifford F. Thies

As every public school child and the NPR knows, Paul Revere, on his midnight ride, shouted "The British are coming! The British are coming!" Why, the word "British" is even in the poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. So how could anybody be so stupid as Sarah Palin and say that Paul Revere was warning the British, when he was obviously warning the Americans?

First, through the Battle of Bunker Hill, the patriots considered themselves to be British. Indeed, the flag they flew at Bunker Hill was the British flag. They flew that flag to demand their rights as Englishmen under Magna Carta. For Revere to have said. "The British are coming!" would be like today, driving up and down the street to warn the people about a coming assault by the BATF, saying "The Americans are coming!" What Revere actually said in the first part of his ride was "The Regulars are coming." Later, when Longfellow wrote his poem, he (Longfellow) changed it to "The British are coming," as few people could relate to the mindset of the earlier time.

I happen to know a little about this history because of my interest in currency. Paul Revere was a silver smith. Among his more famous works are two designs for the engraving plates for the paper money of Massachusetts. In 1775, he designed the "Sword in the Hand" currency issue. It featured a patriot ready to defend his rights under Magna Carta. The next year, after the Declaration of Independence, the "Sword in the Hard" money was redesigned to display a patriot ready to defend his rights under the Declaration. Obviously, Paul Revere on the night of his famous midnight ride, imagined that he and his fellow patriots were British demanding their rights under Magna Carta.

Second, there was a second part to Revere's ride, when he was detained by the Regulars, who inquired as to his whereabouts. It was while he was questioned that Revere "warned" the Regulars about the patriots, telling them that it was they who should be afraid, not him, as they were surrounded by as many as 500 armed patriots. This was the specific reference being made by Palin. She is warning the Republican establishment that she and others have warned the people and they, the Republican establishment, should now consider themselves warned.

Of course for the NPR, the combination of ignorance of history and prejudice against those they consider to be white trash gives them an irresistible urge to disrespect Palin whenever they think they can. On the other hand, with regard to the doper-in-chief and his side-kick Little Mister Plagiarizer, no misstatements are ever recognized. But if the standard of perfection they demand of conservatives were equally applied to liberals, nobody would survive the scrutiny. On the other hand, a fair consideration of the intelligence of the principal leaders of each side would indicate that the real difference between them is that one side is for big government and socialism and the other side is for limited government and capitalism.