I'm going to break up your post to respond. I know some people don't like that (the post fragmenting responses) but you've got a couple interesting points / allegations in there that I want to address and this stuff is highly interesting to me:
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Originally Posted by TheBig3KilledMyRainDog
Well no. If you're a liberal **** who thinks anyone who doesn't measure up to modern day moral standards, then I wasn't talking to those people.
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Well, yes, actually. I am not one of 'those people' in fact, if anything, I am a relativist **** who thinks way beyond that
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What I mean is, for those of us who can say "alright well Slavery was an abhorrent institution but people then but we can't reasonably hold the candle of 21st century morality to a guy living in the 1700's" then this book shows Jefferson as something of a douche.
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I know that we can't judge Americans' perception of race in the 18th century as basely as that. Just FYI that's not where I'm coming from at all. I could make a list of relativist-approved douche-like behaviors of Jefferson but that would be kinda off topic until I understand what you mean exactly.
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Not because of things we think are unacceptable today, but because he abandoned Reason in the final stages of his life because his short-sighted flaws from the jump fell through.
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I totaly agree but you still haven't told me anything so I'm not sure what we agree on. What flaws? I can think of a few and he's in my top 2 fave founding fathers.
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I'll grant you that I didn't spell out why I thought he was a douche.
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No you didn't at all and I haven't read the book
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But if you're going to go ape-wild on people then for what we do now, you're going to blind yourself to quite a few historical positions.
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I absolutely won't. Enlighten me. What did the book tell you about Jefferson? *note: I'm seriously interested. Depending on your response I may read the book.
On topic: I'm still reading Infinite Jest and probably won't be done until like November but I have a feeling that I'll be craving some good ol' fashioned US History at that point. Maybe I'll read Wood's book - that's why I bothered with this.