Wednesday, October 22, 2008

His last battlefield

No More Mister Nice Blog on why McCain would be foolish enough to fight his final battle in Pennsylvannia:
Right now, Obama is ahead of McCain in a number of Bush states -- and maybe McCain is less interested in wresting those states back than in saying, "Oh yeah? Well, I'm going to fight you in a blue state! So there!" Maybe there's less strategic thinking going on than we think -- maybe it's all gut.
As the Civil War dragged on, General Robert E. Lee came to understand that The Confederacy could never beat The Union in a protracted war. Yes, they had several battlefield successes, but the resources of The South were already stretched to the breaking point and could never hope to last against the industrial might of The North. He needed something big to give The Union pause and to impress foreign powers to intervene.

He decided on what might be called a hail-mary pass. He would cross the border into The North and attack The Union directly (nearly all fighting, up to that point, had been in The Confederacy). The eventual battle, at Gettysburg, ended up being the largest of the war (and the largest land battle until WWII). Despite his great tactical abilities, Lee was badly beaten and slunk back across the border. Gettysburg is widely considered to be the "turning point" of the war. From that point on the South was forever in retreat.

Gettysburg is in Pennsylvannia.

Just saying...

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