The never-ending battle over Columbus Day brings to mind the world’s second oldest profession. As Harry S. Truman noted: “My choice early in life was either to be a piano player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there’s hardly any difference.”
After marching in last year’s parade honoring the Admiral of the Ocean Sea, Gov. Hochul peremptorily recognized Indigenous Peoples’ Day. In effect, the governor aligned herself with the likes of activist Cliff Matias, who stated that “Indigenous Peoples’ Day was created as an answer to Columbus Day.” Matias labeled Cristoforo Colombo a “lost Italian,” snarking that “To honor Indigenous people we selected this day to say, ‘We have survived that dude.’ ”
Now along comes Democratic Socialist Assemblywoman Marcela Mitaynes (D-Brooklyn), who introduced a bill to deep-six Columbus Day and supplant it with Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Soon after Hochul’s Republican gubernatorial opponent, Rep. Lee Zeldin, denounced this far-left proposal, the governor followed suit. It remains to be seen whether Hochul will be true to her word if she is reelected. What fools these woke politicos be.
The son of Domenico Colombo and Susanna Fontanarossa is a pivotal actor in the saga of humanity. As Samuel Eliot Morrison explained: “The whole history of the Americas stems from the Four Voyages of Christopher Columbus.”
Hochul’s voltafaccia (about-face) redefines political pandering. The governor’s hypocrisy is outweighed only by her condescension: “But I also want to celebrate the heritage of thousands of Italian-Americans who came here as immigrants.”
New York City’s public school system eradicated Columbus Day, replacing it with the patronizing “Italian Heritage/Indigenous Peoples’ Day.” In other words, let’s placate those sausage-and-pepper simpletons. And Democratic State Sen. Alessandra Biaggi has agitated for the removal of the Great Navigator’s monument in Manhattan’s Columbus Circle. Though Italian-Americans comprise the Empire State’s largest ethnicity, politicians in thrall to progressive gospel actually prove they care little for this voting bloc.
Despite the fact that Dr. Jill Biden is of Italian descent, Joe Biden became the first President of the United States to formally recognize Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House of Representatives, has denied reports that she is seeking the U.S. ambassadorship to Italy. But there’s no denying Pelosi’s affinity for idyllic Italian vacation venues. Her sense of italianità, however, stops at the spiaggia’s edge. When a band of protestors ravaged Baltimore’s “Little Italy,” tore the Columbus statue off its podium and hurled it into the Inner Harbor, Pelosi said, “people will do what they do.” “I don’t even have my grandmother’s earrings,” mumbled the speaker. The next time Pelosi journeys to Italy — either in an official capacity or for personal reasons — will she refuse to land at Genoa’s Cristoforo Colombo Aeroporto? What will Pelosi say to Giorgia Meloni, Italy’s first female prime minister, regarding one of the Magic Boot’s greatest sons?
Before Kamala Harris became vice president of the United States, she vowed to lead a federal initiative renaming Columbus Day “Indigenous Peoples’ Day.” “Sign me up,” said a giddy Harris. Now that Harris is but a heartbeat away from the Oval Office, the vice president has railed against the Age of Exploration. We “must not shy away from this shameful past,” and must “shed light” on the explorers who “ushered in a wave of devastation” on indigenous populations.
But long before Europeans arrived, slavery, internecine warfare, child sacrifice and, yes, cannibalism were common among the native tribes of the New World. And one wonders if Harris is aware that human rights violations, ethnic cleansing, ritual misogyny and genocide are taking place today in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region; Ethiopia’s Tigray sector; Sudan’s Darfur; and Turkey’s persecution of the Kurds across the Middle East.
The sins of the Spanish Crown and the depredations of the conquistadors have been deliberately elided for reasons of political correctness so as to sully the Italian navigator. Columbus was an explorer for the ages, not an angel or a messiah. As Carol Delaney details in Columbus and the Quest for Jerusalem, his ultimate dream was to bring the world back to the unity of the Roman eagle — this time under Christianity.
His bold trek across the wine-dark Atlantic linked disparate peoples of the Earth for the first time in 10 millennia, as astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson has averred. In fact, the Admiral of the Ocean Sea made our pale blue dot larger. His voyages represent that triumph of classical humanism known as the Italian Renaissance.
Had there been no Columbian Exchange, there would be no American Republic — with its Constitution, tripartite government and rule of law. And absent the Admiral of the Ocean Sea — and the scientific discoveries of Galileo Galilei and Leonardo da Vinci — Apollo 11′s Columbia command module would never have been circling the moon as the Eagle lander descended on the Mare Tranquilitatis.
As Election Day nears, voters should heed Marcus Tullius Cicero: “Poor is the nation that has no heroes, but poorer still is the nation that, having heroes, fails to remember and honor them.” –RAI
[This essay was published in the October 10th edition of the New York Daily News]
To those who slander Columbus as a “lost Italian” I’d like to remind you that ‘indigenous people” couldn’t come up with the wheel or a written language. Just saying.
Not only didn’t they have the wheel or written language, they didn’t have the potato until the English introduced it from South America. So much for indigenous people knowing about their own continents. And don’t forget the horse. Before Columbus the Plains Indians could only run after the bison or stampede them off a cliff.
The facts are that it was not Columbus that butchered, drove the natives from their land, and imprisoned them into reservations, the most inhospitable and difficult lands. It was the early American settlers and politicians that broke treaty after treaty with the Indians, It was military men such as George Armstrong Custer, and Andrew Jackson, (trail of tears) that displaced them hoping they would not survive. Indians were not regarded as human beings.
Columbus’ log notes the admiration he had for the inhabitants he met on that first day.
Only in unity can we be successful. He who is in a position of power writes the history books.
This is all a symptom of the times and some very strange bedfellows. SF has the oldest Columbus Day Parade, 150 years in the Nation…I participated this year, Now called Italian Pride Day, and found it very impressive and the turnout was amazing…..all communities and ethnic groups participated …..it was fun and exhilarating….saying that because there were no demonstrations, fights, or major issues…not one word, or if there was, I missed it in the paper…..and hardly any media coverage The sad fact is there is an element in society that has a vested interest in divisions, and that is what needs to be resisted. This current wave of activity may have started with Columbus but won’t stop with Columbus as the politically correct attacked Washington and even Lincoln.
And recently I have been reading about the expansion of modern slavery in Southeast Asia and of course the Middle East where it really has never gone away…but to talk about that, carries its own set of political correctness…not to mention showing your hair in Iran can get u killed…….where is the knee jerk pseudo historians when it comes to those realities.
Once u pick and choose what is history and what you ignore you are totally in the realm of propaganda..Even Cortez’s attack on the Aztec empire could not have happened had he not had major Native American alliances because for some strange reason they did not relish the idea of being sacrificed to Quezaquodel (of which San Jose has a public statue !) You bring those facts to light and it’s totally ignored by the Aztec image makers.
In truth, we are dealing with people across the political spectrum with an agenda, and use history as propaganda, and that is what needs to be resisted. ..