John Adams

I just finished watching the John Adams HBO miniseries, and it's very good. Adam's wife is fantastic. The portrayals of Jefferson, Franklin and Washington are unique. Abigail, his wife, is wonderfully played and is the real star of the movie, imo. Easily the most uninteresting character is Adams, and I can't help but wonder if that was by design. He's upstaged in every scene. The character is inconsistent.

Frankly, the only reason Adams is a compelling character is his associations. His never ending love affair and partnership with his wife is extremely compelling. This telling presents Adams as the poster child for the old saying that behind every great man is a great woman.

The guy playing Jefferson is amazing. He portrays Jefferson with a sanguine, contemplative style that's very unusual. He uses large, slow, demonstrative mannerisms and postures that could be off-putting, but I think really bring personality to the character. Jefferson steals every seen he's in. He's more interesting to watch than Adams even when he's in the background.

Franklin is portrayed very well as a wise yet scheming politician. Washington is portrayed as kind of a gentle giant who succeeds on mere presence alone. Hamilton is a tyrannical monster and it's unfortunate that Washington shut Adams out of the conflicts with Jefferson and Hamilton because since the show follows Adams, we only get a hint of them and second hand information about them.

Adams frets a number of times that history will credit Washington, Jefferson and Franklin more with the founding of the country than him, and he turned out to be prescient about that, but at the same time, it seems he was generally playing second fiddle, and that his ego wouldn't let him accept it. The lone exception in the story is that he championed the independence, though today we tend to credit Jefferson because he wrote the Declaration of Independence - at Adam's request. But you can't help but thinking we would never have heard of John Adams except for his marriage to Abigail.

So I wonder if the reason Adams is the least interesting character isn't on purpose. I can't help but think that it was by design that you're supposed to be drawn to Jefferson, Washington and Franklin, even when they're in the background of a scene focusing on Adams.

I didn't know that Jefferson was a Republican. I always heard that he was a Democrat. I guess the Republican-Democrats became just the Democrats later. Funny, and sad, how the Democrats have transformed into the Federalists of today. One of the biggest issues for Hamilton and the Federalists was to run up as massive a Federal debt as possible under the belief that a bigger Federal debt would prompt countries to lend the Federal government more money. Increasing taxes was another. Hamilton's curse is thriving in the Democrat party, and all too powerful in the Republican party. Jefferson must be turning over in his grave.

There's a lot of interesting tidbits about politics and government. The things the press says about the presidents are far more harsh than anything you hear today. The way the parties attack each other are far more harsh than today. Burr killed Hamilton in a duel over it. Anybody who thinks politics today is more partisan than the past is nuts. The politicians and the accomplice press push that nonsense on us to keep themselves in power. And it's stunning to see how, right from the beginning, under the the manipulations of Hamilton (model for Lincoln, Wilson and FDR), the Federal government tried to take control of the country, create massive debt, a central bank, high taxes and start wars. Sound familiar?

It really shows how stunningly inaccurate and irresponsible liberal attacks on George Bush were. Adams signed a the Alien and Sedition acts, allowing him to arrest anybody in the country just for being of French descent or speaking against the government. It was the precursor to FDR putting all Americans of Japanese descent into armed camps. As bad as George Bush is by modern standards, he's remarkably mild by comparison.

Adams burned a whole bunch of documents as he left office. I don't know if that's historically accurate or not, but nobody could get away with that today. The scene when Adams moves into the White House, still under construction by slaves, is stark and heartbreaking. Abigail foreshadows the Civil War with her comment that nothing good will come from having slaves build that house.

Anyway, it's well worth watching this series.

P.S. I have Hamilton's Curse sitting here, and I'm so looking forward to reading it. The more I learn about Hamilton (my hometown is named after Hamilton - yuk), the more I appreciate Aaron Burr for killing him in a duel.