Zachary Taylor Demands Justice

(Conspiracy Nation, 3/31/05) -- In these times of upset over the Terri Schiavo situation, there is another case which is not going away either: that of Zachary Taylor (image, left). Known as "Old Rough and Ready," General Taylor decisively defeated Mexican forces which dared cross the Rio Grande into what is now Texas. Pursuing his advantage, Taylor lead his army into Mexico and captured Monterrey. A dispute with president James Polk caused Taylor's best troops to be transferred to the command of "Old Fuss and Feathers," General Winfield Scott. Henceforth Taylor was ordered by Polk to confine himself to defensive measures. But Taylor defied president Polk and in February 1847 managed, against vastly superior forces, a brilliant victory: the Battle

A hero of the Mexican War, Taylor was nominated by the Whig party as their candidate for president. He went on to defeat the Democrat candidate, Lewis Cass, and was elected president, in 1848.

With the nation expanding westward, the debate at the time was whether newly admitted states would permit slavery. It must be remembered that, back then, the Democrats were the party of slavery. Taylor, a Whig, opposed the creation of new slave states. In December 1849, he "called for immediate statehood for California, whose new constitution explicitly prohibited slavery." [1] Taylor's proposal was bitterly fought against by the Democrats -- and then, in the middle of the divisive fight, with the nation "polarized," Zachary Taylor suddenly died from "eating cherries and milk."

Machinery Of Lies

Michael Parenti, in a nonpareil examination of the Taylor case, gives, in microcosm, a perfect example of how the Machinery of Lies operates in these united States. In chapter 6 of his book, History As Mystery, he takes a close look at "The Strange Death of President Zachary Taylor" and shows how the "associated" press in this nation is over-eager to pronounce "case closed."

In 1991, General Taylor's crypt was opened and samples were taken for analysis. Dissenters from establishment history had struggled for forensic determination of the possibility that Taylor may have been assassinated by poison. The wolf pack mainstream press immediately grew hostile against the endeavor.

Then, when the Kentucky State medical examiner announced that, although traces of arsenic had been found, Taylor had not been poisoned, the press was instantaneously jubilant. The press asked no questions, did no digging of its own, but gladly embraced the examiner's conclusions and breathed a sigh of relief.

But Parenti, "having never known cherries and milk to be fatal," decided to ask a few questions. After some difficulty, he obtained a copy of the examiner's medical report. Parenti was amazed to discover that the report itself states, in part, that "The symptoms and duration of Zachary Taylor's disorder are historically and medically compatible with acute arsenic poisoning... the symptoms which he exhibited and the rapidity of his death are clearly consistent with acute arsenic poisoning."

Michael Parenti, an academic, a scholar, and a Ph.D., gives a careful, step-by-step presentation of the unheralded facts in his analysis of the case. It boils down to that the medical examiner had used whole-hair samples instead of doing sectional analysis in his investigation. The examiner's investigation was flawed in that "Taylor's symptoms were congruent with acute arsenic poisoning, the result of one lethal dosage, as opposed to chronic poisoning, involving ingestion of smaller amounts over a protracted period." Whole hair samples would have detected chronic poisoning; but in Taylor's case he died suddenly, "after eating cherries and milk," so acute poisoning is indicated and detailed sectional analysis of hair and other samples ought to have been done.

Yet the "associated" press noticed none of this in their unseemly hurry to embrace the medical examiner's conclusion. Time and again, a careful retrospective analysis of press reports reveals bias and inconsistency. As distance from events increases, the haze clears and truth can be discerned. In the Terri Schiavo case, the fury surrounding it at the moment causes difficulty in vision. As in the circumstances of the strange death of Zachary Taylor, though, truth-hounds will not let the matter fade until justice is satisfied. [2]

------- Notes -------
[1] Encyclopedia Britannica, electronic edition.
[2] Highly recommended for detailed study of the Zachary Taylor case: History As Mystery by Michael Parenti.
San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1999. ISBN: 0-87286-357-3

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